03/07/2006

There's a Better Alternative to 'Bible and Its Influence'
Bob Withers, The Herald-Dispatch

Mar. 7 -- You would never know it by reading most newspapers, but what many Christians believe to be a worthy opponent to the Bible Literacy Project's "The Bible and Its Influence" is competing for students' literary attention.

The contender is "The Bible in History and Literature," a curriculum guide published by the National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools in Greensboro, N.C.

The curriculum already is being used in 320 school districts across the country (including three in West Virginia, and five each in Ohio and Kentucky) that include almost 1,200 high schools.

Nowhere in this work will you find claims that most Christians and Jews don't read Genesis as literal history or that liberal Jews, "mainline" Protestant Christians and Roman Catholics believe the book of Isaiah was written by three different people.

The workbook is designed to be used with the King James Bible because of that version's "widespread use, its influence upon the development of American culture and Western civilization, and its literary qualities," its writers say. Detractors usually do not add that those writers also encourage school districts to use -- or allow students to use -- whichever version they wish.

This alternative has been acknowledged sparingly in the press, usually in a derogatory way.

Richard N. Ostling of The Associated Press mentioned it in the last paragraph of a May 9, 2005, story on the BLP version. After giving the BLP a pass, he points out that critics say the NCBCPS material presents a "narrow, conservative Protestant viewpoint."

Many Christians are likely to challenge that statement. NCBCPS is supported by Anne Graham Lotz, WallBuilders Founder/President David Barton, Dr. D. James Kennedy and Dr. Charles Stanley. It's also backed by Rabbi Daniel Lapin, founder/president of Toward Tradition, a Mercer Island, Wash., coalition of Jews and Christians who favor returning the nation to its traditional Judeo-Christian values; and two prominent Catholic law professors -- Gerard Bradley at Notre Dame and Robert George at Princeton.

The North Carolina group caught all kinds of flack from BLP supporters when the Ector County Independent School District -- based in Odessa, Texas -- decided in December to offer an elective course using "The Bible in History and Literature" instead of "The Bible and Its Influence" after 6,000 citizens signed petitions last spring supporting a course on the Bible.

And a battle rages now in Alabama because several legislators are trying to circumnavigate the state's board of education in permitting only the BLP volume in classrooms there.

Contrary to popular opinion, classwork about the Bible is legal despite the so-called separation of church and state. A 1999 agreement -- endorsed by the National Council of Churches, major Jewish and Christian groups, advocates of church-state separation, the National Association of Secondary School Principals and other secular organizations says Bible courses are acceptable if taught "academically" and "objectively," if they neither "promote nor disparage religion" or if they don't adopt "a particular sectarian point of view" or "devotional approach."

Although neither the BLP textbook nor the NCBCPS curriculum is in Cabell County classrooms, the possibility might come up someday. It would certainly behoove parents to know what choices are available for textbooks and course material should that day come.

Bob Withers is a reporter for The Herald-Dispatch and a Baptist minister. You may contact him at (304) 526- 2792 or bwithers@herald-dispatch.com. Copyright (c) The Herald-Dispatch. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of Gannett Co., Inc. by NewsBank, inc.