The Nutty Professor

We have all heard of the nutty professor who is perhaps a little eccentric but basically harmless but what of the other kind who assumes the mantle of a great purveyor of truth but is actually full blown insane. What if a professor told you that there are trolls living under the bridge and he meant it! What if he thought the world is 6000 years old and had book to prove it and would kill you if you disagreed then he would be truly malevolent. What if he thought there are angels floating around but you just could'nt see them or had no proof of their existence only second hand accounts of them and would kill you if you did'nt believe that.Then he would be dangerous.Supposing he spent his entire life theorizing about the trolls under the bridge which no one ever sees and has the audacity to call himself a scholar of trolls.That person would be a joke and a laughingstock even among polite society. However substitute angels for trolls and you have a religious scholar the world's foremost oxymoron.Although someone has read and studied something and can recite it forwards and backwards that does'nt mean what they have studied has any validity.Aztec scholars no doubt knew the intricacies of tearing a beating heart from someone and Marxist scholars had an in detailed knowledge of the labour theory of value. Confusing an in depth knowledge of something however ridiculous with actual knowledge is a category mistake.The next time you see a religious scholar with their unique hat or headgear and each group invariably has their own hat because somehow you need a hat to be wise think past the decorations and ask just how absurd are their pronouncements.Give the religous scholars all the respect they deserve.