Vocation by chance

Christian Century, July 16, 1997 by Martin E. Marty

THE LATE Marvin Pope was a truly distinguished authority on Ugarit, an ancient city, and its language, Ugaritic. He was a scholar's scholar. And though Ugarit and Ugaritic lie beyond the ken of most of us moderns, the ancient Syrian city and language are much studied by biblical scholars, who cite Pope constantly. Many learned from him: from 1949 to 1986 he taught, wittily and profoundly, at Yale.

Holcomb B. Noble's New York Times obituary suggests that Pope, a key figure in producing the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, died as he lived: close to the scriptural sources. "He and his wife had just finished reading passages from the Bible to the congregation [at First Church of Round Hill in Greenwich, Connecticut] and returned to their pew when he collapsed" at age 80.

How does a Marvin Pope become a world-class scholar of an arcane subject that demands great technical skill? Did he get up one morning 75 years ago and tell his parents, "When I grow up, I'm going to be an expert in Hebrew and Ugaritic"? Did he tell his teachers in North Carolina 70 years ago, "Show me an ancient city in ruins or a text that looks untranslatable, and I'll show you a boy ready to become a man devoted to their study"? Let the other Tarheel guys shoot marbles or baskets, collect stamps or girl friends--was young Marvin obsessed with the subjects that became central to his vocation and career?

Rich lives are rarely lived on the basis of such anticipation and focus. Noble describes how accidentally Pope's life work got started. "[Pope] earned a bachelor's degree in 1938 at Duke University, where he was signed up by mistake for a course in Hebrew. He remained in the course, which led him to a master's degree in Semitic languages . . . [and] a doctorate from Yale in 1949."

It might be easier to unearth Ugarit or crack the Ugaritic language code than to figure out what went into the phrase "he was signed up by mistake for a course in Hebrew." Couldn't Pope read the English language of the syllabus? Was an errant functionary at the registration desk guilty of the mistake? Why didn't Pope correct the mistake before he had to show up for class? Let possible answers to such questions quickly fall into the dust of Ugarit: he did stay, got hooked, made something of it and left a rich legacy.

Accidents occur. Contingencies rule much of life. The odds against something happening are trillions of times higher than for its happening. That's how the ball bounces. That's how the cookie crumbles. Faith and theology come on the level of interpretation what does one make of the cards dealt by accident, or as if by accident, in a world and life of chance?

Had the mistake pushed Pope into engineering, would he have become a great engineer? Had a mistake at Protestant Duke pushed him into courses that bred reaction so strong that he fled to Rome, converted and became a priest, would Pope accidentally have become pope? Things happen.

What would history look like had Hitler not served in the army or been a failed taker of art courses? What if Karl Marx had been mistakenly enrolled in a pre-med course and become Dr. Marx?

Such indulgence in fantasy does little to change the world. I let the Pope obituary, about a life changed by a mistake made in college course registration, lead to a celebration of what good people make of bad accidents and the affirmations we get to make in our chancy yet graced lives.