“Dr.” David Tee

The last few weeks we have been visited by someone who is claiming to be a “Dr.”, David Tee. It was pretty obvious from his poor argumentation that he has had very little to no training in any sort of academic process, but he kept claiming that he has, and that his degrees are ‘personal’ information (as if anyone who has gone to University in NA keeps that sort of information as “personal”).

Anyways, I decided to do some poking around, who knew, maybe he had acquired some sort of training in a fundamentalist, conservative school? It’s not like Liberty University is turning out the brightest biblical scholars in the world. It could be possible… but, no, it seems my original suspicion might be closer to the truth.

I googled “Dr.” David Tee, and mostly found comments on other people’s blogs. He has some sort of association with the Dakotas Christian Believers Arena.

And he’s self-published… which is where this gets interesting, and a little sad/humorous.

“Dr. Tee has two books he has written

1. What I Have Learned as a Korean Public School Teacher
2. Archaeology and the Unwary Believer

While I could go on ad nauseum about the irony of “Dr.” Tee teaching other people English (seriously “Dr.”, you need a refresher on proper comma usage, co-ordinating conjunctions, and independent clauses. Like, real bad.), I’ll let the back cover of his book on teaching demonstrate:

Wow, that’s a beautiful first sentence… for a sixth grader!

I will profess to being ignorant of the higher education of Korea, but does it seem more probable that “Dr.” Tee was attending a reputable school and in 10 years, while teaching, earned University degrees in theology, church history, and archaeology? Or is it far more likely that he did a couple of online courses and styles himself a “Dr.” now?

“Dr.” Tee also really likes Comic Sans font: I kid you not, his ‘academic’ tome on archaeology is entirely printed in comic sans.

If any actual professors or Doctors are looking for classroom examples of circular fideistic logic, strawmen, false dichotomies, and logical fallacies then this is the book for you: it’s packed! Apparently, that’s what you learn when you get your degrees online.

So, apparently, according to “Dr.” Tee, biblical scholars that disagree with him can’t be honest or are unbelievers. In his mentally stunted mind he simply can’t comprehend how the actual historical process works, and why scholars might come to different conclusions according to the biblical chronology and actual history: that in itself proves his lack of actual academic experience. A good scholar worth his salt does not create a strawman of those he or she disagrees with, or minimizes their position to be swept under the rug with grand sweeping generalizations and false dichotomies.

A good scholar must understand the fundamental issues of another scholar’s position, how and why they came to those conclusions, and must understand that all historical reconstructions are contextual and provisional. I have no problem with someone disagreeing with my work; however, in the academy anyways, you must actually read and try to understand someone first, then offer a counter-argument that deals with their evidence and argumentation, and finally, offer an alternative theory that uses actual data and not just presuppositional theories. Deductive ideas how things “must” work often beg the question and are circular.

I could give examples of how higher criticism actually works, or ask some questions that would require using historical academic skills: how on earth does Darius reverse the decree of Artaxerxes? But dealing with these issues or answering these questions requires actual thinking… something I’m becoming more convinced that “Dr.” Tee is unable to do. Hiding under the rigid deductive shield of fundamentalist indoctrination and false titles doesn’t really help with ‘thinking’.