The document summarizes the question ranking results from seminars on the Bible in the digital age, Bible and society, and Bible and history. The top-ranked questions focused on: 1) Defining key biblical terms and how digitization is changing scripture and canon. 2) How the Bible can be discussed responsibly in public and addressed issues like violence and sexuality. 3) Revising historical analyses of the origins of ancient Israel, prominence of figures like Moses, and evidence for biblical accounts like the Exodus.

1. BIBLE SEMINAR
QUESTION RANKING RESULTS

2. ONCE AND FUTURE BIBLE
1. Do we need to lend more precision to our
terminology—what is the difference between
sacred texts, scripture, canon, and Bible?
2. If the Bible gets reconceptualized in the digital
age, will Christianity, broadly speaking, get
reconceptualized too?
3. In what ways has print technology informed and
delimited the modern understanding of the Bible?

3. ONCE AND FUTURE BIBLE
4. Can we ascertain what the conceptualization of
scripture was before the rise of the codex? What is
the relation between scripture and scroll?
5. In what ways is digitization constructing scripture
and canon differently than the book form and
print-technology?
6. In what ways has the codex form of the Bible
informed and delimited the modern
understanding of scripture and canon?

4. ONCE AND FUTURE BIBLE
7. What is the relationship between a closed canon and a
fixed text? And are they both tied to the printed word?
8. How are the peoples of other religions imagining their holy
books today, or historically for that matter? How is the digital
revolution impacting them? What can we learn about the
Jewish and Christian Biblical imagination by the
comparison?
9. What do we know about written media technology when
the writings of the Hebrew Bible were being collected?
10. Scholars for a couple generations have argued for the
importance of the connection between Christianity and its
identity as a book-religion with the rise of the codex. Roger
Bagnell has just written a book arguing scholars of early
Christianity have grossly overstated the case. Are we due
for a reassessment and what does it look like?

5. BIBLE AND SOCIETY
1. Can the Bible be read meaningfully within a
scientific, technological and planetary
perspective?
2. Who speaks for the Bible today? How can the
Bible be read, discussed, debated, and employed
responsibly in a public venue?
3. What should critical readers of the Bible do with
such texts that depict divinely-ordained or
initiated violence? Is it enough to understand
such texts, or should they be expunged from
scripture?

6. BIBLE AND SOCIETY
4. Is the Bible still a resource for a society in which inter-
dependence and equality, not patriarchal domination
are the hallmark of life for a liberated life of women
and men?
5. Can investigation of the basic metaphors and
assumptions of debt and obligation in the Bible throw
significant light on the problem of
individual, corporate, national, and global debt?
6. Does the Bible have anything significant to say to other
religions that transcends the tribalism of its temporal
frame?
7. What can and should a responsible reader of the Bible
say about the question of homosexuality within the
public forum?

7. BIBLE AND SOCIETY
8. Has the Bible been replaced by film as the vehicle
of meaning for human life?
9. What does the Bible say about marriage and
family values?
10. Can the utopian aspects of certain biblical texts
be embraced without aiding and abetting the
denial of human limits and death?
11. What does the Bible say about the American
mono-myth of the rugged individual hero, who
uses violence as a legitimate means to an end:
Dirty Harry: “Go ahead, make my day.”

8. BIBLE AND HISTORY
1. What is the current status of our understanding of
the origins of Ancient Israel and Judah? How does
one define terms such as
Canaanite, Amorite, Hebrew, Israelite, Judean, et
c. and track their historical development and
interrelations?
2. To what extent does Wellhausen’s documentary
Hypothesis of the origins of the Torah/Pentateuch
still serve as a standard for literary analysis of the
Hebrew Bible? How should these analyses be
revised or should they be discarded all together?

9. BIBLE AND HISTORY
3. What can be said about the historical Moses and
the date(s) and origin(s) of the legal tradition(s)
that are associated with him?
4. What is the historical evidence (archaeological &
literary) for the biblical account(s) of the Exodus
from Egypt?
5. To what extent does Gunkel’s analysis of the
genres of myth, legend, and historical narrative still
serve as a standard for literary analysis of the
Hebrew Bible? How should these analyses be
revised or should they be discarded all together?

10. BIBLE AND HISTORY
6. Can the United Monarchy under David and
Solomon be historically documented or is it largely
fictitious?
7. What can be documented regarding the
historical Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as
the nature of the Hebrew Bible genealogies in
general?
8. What is the historical evidence for the
enslavement of the Hebrews in Egypt and the
accounts of Joseph and his brothers in the biblical
narrative?

11. BIBLE AND HISTORY
9. What led to the rise of the so-called Divided
Monarchy of Israel and Judah in the 9th Century
BCE? Was it the result of the breakdown of the
United Monarchy or were they kingdoms that
emerged independently at roughly the same
time, along with Edom, Moab and Ammon?
10. How many voices are there in the Isaiah literature?