How would you answer this question?

[Zakuska]

Okay, so you are the Gospel Doctrine teacher; you have spent literally hours of prep time during the week preceding class in order to help your class understand the Creation account in terms of the ancient Hebrew cosmic view; you are going through the different days, explaining what is happening in those terms, and showing the structure of how the days relate to each other.

No doubtedly... literally buried in a mountian of books, swet dripping from your brow.

Our GD teacher has been using the DVD that goes along with the lessons and letting the Apostles teach all this. That way all the "Sam the Eagles" in the congregation can't complain to the Bishop later.

[Luigi]

Well personally I would have found your lesson very interesting but at one time I probably would have sympathized with the commenter. He probably wanted a lesson that concentrated on the central role of the Creation in God's plan of salvation and perhaps an integration of the creation story to the every day involvement of Church participation and beliefs as expressed by modern day Church leaders. Bringing up, perhaps, that since the Creation is a central theme to the temple ceremony-with a quote from a General Authority emphasizing that point, it must not only be important as a matter of interest and explanation but that it communicates something essential about our eternal destiny and spiritual development and then conduct a discussion around that point. Intellectual points about what the ancient Hebrews did or thought would certainly catch some interest but if it became more than a sidenote it would probably distract from the spiritual emotions evoked from seeing how the creation story can be intricately intertwined in the beliefs and day-to-day practices of a member today.

[David T]

Nice work.

You may be interested to know that I printed off and distributed a copy of one of those diagrams to help the class see what was going on in the Creation.

Thanks for the link!

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[Mordecai]

I think that kind of lesson encourages more reading of the scriptures, as it improves reading comprehension. My response would have been something along the lines of how even Nephi mentions that those that understand the scriptures are the Jews, because of their culture. If we understand Abraham and his thinking better, we understand his writings better. This lesson was all about the Book of Abraham, making it very scriptural and enlightening. It's a little hardcore for some, but it teaches how to read Abraham properly. I'm all for this kind of stuff, as long as it is done prayerfully and with your audience in mind.

[cinepro]

"I don't mean to throw a monkey wrench into everything, but don't you think you are overly intellectualizing all of this? I mean, isn't the only important thing that we believe that God created the world?"

--Consiglieri

For as many times as I've heard that argument online, it still makes me chuckle.

But I suppose the best response would be to point out (as others have noted) that the scriptues go beyond "God created the world", so it is entirely appropriate to study the details given in the scriptures.

"God created the world" is certainly an important thing (and maybe the most important thing), but it isn't the only important thing.

[frankenstein]

Here is the set up for the question that I would like to know how you would answer . . .

Okay, so you are the Gospel Doctrine teacher; you have spent literally hours of prep time during the week preceding class in order to help your class understand the Creation account in terms of the ancient Hebrew cosmic view; you are going through the different days, explaining what is happening in those terms, and showing the structure of how the days relate to each other.

Is this the "hebrew cosmic view" the stated purpose of the lesson which is:

Purpose

To help class members feel gratitude that God created all things for our benefit and that we are created in his image

or just a pet project?

You have talked briefly about how Moses 1 serves as a good introduction to the first line of Genesis, by explaining that "In the beginning" does not mean "in the beginning" of the universe, but simply "in the beginning" of this world alone; you have mentioned how Old Testament scholars have a solid majority stating that whatever Genesis means here, it does NOT mean creation ex nihilo, which is important for LDS because we have scriptures committing us to that position in Section 93.

"This earth" is actually in Moses 1, and it was only what Moses was shown, so hopefully you pointed this out in the Moses 1.

However I think Charity gave the best response.

Those who have made snibe remarks about attending Gospel Principles perhaps you should take time to compare how terribly basic each manual - Gospel Doctrine and Gospel Principles - are. Also consider how terribly basic each manual is in its suggested question. so really there is not much a difference in either class, it just seems pet projects come up more in Gospel Doctrine than any other class.

