One of my favorite courses to teach is "Introduction to Biblical Literature." It is a 200-level course, and therefore only open to upperclassmen. These are college students who have already been around the block once or twice, and they know the rules of the game for getting good grades.

Because the course is a biblical survey, there is a lot of material to cover, and little that can be pursued in depth. Yet, I want my students to think theologically, so I place before the group every year one question that I tell them will be on the final exam. I will ask them to give me some comprehensive ideas for why these writings are collected into the single book we call the Bible, and how this idea weds them together in some form of literary or theological or structural unity.

I tell them that the…