Ways of Knowing
Foundations of Orality
This lesson will focus on the cluster related to ways of knowing, namely the orality traits of logic, learning, and memory.
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Logic
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Making sense of it
Sarai (to Abram): You can see that the Eternal One has still not allowed me to have any children. Why don’t you sleep with my servant girl? Maybe I could use her as a surrogate and have a child through her!
Genesis 16:2, VOICE
😃🤔🤯 Take 10 minutes to reflect and try to imagine being in Sarai’s situation (remember, to this point, God only promised offspring to her Husband). How does Sarai make sense of her situation? Can you understand her?
(Un)logical
When interacting with people, especially from cultures other than our own, their logic may seem unlogical to us, as we can’t “wrap our head around it” and understand their thinking.
Let’s see how approaches to sensemaking are different on the 2 ends of the spectrum:
HOR: People think in spirals and situational. Stories are often used to explain things.
LOR: Thought processes are linear and conceptual in nature. Prinziples are used for explenations.
📔 Read John 3.
😃🤔🤯 Put yourself in Nicomemus’s situation as he tries to make sense of Jesus as the Messiah who is so different from what he expected the Messiah to be. Make a list of Nicodemus’ vs. Jesus’ logic in John 3.
(In)direct
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Watch this short explanation of the elaboration likelihood theory.
The elaboration likelihood model explains how people decide whether to agree with a persuasive message. It says we can think about the message carefully (the central route) or go with our gut feeling (the peripheral route).1
It is a bit like climbing a mountain. We can choose an easier, longer route or a challenging direct route.
The elaboration likelihood model also relates to spiral and linear thinking. Just like climbing a steep slope on a mountain requires special equipment, linear thinking is a learned skill.
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Observe how the Biblical Primeval Narrative and even the giving of the Law follow a spiral thinking pattern.
Bible schools and seminaries around the world teach linear thinking, and that is also reflected in how pastors preach.
Maybe you can’t relate to your pastor’s style of preaching, or are you frustrated that people don’t understand your sermons?
We are not proposing one preaching style over the other. What is important is that the sermons (any teaching for, that matter) are tailored to the thinking of the target culture.
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Check out this video that shows how reading changes the way our brain works.
😃🤔🤯 Did you ever observe something in another culture that does not make any sense to you? What will you do understand the logic behind their thinking?
Learning
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Teaching
With that Jesus finished His teaching, and the crowds were amazed by all He had said. But Jesus taught in His own name, on His own authority, not like the scribes.
Matthew 7:28-29, VOICE
😃🤔🤯 Make a recording of yourself reflecting on what made Jesus’ teaching so amazing and different.
As the title of this certification program suggests, Jesus uses many oral teaching methods. Here a few tendencies of HOR and LOR teaching approaches:
HOR: Teaching is mostly done through oral transmission of information on an as-needed basis. Learning happens informally and is usually practical and hands-on.
LOR: A lot of teaching is done in formal settings such as schools and relies on written text. Learning is often curriculum-based and can be very theoretical in nature.
In/transformation
I will never need this in my life!
Student
That is the sad reality of most educational systems. It’s about teaching the curriculum. It’s about INforming. Giving information.
Jesus’ teaching was all about TRANSformation (move the slider on the image below). Changing lives! 🧠Mind, 💟heart, and 🫴🏾hands…
Even the Great Commission teaches that it is not just about informing people about the Good News. It’s about transformation through the power of the Good News.
Make disciples of all nations: Baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Teach them to do everything I have commanded you.
Matthew 28:19-20, GW
Learning best
What type of learner are you? According to Edgar Dale,2 the more pedagogies are applied, the better retention gets as shown in the learning pyramid below.
The numbers in the illustration are not based on research but help to get the point across, and they are not originally from Dale. Moreover, Dale did not intend to show a hierarchy of learning but rather the involvement of an increasing number of senses used at the bottom of the pyramid.3
😃🤔🤯 Before watching the next video, record yourself talking about what kind of learner you are. How do you learn best?
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😃🤔🤯 Now watch your recording and reflect on this lesson. Make a list of a few concrete things that you will do to make your teaching more memorable & transformative.
