Little Rock Scripture Study

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Liberian

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Folks,

Some months ago a poster asked a question about Bible studies and I mentioned that my church used the Little Rock Scripture Study. While I had not taken part in it myself, my parish has a good priest who would not have gotten anything that was too far off the wall.

I am now taking part in a Little Rock Scripture Study. While it has been generally quite informative, at last night’s study the speaker raised a point that I do not think is in keeping with the teachings of the Church. He said that there is a possibility that I Corinthians 14:34-35, about women keeping quiet in church, was not written by Paul but was a later interpolation. The liner notes in the Collegeville Bible Commentary, which the Little Rock Scripture Study uses, go so far as to say that “According to one view, 14:34-35 represents an interpoolation dating from the end of the first Christian century and expressing a heretical view such as the one challenged in I Tim 2:11-15.”

I gather from the Collegeville commentary that they are considering the possibility that God has allowed heresy to creep into His Word. The speaker gave two or three evidences supporting the idea that these two verses were a later interpolation.

In my view, giving evidences such as this is about as believable as giving evidences that two plus two equals five. Since the Church has declared that the Scriptures are without error when properly interpreted, it really doesn’t matter what sort of “evidences” they can give to support the idea that this is a heretical interpolation, the idea that they are supporting is simply false.

Am I missing something here?
  • Liberian
 
LRSS contains a certain amount of stuff that is speculative.

I’ve used it for my Bible studies in the past, but there were a few times that I simply had the students skip over certain parts, because those parts seemed to go contrary to the Catholic faith, in my opinion.

I also made it clear to the students that they, too, were “theologians” and that their opinions were just as valid as the opinions of the theologians who wrote the commentaries.

The Bible, on the other hand, is God’s word, and if a theologian (whether ourselves, or someone who wrote a book) contradicts the plain sense of the Scriptures, well, then, guess who is wrong. 😃

The LRSS is mostly pretty good, but there was that once in a while when it seemed to go off the deep end, so to speak, and when we couldn’t skip over it, we did discuss it in class, to make sure that the students understood how to discern the plain sense of the Scriptures for themselves.
 
I’m glad to read your “high view” of the Scriptures. I agree with your perspectives.

As far as Bible studies, I have used “Collegeville Bible Commentaries” and “Six Weeks in the Bible” (by Loyola Press).

Collegville is the Scripture and the author’s commentary, but no Q&As. I’ve found them to be good, but without good guidance (from the leaders) some of the studies tend to languish. This is OK, as long as everyone can deal with the pace.

On the other hand, the “Six Weeks” studies are very short and tend to be very directed by he author. There is Q&A and the study is thematic. These studies tend to get very personal, which fo rsome is a great way to learn. Others are intimidated by the personal nature or put off by the non-theolgical bent.

God Bless you -
Steve
 
even if a given passage of a book of the Bible were to be found to be an interpolation by a later writer, it would not change the fact that the entire book is inspired by the Holy Spirit and is part of the book accepted in the canon of Scripture by the Catholic Church, and therefore free from error. Like everything else in scripture, passages such as the one cited must be interpreted in light of time and place of writing, the audience, the circumstances, the context and in light of the entire scripture, and with the mind of the Church.
 
Little Rock Scripture Study is orthodox. The commentaries and the study guides all have the imprimatur and nihil obstat.
 
Lak611,

Thank you for noting that.

I would mention that I once saw a book called “Good Goats” that also has a “nihil obstat” and “imprimatur” and which states that Hell does not exist. I’m a little fuzzy on how this can be orthodox.
  • Liberian
 
Not too long ago I started a thread in which I was lamenting the quality of scripture study courses. Several parishes within driving distance use Little Rock. I was thinking about joining one of those classes next year.

My parish is using a course written by a nun from the Diocese of Fort Worth. While the written material she has left behind may be good, the implementation of the course at my parish is not. You get what you pay for, nothing. 😦

There are no answers to the study questions. If that’s the case, then why do I need the questions? We don’t have any speakers who explain the Catholic interpretation of the study material. How am I supposed to know that I’m understanding what I’m reading correctly? I don’t.

