Fundamentalists and Scholarship, Part 2

What Is a Scholar?

Read Part 1.

The idea of scholarship has narrowed over the centuries. During the later Middle Ages and the Renaissance, an ideal scholar would attempt to comprehend the entire body of human knowledge. As the corpus of knowledge expanded, however, the sciences and the humanities were gradually disengaged from one or the other, resulting in two sets of scholars. During the 19th and early 20th centuries, European universities (beginning with Berlin) were transformed into research institutions, and scholarship was increasingly viewed as advancement with a narrow specialization. This model was transplanted to North America, first at Johns Hopkins University and then in the schools connected with the American Association of Universities.

These shifts have resulted in two tensions surrounding the term “scholar.” First, some favor an older vision of scholarship that emphasizes broad learning, while others favor a definition focused more narrowly on advancing the frontiers of knowledge through specialized research and publishing. Second, the two halves of the academy tend to be suspicious of each other’s scholarship. Humanists sometimes dismiss scientists as mere technicians, while scientists sometimes write off the humanities as less than rigorous.

These differences are mere niggles, however, in view of a broad consensus about what scholarship involves and who is qualified as a scholar. What are the elements in this consensus?

First, scholars understand the role of their discipline within the overall intellectual enterprise. This understanding requires them to possess both intellectual skill (mastery of the liberal arts) and exposure to the entire field of learning. More specifically, they must grasp the main contours of the “Great Conversation” within Western intellectual development. They know the main questions that have been asked and the most important answers that have been suggested. In other words, a scholar must, to at least some degree, be a person of culture and broad learning.

Second, scholars must master comprehensively the literature within their own disciplines, including both the current and classical literature (the “classical” literature may not be very old, depending on the discipline). They know their partners in conversation, whether living or dead. They are familiar with what has been thought and said. They immerse themselves in their discipline. It becomes the medium in which they live and move and have their being. They are constantly aware of their indebtedness to the discipline. They realize how their own work builds upon it, and they recognize when their research and conclusions depart from its established wisdom.

Third, scholars not only know the conversation and listen to the conversation, but they also advance the conversation. More than any other thing, the ability to advance the discipline—to contribute to knowledge—is what marks an individual as a scholar. In order to contribute to the conversation and advance the discipline, a scholar must necessarily engage in specialized research. Scientists conduct their research in laboratories while humanists conduct theirs in libraries, but no one qualifies as a scholar who is not somehow furthering the discipline through research.

Fourth, and implied in the foregoing, scholars enter into the conversation. They share the results of their research through professional interaction. They attend the meetings of their discipline, where they read and hear papers. They contribute to the journals. They put the results of their research into print. In a word, they publish, not for the general populace, but for the community of scholars. Credible, academic publication is the sine qua non of scholarship.

Fifth, scholars are accountable to the discipline. In other words, they are subject to peer review. Peer review is not peer agreement. Rather, it is recognition that the canons of the discipline have been observed. Scholars do not publish their serious works through vanity presses or in popular venues. They do not self-publish. Rather, they take advantage of the venues that are offered within and recognized by the discipline. Even if they disagree with the established wisdom of the discipline, their goal is to persuade other scholars. Whatever popular writing a scholar may print is simply irrelevant to her or his standing as a scholar.

Sixth, scholars converse in a particular manner. They do not typically set out to prove a point, but to find an answer. They are driven by a sense of wonder. They want to know; they want to discover. When they submit the results of their research, they articulate the questions that they are intending to answer, the alternatives that they have examined, and the evidence that they have accumulated. They explain how they have weighed the evidence and why they have weighed it as they have. They assess the probability of their conclusions, and they articulate the conditions under which their conclusions might be shown to be mistaken. They listen respectfully to contradictory opinions, and they respond dispassionately. This “scholarly temperament” does not come naturally to everyone, but it is cultivated by all scholars for their interactions within the discipline.

Finally, scholars are aware of disciplines that overlap theirs. If they are theologians, then they take cognizance of philosophy and intellectual history. If they are Old Testament scholars, then they know what is happening in archaeology, Semitics, and ancient Near-and-Middle Eastern Studies. If they are New Testament scholars, then they keep at least marginally current in classics, patristics, and first century history. Just as scholars hold each other accountable within each discipline, the disciplines also hold each other accountable.

The foregoing discussion reveals that scholarship is the activity of communities. It is not pursued by solitary individuals, and it cannot flourish in intellectual ghettoes. The individual scholar pursues specialized research that builds upon and contributes to the work of an entire discipline. For scholars, no “parallel universe” exists outside of the disciplines. Those who isolate themselves from the disciplines forfeit the privilege of being recognized as scholars, no matter how learned they may be.

Holding a doctor’s degree is no guarantee that a person is a scholar, though a research doctorate is normally a milestone towards scholarship. The purposes of the doctorate are to prepare students to perform the tasks of a scholar and to bring them into the conversation of a discipline. The dissertation is the first substantial word that a fledgling scholar speaks in the conversation. It is only the beginning, however. Recognition as a scholar depends entirely upon what one does after one has completed the Ph.D.

To Heaven

Ben Jonson (1572-1637)

Good and great God, can I not think of thee
But it must straight my melancholy be?
Is it interpreted in me disease
That, laden with my sins, I seek for ease?
Oh be thou witness, that the reins dost know
And hearts of all, if I be sad for show,
And judge me after; if I dare pretend
To ought but grace or aim at other end.
As thou art all, so be thou all to me,
First, midst, and last, converted, one and three;
My faith, my hope, my love; and in this state
My judge, my witness, and my advocate.
Where have I been this while exil’d from thee?
And whither rap’d, now thou but stoop’st to me?
Dwell, dwell here still. O, being everywhere,
How can I doubt to find thee ever here?
I know my state, both full of shame and scorn,
Conceiv’d in sin, and unto labour borne,
Standing with fear, and must with horror fall,
And destin’d unto judgment, after all.
I feel my griefs too, and there scarce is ground
Upon my flesh t’ inflict another wound.
Yet dare I not complain, or wish for death
With holy Paul, lest it be thought the breath
Of discontent; or that these prayers be
For weariness of life, not love of thee.

This essay is by Dr. Kevin T. Bauder, president of Central Baptist Theological Seminary (Plymouth, MN). Not every professor, student, or alumnus of Central Seminary necessarily agrees with every opinion that it expresses.