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(2014
midterm assignment) Sample Student Midterm Answers 2014 #3: Web Highlights |
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Thomas Dion
Relevance vs. Religion
Is this a religious seminar or a literature class? At times I
almost cannot tell from how many allusions to the Bible there are in Western
literature, namely Early American Literature. I was glad to see this was not
easily over looked by anyone from previous classes, like Robbyn Smith, and
enjoyed reading what she thought of so much religion – especially Christianity –
being incorporated into her assigned texts for class. Jeff Derrickson
dissimilarly saw religion in his text too and was driven to investigate as he
put it, “educated folks” who dismissed “choking Puritan values.” Both research
posts appear at odds of painting a single picture of how to take in the scope of
Early America and what is important, however, Rochelle La Touché would reconcile
the disagreement in her Essay, “Religion: It’s all Relative, Right?”.
Like the other two students, Smith, saw the
increasing importance of recognizing the Bible allusions to texts like Anne
Bradstreet’s poetry or Cotton Mather’s sermons. Her observations about how many
students knew very little of the Bible, including herself, led her to believe an
appreciation level was missing when reading the texts. She is not alone; some
four-hundred students elected “take a Bible course because they, (junior and
senior students) were tired of not knowing what people were talking about or
what literature or history was all about that in some way is connected with
biblical sources.” Although I agree with her that we should have a working
knowledge of the Bible, I disagree with how she proposed it as, “I am shocked
that there is not a more public outcry and concerted effort to increase the
level of sophistication of students’ historical knowledge of the Bible.” Perhaps
she meant literary knowledge, because “historical” is crossing over the first
amendment line of religious freedom. Historical is a weighted word that can mean
among many things, the truth. Some of us have a completely different outlook as
to history, religion, and what should be taught in school, as Jeff Derrickson
points out.
Robbyn Smith posited that
Christianity is a “common currency” of Western Culture, but she never discusses
the issue of exchange rate as Derrickson notices. Indeed Bible literacy has
declined and can be seen as tied to the onset of the enlightenment, and “The
Burgeoning Acceptance of Deism,” but what does that mean. Deism defined as
“anyone who relies on nature and logic is, by nature” and opposed to the
supernatural aspects of creation is a deist. In 1771 a document titled
Sermon on Natural Religion by a Natural Man
was published by an anonymous writer and sent the governor of New York [name not
given] reeling into finding the culprit of such blasphemy. Ethan Allen was
fraudulently arrested for the printing of this pamphlet and not until a year
later was progress made in allowing unchristian voices to be expressed without
persecution. This happened when a defiant Thomas Young published
his entire deistic creed in the
Massachusetts Spy
newspaper. An outcry was again heard from the New York governor, but this time
the notoriously conservative Samuel Adams leapt to Young's defense and “accused
the accuser of hypocrisy on the grounds that he was attacking Young's political
actions through his religious beliefs.” Could this be one of the many situations
that have brought the Bible literacy rates down? And if so should they stay down
in order for others to feel free from oppression? Or can the two sides be
reconciled, religion and unreligious, working together at last?
Rochelle La Touché brings this sentiment to the
fore front in her essay “Religion: It’s all Relative, Right?”. She noticed the
many similarities between creation origin stories for not only Christianity and
Indigenous peoples, but also classic literature from Ovid and Virgil. With so
many similarities, why do so many feel the need to bicker and argue over who is
right over mere procedure. Instead of being at odds with both sides, we should
come together with a mutual respect of what the other has to offer, especially
when it comes to literary studies. In fact at times it would seem we bicker over
who gets to use the same words and emotions. Take this inspirational atheist
quote from
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein,
a
philosopher and novelist,
“Math
. . . music ... starry nights . . . These are secular ways of achieving
transcendence, of feeling lifted into a grand perspective. It’s a sense of being
awed by existence that almost obliterates the self. Religious people think of it
as an essentially religious experience but it’s not. It’s an essentially human
experience.” Well Ms. Goldstein you said it yourself, math…music…starry
nights…these are all religious experiences too, because religion is part of the
human experience whether we believe or not.
The approach to how religion is taught, especially when it
comes to public school, is a tricky subject. Something to keep in mind is that
we are all human and the respect that should come with this, should trump all
other beliefs. Therefore, we should read as much and as often as we can so we do
not fall on a slippery slope of ignorance.
