Great question. I have just been reading Pete Enns’ “Anti-Expertism: I Sort of Get it But I Don’t.” It occurred to me that the very essence of religion in direct contact of God with the common man, while it’s tremendously freeing (gives worth to each of us, stimulated free thought among slaves and the downtrodden, for example), also can be, in a way, anti-intellectual. If I have as good a relationship with, and worth in front of, the Master of the Universe, acknowledging that someone can learn more about the Bible puts my worth and relationship in danger of doubt and change.
If God is truly just, of course, it doesn’t do that. He knows how much we do, and don’t, know. However, it seems that that can be a natural response to intellectualism. It may even be more of the case in the US, where we sometimes consider individualism and pride in being self-made as virtues.
Mark Noll, in “Scandal of the Evangelical Mind,” does acknowledge an anti-intellectualism in the American, dispensational and revivalist movements. He pointed out that many ministers with no intellectual background were happy to set up colleges in their own name, instead of supporting institutions with prior scholastic achievements. Also, the majority of courses of these colleges were more for evangelism than analytical scholarship. Thus, evangelical universities were no match for Princeton, Yale, etc.
Thanks.
That all has a very protestant flavor about it - the Bible in the hands of “everyman”. Don’t dare try to bring back in that old expertise/education as a wedge between me and my Bible. Perhaps that all is in parallel with our desired egalitarian access to reality too. What it fails to take into account is that God uses people (and even institutions, training, education) as vehicles for his Spirit to reach out to and teach others. So while there is some value in this much-sought independence, and yes, God does work with each of us directly, there is nonetheless no such thing as solo Christianity. And no “solo” appraisals of reality either that can hope to be more accurate than more widely informed appraisals. And all of that on top of the fact that even those who may pride themselves on such protestant-fueled “independence” have no such independence at all, but have only replaced one tribe of expertise for another (and a fatally cocooned one at that), thereby failing even their own aspirations at both levels.
A couple of verses that are frequently quoted include Jeremiah 31:34 and Hebrews 8:11, “No longer will they teach their neighbor,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest.”
On the other hand, Judges 21:25, “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes,” implies taking that to a certain conclusion can lead to chaos.
Taking faith to the conclusion that our relationship to God is like that of little children, there is scope for learning more without being guilty for lack of knowledge and seems to harmonize the personal relationship and scholarly aspects (not that scholars can’t be completely immoral or unkind, and those who learn only the basics of Jesus’s teaching become very mature and self sacrificing)
Along with the many denominations, this also seems to be another error of the Protestant movement, the idea that the Bible and Bible alone can answer our questions and we don’t need tradition or reason to go to for answers. Of course this really didn’t take effect until the 2nd Great Awakening that gave rise to Christian Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism.
It may be just down to the sheer demographics. England, even GB is compact so we know most of what goes on but America, despite being called United is so vast that each State is comparable to the UK as a whole. In terms of knowledge and recognition, there could be thousands lost within the anonymity of deepest USA who, if in the UK, would be recognised.
This is an interesting question. I asked this on Facebook the other day, to see what my friends might say about it. Most of the answers that people gave were people of a higher calibre than Chuck Swindoll, Max Lucado and Rick Warren – the names people mentioned included NT Wright, Ravi Zacharias, William Lane Craig, John Lennox, Alister McGrath, and so on. I think most Christians (certainly here in the UK) recognise the difference between pop-psych TED-talk style preachers such as Rick Warren or Max Lucado and serious theologians, and do actually value the latter.
Actually, John Stott was British. Or is there another John Stott that I wasn’t aware of?
Nope. You are right. I was confusing his nationality with J. I. Packer. [Who I just looked up and who was actually born in Britain, though he lived and taught in Canada]
No doubt my internet friends would choose such names also. My internet friends tend to be a little more cerebral!! Actually, I think my church buddies would also name Ravi Zacharias and John Piper and whoever else has their name on a study Bible at Lifeway,. but it is interesting how many little segments our society has. My daughter is in a church that is a little more charismatic, and they have a whole different set of authors they read.
Oh, the Greek Orthodox Church has scholars alright. I vaguely remember attending lectures given by the late Stylianos Harkianasis (Greek : Στυλιανός Χαρκιανάκης ; 29 December 1935 – 25 March 2019) who was the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Australia and Primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia.) This was back in the 1980s, and I must confess I remember little of his lectures, except for the account he gave of the time he visited a Christian hermit in a cave. His dark eyes flashed as he told of a snake that suddenly appeared in the cave and was about to kill it when the hermit objected with the statement, “If you cannot give life, how can you take it?”
Of more relevance, Kallistos Ware is a well-known Orthodox theologian. My reading of his work dates to the time he was Spaulding Lecturer in Eastern Orthodox Studies at the University of Oxford. He retired in 2001, but that did not stop him writing and publishing theology. He would be a good place to start. He can explain the historical influences that moulded the Orthodox Church, including the interaction with the West following the Turkish occupation. He suggests that the Orthodox Church might well build a bridge between Catholics and Protestants. However, he was an English Anglican who became an Orthodox priest; so there go the Brits again!
Having M.A.and D.Phil degrees, and being appointed a lecturing position at Oxford University, usually results in recognition as a scholar. I am talking about Kallistos Ware in this regard.
As a few others have pointed out I guess it depends on what you think is actually solid doctrine versus lots of words to explain a non biblical church doctrine and so on. Some of those people even though I think they have some things great they are so far removed from my views on doctrine that it baffles me how they came to the conclusions they came to.
In the end, I don’t think it’s either or with whose has more scholars or who has better scholars.
Lets not forget that for quite some time there was an ESTABLISHED CHURCH monopolizing the center ground in the UK, and for a while it was the ONLY church allowed.
For generations all the over-wrought overly zealous sects and sodalities made a constant “river” to America where there is no established church.