Whale Carcasses, Ghosts, and Biblical Studies

I recently had the good fortune to be able to reread Moby-Dick for the first time since high school. Among other things, I was struck by a short chapter deep in the heart of the book in which Melville describes the disposal of a whale carcass after it has been processed by the crew of a whaling ship. The carcass, it turns out, has a very interesting afterlife as it continues floating at sea, clouded over with “sea-vultures” and “air-sharks” all arrayed in fine back and white suits for a “doleful and most mocking funeral.” Melville goes on to explain how the sight of the vast body, with clouds of birds over it and water splashing up next to it, may later be observed from a distance by another ship. To the untrained eye, from a great distance, such an observation may lead to a misinformed entry in the ship’s log—one that may affect boats and travelers for many years to come. Melville, or rather, Ishmael, explains:

     Nor is this the end. Desecrated as the body is, a vengeful ghost survives and hovers over it to scare. Espied by some timid man-of-war or blundering discovery-vessel from afar, when the distance obscuring the swarming fowls, nevertheless still shows the white mass floating in the sun, and the white spray heaving high against it; straightway the whale's unharming corpse, with trembling fingers is set down in the log—shoals, rocks, and breakers hereabouts: beware! And for years afterwards, perhaps, ships shun the place; leaping over it as silly sheep leap over a vacuum, because their leader originally leaped there when a stick was held. There's your law of precedents; there's your utility of traditions; there's the story of your obstinate survival of old beliefs never bottomed on the earth, and now not even hovering in the air! There's orthodoxy!  

     Thus, while in life the great whale's body may have been a real terror to his foes, in his death his ghost becomes a powerless panic to a world.

     Are you a believer in ghosts, my friend? There are other ghosts than the Cock-Lane one, and far deeper men than Doctor Johnson who believe in them. (Excerpted from Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, [Penguin Classics edition] pp. 336-337.)

For those of us in the field of biblical studies, or even religious studies more generally, Melville’s question is apt, and we would certainly be keen to echo it with our students. Many of us have seen the ways that incomplete or inadequate understandings of observed phenomena—or phenomena that others have observed—give birth to complicated systems of belief which, over time, gain the status of being “right thinking.” Yet when these are not based on a foundation of adequate critical reflection and careful thinking, a whole mountain of doctrine may be formed which later generations accept merely due to its longevity. For each new generation in its own time and place, there are some beliefs, values, and practices which need to be revisited both in terms of their origins and their current significance. Surely this is the responsibility of all educated people of faith, but especially those called to serve in the academy.

But Melville's question, “Are you a believer in ghosts, my friend?” is surely a double-edged sword. The one edge reminds us to  bring a critical eye to the ideas that we receive as part of our religious and cultural heritage. The other edge of this sword, however, reminds us to bring a critical eye to the accepted wisdom of our own scholarly discipline. As many others have pointed out, the field of biblical studies is one where theories and ideas of influential scholars can come to be too easily accepted as true by students and later generations of scholars. (As but one example consider the unfortunate characterizations of early Judaism prominent in some New Testament scholarshp of the 19^th and  early 20^th centuries). It takes careful thought, significant time, and, above all, intellectual courage to revisit the primary sources and the original phenomena that have lead to the development of a particular theory. And it takes more work in addition to articulate a different, more compelling view of the actual phenomena. But this is work that must be done if we are to exorcise the ghosts and not leave ships' logs full of false warnings for future generations.

Whether we work in the church or in the academy, those of us called to an intellectual vocation should work, among other things, against the “obstinate survival of old beliefs never bottomed out on the earth.” Far better—for us and our students—to face reality honestly and openly, allowing our minds to grapple with the world as it is, even as we attempt to do so with an awarenes of the context of our own tradition.