Yet Another “Heresy Hunting” Response

The 2008 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature begins tomorrow and I have been so busy working on my presentation on the Syriac tradition of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas that I have neglected the ongoing discussion of my “Heresy Hunting” article. I don’t have time enough yet to respond to Darrell Bock’s formal response, but I will quickly respond to Rob Bowman’s last post.

First, Rob took issue with my characterization of previous work on Gos. Thom. 114. I wrote:

“In response, Bowman excerpted a number of non-conservative scholars (including Pagels, Patterson, and Meyer) who agree that the saying is indeed misogynist. These may not be the best scholars to appeal to in this debate, however, as they write often for popular audiences and their comments on the texts may suffer from the same lack of depth as the apologists I criticize.”

And he responded: 

“I expect to be at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in a couple of weeks, and I would love to get Burke in a room together with Pagels, Patterson, and Meyer to hear him defend this statement. Pagels, Patterson, and Meyer are without a doubt three of the top mainstream scholars working on the Gospel of Thomas. I also cited Antti Marjanen, whose publications that I cited cannot possibly be described as intended for popular audiences. Burke says nothing about Marjanen, perhaps for this reason. But his statement about Pagels, Patterson, and Meyer is indefensible.”

Now, I don’t want to be in a room with these people. I think I can take Pagels, but Meyer’s a big guy and I’m pretty sure he could kick my ass. My point, however, was not that they were not accomplished scholars, but that the works that Bowman was appealing to (some of them, that is, particularly Pagels’ The Gnostic Gospels) do not present a range of opinions on the topic. And my objection to the apologists’ comments on Gos. Thom. 114 is that they state only that it is misogynist, as if there are no other ways to interpret the saying. So, by “lack of depth” I simply meant that some of these other works (by Pagels, etc.) also only present one interpretation of the saying. Bowman is right, however, to object to my generalization of all four of the scholars as writing for popular audiences; Marjanen’s contribution is certainly not in the same vein.

As for the bulk of Bowman’s response I will limit myself to a few general comments:

1. The debate over the meaning of Gos. Thom. 114 was part of a larger argument I was making about the apologists’ tendency to focus on what they saw as negative aspects of the CA. Bowman remarks that they do so to counter “the mistaken notion being peddled by some popularizers that the Gnostic writings represent an egalitarian or even feminist variety of Christianity.” It seems I should be forgiving of conservative simplification if it counters liberal simplification. In my ideal world, nobody would do so. Also, dismantling the feminist interpretation of Gnosticism is not the only reason why the apologists discuss apocryphal texts; The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, for example, is not Gnostic, nor does it say anything about women, but some of the writers denigrate that text and others for no apparent reason other than to ridicule them. For example, Komoszewski et al (Reinventing Jesus) discuss the infancy gospels in a chapter intended to describe what “other gospels” were “really like” and why they didn’t “make the cut” (p. 152). There is nothing wrong with countering another scholar’s opinion on a text, but it is better, I think, to do so by drawing upon a range of scholarship (preferably the most recent and most in-depth) and with requisite scholarly objectivity (well, as much as possible anyway). 
2. Bowman asked me to cite scholarship on Gos. Thom. 114 that indicates it is not misogynist and that it may be a late addition to the text. While a few sources come to mind, I have stated already that I am no expert on the text and would rather not get into a protracted debate over it. Should you listen to my opinions on the text? Probably not, but my point was only that the saying should not be quickly dismissed as “misogynist” without discussion of other interpretations of it. Even Bowman notes some interpretations of the saying that draw upon ancient notions of spirituality. He states also, “One must first demonstrate that one of these more female-friendly interpretations is correct.” Again, he is missing my point: I am not championing any particular interpretation of the saying, whether “female-friendly” or misogynist; I simply expect a good scholar to acknowledge the range of possible interpretations before presenting his argument to his or her audience.  
3. I have been charged again and again with bias, that my “liberal” bias is just as bad as the “conservative” bias I identify in the works I criticize. None of my critics are able to cite an example from my own scholarship of such a bias (well, probably because no-one reads my scholarship), but worse than that they occupy their time on the minutiae of the article and ignore the final paragraph, which states (diplomatically, I think):

“But perhaps we are not doomed to repeat the errors of the past. There is no good reason for either the apologists or the CA scholars not to pay closer attention to each others' works and their implications. Some CA scholars are indeed "radical" in the esteem they grant this literature and their idyllic portrayals of the groups that valued them. It would be wise of them to consider the responses of their critics. Likewise, the apologists would be served well to consult a broader range of scholarship in their assessment of the CA and in other aspects of their scholarship; such openness might lead them to reconsider their beliefs that the CA are all late, derivative, and ultimately deserving of censure. If the two groups can set aside their guiding assumptions, they may find they have more to discuss than they expect.”