Theology Model Personal Statement
This is a model personal statement by a succesful Oxbridge Theology applicant.
Religious disputes have shaped not only the development of the Christian church, but also the politics, society and history of modern Europe. Alistair McGrath's 'Introduction to Theology' gave me a new understanding of the developments of ideas from ancient concepts such as the doctrine of the Trinity to modern day feminism. It made it clear to me how relevant Theology is in terms of its broadness and depth and how it incorporates many subjects I am eager to study further including history, philosophy, sociology and languages.
Analysis of ancient texts which remain relevant and controversial today attracts me to this multi-facetted subject. Alice Matthews' 'Gender Roles and the People of God' gave me an insight into how mistranslation, misinterpretation and societal bias led to a seemingly cogent argument for the justification of the modern day patriarchy within religion. Matthews' arguments stem from the mistranslation of the Hebrew term 'ezer' as a subordinate helper used to describe the relationship of Eve to Adam, but interestingly also used to describe God. These tensions regarding the approach that women's inferiority is something embedded in the Bible fascinates me when considering the original meaning and context.
Hearing Dr Mihai and Professor Swinburne give lectures, unlocked my interest for arguments relating to God's nature and existence. I explored this in an essay entitled 'Creation is to a creator not as a pot is to a potter but as a dance is to a dancer' at the John Locke Institute on a 3-week summer school. In this essay I argued that the nature of God is more analogous to the nature of a dancer, due to the likeness of a dance to evolution and hence the parallels between the nature of the creator and the dancer. This analogy changed the way I approached theological ideas by removing any prior beliefs regarding God's nature, anchoring it instead in other crucial debates such as the problem of evil and analysing the presence of God's (the dancer's) omnipotence while retaining the spontaneous character of the dance.
Keen to understand further the importance of context within the development of theological texts, I attended a lecture on The Gospel of Judas and was intrigued by the influence of Plato's philosophy. I studied John's Gospel in my own time to learn more about the Hellenistic influence on the Christian tradition. This type of exploration is something I have loved when studying History; gathering incomplete, hypothesised sources and constructing an argument. I am also interested by the impact of religious tensions on politics throughout History, such as in Stuart Britain, and its consequential effects on politics and society.
I chose to focus on the relevance of The Book of Proverbs in today's modern society when researching my EPQ. I argued that the Proverbs are not only of historical significance but also modern relevance in terms of their teachings about relationships with oneself, others and God. The timeless moral teachings found in the Bible prompted me to explore the notion of objective morality and led me to a lecture series on Aquinas' views on natural law. Despite the cultural relativism evident in society, there are reasons in favour of an objective moral truth, just as in Maths there are non-natural objective truths. Studying Maths has therefore helped my rigour in building logical arguments.
Alongside academia, I have the responsibility and enjoyment of being the Head of School, spearheading significant changes, for example: bringing in the charity Mind to train students on peer listening; making counsellors more accessible; and setting up productive student-teacher meetings to discuss challenges within the curriculum. I organised and led a sports day for 300 children and this Community Project will be continued in the future. I also have a wide range of interests including volunteering for Horizons and participating in student plays and dance shows as Ballet Captain.
