Going To Harvard, or, To the Local Bible College

SUPPOSE YOU'RE IN HIGH SCHOOL, and you have a born again conversion experience. You are saved, have become a fundamentalist, evangelical Christian, and feel the calling to become a minister of the gospel. You want a good ministry, a good career, and for that you need a good education. The local Bible College offers Bible study courses, and a guaranteed job on campus, if you sign a pledge affirming your acceptance of the Bible as the absolute, inerrant Word of God. That's one option. Then there are places like the Moody Institute in Chicago, a reputable divinity school, where you still have the on campus job and the signed pledge, with a little more comprehensive Bible study and church history. A bit more expensive but extensive, a place like Moody. That's another option for you. Then, there are places like Harvard, Princeton, or Yale, some of the oldest and best theological seminaries in America or the entire world. At places like these, there is no signed pledge - they want you to decide such things for yourself - and no on campus job; you won't have time for that. There is, however, the most rigorous, comprehensive Bible study possible, every chapter, verse, and word, covered in depth, courses in Old testament and New Testament, one after another, almost to the point of memorization. Then, there are classes in ancient Hebrew, Greek, and Latin; all the early languages of the Bible; you are required to be fluent in each, and to read the Bible in its original forms and languages. Then, there are the classes in ancient Hebrew, Roman, and Greek history and culture, and course after course in early Christian history, and the historiography of the Bible. You get the chance to attend Harvard, and so you do, Harvard instead of the local Bible college, because, well, you want the best ministry possible, and a Doctor of Divinity from Harvard will get you the very best. And when you graduate from Harvard seminary, you are indeed ready to preach. You have learned the truth, beyond anything you would have learned in Bible College. You have learned that the bible is full of mistakes, contradictions, and outright false statements, and that nobody know who wrote most of the Bible. The errors of fact in the Bible they don't hide or ignore at Harvard - they bring them out into the light for examination. Every professor of theology at every great university in America and in the world knows all about the errors of fact in the Bible, but somehow, those errors never get mentioned or discussed in churches, or preached from the pulpit. People who graduate from Harvard divinity seem to automatically forget their education when they get their fist job, and they never again concern themselves with such matters. At bible colleges people receive the devotional Bible education, and at Harvard they receive the factual, historic, scientific, historical critical method, because, at a place like Harvard, the truth counts. As you nervously ascend the pulpit to deliver your very first sermon, you suddenly realize; you might as well have gone to the local Bible College, because, you value job security, and there is no way your congregation will ever know what you learned at Harvard.