In the end. I’m left to my own devices: five very good Catholic Biblical commentaries. The Collegeville commentary isn’t one of them. I have it sitting in a box to go back to Amazon. In glancing through it, I wasn’t impressed. I’ll take another look, but I’m not hopeful.
 
Leah;

If you have a choice, go with one of the Scott Hahn studies, or Mark Shea, or someone like that.

There is also a study edition of the RSV-CE that is supposed to be very good - I haven’t checked it out, yet, but a priest whose opinions I value raves about it; he thinks it’s the best thing since St. Jerome put the Scriptures into the common language of Latin and enclosed them all in one codex, easy to find, and portable. 😃
 
jmcrae said:
Leah;

If you have a choice, go with one of the Scott Hahn studies, or Mark Shea, or someone like that.

There is also a study edition of the RSV-CE that is supposed to be very good - I haven’t checked it out, yet, but a priest whose opinions I value raves about it; he thinks it’s the best thing since St. Jerome put the Scriptures into the common language of Latin and enclosed them all in one codex, easy to find, and portable. 😃
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I have a RSV-CE study edition written by Scott Hahn. It comes in separate paperback books for each book of the New Testament. It is really good.
 
LeahInancsi said:
In the end. I’m left to my own devices: five very good Catholic Biblical commentaries. ** The Collegeville commentary isn’t one of them. ** I have it sitting in a box to go back to Amazon. In glancing through it, I wasn’t impressed. I’ll take another look, but I’m not hopeful.
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I’ve taken a second look at Collegville Bible Commentary. I think I’ll add it to my ever bulging library. It has some good information on a few passages that I’ve been having trouble with lately. 🙂
 
Catholic Exchange puts out a good Bible Study. You can get info at css.catholicexchange.com
Originally anyone could download it free and I used to do it on my own. Now, the policy has changed and I think it’s only available for group study and there is a charge. It’s definitely worth checking out if you have a group.

Nita
 
Leah,

You’re right; Collegeville Bible Commentary has a lot of good stuff in it. I had simply noticed this one thing (around week seven of a nine-week course) and had been thrown for a loop by it.
  • Liberian
 
StevenS said:
…Collegville is the Scripture and the author’s commentary, but no Q&As. I’ve found them to be good, but without good guidance (from the leaders) some of the studies tend to languish. This is OK, as long as everyone can deal with the pace. …Steve
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I’ve dropped out of Little Rock studies just because the pace was too fast. By the second meeting, people are sitting there with blank pages in their workbook, because they can’t keep up. Such a study plan may work for some, but does not work always and everywhere.

The best bible study I’ve been in was at a Christian Reformed Church. First of all, it was friendly. The leaders were a married couple. They met with other leaders a half-hour before our study began, to huddle about what the objectives were that evening. Then, they met with the group for about an hour. Then, we all got back together in one mass group.

A church deacon, who was the leader of a different group, gave a wrap up of the “chapter” that we focused on that evening. The wrap up went into related and/or parallel verses, and it made everyone leave with a sense of closure about that evening’s lesson.

But, whoa, there, partner! Get your Little Rock study book out and we’re all experts, listing all the reasons why Paul couldn’t have been the author of Hebrews, for example. What a dull topic, about which absolutely no one is an expert. And, once the tone is set to ravage scripture in that way, it’s really a drag (in my opinion) and says to everybody, don’t say anything, because you can’t possibly know anything. because nobody knows anything.

And, in the Catholic Church, you know, we know that we **don’t know **who wrote anything, of course, it’s simple. So, don’t say anything so foolish as, Isaiah says this, or Matthew says that. Because if you do, you’re a fundamentalist!

I hate this trivial pursuit sort of discussion of scripture. I’d rather take a chapter a week, where OH DEAR LORD there’s actually time to READ the scripture DURING the study, for no better reason than to bring everyone up to speed on the reading, to begin with. And, in my view, to actually hear the beauty of the “word of God.”

