It’s worth noting for the general reader here that, according to statistics compiled by the American Academy of Religion, about 55% of all American institutions of higher education that have departments of “religion” are related to religious bodies in some way, even if only historically. The 45% of “secular” schools are mostly public (i.e. state financed), and a few are private and unaffiliated. I am not sure about the ratio among ALL institutions, but I assume it is similar. It is also the case that the vast majority of liberal arts colleges and institutions have at least a historic relationship to some (usually Christian) religious body, although there are always exceptions!

BTW, if I may offer a bit of a clarification for folks. You said, “The scholars who attend this conference all work either in seminaries or in religion and theology departments distributed throughout almost every kind of school nationwide: from public to religiously related to unaffiliated; from tiny and obscure to huge and famous”

A lot of us teach at secular schools (many even state affiliated) and in departments that are not particular or overtly related to religion. E.g., History and Classics. Some are in Linguistics, others in Sociology, Psychology, and so on. I think this is important to remember because I think it illustrates some of what surprised me in our sessions. Many (almost all? I will have to check) of the papers were by scholars teaching in a Liberal Arts context, but within a sectarian environment. My experience has been quite different and I a fair number of SBL members also have a more “secular” experience as well. I wonder what the stats are…

In any event, I think that context certainly changes our perspective on how we teach Biblical Studies (or Jewish Studies, for that matter).

Thanks for the great blog and keep up the dialogue!