It is less likely today that a person in the United States will know the significance of David and Goliath than a person 230 years ago would know.

David and Goliath is one of the greatest Judeo-Christian legends.

The more I think about this, the more I doubt it. David and Goliath are so tied into the modern dialect of America that knowledge of them is unavoidable. Make the same comment about Delilah and Samson and I'd agree.

Cobra: I attended a dinner party at my Jewish friend's home. At the table was a child of Russian immigrants. The children were sharing how the Russian father had no idea who David and Goliath were.

Chuck Colson likes telling the following story:

I remember when Pope John Paul II said that he would return to Poland if the Soviets invaded during Poland’s period of martial law in the early eighties. Years earlier Stalin had said, “Hah! The Pope! How many divisions does he have?” Well, as a result of the Solidarity movement, we saw how many divisions he had-a whole lot more than the Soviets.

David and Goliath comes up in the news regularly when talking about small companies versus big ones. Today we have television that spreads stories of David and Goliath in easy to understand forms. Literacy is up, and lots of kids read Bible stories, and David and Goliath is basically always included because it's fun and easy and free of some of the nastier elements in the Bible.

Plus, literacy is greatly increased. I think church attendance is even increased.

Rachel: You make some persuasive points. Where I live, less than 10% of the population attends any kind of religious services. The local public schools frown upon any scriptural education. So, people need to be curious if they are going to be hip to Biblical metaphors. As a youth, I did not know Lincoln was quoting the Biblical Jesus when he said a house divided against itself cannot stand.

Hmmm, we had to read a portion of the Bible in high school, and I have no problem with that. It was presented like this:

You don't have to agree with it, but this book has influenced a great deal of the culture and literature in the world, and you should basically be familiar with what it says.

I agree with that. If you're going to live in the US, you should know the basics of the Bible. You can believe or disbelieve it as you choose.

David and Goliath is a tale so archetypal it transcends the Judeo-Christian tradition that gave it birth -- it's much larger than that. It's the tale of everyman up against overwhelming and apparently unassailable forces, armed only with the courage of his convictions. I don't like the conventional uses to which the Bible is put by those groups with which it is most popular, but the fact remains that some of its tales and quotes, considered in isolation, ring true. (Most of my favourites come from Ecclesiastes, as, for example, 4:13: "Better is a poor and a wise child than an old and foolish king, who will no more be admonished.")

So the reason this claim about people in the United States was written was that a person from Russia didn't know about David and Goliath?

John Patrick writes,

In 1987 Allan Bloom’s book, “the Closing of the American Mind”, was published and it has much more to say about the ethical standards of modern society. Bloom analyzed the problem of education more deeply. Like Eichna, he was disturbed but he drew the shattering conclusion that the students had lost their soul, because they had no contact with the cultural foundations of their society. Here is an eloquent passage comparing his grandparents, who were uneducated in the formal sense, with his PhD and MD cousins. “My grandparents held only lowly jobs. But their home was spiritually rich because all the things done in it, not only what was specifically ritual, found their origin in the Bible’s commandments, and their explanation in the Bible’s stories and the commentaries on them, and had their imaginative counterparts in the deeds of the myriad of exemplary heroes. My grandparents found reasons of the existence of their family and the fulfillment of their duties in serious writings, and they interpreted their special sufferings with respect to a great scholars and thinkers who dealt with the same material, not from outside or from an alien perspective, but believing as they did, while simply going deeper and providing guidance. There was a respect for real learning, because it had a felt connection with their lives. This is what a community and a history mean, a common experience inviting high and low a single body of belief.”

I do not believe that my generation, my cousins who have been educated in the American way, all of whom are MDs or PhDs, have any comparable wisdom when they speak of the relation between men and women, parents and children, the human condition, I hear nothing but clichés, superficialities, the material of satire. I am not saying anything so trite as that a life is fuller when people have myths to live by. I mean rather that a life based on the book is closer to the truth, that it provides the material for deeper research in and access to the real nature of things. Without the great revelations, epic and philosophies as part of our natural vision, there is nothing to see out there, and eventually little left inside. The Bible is not the only means to furnish a mind, but without a book of similar gravity, read with the gravity of the potential believer, it will remain unfurnished.

Meta, I appreciate your questions. The father from Russia who did not know the reference to David and Goliath makes me curious as to what kind of culture would produce an adult who is ignorant of this story.

