Should The Bible Be Taught In The Classroom?
Recently, the Alabama Board of Education “became the first state in the union to approve a textbook for a course about the Bible in its public schools.” See the Time article here.
I came across the story initially while reading The Huffington Post. The textbook in question is entitled “The Bible and Its Influence,” and is supposed to be used alongside the teaching of sections of the Bible, such as Genesis and Exodus, to illustrate how those sections are used in the Arts & Literature (Shakespeare of course being the most prominent example). The book has a rather interesting history in the legislatures in that it’s usually Democrats who want to prescribe the book but Republicans who vote it down. The Time article does a good job of going into that, and I rather focus on whether the Bible should be taught in the classroom.
The question invokes passion on both sides of the debate. There’s one side who says the Bible forms the foundation of Western society, and thus should be taught so that students can understand how Western society came to be. But that’s a false notion. While the Bible has certainly played a role, today’s government owes much more to Ancient Greek democracy and the Roman legal system than Judean philosophy.
On the other side, there are the concerns about the separation of Church and State. In most countries, that’s not a concern, but that separation is specifically enshrined in the United States Constitution and is meant to ensure that the government does not favor one set of people over another. On its face, the teaching of the Bible would violate that separation; at least it would pursuant to Supreme Court decisions over the past fifty years.
And in fact, the teaching of the entire Bible from a religious perspective in public schools isn’t allowed. But should sections of the Bible, such as Genesis and Exodus, be taught for literary reasons? I think so, as long as it’s done from a literary perspective. On an anecdotal level, I attended a Catholic school for all of grade school. By the time I entered public high-school, I had a much better understanding of religious references in literary works, and thus understood the books assigned much better than most of my peers.
On an objective level, you cannot understand much of Shakespeare (to use the most cited example) without some understanding of at least Genesis and Exodus. For that reason, my twelfth grade English teacher, an atheist, required my AP English class to read Genesis and Exodus.
But as with all but the most plainest of cases, there is room for disagreement and obviously any teaching of the Bible in a public classroom would have to be controlled in some fashion. Although, I do think it’s interesting that the blogger at the Huffington Post who is very much against teaching the Bible in the classroom added an apostrophe in the ‘Its’ in “The Bible and Its Influence.” A small thing to be sure, but perhaps it is linked to his own misunderstanding of literature? Hmm…
October 23rd, 2007 at 10:35 pm
Hmm, interesting. Personally, I think if the Bible is being used as an accessory to another story (like you said, as in to explain Shakespeare a little better) then it is fine to use it. I think teaching the Bible solely as a course on the Bible is stretching it much for public schools.
October 24th, 2007 at 12:18 am
If it is strictly for educational purposes (ie literary allusions, effect on ancient societies, etc.) then I have no problem with it. If it turns into a convert-the-student-fest, then it doesn’t belong.
October 24th, 2007 at 6:19 am
I think it’s perfectly valid to use the Bible as you would any other literary text; for references and analysis, etc. Just so long as it doesn’t turn into a “convert-the-student-fest” as Trident said…
October 24th, 2007 at 3:33 pm
uuuh I didn’t read all the blog post, but in my AP [college in high school, essentially.] American Literary Masterpieces class, we study Jonathan Edwards, a famous preacher. Sure, it isn’t the bible, but we have to understand the religion and God and all of it to analyze the text. It would be taking out a whole section of American literature.. or for that matter, history, since we studied him in my AP American History class, too.
October 24th, 2007 at 5:51 pm
My school’s AP English Literature classes all read the Bible. It is, indeed, English Literature, and it’s perfectly legitimate to study it as a form of literature or as an important historical document. Having a student study a religion does not necessarily imply that the student is being coerced into converting.
October 24th, 2007 at 9:16 pm
It’s not really English Literature. It’s Literature, yes. But the problem with having students study it in class is….well if we’re studying the bible why can’t we study the books for the other eight million religions? Those are just as much literature as the Bible is. It’s truly a game of favorites, which leads to the issue of church and state.
October 28th, 2007 at 5:14 pm
the bible is a document of religion. so surely it can be studied for educational purposes, like they study other religious documents to compare the religions. it can actually be an interesting read, when you’re in the mood, you can see how much we’ve progressed from the times when everyone’s lives were based around their beliefs and everything they did had to have something to do with that. literature has used the bible as a background for centuries, shakespeare is a perfect example of that, so studying it as part of literature isn’t a bad idea.
However, i went to a Catholic primary school, and of course bible studies was part of th curriculum. it was so boring! i was much more interested in maths and writing, not my soul, and the eternal lives of heaven and hell. the teaching was not very inclusive or interesting, it was telling us what to think and when to how to think it. It was quite imposing! thankfully in my last years i had a teacher who seemed to realise this and she allowed us to discuss some things, like the society of the time, and i learnt alot about their culture, not just the catholic one either, but she wouldn’t let us question the ideas behind the bible.
So if The bible is going to be taught in public schools it can’t be restricting, or one-sided, that’s just not fair.