Homestar Runner Wiki Forum

So in case you haven't heard, Georgia's Board of Education has approved to offer two elective courses that would teach the literary and historical aspects of the Holy Bible--one course for the New Testament and one course for the Old Testament. Georgia's Senate Bill 79 states that such curriculum would teach "the contents of the Old and New Testaments, the history recorded by the Old and New Testaments, the literary style and structure of the Old and New Testaments, the customs and cultures of the peoples and societies recorded in the Old and New Testaments, and the influence of the Old and New Testaments upon law, history, government, literature, art, music, customs, morals, values, and culture."

Now, honestly, that really doesn't sound too bad. I think that since Christianity has had such a ubiquitous impact on Western Civilization, studying the roots of such influence from a historical and literary standpoint can be very beneficial to the development of an individual in our society. Furthermore, as this course is only being offered as an elective and not mandatory, I'd say it's just fine.

The next step, IMO, would be perhaps to provide similar courses that show religions that have deeply influenced other cultures, such as Confucianism, Islam, etc.

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The meaning of life is 'bucket.'

FOR PONY!!!

Well, as a matter of fact, my high school has a Comparative Religions class that I'm taking this semester. Very interesting; our current unit is Buddhism.

This Bible class sounds like a good idea.

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My school has that. Every atheist at my school thinks its teaching the religion, but its not. I support it, people need to learn about ti and think for themselves.
but really, what all schools need is a philosophy class.

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I had a similar sort of "class" at the church I used to attend. The only problem was, of course, that it wasn't wholly an objective teaching, since the lessons typically ended with comparing the beliefs to the United Methodist interpretation of Christianity. I remember studying important religious figures (e.g. Jesus, Siddharta, Quetzlcoatl) in my college philosophy course, as well, and hearing it from a more objective point of view was rather refreshing.

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The meaning of life is 'bucket.'

FOR PONY!!!

These classes are probably a good idea if they're taught objectively by legitimate religious scholars. The teachers are going to really have to walk the line carefully, though. All it takes is one "the Bible is true" slip of the tongue and you're out the door (and you should be...see Establishment Clause, U.S. Constitution).

I will say this, though: considering how far in the hole this state's public education system is, the state legislature has more important things to be worrying about than approving reelection-friendly Bible courses.

Mike

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Logical fallacies ahoy! I'd also like to say: graaaaagh!

I think it'd actually be a pretty cool class. There is definitely a history behind it, that's for sure.

We've been doing a lot of studies of other religions and philosophies (Buddhism, Hinduism, Egyptian religion, Confucianism, legalism, etc.) in history class, and I've found it very fascinating. It's really interesting to see what other people believe, y'know? In a way, I think a religion class in general could be more interesting, but a class about the history of the Bible and such could still be pretty darn interesting.

Personally, I can't wait till we start learning about Greek mythology--we're studying Greece right now (for the record, this is an ancient world history class), and Greek mythology is really fun.

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Greek mythology is fun. I used to study ancient history hugely much. Roman and Greek mythology were the most interesting.

But on-topic, I've never been public schooled, and my dad is a pastor, so I think I might know as much if not more than they would teach, since it seems as though they are using this as a history class. I do think this is a good idea.

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I was always disappointed in jr. high and sr. high mythology studies. We would only study the Greek/Roman mythos. I wanted to study the Norse mythos, which I always found very cool. And some Japanese, Chinese, Persian, and maybe Celtic mythology would be great too.

I think it's a step in the right direction. The modern trend seems to be to try to ignore that the book ever existed, or that it ever had any impact on society at all.

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Ah, good old-fashioned "everyone-can-have-freedom-of-speech-except-Christians". I'm not complaining, I know there's a separation of Church and state, I just find that kinda hypocritical.

And furthermore, I don't really see why this idea is so outlandish. If it would be a voluntary class, I really don't see why everyone's raising such a stink about it.

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That's not what Mike D is saying. He's just saying that it should be taught as a possiblility, not as absolute truth.

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Nobody's freedom of speech is violated in the case I described. If a teacher stood up in class and proclaimed that, say, Hinduism was true, they'd be fired just as quickly...perhaps more quickly, as area parents would be completely outraged.

Freedom of speech does not grant the ability to promote religion using state or federal resources, which is what a teacher would be doing in this example. I've no idea where you're seeing hypocrisy.

Mike

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Logical fallacies ahoy! I'd also like to say: graaaaagh!

If they do this, then they also should have Koran classes, Torah classes, etc. It's only fair, IMO.

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I'm all for being objective, and even I don't think that's necessary. Besides, the Old Testament is the Torah, pretty much. OH SNAP.

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Good one, Jello.

Actually, the Old Testament is sometimes called Torah, but more commonly called Tanak (short for Law, Prophets, and Writings). Torah more commonly refers to the Pentateuch, that is, Genesis - Deuteronomy.

In all likelihood, such a class would be an elective and not a requirement anyway.

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Agreed. Comparative Religion courses and other courses should be taught as well, since one course on any religion is a bit limited, IMO.

If it is an elective, who cares? It is not a required course, so I see no reason why people should be in arms over this, although I haven't seen anyone doing so at this point.

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GENGHIS KHAN!!!!!

Well, I think the main point of the class is not to teach the ins and outs of the religion (even from an objective standpoint)--I think it's more about seeing how Christianity specifically has influenced so much of our history here in the Western world.

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The meaning of life is 'bucket.'

FOR PONY!!!

Well, if its not about the teachings, but about how a certain religion has affected Western Society, than I think it's alright. There still should be multiple religions though, to prevent controversy.

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Agreed, but just not in the same course. Losing out on a lot of information just to avoid controversy is just counterproductive.

And I think people would understand if a school didnt have the resources to have 1 course for each influential writing.

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Yeah, I could understand if the schools in Mountian Home, Arkansas want to teach only the Bible, since its a 99% white community. But if you're say, in New York City, or San Fransisco, or the areas around places like that, you gotta have more than just Christianity.

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But again, the students' background does not matter. They will only be learning the impact that the book has had on the world. The bible has distributed somewhere between 5 and 6 billion copies, while the qu'ran still hasnt reached 300 million, and the book of mormon is about 110 million.

The bible contains material held to be sacred by people of most (If not all, but I dont like to assume all) sects of christianity, as well as some material that is important to the Jews.

In addition to that, the bible has been an important part of moral and philosophical studies throughout much of history.

And with the christian missionary movement, the bible spread into relatively isolated parts of the world at early times in history. This is one of the examples of a way that the bible has affected the world.

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