Welcome to the Faculty of Theology's Open Day. My name is Professor Dion Forster.
I am a professor of Systematic Theology and Ethics in the Department of Systematic Theology,
and it is my joy to be able to tell you a few things about the Bachelor of Divinity degree
that we offer within the faculty. Let us begin with a little bit of information about the faculty itself.
The Faculty of Theology is a very diverse community of students and staff.
It is a wonderful place for you to come and study, to learn, to grow, and to prepare yourself for
ministry, for service, for ethics and responsible living. One of the basic questions people often
ask us, is, What is theology? In general, the subject of Theology is a study of the beliefs,
the ideas, the notions, the concepts of what we call Christianity or the Christian faith.
We tend to focus on a number of sources. The first of those, of course, is an understanding
of the Bible; those 66 books of the Bible – the Hebrew scriptures or Old Testament and the Greek
scriptures or the New Testament. We learn about the time in which they were written,
the history and culture of those who wrote them and read them. Then we focus on the message
that is contained within those books and the historical reception – how people have used the
Bible over the centuries to contemporary times. The second area that we focus on, is the history
of Christianity and the church, from its founding just after the time of the writing
of the New Testament all the way to today. For example, why are there Catholics and protestants,
why are there churches like the Dutch Reformed Church and the Methodist Church, what makes them
different from one another, what makes each of those unique, what do they teach and believe, what
are their practices? The history of Christianity or Ecclesiology is the study in which we do that.
The third area that we focus on, is the notion of practical service in relation to the church
or forms of ministry. Not everyone who studies Theology is going to become a pastor or a minister
or a priest; many people become counsellors or journalists or teachers. But we teach you
the kind of skills that you need; things like leadership, understandings of spirituality,
understandings of what it means to be in community, conflict resolution.
For those who are going to become ministers or priests – how to preach, how to conduct
services like funerals and many other things. That is more or less what we cover
in the study of Theology and we go all the way from bachelor's degrees through the Postgraduate
Diploma to master's degrees and the PhD. You will see from the yearbook that there are a number of
undergraduate degrees that you can register for. I am not going to speak about the Bachelor of
Theology or the Bachelor of Theology Youth Work –a three-year degree my colleague will speak about.
What I want to focus on, is to tell you a about the entrance requirements to get into the Bachelor
of Divinity or the Bachelor of Theology. They are actually the same: firstly, you need a national
senior certificate certified by Umalusi and an average of 60 percent (Life Orientation excluded),
and then you need a mark of at least 50 percent in each of four school subjects on the list of
designated subjects. The good news is, in fact, all accredited subjects by Umalusi are recognised now.
To enter the Faculty of Theology, you do not need to write the NBT test (the National Benchmarking Test).
However, if you do want to take it and write it, you can do so.
The details are in this presentation. If it should come to the point where we have to select persons, if we have
more applications than those that we can take, the NBT test helps us to see who has the interest and
the aptitude for the kind of studying that we do in Theology. This is just a brief list of some of
the subjects that are considered; if you come with these kinds of subjects, you will be considered.
Unlike some other faculties, we do not require you to have specific subjects. If you have any of the
subjects with a 60 percent average with 50 percent for four of them (excluding Life Orientation),
you will qualify to be considered for entrance. Which are the kinds of subjects which would help you?
If you are in grade 11 and you are busy preparing and thinking about studying Theology,
some good advice is that you pay attention to languages, to literary subjects,
because, like Philosophy or History, Theology focuses a great deal on literature – the Bible,
historical documents, beliefs, and doctrines. All of these are contained in books. The one thing
that we know about theologians, is that they learn to read and they learn to enjoy reading. And,
of course, we also write a lot. We tend to write a lot of essays, we write sermons, we write talks,
newspaper articles. So, any subject that can help you to develop literary skills, that can help you
to develop as a reader, a thinker, a writer, a speaker – those are going to be the kinds of
subjects that would prepare you to study Theology. What are the possibilities? As I mentioned
earlier, there is the Bachelor of Theology degree or the Bachelor of Theology Youth Work degree.