[mfbukowski]

Would you similarly think you were an ineffective teacher if you allowed the needs of the one to outweigh the needs of the many?

Are you advocating that I spend no time preparing for my class? Why do you think the material I covered a "waste" and not "necessary"?

A number of people thanked me afterward for the lesson and mentioned how it helped them understand the Creation account better than they ever had before. Was it a "waste of time" for them?

Why do you think teaching people in their homes should take priority over teaching people at Church?

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

Well, incredible as it seems, I will let Luigi answer for me. It is a red-letter day when I agree with Luigi!

Well personally I would have found your lesson very interesting but at one time I probably would have sympathized with the commenter. He probably wanted a lesson that concentrated on the central role of the Creation in God's plan of salvation and perhaps an integration of the creation story to the every day involvement of Church participation and beliefs as expressed by modern day Church leaders. Bringing up, perhaps, that since the Creation is a central theme to the temple ceremony-with a quote from a General Authority emphasizing that point, it must not only be important as a matter of interest and explanation but that it communicates something essential about our eternal destiny and spiritual development and then conduct a discussion around that point. Intellectual points about what the ancient Hebrews did or thought would certainly catch some interest but if it became more than a sidenote it would probably distract from the spiritual emotions evoked from seeing how the creation story can be intricately intertwined in the beliefs and day-to-day practices of a member today.

Between Consig and Luigi, I feel like a real paisano! Pass the pasta fazool!

[Scottie]

Sooo....

What DID you say???

[Bob Crockett]

Here is the set up for the question that I would like to know how you would answer . . .

Okay, so you are the Gospel Doctrine teacher; you have spent literally hours of prep time during the week preceding class in order to help your class understand the Creation account in terms of the ancient Hebrew cosmic view; you are going through the different days, explaining what is happening in those terms, and showing the structure of how the days relate to each other.

You have talked briefly about how Moses 1 serves as a good introduction to the first line of Genesis, by explaining that "In the beginning" does not mean "in the beginning" of the universe, but simply "in the beginning" of this world alone; you have mentioned how Old Testament scholars have a solid majority stating that whatever Genesis means here, it does NOT mean creation ex nihilo, which is important for LDS because we have scriptures committing us to that position in Section 93.

As you are moving through this material, a 50-something male student raises his hand and is called on, who then asks this question:

"I don't mean to throw a monkey wrench into everything, but don't you think you are overly intellectualizing all of this? I mean, isn't the only important thing that we believe that God created the world?"

How would you answer this question?

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

Perhaps it is more of a comment about the instructor. The very best gospel doctrine instructors are those who can get into the meat of the gospel without appearing to be above it all. Unfortunately, too many of my friends who really know their stuff about the church let it go to their heads (in which case they are not fit to be instructors) and reasonably intelligent members can see it. I'm probably one of those guilty folks as well.

[Bob Crockett]

dupe

[Scott Lloyd]

I consider it a Proper Source. After all, it was published in the Church News

Only because that heretic and intellectual blowhard Daniel Peterson used the image in his PowerPoint during his FAIR Conference presentation last year.

-- Scott Lloyd, writer of the Church News article

[consiglieri]

Sooo....

What DID you say???

I thought you would never ask!

Here is what I said:

Actually, I'm not intellectualizing it at all. Rather, I am doing the opposite. There is a tendency among people, whether inside the Church or outside the Church, to think that whenever they live, their knowledge of things is better than those who lived in the past, and even though we know our knowledge and understanding is changing all the time, people nevertheless tend to think that whatever their knowledge happens to be at the time is simply the way things really are.

Whenever we look at the writings of an ancient culture (or even a modern culture that is different from our own), our tendency is to read in terms of our own culture. The key is to read within the context of the culture that produced the writing. If our goal is to understand what the author meant, this is the only way to go about it.

