Tuesday, July 20, 2004

FRANK MOORE CROSS AND ELIE WIESEL are interviewed together and give their views on the Bible in the current issue of Biblical Archaeology Review. The piece is not available online, but you can read a summary of it in this A.P. article:
Cultural titans share thoughts on Bible

Publication links Hebrew professor, Holocaust victim


ASSOCIATED PRESS

They are titans in their respective fields who have taught within miles of each other. But they never met until a journalist brought them together to talk about the Bible.

The talkers were Frank Moore Cross, 82, the distinguished professor of Hebrew literature at Harvard University since 1957 (now emeritus); and Boston University's Elie Wiesel, 75, Holocaust survivor, author and winner of the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize. Their chat was arranged by Hershel Shanks for the magazine he edits, Biblical Archaeology Review.

What attracts Wiesel to the Bible?

"I see history in it. I see revealed truth in it. I see in it human holiness as much as divine inspiration. Whenever you open it, any page, you know you are in the presence of something that exists nowhere else."

And Cross?

He said in the classroom and writings he takes a strictly "scientific" approach. "I attempt to deal with the Bible as I would with any work of literature," and to treat the history of Israel the same as that of England or China.

But along with that there's a private aspect Cross doesn't teach or write about publicly. "The Bible is a book that has shaped my life, my beliefs, my ethics, my moral concerns, my religious outlook."

[...]

As I think I've mentioned before, Frank Cross supervised my doctoral work.

UPDATE: Stephen Goranson has pointed me to the location of the BAR article online.

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