By SharperIron on
Church & Ministry
Mark Driscoll
Plagiarism

Crossway and NavPress begin reviews of the megachurch pastor’s books amid concerns of plagiarism. WORLD

Discussion

Fri, 01/03/14

Janet Mefferd’s former producer was not available for comment.

"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells

Fri, 01/03/14

Driscoll or his ghostwriters?
Seriously, one of the first lessons in elementary composition is proper attribution and warnings against plagiarism. I don’t think the word ‘mistake’ covers it. However, with the new world of publishing that blogging has created, the lines between plagiarism, copyright infringment, and fair use have gotten a tad blurry.

Scenescape Media

Fri, 01/03/14

The concept of ghostwriters wrankles me ..

I suppose it’s been done for centuries .. but I don’t understand the concept. If a book is written - using someones ideas .. then someone elses words .. then BOTH should get credit. If a person cannot write ( like me.. laugh).. then it should be a collaborative effort and stated as such.

As to plagerism .. well it is dishonest. To take someones words and copy so closely (as was shown in Mefford’s blog posts) .. that was pretty blatant .. and if his name’s on it ( ghostwriter or not) I would think he would be responsible. If he doesn’t have time to be so prolific in his writings .. maybe he should “write” less.

Mon, 01/06/14

I found it interesting how many people are following this. I checked some of the Driscoll books at Amazon—ones that evidence plagiarism, and sure enough some reviewers posted there warning buyers that the book has been found to contain plagiarized material.

The first finding looked like an example of plagiarism due to very poor footnoting, but the later example where entire paragraphs were lifted word-for-word from a commentary was the most troubling.

I also find it troubling that as important as plagiarism is, many evangelicals are far more concerned about plagiarism than they are about Driscoll’s claim that Jesus puts pornographic videos in his mind showing him as clear as watching TV acts of adultery and fornication.