Otherwise, there will be three categories of things when we read the writings from another culture: (1) There is a certain amount of material that will come across directly, as there will be points in common between both cultures, all of us being human and relating to the human condition; (2) There will be a certain number of things that simply don't make sense to us because we are trying to make it fit our culture's preconceptions and it just doesn't fit; and, (3) Perhaps most dangerous of all are those things from another culture that we are simply reading completely wrong, because we are making it fit our own culture.

What we are trying to do in this class is unlock the key of the Creation account by reading it as best we can from within the cultural framework of the person who wrote it.

I then pantomined tossing something to Brother X and said with a wink and a grin, "There, now I'm throwing your monkey wrench right back at you."

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[volgadon]

As I had the 14-18 year olds, I thought it more important to focus on what relevance the creation account has to their attempts to live the gospel and understand their role better, so even though I read the manual, I didn't use it. I even <shock, gasp, horrors> used a verse from Alma 30 to introduce the lesson and told a Jewish joke.

One thing I did however share was my thought on why separating the waters was important. People depended on the rain for life, be you a farmer or a semi-nomadic shepherd. It was important to know who created and controlled the rains and dew!

[consiglieri]

I even <shock, gasp, horrors> used a verse from Alma 30 to introduce the lesson and told a Jewish joke.

You are so going to hell.

[Scott Lloyd]

As I had the 14-18 year olds, I thought it more important to focus on what relevance the creation account has to their attempts to live the gospel and understand their role better, so even though I read the manual, I didn't use it. I even <shock, gasp, horrors> used a verse from Alma 30 to introduce the lesson and told a Jewish joke.

Not to criticize your presentation, but I don't understand how using the lesson as written would have hindered one in teaching older youth about the relevance of the creation account to their efforts to live the gospel.

[Zakuska]

I thought you would never ask!

Here is what I said:

<SNIP>

For those Trekies in the Audience... The episode DORMAK demonstrates what Consig has very APTLY shown.

Picard has to learn these 3 truths in a life and death situation.

"Darmok" is an episode of the television science fiction series Star Trek: The Next Generation, first broadcast in the United States on September 30, 1991; it was written by Joe Menosky. The episode contains a brief, but notable recounting of the Gilgamesh epic, which is communicated by Picard to the Tamarian captain. The episode has an average rating of 4.5/5 on the official Star Trek website (as of 18 August 2009 (2009 -08-18)[update]).[1]

...

The episode examines the interactions between the USS Enterprise's crew and a race called Tamarians, or "The Children of Tama." A Tamarian captain abducts Captain Picard in an eager attempt to bridge their language gap through shared experience. The Enterprise captain and crew must decipher the Tamarians' metaphorical language, or risk failing in the opening of diplomatic relations and losing Captain Picard to a meaningless death at the hands of an entity with the capability to disappear.

The story centers on Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Captain Dathon of the Tamarian race (Paul Winfield). The Tamarian language is unintelligible to Starfleet's universal translators because it is too deeply rooted in local metaphor, so its sentences do not have any meaning to other civilizations. When the Tamarians realize that this attempt has failed, the Tamarian captain has Picard and himself transported to the planet El-Adrel IV, which is occupied by a hostile entity.

It wasn't until Star Fleet learned the Alian Culture that they were finally able to communicate with them, and understand what in the Universe they were talking about.

Very nicely done Consig! Now THIS is much better than the Breats feedings we usuauly get at church.

[volgadon]

Apart from Alma 30:44, I only used the scriptures that were listed in the lesson. They were my focus, not the syntax of the lesson plan.

The biggest thing is that I was asked to give that particular lesson at short notice and have neither manual or printer.

[Scott Lloyd]

Apart from Alma 30:44, I only used the scriptures that were listed in the lesson. They were my focus, not the syntax of the lesson plan.

The biggest thing is that I was asked to give that particular lesson at short notice and have neither manual or printer.

Ah, then I understand much better. Thank you.

