John J. Collins > Quotes

“The responsible use of the Bible must begin by acknowledging that these books were not written with our modern situations in mind, and are informed by the assumptions of an ancient culture remote from our own.”
― John J. Collins, A Short Introduction to the Hebrew Bible

“Anachronism becomes a problem only in questions of historical meaning, and even then anachronistic analogies can still have heuristic value.”
― John J. Collins

“All scholars agree that the account is composite. (Witness the number of times Moses ascends the mountain.) The older documentary hypothesis,”
― John J. Collins, The Invention of Judaism: Torah and Jewish Identity from Deuteronomy to Paul (Taubman Lectures in Jewish Studies Book 7)

“One generation learns by criticizing the work of its predecessors but must do so in full consciousness that it will be subject to similar criticism in turn.”
― John J. Collins, Introduction to the Hebrew Bible

“See Rudolf Smend, "Julius Wellhausen and His Prolegomena to the History of Israel," Semeia 25 (1982): 1-20. On 5 April 1882, he wrote to the Prussian Minister of Culture: "I became a theologian because the scientific treatment of the Bible interested me; only gradually did I come to understand that a professor of theology also has the practical task of preparing the students for service in the Protestant Church, and that I am not adequate to this practical task, but that instead despite all caution on my own part I make my hearers unfit for their office" (6).”
― John J. Collins, The Bible after Babel: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age

“The line between actual killing and verbal, symbolic, or imaginary violence is thin and permeable. The threat of violence is a method of forceful coercion, even if no blood is actually shed.”
― John J. Collins, Does the Bible Justify Violence?