And, maybe some day:o , we’ll be able to discuss the scripture according to the direction of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, to look at the literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical “senses” of the scripture. Oh Boy, Oh Girl, I can’t wait.
 
Crumpy said:
I’ve dropped out of Little Rock studies just because the pace was too fast. By the second meeting, people are sitting there with blank pages in their workbook, because they can’t keep up. Such a study plan may work for some, but does not work always and everywhere.
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I’ve ordered the study guide, commentary and answer guide to the gospel courses for Little Rock. I’m hoping I can get some good out of just that much.

Last week, I was so discouraged with the scripture study at my parish that I as thinking about starting a small Little Rock study group. The only problem is that I don’t want to ruffle any feathers with the DRE, etc. It’s good to know that it may be too fast paced for some people. That might be a problem in maintaining a group. I wonder if it would be better to meet every other week instead of every week? That is if people wouldn’t lose interest by not meeting every week.
 
LeahInancsi said:
I’ve ordered the study guide, commentary and answer guide to the gospel courses for Little Rock. I’m hoping I can get some good out of just that much.

Last week, I was so discouraged with the scripture study at my parish that I as thinking about starting a small Little Rock study group. The only problem is that I don’t want to ruffle any feathers with the DRE, etc. It’s good to know that it may be too fast paced for some people. That might be a problem in maintaining a group. I wonder if it would be better to meet every other week instead of every week? That is if people wouldn’t lose interest by not meeting every week.
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Another way to do it might be to double the length - for example, if it says, 13 Weeks of whatever, then make it 26 weeks, and just do half a lesson each week, with the video every second week.

What I did when I was leading it (and by the way, there is a four-week leadership training course that you can/should take before leading this, just so you know - do yourself the favour of taking this course and getting your LRSS Leader certificate before billing yourself as a Little Rock Scripture Study leader 😉 ) - I just told the participants to do their best, and at each of the meetings we just went through the questions and had them answer the ones they knew, and then we discussed one or two out of the ones they didn’t do, in the class itself.
 
That’s a great idea about anwsering the questions they know and discussing the others. The biggest source of discouragement is getting stuck on a question because you have no idea were to start. This is supposed to be fun, not agony.
 
LeahInancsi said:
That’s a great idea about anwsering the questions they know and discussing the others. The biggest source of discouragement is getting stuck on a question because you have no idea were to start. This is supposed to be fun, not agony.
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If you’re registered with them as a Leader, you also receive extra Leader resources, as well - they don’t leave you “high and dry.” 😉
 
If you’re going to use LRSS, then you might want to divide the labor.

Although everyone can read the Collegiate scripture analysis, why not ask a different voluteer to wade through that and then call on them to report anything special they found in there.

Another way to deal with time limits is to eliminate or perhaps prioritize which of the LRSS questions are more important.

In my group, people sort of broke down on the questions, and reverted to saying, OK, what does the answer book say? instead of trying to work through the questions. Or, you might skip those questions that had different answers possible, unless someone wanted to hear the different answers.

Also, realize that the accompanying video tapes are optional, as far as I can tell. I heard a couple ideas in there, but I was disappointed that the pace of the video is so fast, I couldn’t even take notes on it. There, too, you might want you as the leader, or someone else to review the tape outside of the group meeting, and then simply to report on any highlights that were most interesting. That would also free up a few extra minutes in the meeting for discussion.
 
I am also currently involved in a LRSS on the Gospel of Luke. I agree that LRSS misses the mark in several places. For instance, when we covered the first chapter of Luke, the commentary in the book and the video kept going on and on about how Mary must have felt at the Annunciation. They kept going on like she was some poor confused little girl who just didn’t know what the heck was going on. I’m sorry, but speculating about how people in the Bible felt and dumbing-down the Blessed Mother are both very protestant practices and borderline on private interpretation.

I’ll stick with this one until it’s over but probably will only do CSS from now on.
 
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