If you want to study the culture that lived at the time, there are far more insightful works out there that archaeologists have recovered that talk about people who actually left evidence of their existence behind and not just about what was at the time simply an unpopular cult. In fact we get more and more reliable information about early Christianity from sources other than the Bible.

‘And it doesn’t give us insight into how people wrote years ago.’ .. it doesn’t? huh?

All of the characters in the book are either good or evil. There is no conflict in them unless it is to arbitrarily make a point, (this point being made with a sledgehammer) and then it is discarded. This is made more difficult because it is hard to relate to “good” characters who keep slaves and kill those who don’t believe in God and “evil” characters who just want to be left alone and do their own thing. It’s clear what the author thinks about them, but since there is no explanation WHY the author makes his judgments of good and evil, the reader is left with just a “do as you’re told” plot point with no independent way of verifying what “good” and “evil” really are and making it difficult to always do one and never do the other. It makes the actions of the characters seem without any ultimate goals, except the arbitrary one of “do as you’re told”.

All in all, I found it muddled, contradictory and lacking in any real intrigue or mystery, except the rather impossible task of figuring out what point the author was trying to make.

And it doesn’t give us insight into how people wrote years ago. It gives us insight into how religious nut-jobs wrote nine centuries ago. As a tool for archaeology and history, it’s not bad, although there are many more manuscripts of the time that explain what people were doing and thinking, and some of those were official documents and economic records that give us more information in an easier to digest form.

As a work of fictional literature, it is below average. It isn’t even very original, since most of the events that supposedly happen in the book are found in earlier works with the names and places changed, so it gets few points for originality, continuity, clarity, and overall quality. If it wasn’t a holy book, it wouldn’t be on anyone’s “best seller” list.

Even if those points were true…. who cares … Its old text, it full of poetry, it gives us insight into how people wrote years ago .. just like other texts from years ago ..

… maybe you missed the point where I said .. whether its ‘fictional or not’.

No clear plot; one-dimensional characters; glaring continuity issues…

Finest pieces of literature known to man? Which man? Tell me so I may avoid this moron.

A friend of mine took a “The Bible as Literature” in college about 20 years ago. The idea is to study the Bible just like The Iliad or any other ancient text. Should we be up in arms that our children are learning about ancient Greek texts as a way to push polytheist agenda?

And the bible wasn’t written by God per say. It was interpretted from God by humans. So if everything in it doesn’t make sense, which most does depending on how you interpret it, that’s really becuase humans don’t completely make sense.

Plus, I would imagine if God wrote a book we wouldn’t even be able to understand it. I mean, I’d imagine God knows a lot, and has thinking far beyond ours.

But in the end let’s just keep Religion and State seperate….

Most literature doesn’t have chapters for things the audience isn’t supposed to do or threaten their readers on a regular basis. I’d consider Gilgamesh literature because there’s a single narrative story(well of the threaded translations we’ve had to combine) on it’s lonesome.

That being said a basic understanding of the mythology of the Bible is required for a proper understanding of most pre-20th century poetry. There are a few poems from the 19th century that just sound like the writer asking to be raped/killed until you realize he’s talking about organized religion. But the Bible itself isn’t the only reference for Poetry, you’d have to read Gilgamesh, have a firm understanding of Roman History, have firm knowledge of Greek(and maybe Norse) mythology and private cults.

The bible has it’s uses in law school though in order to argue constitutionality in front of a jury of hostile believers, the course could teach proper rhetoric in the hardest audience ever or accepting that sometimes it’s alright to take up a lost cause(the case, not the larger action).

I imagine this is a sort of back door for religion to work it’s way into public schools, though.

In which case, I wonder if I can suggest “Lord of the Rings” in place of the bible.

Or better yet, “Death from the Skies”.

I am not actually sure what the religious beliefs of my teacher were, if any. He seemed pretty much neutral on the subject in the class. The actual point of the class, however, was to teach you skills necessary for studying, learning, assessing information, making decisions, and so on, so I suspect the point of the religion bit was to make people look at and understand the beliefs of others and see how others view your beliefs.

This is what I would consider a best-case scenario for religious education, and as such would cause a riot in most parts of the U.S. Most parents don’t like their kids being exposed to different ideas or want them being forced to actually think for themselves, but those sorts of parents would never have sent their kids to my high school in the first place (it is a public school, but a “magnet” program).

Ok. You guys know the dutch word “apartheid”.
Well in The Netherlands to this day we have what we call “verzuiling”.
Look it up and learn.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillarisation

Works fine. You go to your school and I´ll go to mine.
Same goes for shopping, football (not handegg) clubs, political parties, public broadcast etc.
Everybody gets his own.

To which I say:

We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of “separate but equal” has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold that the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained of, deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.
Brown v. Board of Education, Unanimous opinion

I agree with the assessment. “Separate but equal” is a contradiction. The very act of separating groups like this necessary implies one group of people ostracizing another group.

Dutch tolerance is based on this.

You do your thing and I will not speak with you as long as you don´t speak to me and let me do my thing.
Works.

At least according to your link, people practically have no contact except with like-minded people. That isn’t tolerance, that is the most extreme form of intolerence. You refuse to even associate with people who are different from you. You go to different schools, have different banks, organizations, sports teams. Everyone who doesn’t agree with your view is ostracized completely from these institutions. And anyone who can’t fit into one of the groups either is out of luck entirely or has to work within a group that does not represent them.

It will open minds to the idea that there are 4+ billion people on this planet, and not everyone thinks like you.

Dude. Reality check. The rest of your post is absolutely spot on, but get with the programme on your stats. The last time the global population was at 4 billion was probably sometime in the late 60′s. We’re at 6.8 billion now, and counting.

This is the future calling. We’d like to have our planet back, before it was overrun by humanity.

That bothers me more than anything else said here. Of course, I could be paranoid.

On the other hand, maybe I don’t have enough tin foil.

This is all predicated on a county that has multiple times gotten its wrist slapped for violations of the separation of Church and State. (Hi Wilson County!)

I promise you, if this is allowed, it will turn into precisely what Phil is afraid it will.

Students will “be allowed the choice to be religious on their own accord”, and since the school is not enforcing it, then it’ll just be religious education in public schools.

Let me put it this way, a coworker who home schools their kids because of the lack of religion in schools is more than overjoyed at this decision.

In my Honors World History class, we spent about a week discussing the similarities between the three “Abrahamic” religions in a completely secular manner. I think that was the most interesting part of the class.

Unfortunately you and I are in the minority. This is why Intelligent design is not only believed in, but widely enough for our political leaders to have it and for people to be even considering it for our schools. It is why people distrust science. It’s why homeopathy exists. It’s why people believe the illogic of climate deniers without having the skills to figure out for themselves that it’s bogus.

Critical thinking NEEDS to be mandatory. Unfortunately because it immediately leads to people rejecting things like goofy superstition and untenable but politically advantageous scientific ideas, it gets labeled as anti-religious or anti-American behavior and people think you have an intolerant or politically driven agenda. You can’t just tell the truth. People see it as bias whenever the truth deviates from what they believe.