Of Academic Respectability and "Biblicism"

Here's an article from Inside Higher Ed about the rising recognition of evangelicals in higher education. It was informative and unhelpful at the same time.

Informative, in that it provides its non-evangelical readers with an overview of the increasing "heft" of evangelical scholarship.

Unhelpful, in that it advises evangelicals to shed our "biblicism" if we want to be given any more respectability than we already have.

The idea of "inerrancy" is the bogeyman in this story. And, while the authors note the dangers should evangelicals move forward with looser doctrinal statements in fawning attempts to court worldly approval, in the end I can't see the authors advising anything other than exactly this. (It's always curious to see someone "note" the dangers in adopting his or her point, without suggesting concrete steps to avoiding such dangers should the point be adopted.)

But if evangelicals have begun to be recognized for serious academic scholarship despite what the authors call this burden of "biblicism," I think we'd do best to ignore the authors for their unnecessary advice on how to be more respectable.