I recall from my childhood reading about Abraham Lincoln. He said, "A house divided against itself cannot stand." At that time, I understood this to mean that a country with a population that disagreed about the role of slavery was facing a questionable future.

Later in my adulthood I read the New Testament and I was struck by the fact that this quote was attributed to Jesus. I had been ignorant of this fact when I first learned about Abraham Lincoln's quote.

John Patrick has a whole list of metaphors that he likes to challenge his audience to identify their source and significance to the culture.

DAVID VAN BIEMA makes The Case for Teaching The Bible in the April 2, 2007 issue of Time magazine on pages 43-44,46.

He writes, "If literature doesn't interest you, you also need the Bible to make sense of the ideas and rhetoric that have helped drive U.S. history. 'The shining city on the hill'? That's Puritan leader John Winthrop quoting Matthew to describe his settlement's convenantal standing with God. ... When Martin Luther King Jr. talked of 'Justice rolling down like waters' in his 'I Have a Dream' speech, he was consciously enlisting the Old Testament prophet Amos, who first spoke those words. ...Kendrick aces the compulsories--notes John Locke's use of the Beatitudes and Frank Zappa's riffs on 'the meek shall inherit the earth,' and ponders why various politicians have found it more convenient to attribute the 'city on a hill' to Winthrop rather than to Matthew."

I was the one who mentioned the Russia thing, not meta. And I think the culture you're looking for is probably this one.

I have an English degree. So yes, I definitely agree that a good knowledge of the Bible is important for understanding American and European literature. Luckily, I went to a ragingly liberal Christian school that gave me a good grounding in the Torah, the Gospels, the Iliad, the Ramayana, Gilgamesh, Beowulf, and the basic precepts of Buddhism, Popular and religious Taoism, and Islam. I simply can't imagine trying to read Moby-Dick without biblical background.

However, much of the literature written in English over the last few centuries is less comprehensible and less rich if one fails to read the major works of Shakespeare, as well, so there you are. Personally, I know which I'd rather have with me on a desert island.

John Patrick writes, "...all societies have a great narrative that provides meaning for life, reasons for bearing sorrows and performing duties, but also speaks to us of our potentialities and logical limitations. The Western world was shaped by the Bible, the Muslim world by the Koran, Soviet Russia by Das Kapital and the pagan world by the
book of Nature."

Jim,

John Patrick is no inherently a better source or political or social commentary than you or I are.

if you look at those letters next to his name, they're all medical degrees, except the BS, which is ultimately, just a Bachelor's degree, a lot of people have them, so what. He's a medical doctor. He wrote a paper, congratulations.

I'd have found the argument more compelling if you'ld either made it personally or it came from a source with some connectivity to culture and literature.

Or if his point didn't boil down to: When I see people who were raised the way I was, it looks like that is a better way than when I see people who do things differently and it feels inherently inferior to me.

Cobra:

John Patrick is a better source of political and social commentary in my opinion. I find his logic and arguments easier to follow than yours.

I am ignorant of The Talmud. I understand that you reference talmudic prophecies.

You wrote,
"The Talmud is a collection of thoughts, essays, papers, etc. by various Jewish thinkers over the years."

Until I am knowledgeable of relevant talmudic arguments, I will reference John Patrick. I respect the way he thinks and communicates.

But Jim, basing an argument in his writings doesn't gain you anything. He's not so famous that everyone recognizes his name. He's not a scholar in the field you're referencing him in regards to, do he doesn't gain much credibility. If you don't care about gaining credibility, that's fine, but if that's the instance, why cite sources?

Cobra,

You write that he is not a scholar in the field I am referencing.

What field are you claiming I am referencing?

One of John Patrick's career objectives is to: To help to relate belief and practice so that the wisdom contained in the ancient religions maintains its influence in medicine and the limitations of determinism are understood.

I cite sources for the following reasons:

* I benefit when others cite their sources. For example

* Others might appreciate the reference. For example

So one of his career objectives is to insert religion into a field where it has little to no place.

Yep, that increases his credibility.

So Cobra are you saying that the Hippocratic Oath has little or no place in the practice of medicine?

That's why it's no longer required of all doctors.

But seriously, The Oath has changed over the years to, among other things, eliminate the unnecessary religious elements. It's also part of the reason that the oath per se is no longer required.