As we square up over values, remember Bible belongs to us all

Published on Thursday 22 December 2005 00:50

THE ruling by a federal judge that "intelligent design" cannot be taught in biology classes in a Pennsylvania school district has the potential to put the teaching of the Bible back where it belongs in US schools: not in the science laboratory, but in its proper historical and literary context.

Though the far right may complain that the academic approach to teaching the Bible locks God out of the classroom, and the far left may complain that it sneaks God in, most Americans would embrace it.

Moderates can show that the Bible is not composed entirely of talking points for the religious right. On a range of topics, including respecting the value of other faiths and shielding religion from politics, it offers powerful arguments for moderate and liberal causes.

In the story of David, the ruthless king who unites the tribes of Israel but is rebuked by God when he wants to build a temple, the Bible makes a stirring argument for separating religion and politics.

In the Book of Isaiah, God embraces the Persian king Cyrus and his respect for different religions, even though Cyrus does not know God's name and does not practise Judaism. By calling Cyrus "the anointed one", or messiah, God signals his tolerance for people who share his moral vision, no matter their nationality or faith.

In the Book of Jonah, God offers a message of forgiveness and tolerance when he denounces his own prophet and spares his former enemies, the Ninevehites, when they repent and turn toward him.

In recent decades, the debate over religion has been characterised as a struggle between two groups that Noah Feldman calls "values evangelicals" like Roy Moore, who placed the Ten Commandments in the Alabama supreme court, and "legal secularists" like Michael Newdow, who attacked the use of "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. This debate does not represent reality.

The Fourth National Survey of Religion and Politics, completed in 2004, shows that only 12.6 per cent of Americans consider themselves "traditionalist evangelical Protestants", which the survey equates with the "religious right". A mere 10.7 per cent call themselves "secular" or "atheist, agnostic". The vast majority are what survey-takers term centrist or modernist in their religious views. They welcome religion in public life but are turned off by claims of exclusive access to God.

At a time when religion dominates the headlines - from Iraq to stem cells - finding a way to educate the young about faith is essential.

The extremists talk about religion - and spew messages of hate. When flamethrowers hold up Scripture and say, "It says this," moderates must hold up the same text and say, "Yes, but it also says this." The Bible is too important to the history of Western civilisation - and too vital to its future - to be ceded to one side in a debate on values.

• Bruce Feiler is the author of Where God Was Born: A Journey by Land to the Roots of Religion.