These do not require the source languages of the Bible – Hebrew for the Hebrew scriptures or the
Old Testament, and Greek for the New Testament. But what we want to talk about today, is the
Bachelor of Divinity degree. This is a four-year professional degree, so when you exit it, you have
the equivalent of an honours degree. The Bachelor of Divinity degree is a degree which is required
by certain denominations for persons to become ministers, for example the Dutch Reformed Church,
URCSA - the Uniting Reformed Church, the Lutherans, some Anglicans,
Methodists and other churches encourage their students to do the Bachelor of Divinity degree.
This degree covers all of the subjects that we spoke about earlier: Old Testament,
New Testament, Systematic Theology (which is about the beliefs – why do we believe in God?,
what is the nature and person of God?, things like the church, what is evil?, what is sin?, how do we
deal with these kinds of issues?, and ethics – if we believe that creation is made good, how should
we live in a way to bless and honour creation?, if humanity is created in the image of God, how do we
safeguard one another's dignity?) Practical Theology, such as counselling, leadership,
spirituality, conflict resolution. And then Missiology – how we establish churches that fulfil
God's will in the world and can best serve people? What sets the Bachelor of Divinity degree apart from
the Bachelor of Theology degree, is that you have to do source languages; you have to do Greek and Hebrew.
And as someone who has done those languages, it may sound a little bit scary, but
it is the most wonderful thing to be able to read the Bible in those source texts, to be able to
read the original text as it was written by the authors, to understand those particular
words in their context – the lexical meaning, the grammatical syntactical meaning. That really is a
wonderful thing. You do that in the Department of Ancient Studies, so you spend some time
moving off our beautiful Theology campus onto the beautiful main campus. The other difference is,
in your fourth year, you specialise in a subject, one of the three disciplines (Systematic Theology
and Ecclesiology; or Practical Theology and Missiology, or Old Testament and New Testament),
or one of the six sub-disciplines and write and do your first extended research assignment.
That prepares you to be able to go on into ministry. In some churches there is the requirement that
you do a Masters’ of Divinity degree, which is a one-year professional degree, a bit like an MBA
for persons who are going into ministry. The BDiv degree gives you entry into that degree;
it gives you that honours qualification. And there you get to really hone your skills.
Just to mention for students who are wanting to enter the ministry of the Dutch Reformed Church,
once you finish the degree, you go into a church and in that practical year you do a Post-graduate
Diploma in Theology and Ministry. You will visit the campus a few times during that year,
but your major work will be done in your church.
This is an absolutely wonderful qualification for anyone who is wanting to prepare
and develop themselves for work of service, for the kind of work that is in the interests of
the common good in society, for persons who are wanting to develop critical analytical skills,
who are wanting to work in things like ethics or counselling, for persons who are wanting to write,
such as journalists or authors. It really is a wonderful degree for you to study.
What does it cost? The Bachelor of Theology degree costs R45 106 per annum
and the Bachelor of Divinity degree costs R 52 060 per annum.
Many of the churches that require their students to come to the faculty, offer some financial aid and support.
We would encourage you, if you are thinking of studying Theology, speak to your bishop,
your moderator or your supervisor of studies, or your local minister, and find out if there
is any financial support to aid you. You can also contact the University of Stellenbosch; there are
sometimes bursaries and loans which are available. You can do that via the details on the screen:
send an email to info@sun.ac.za or phone the number listed there, and they will be
able to point you in the correct direction. If you are interested to apply, if you are
grade 12 this year and you are wanting to join us in in the following year, please remember that
applications open on the 1st of April and close on the 31st of July 2021.
So, to enter the 2022 cohort, you need to apply this year even before you have finished your matric.
If you can do that via the university's website, apply online and then, as soon as your results are received,
you will be notified whether you have a space in the Faculty of Theology.
Colleagues, thank you very much for joining us for this Open Day presentation in the Faculty of Theology.
It is a wonderful community, a great place to study, a wonderful place to prepare for a
lifetime of service, for a lifetime of impact, for a lifetime of learning how to shape and change the
world, and we would love to see you joining us in our faculty. Thanks for being with us today.