Friends,
I have been a software developer for more than half of my life;
that is more than a quarter of a century. As a new entrant into the software
industry, like many others, my dream was to become another Bill Gates. (Back
then there was no Google or Yahoo; Apple, Oracle and IBM were not prominent
enough.) But, like millions of aspirants, I did not become another Bill Gates.
Apart from his skills and business acumen, there are many factors that
contributed to his phenomenal success.
Had there been open source and freeware software available
at the time Bill Gates founded his Microsoft Corporation, it is unlikely that
he would have reached the heights where he is now. He established his business
empire before Linux and Android and other competitors came on the scene.
Just as me and the millions of other new entrants into the
software industry aspired to be like Bill Gates, many Christians aspire to be
as successful as Joel Osteen, or at least some of the successful preacher known
to them. [Someone may accuse me that I am jealous of Joel Osteen. I am sorry, I
have more reasons to be jealous of Bill Gates, because, it was in software
industry that I invested my youth, time and energy, studying and updating
myself, over and over again.]
Joel Osteen established his empire while the internet was
still in its nascent stage, with connectivity being out of the reach of common
man. He utilized various television channels to reach out to millions all over
the world. He has a captive audience eagerly waiting to watch or witness his
shows. Fortunately for him, most of his captive audience are less knowledgeable
than him, as regards the scriptures. I can visualize their astonished faces while
they listen to him including Prophet Daniel and his friends in the conversation
between Jehovah and Moses. (Such gaffes are not unique to Joel Osteen, many
preachers make such mistakes.)
Once an establishment becomes huge, it becomes inaccessible
to common man. Have you ever tried calling up the customer service of some
giant organization like Microsoft? Once the call is connected to the customer
service number, you are asked to press 0, 1, 2, and so on, ad infinitum, to
connect to a real human being, all the while listening to recorded voices
telling you how great the company’s customer service is. Then you get to speak
to some customer service executive, who is more interested in flaunting his
accent, than in solving your problem.
The same situation arises while a preacher becomes an
establishment. You have a serious doubt about some passage in the Bible or some
issue that begs for the attention of your pastor. But, with a huge crowd
hanging around him/her, it is quite unlikely you will be attended to. If your
doubts could challenge some of the tenets of your denomination or congregation,
I am pretty sure you will not present your doubts in front of your preacher,
fearing excommunication or shunning. And, there is absolutely nothing that
assures you that your preacher has the answers or solutions for your doubts. If
the preacher has no answers, the situation would be really unpleasant. It is
hard to find a preacher who would admit his or her ignorance on a given topic.
(On the 3rd of August 2003, in the early morning, while I was
reading the Bible, I got a doubt and I presented it before our preacher and
some of the elders of our congregation, only to be shunned. It took years for some
of them to realize that they were wrong.)
Just as the internet, with its open source software and freeware,
is adversely affecting the monopoly of big corporates like Microsoft, it is
playing spoilsport in the business interests of preachers. Today, with the
internet (specifically Google and Facebook) you have your answers at your
fingertips, within a matter of a few seconds. (On that morning on the 3rd
of August, 2003, I could get only one answer for my question, today there are
thousands of them.)
The theologians of yesteryears were taught to study the Bible
using Strong’s Concordance, which often aggregates many unrelated words under
one index number. Their knowledge of ancient Hebrew, Koine Greek and Aramaic
were limited to learning the alphabets of those obsolete languages and the
ability to read a few words from Strong’s Lexicon, though they may claim that
they are well versed in all these languages. I need to add this, though there
may be exceptions, it is rare that someone with outstanding academic records
taking up preaching as a career.
Other than some “explaining away” websites like
gotquestions.org, answersingenesis.org and preachers who defend their
preconceived notions, many of the answers that you receive from the internet
may be from people who have invested their time in studying to prove themselves
worthy. Any software engineer, who is worth his salt, can extract Greek or
Hebrew word patterns that matches an instance and infer the meaning in context,
rather than using Strong’s or any other lexicon. Again, manuscripts of the
scriptures are no more within the constraints of seminaries and theological
colleges. You can find them on websites like http://www.codexsinaiticus.org. And
there are wonderful, free software, like eSword, which facilitates fast search
for words and patterns. Hundreds of versions of the Bible are available in
public domain, so that one may compare and study.
World is changing, pretty fast. If you are a planning a
career in preaching for yourself or your son or daughter, please don’t expect
that you could be the next Joel Osteen. A new generation of Bible scholars, who
are content to be loyal to God and His Christ are coming up, and take it from
me, that you will not be able to match their knowledge and insight. You may
argue that the true knowledge comes from the Holy Spirit, but you may find it
hard to prove that these people who are way smarter than you have received
their intelligence from any other source than the Holy Spirit.
In Christ,
Tomsan Kattackal
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