Review of “A History of the Bible: The Story of the World’s Most Influential Book” by John Barton

Author John Barton, a priest in the Anglican Church and Oxford professor, reflects the influence of both institutions in this long and detailed history of the Bible and how it developed.

He calls the Bible a “melee of materials”: a collection of folk memories, myths, and aphorisms subject to vagaries of translation over the years.  He avers that “the history of the Bible is the story of the interplay between the religion and the book—neither mapping exactly onto the other.”  

For example, there are absolutely central doctrines in Christianity, such as that of the Trinity; the “real presence” (in Catholicism); or the organization of the Church itself, that are almost entirely absent from the New Testament. Barton states, “One of my purposes in this book is to demonstrate that there really are irreconcilables: that the faiths that appeal to the Bible are not totally congruent with it, though they are clearly closely related.”

He points out that all printed versions of the New Testament (and he analyses all the major ones) are based on the comparison of various different ancient manuscripts.  Therefore an appeal to the exact wording of the New Testament is fraught with difficulty because of the lack of an agreed text.  As Barton says:

To attribute religious authority to such a document stretches the word ‘authority’ to its limits, and can only be sustained by devising special ways of interpreting this book that differ from those in which others are interpreted.”

This does not, however, stop religious adherents from claiming doctrines are irrefutable because “the Bible says….”

In addition, Jews and Christians both read their version of the Bible as if it were a single book with a consistent theme, but their respective themes are quite different.  The Old Testament is one characterized by the themes of violence and revenge; the New Testament is all about redemption.  Christians emphasize the story of “The Fall” in Eden as an event from which mankind must be “redeemed,” and see the suffering and death of Jesus as the mechanism by which the redemption is effected.  Moreover they employ some very strained interpretations of Delphic prophesies in the Old Testament as applying to or “prefiguring” events in the life of Jesus.  Jews, on the other hand, ascribe little importance to the story of Adam and Eve, and view the Hebrew Bible as a narration of God’s continuing interaction with his chosen people.

Then there is the problem that many passages of the Bible are absurd on their face or at least highly incredible to a modern scientifically educated reader. That is not a new problem for believers. As early as the second century, Christian apologists struggled with some Old Testament passages. Origen was the Christian scholar who came up with the ultimate technique of interpretation that protected the Bible from criticism for its absurdities and inconsistencies.  He said that it should always be interpreted allegorically—to him, the literal meaning of the text was relatively unimportant (and thus, it could be outright false) because the real meaning was hidden or stated indirectly.

Indeed, the need for translation and interpretation represents one of the most enduring problems of the Bible.  Translators often could not come up with literal meanings to correspond to those in the documents they worked with, and thus individual beliefs, pedagogical orientations, and cultural agendas colored their work.

Translators and interpreters had more barriers than just lacking a Rosetta Stone for their work.  For example, scrolls of the Hebrew Scriptures contain only consonants, forcing the reader into a creative process by having to determine contextual connections and inflections. This situation led to a large body of work in Judaism (specifically, the Talmud and the Midrash) to interpret the sacred texts.  Early Jewish sages viewed the lack of “pure” or “objective” truth as positive:  one must come to faith by active intellectual engagement.  Christian scholars were more oriented towards finding the “essential truth” revealed by the Bible, and thus a great deal of violence has been exercised over the years in the attempt to establish a “definitive” version of religious “truth.” 

Another interesting issue in translating the Bible is that the original versions of the various books, having been written by different people, manifest substantially different levels of sophistication and eloquence. For example, the original Greek of Mark is rather rough, whereas Luke and Matthew show a higher level of education. Moreover, Revelation (or the “Apocalypse”) is often ungrammatical. And yet, every English, German, and French translation has chosen to translate every book in a single “voice,” as if it were written by the same person. In fact, the King James Version of the English Bible is often pointed to as a paradigm of excellence in English composition. Barton thinks much could be gained by preserving the variation in diction in the original to the extent practicable.

Bible Translation Spectrum from Logos Bible Software Wiki – see larger here: https://wiki.logos.com/Bible_Translation_Spectrum

It should be noted, however, that freedom to interpret religious texts can go only so far in the real world; the great Jewish philosopher Benedict Spinoza, now recognized as one of the founders of biblical criticism, was excommunicated for calling into question a literal interpretation of the Bible, rejecting the idea that the Bible consisted of “inspired truths.”  His distinction between knowledge and logic on the one hand, and obedience to faith on the other, did not endear him to religious authorities; in 1656 he was cast out of the Jewish community. He believed the Bible should be read and interpreted just like any other book. He rejected the possibility of miracles and doubted the accepted authorship of some of the Old Testament books, proving for example that Moses could not have written all the books of the Pentateuch. One of his most innovative concepts was that people in biblical times thought differently from modern people, an idea that had not been clearly articulated before.

Spinoza

Spinoza might have been pleased by Barton’s use of  comprehensive scholarship in an attempt to right the misconception that the Bible has one definitive meaning.  He shows the stories in the Bible are diverse in style and content, contradictory, and reflect different historical needs.  He contends that the assertion of a perfect fit between scripture and the faiths of either Judaism or Christianity is totally without justification, given the history that he so ably elucidates.

Evaluation:  This book is an excellent and consistently interesting must-read for students of religion.  As for Fundamentalists, they wouldn’t like it….

Rating: 5/5

Published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House, 2019