I only asked because I know, having taught the lesson myself yesterday, that there is significant content and grist for discussion in there about earth life preparing us for eternal life and about men and women being created in the image of God. All of which strikes me as directly relevant to one's efforts to live the gospel and to one's role in mortality -- even if the student is 14 years old.

[Scott Lloyd]

Our GD teacher has been using the DVD that goes along with the lessons and letting the Apostles teach all this. That way all the "Sam the Eagles" in the congregation can't complain to the Bishop later.

I showed the video with Elder Russell M. Nelson. And we had plenty of time left for scripture reading and stimulating discussion.

I don't think those are mutually exclusive.

[Connolly]

How would you answer this question?

I would answer that if you can understand that the creation account as presented is not a primer on exactly how the world was made, but that it was given to teach us something else, then you can be ready learn some profound things about Christ from the endowment presentation covering the same matter.

[zerinus]

Here is the set up for the question that I would like to know how you would answer . . .

Okay, so you are the Gospel Doctrine teacher; you have spent literally hours of prep time during the week preceding class in order to help your class understand the Creation account in terms of the ancient Hebrew cosmic view; ...

Hi, I an interested to know what you mean by that, and where you obtained that information from. What exactly is the "ancient Hebrew cosmic view," and what was the source of your information?

... you are going through the different days, explaining what is happening in those terms, and showing the structure of how the days relate to each other.

I would appreciate it if you could briefly tell us what that information was that you were imparting to your class.

[volgadon]

Ah, then I understand much better. Thank you.

I only asked because I know, having taught the lesson myself yesterday, that there is significant content and grist for discussion in there about earth life preparing us for eternal life and about men and women being created in the image of God. All of which strikes me as directly relevant to one's efforts to live the gospel and to one's role in mortality -- even if the student is 14 years old.

I guess it is just a funny way of me saying I personalised the lesson. being created in the image of God was half my lesson. It helsp answers the 3 biggest questions in life- who am I, where did I come from and what does the future hold. I also taught that knowing who he was helped Moses resist the devil.

The other half of the lesson was that knowing that things were created for a reason and along an orderly timetable helps us realise that God has a plan and that he is in control of everything. Both points should give us purpose and confidence. We can make the right choices and increase our faith in God because we know who we are and we can learn who he is, by studying specific examples of his interaction with us.

Oh and the joke was a way of illustrating the figurative nature of 'days'.

[consiglieri]

I would appreciate it if you could briefly tell us what that information was that you were imparting to your class.

The days are presented as two lists of three, which correspond to each other as 1:4, 2:5, and 3:6--

Day One--Creates light, night and day //Day Four--Creates moon, sun and stars

Day Two--Divides water and creates sky //Day Five--Creates fish for water and birds for sky

Day Three--Creates land and plants //Day Six--Creates land animals and man

Day Seven--Rests.

This not only points out the structural beauty of the creation account, but also helps explain why stars, moon and sun are created on the fourth day when light is created on the first, which makes little sense otherwise.

It also helps explain why there are actually eight creative acts crammed into six days, with two creative acts on day three (land and then plants) balancing two creative acts on day six (animals and then man).

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[cdowis]

"I don't mean to throw a monkey wrench into everything, but don't you think you are overly intellectualizing all of this? I mean, isn't the only important thing that we believe that God created the world?"

How would you answer this question?

I would agree with him completely, apologize to the class and seek the inspiration of the Spirit on the next lesson, and stop trying to impress the class members with my intellectual fireworks and stick with the lesson material. (For example, where are Hebrew scholars mentioned in the curriculum materials? Where does it discuss ex nihlo? Who do you think you are talking about such stuff.)

In any case, I think the class member should have brought up your inappropriate teaching style with the SS president, or the bishop.

[consiglieri]

Who do you think you are talking about such stuff.

First Officer of the U.S.S. Enterprise.

(That one's for you, Zak!)