Comments on: Climbing down from the Sunday School Pedestal http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/ A Mormon Blog Fri, 01 Jun 2012 13:16:46 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: nhilton http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110470 Sun, 04 Mar 2007 07:33:42 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110470 So, back to the “other translation” topic…just what translations are you lugging to GD class? I’ve brought the RLDS Bible & the NIV Bible. I always get a kick out of the big eyes & open mouths as I reference them during class & how many people rush up afterwards to touch & feel this contraband. Why are we so inbred in our thinking? Sometimes just asking a non-maintenance question in class draws stares of fear, like they are afraid to consider a question that doesn’t have an answer found in the manual. I know the early Saints didn’t feel this way!

However, if I have time, I love the comparrisons I get from these extra sources as I prepare my GD lessons. New insights flow!

BTW, which translation was Moroni quoting to Joseph Smith since it wasn’t the KJV?

]]> By: Thomas Parkin http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110459 Wed, 28 Feb 2007 18:34:15 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110459 MCQ,

Thanks for #10.

I mostly notice with every post that my grammar is as awful as ever, and that I’m grouchy – and I recall that online discussion – which I’ve got a long history with – rarely brings out the best of me. (I could link some bits – but my past isn’t very family friendly.) But, gracias. :)

~

]]> By: HP/JDC http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110455 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 15:13:25 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110455 Ardis,
I agree that there is a danger of too much self-aggrandizement in teaching (which Mark IV address a couple of months ago in a post better than I could). This is why I think it is so important to (as Kevin puts it) use outside info judiciously, not just because one can.

Greg,
I don’t think it is a problem to ask a question to which one doesn’t know the answer, but one should always know an answer.

]]> By: BTD Greg http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110456 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 15:04:24 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110456 “The “snooty” comes not from using those materials; it comes from using those materials with a smirk, drawing more attention to the teacher and his brilliance than to whatever scriptural point is being taught.”

Wow, that’s harsh. Sound to me like this may be a case of a class member failing to think about what the teacher is actually teaching because they can’t get past the teacher’s personal idiosyncrasies.

This is an interesting discussion. I especially like the advice about asking uncomfortable questions, though I’m not sure I would phrase it the same way. I like to think of it more as “asking difficult questions.” For example, I think, “Why would the Lord command Abraham to kill his son?” is a very fair question. Additionally, I think teachers should be brave enough to ask questions that they themselves don’t necessarily know the answers to.

]]> By: Steve Evans http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110458 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 05:15:00 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110458 MCQ, it’s not just you!

]]> By: Norbert http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110461 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 04:57:37 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110461

Go along with them for the ride; admit what makes you struggle with a given doctrine, but also explain how you are dealing with it for the time being.

Your scripture reading should be bringing you nearer to God; share with your class how it is. Your study should be enlightening your mind; share with your class how it is.

This is very wise and insightful, and incredibly useful.

I guess I’m thinking I need to be a bit more careful than I would with adults, but then I’m afraid I’m talking down to them.

I would never be ‘careful’ with youth SS. Teenagers love emotional intensity. (It’s why Of Mice & Men is so memorable for HS students.) Show your own intensity in dealing with the application of gospel principles applied to situations with which they can relate. It makes me angry to see youth leaders in the church pandering to the youth’s natural tendency toward a lack of intellectual engagement instead of reaching past it to emotional and spiritual intensity.

]]> By: MCQ http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110460 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 04:56:49 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110460 I don’t know if it’s just me, but I have to say that I love every comment I have ever read by Thomas Parkin.

]]> By: Thomas Parkin http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110464 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 03:38:39 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110464 “those attending do not actually come to learn anything. Rather, they are there in order to have what they already believe confirmed. ”

Back in the day when I used to get an ego thrill over antagonizing people, speaking of snooty, I liked to call this thing that you’ve described ‘taking hold of the Iron Rod, and just standing there.’ I thought I was quite clever, but see now that it doesn’t really communicate the intensity with which one might be holding on, or the determination and gravity by which one’s feet are ‘firmly planted.’

~

]]> By: Kevin Barney http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110465 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 02:31:49 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110465 I think there is a difference between trying to teach exclusively from an alternate translation and using one judiciously to explicate a difficult text or to make a point. In my experience people would feel very uncomfortable with the former, but would in general appreciate the latter.

]]> By: Ardis Parshall http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/26/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110466 Tue, 27 Feb 2007 02:25:51 +0000 http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/02/climbing-down-from-the-sunday-school-pedestal/#comment-110466 The “snooty” comes not from using those materials; it comes from using those materials with a smirk, drawing more attention to the teacher and his brilliance than to whatever scriptural point is being taught.

C.S. Lewis in my favorite essay, “Learning in War Time”: “The intellectual life is not the only road to God, nor the safest, but we find it to be a road, and it may be the appointed road for us. Of course, it will be so only so long as we keep the impulse pure and disinterested. That is the great difficulty. As the author of the Theologia Germanica says, we may come to love knowledge — our knowing — more than the thing known; to delight not in the exercise of our talents but in the fact that they are ours, or even in the reputation they bring us. Every success in the scholar’s life increases this danger.”

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