John Shore: Betraying the Spirit: How the Christian Right Gets the Bible Wrong

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I just released UNFAIR: Christians and LGBT Question, the much revised and updated version of my earlier title, UNFAIR: Why the 'Christian' View of Gays Doesn't Work.

Among the most significant new content in the book is this passage, taken from its (now) opening essay, Taking God at His Word: The Bible and Homosexuality:

The Bible isn't a rulebook, and Christians cannot lift out of its context any passage from it, and still hope to gain a clear understanding of that passage.
It is important to understand that even the most fundamentalist Christian sects do not take the Bible wholly literally. The New Testament is two thousand years old, the old Testament much older. The Bible's cultural contexts, along with the translation at hand, is always taken into consideration by any Christian serious about understanding this vast and complex work.

To excerpt any isolated short passage from the Bible, and then claim for that passage absolute authority, is to fail to take the Bible on its own terms. If we wish to follow the word of God, then we must take the entirety of God's words into account. For example, when the Bible itself identifies some of its words as proverbs, it is bestowing upon those words less moral weight than other words that it identifies as commandments. The Bible itself tells us that some of its contents are songs, some visions, some histories, some dreams, some parables, and some commandments. The Bible itself also instructs Christians that New Testament moral directives supersede Old Testament moral directives. The Bible itself tells us that its moral principles supersede any of its moral "rules."

The context of any Bible passage is as integral to its meaning as the passage itself. It may be appropriate to give equal weight to each clause within a business contract, each step within a set of mechanical instructions, or each rule within a game rulebook. But the Bible itself tells us that the Bible is not a uniform document, with each passage spelling out something clear and specific, and all passages having equal value. The Bible is not a rulebook for being Christian. We would be foolish to fail to understand that not everything in the Bible is a commandment, and that Christians cannot take a small section of the Bible out of its larger context, and still hope to gain a clear understanding of that section. Isolating a clobber passage from its context, and then claiming a sort of moral helplessness because "it's in the Bible," is failing to take the Bible either literally or seriously.

The Christian right, in other words, is getting--and has always gotten--the Bible wrong. And the excruciating irony of it is that they treat the Bible in precisely the manner they're forever accusing the Christian left* of treating the Bible.

The most dependable weapon in the arsenal used by Christian conservatives against their liberal counterparts is the accusation that liberals fail to take the Bible seriously.

The conservatives' kill shot has always been a silver bullet with four words engraved into it: "It's in the Bible."

A wife is to submit to her husband. A woman shouldn't speak in church. Spare the rod, spoil the child. The Earth is the center of the universe. God's plan is for the white man to have slaves. Gay people are a moral abomination. People who die without having accepted Jesus Christ as their personal lord and savior must spend eternity burning in the hellfire of damnation.

The conservative Christian makes this sort of ruinous proclamation, and then shrugs innocently, smiles with humble assurance, and says, "Hey, it's not me saying it. It's in the Bible."

But much like the Hollywood movie publicist who cobbles together a glowing review from a savage one by carefully selecting from the latter a few choice words and then tossing the rest, the Christian right is ignoring the entire point of the Bible. Repeatedly, and in no uncertain terms, Jesus insists that equity, compassion, humility, fairness, and love supersede any specific "rule" in the Bible. Christ instructed us not by prohibiting specific behaviors and prescribing others, but rather, in principles and parables, making clear that he expects us to use our hearts, minds, and the Holy Spirit to translate his words into actions appropriate to our time and place.

God is all-powerful. If he wanted Christians to follow a simple, clear set of rules, then the New Testament would be a simple, clear set of rules. But it's not. Because God wants Christians to think more than that, to intuit more than that; God wants us to be more than that.

The Christian right only pretends to take the Bible seriously. But what they actually do is to take out of context, and then take very seriously indeed those few and far between words in the Bible that serve to bring them (gee, what a coincidence) the very power that they want.

They do not serve the Bible. They use the Bible to serve themselves. And, incredibly enough, they've learned to turn that fact into the ultimate in offensive weapon.

* * * * * * * *

*I personally am neither a liberal nor conservative Christian. I'm an Unfundamentalist Christian. If you are, too, come join us where we do our thing on the UC Facebook page.

Follow John Shore on Twitter: www.twitter.com/johnshore

Get Alerts I just released UNFAIR: Christians and LGBT Question, the much revised and updated version of my earlier title, UNFAIR: Why the 'Christian' View of Gays Doesn't Work. Among the most significant new c... I just released UNFAIR: Christians and LGBT Question, the much revised and updated version of my earlier title, UNFAIR: Why the 'Christian' View of Gays Doesn't Work. Among the most significant new c...