Additional resources
🎞️ Watch Charles Madinger moderating this webinar discussion about Orality & Education.
📃 Read this article by Danyal Qalb about oral pedagogies used in a seminary.
Memory
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More than remembering
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The Hebrew word Zakar is often translated “remember,” but it is so much more. It can also mean to “focus attention” or “act upon something.”
The purpose of memory is not just “not forgetting!” It is supposed to transform the way we live.
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Watch this report about the Benin Bronzes and observe how memory, identity, and arts are connected.
In Joshua 3 ant 4, the Israelites crossed the Jordan River.
Go back into the Jordan riverbed to the covenant chest of the Eternal your God, and each carry a stone upon your shoulder, (twelve stones for the twelve tribes of the Israelites) so that we may build a memorial of this day. Someday when your children ask you, “Why are these stones piled up here?” you will tell them how the waters of the Jordan parted as the covenant chest of the Eternal One crossed the river, and these stones will fix that memory for the Israelites forever.
Joshua 4:5-7, VOICE
God used a symbol to engrave this event into the memory of the Israelites that should span generations.
Besides symbols, rituals, and other memory techniques and tools (Shema Israel, Rainbow), God gave instructions to the King:
[The king] must keep this copy with him and read it every day, so that he will learn to fear the Eternal his God and to obey everything in the law and remember all these regulations very carefully in order to do them.
Deuteronomy 17:19, VOICE
😃🤔🤯 Why is God using HOR and LOR memory tools for His people?
Forgetting
Just as learning becomes more effective with more senses involved, memory also improves with more senses involved.
God made us this way, and He wants us to remember His deeds.
Still, after hundreds of years, the Israelites completely turned their backs to God and even lost the law He had given them.
📔 Read the story of Josiah in 2 Chronicles 34:15-30.
😃🤔🤯 Write on a paper some advantages of recorded/written memory.
Different, not better
HOR and LOR cultures employ different memory tools.
HOR: People rely on communal remembering and recalling of information, which is often stored in the arts, stories, symbols, and rituals.
LOR: People rely more on tools to remember. Writing and other recording methods aid the individual’s memory.
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Watch this explainer video on How Your Brain Prossecces Information.
Oral or not, our brains function the same, although they may be trained differently.
HOR cultures may be much better at remembering, but the permeance of written/recorded memory also has its pros.
God wants us to use both the communal memory as the church, the community of believers, and the written testimony of the Scriptures.
Tools and memory
You know what you can recall.
Walter Ong4
Writing things down to remember is a good thing, but at the same time, it robs our brains of the opportunity to practice remembering. In that sense, writing as a memory tool is counterproductive to remembering.
😃🤔🤯 With all the information about memory in mind, think about the culture you are ministering to and answer: What memory tools must I use to engrave God’s message in people’s minds?
Better remembering
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Watch this The Effects of Storytelling on Memory.
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Watch How to Draw to Remember More.
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Watch how a child recites Genesis 9 from drawings.
😃🤔🤯 Make a drawing that will help you remember this lesson better.
Footnotes
- 📃 John T. Cacioppo et al., “Central and Peripheral Routes to Persuasion: An Individual Difference Perspective.,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 51, no. 5 (November 1986): 1032–43. ↩︎
- 🔗 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Dale ↩︎
- 🔗 Harry Cloke, “Edgar Dale’s Cone of Experience: A Comprehensive Guide,” Growth Engineering, June 1, 2023. ↩︎
- 📖 Walter J Ong, Orality and literacy: the technologizing of the word (London: NY: Routledge, 2002), 33. ↩︎
- 📃 “Mobile Phones: The Effect of Its Presence on Learning and Memory,” ed. Barbara Dritschel, PLOS ONE 15, no. 8 (August 13, 2020): e0219233. ↩︎
- 🖥️ DataReportal, “Digital 2019 Global Digital Overview (January 2019) V01,” 40.
🔗 Cora Llamas, “We Are Social Report: Philippines Tops Internet and Social Media Use in 2020,” 2020. ↩︎
🎉Congratulations, you finished this lesson!
Leave additional resources and ideas for others in the 💬comment section below!
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