Christian higher education

I have been on this board now for several years and it has taught me much. A good portion of my library comes from suggestions of members on this board.

For sometime now there has been discussion about the value of education from several institutions,namely Trinity@Newburgh, Andersonville, Bethany,and LBU. Over the years I have heard many comments about pastors who were highly regarded that had graduated from one of these institutioins. So I think there is a strong possibility these schools could be good pastor training grounds. I have personally went through the catalogs of each of these schools checking not only the cirriculum but the teaching staff credentials. It would appear to me that a DMin would not be out of thier area of expertise.

Now when we are talking about degrees which are issued to show proper knowledge for one to teach in a seminary, that is a horse of a different color for specific reasons. PhD's and ThD's are RESEARCH degrees they are language intensive. Terminal degrees require something closer to terminal knowledge of subject material. Greek,Hebrew, Aramaic, Ugaritic, Latin, a couple of languages I can't remember plus German and French (to study the reformation) are needed. Indeed special research skills need to be fully developed at this level. I don't know how those skills can be learned outside of a classroom. These are the fellas you want teaching your pastor Bible and Doctrine.

I think some of our people me included are very leary of some schools, such as Ivey League or semi-Ivy schools (places you would find Jesus Seminar members) because of thier liberalism.

For some it is an issue of money.

For some it is what doctrines are followed at the schools or how certain subjects are taught, so they are wary.

Am I making sense? Looking forward to comments.:tonofbricks:

 

It seems so especially in IFB churches.:thumbs:

 

Since we seem to have a lot of lookers with nothing to say I guess I can get the rest of this off my chest.

When I went to high school we had to take one year of foriegn languages(French, German, or Spanish) in order to graduate. In the earlier days 50's, 60's, and 70's colleges required languages for graduation. I hope some still do.

It boggles my mind how a person can go through 4 years of Bible College and not take at least 2 years of Greek and one year of Hebrew. Again it boggles my mind that a graduate school would consider enrolling a student who did not have 2 years of Greek and one year of Hebrew at minimum. How much time is wasted overcomming lack of language skills in graduate schools. Needless to say at the masters level we would include advanced courses in Greek and Hebrew. It would also be appropriate to add a year of Aramaic and Latin at this level. At the Doctorate with a Ph or Th it would seem the student would be interested in at least learning 2 more Bible languages. Gee that's enough language for a major in Biblical languages at the doctoral level, it sure is. The guys with the doctor at the end of thier letters are going to be the college and seminary professors and researchers , Bible languages should be second nature to them. It probqably would'nt hurt to learn German and French if one wanted to study or research the reformation.
You need to know at least some Hebrew and Greek just to use the advanced word study tools you want to , because you don't want to go deep into language studies.

 

I apologize, I would think that goes without saying.