Bible in Norway is Bestseller; "The Scriptures" is surprising strong in the largely Secular country

OSLO, Norway - may sound like an unlikely best-seller not. 1 for any country, but in Norway - one of the most secular Nations in an increasingly godless Europe - popularity beyond control of the Bible has caught the country by surprise. The Scriptures, in a version of new Norwegian language, even surpassed "Fifty shades of gray" to become the Best Seller of Norway.

The sudden explosion of interest in the word of God has been extended also to the stage, with a six-hour game, called "Bibelen," Norwegian for "the Bible", drawing 16,000 people in a run that just ended in one of the most important theatres in Oslo for three months.

Officials of the Lutheran Church of Norway have left to call it a spiritual awakening, but come the new interest in the Bible as proof that still resonates in a country where only 1 percent of the 5 million residents regularly attends church.

"Thoughts and images of the nature of the Bible have an impact on how we experience reality", said Karl Ove Knausgaard, one of several famous authors of Norwegians are enlisted to help with the translation.

The scholars not surprised by the success of the games or the new translation of the Bible, explaining that faith is a deeply personal matter in this Scandinavian nation taciturn regularly removed from the life of the city for holiday cottages remote in the solitude of the forest, fjords and mountains.

"Church attendance is a poor measure of the Norwegian State of faith," said post-doctoral Thorgeir Kolshus at the University of Oslo. "Religion is a very private thing for Norwegians".

Anne Veiteberg, editorial director of the Bible Society of Norway, said that probably also increased immigration has been a factor.

More than 258,000 immigrants have settled in the country during the last six years only, adding diversity of race and religion. The Church of Norway estimates that around 60 percent of immigrants are Christian, while the rest are Muslims, Buddhists or Hindus.

"Now that we are exposed to other religions, Norwegian have gotten more interested in their own faith," said Veiteberg.

Launched in October of 2011 by Norway of the Bible Society, the new translation replaces an edition of 1978, with the aim of improving the accuracy and legibility. For example, in the previous version, Maria was called "Virgin". In the new translation it is known as a "young". The Conference of Catholic Bishops of the United States also made this change in its most recent translation of the Bible in 2011, saying that change does not alter the teaching about Mary, but it was meant to deal with the possible meanings of the Hebrew word "almah" in the text.

The Bible Society of Norway promotes new translation as a novel of pop fiction, stirring anticipation giving teasers of Bible stories before its release.

It turned to poets and authors as Knausgard to sing and echoes the text for a new generation. And it was packaged in a variety of ways, targeting adolescents with pink leather or denim-covered and adults with bridal or sophisticated literary covers.

"It's easier to read," says Helga Haugland Byfuglien, Presiding Bishop of the Church of Norway. "There is no lack of the text".

Almost 160,000 copies sold and was a bestseller in Norway in 2012. Church officials acknowledge that strong marketing campaigns helped to explain the strong sales.

Like many other European Nations, Norwegians have suffered decades of secularization as religion has taken a step back to other activities. Fiercely bet by the interference of the weekends with skiing, hiking and other outdoor activities, leaving little time other than Christmas or Easter to fill the pews.

Last year, Parliament decided unanimously to put an end to the situation of the Lutheran Church as the official religion of the State.

Erik Ulfsby, artistic director of Det Norske Teatret, who put in scene the work 'Bibelen', said that although the Norwegians do not go to church, still see the Bible as an important part of its literary heritage.

"(The Church) wants that you agree with your interpretation, but the theater gives you the opportunity to think out loud and discuss the Bible," he said.

Certainly, the play, directed by Stein Winge, offered a non-traditional interpretation.

For example, instead of dying on the cross, Jesus was confined to a mental hospital and finally executed by lethal injection. And, at the wedding at Cana, show attendees saw that Jesus is portrayed as being drunk when he changed water to wine.

"Bible" is not the first religious production than Norwegians at the edge of their seats. Renowned actor Svein Tindberg has organized three monologues based on the Bible, each more successful than the previous.

In the mid-1990s, "The Gospel" was scheduled to run for 20 nights, but was such a success that made 220 nights Tindberg. His most recent production, "Children of Abraham", opened last year and has sold 52,000 tickets, compared with 1,000 expectations - surpassing "Evita" in Norway.

Despite the little Orthodox artistic interpretations that arise, the religious authorities in Norway are adopting the concept of living religion through art.

"Even if you don't believe that the core of the message, the Bible has a rich and meaningful stories", Byfuglien said. "Culture breaks religious shyness that people have in association with the Church and is a way for those who have distanced themselves to experience in an interesting way".

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