Bible ... Theology ... Church History ... Greek ... Hebrew:

This is what we're about at the Department of Biblical and Religious Studies at Grove City College.

We aim to help all students at the College, majors as well as others, to grow in the ability to think through their understanding of the world, why they think the way they do, and how the implications of their views affect their lives.

We desire students to learn to analyze issues and ideas with sensitivity to literary style, historical context, philosophical understanding, and religious teaching.  While we ourselves teach from a deep commitment to a Biblical worldview, we want students to come to their own conclusions in the midst of hearing the arguments showing the strength of Christian teaching and faith.  Thus, we have both a deep traditional/classical Evangelical Christian commitment in the Department and we share this as well as a desire and teaching method that encourages students to learn how to think for themselves.   

We hold to a very high view of the authority of Scripture, contending as one great confession of faith puts it that "the Bible is the only infallible rule of faith and practice".  From this perspective we teach and seek to learn bringing "our thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ" (II Corinthians 10:3).

We also believe that students need to learn how to read Scripture well.  This means that we stress historical context, literary genre, and primary purpose of the Biblical text as well as application to present life situations.  Indeed, we believe that without the strong emphasis on contextual reading we truly miss the right kind of applicability to which Scripture calls us.

Theology and history form the other two components of our program as important subordinate studies under Scriptural reflection.  These studies remind us that we all do make systematic truth claims from our Biblical studies and that we do not live in a historical vacuum.  Thus, we need to learn from brothers and sisters from the past and especially make sure our creedal concerns are consistent with Scripture's teaching.

We hope you will be as excited about all of this as we!