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From: gtaylor@cornell.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Christian Fundamentalism, A Definition
Message-ID: <8094@cornell.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 10-May-84 16:31:16 EDT
Article-I.D.: cornell.8094
Posted: Thu May 10 16:31:16 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 12-May-84 09:19:31 EDT
References: <762@akgua.UUCP>
Organization: Cornell Univ. CS Dept.
Lines: 62

Here I am again: A nice Episcopalian putting out objections
that I am sure most secular net.religion flamers will post on
their own.

My problem is this: While Bob's original outline of the
original tenets of Fundementalism are, in fact, pretty
much lifted directly from that old fin-de-siecle chestnut
pamphlet "The Fundementals of the CHristian Faith" (I don't
have my "A Religious History of the American People" here
at my terminal, so that's probably not the exact title),
he is a bit naive to suggest that American Fundementalism
in its current form (a cultural/political/religious entity) is
based entirely on that statement of belief. There are some
problems with that formulation. I'll try a brief one, and lower
my head when the flames return from those of my brethren more
in the Fundementalist tradition.

It is true that much of Fundementalism's early insistence on
the inerrency of Scripture is a direct response to the trraditions
of Hermeneuticial scholarship in the late 1800s, Fundementalism
in its current form would, I think, hold to a more rigourously
defined sense of "inerrency" than Bob's outline would suggest.
That more rigourous definition is, furthermore, becomes a point
of polarization for Fundementalists.

The modern Fundementalist usually uses the phrase "plenary
verbal inspiration" to further qualify the authority of
the Scriptures. That is-the Bible is absolutely correct on
ALL matters (many people are, of course, intelligent enough to
add the phrase "as translated." Simply put, not all Christians
believe that some of the Scriptures can be read by the 20th
century person apart from the cultural context in which they were
written. Further, the mechanism by which Biblical writings and texts
are/were scrutinised suggests that some of what appears in, say,
the King James text, is based on unreliable textual materials.

For the FUndementalist, this notion is a difficult one to deal with.
(It is even harder for the non-Fundementalist sometimes...don't
get me wrong).

ANyhow, when we go about discussing and dfeining F., I'd suggest
that it might be useful to talk about how Fundementalism came to
pick up the cultural baggage that Bob alludes to. Is it, for example,
the result of an extension of the emthodology and frame of reference
of the Fundementalist into realms other than the authority of the Word?

THis is yet another one of my late-nighters. I see that looking over it,
there is much that will perhaps be misunderstood. There are at least
57 ways of leballing me a donkey in the third paragraph alone.

I offer my apologies to those of you I may have offended, but I
think that there is a really interesting opportunity here to talk
about a rather substantive issue here. The flamers on this line
seem to view anyone with a bit of religious commitment as a monolithic
pack of idiots (their characterizations are usually based on a charicature
of a Fundementalist). Here's a chance totalk about those differences.

I know there are some good Kierkegaardian Lutherans out there (you
listening, St. Olaf?). Clean this up and try saying it again, please?

gtaylor