In March 2016 I began a systematic reading of the Bible, no version of which I’d ever read before. I began by reading overviews of the Old Testament and then read the New Testament itself closely, taking notes on personal reactions, and reading commentaries and noting salient points from them. The sources I’m using are as follows:
- Oxford University’s fourth edition of the New Revised Standard Version (2010), with extensive footnotes and introductory and background essays;
- skeptic Steve Wells’ version of the King James Version (KJV), The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible (2013), with Wells’ detailed, sometimes snarky annotations and cross-references to contradictions;
- author Isaac Asimov’s Asimov’s Guide to the Bible (1968, 1969), which focuses on historical and linguistic background of the Biblical texts, often spending pages on obscure place names or lists of begats that most readers skim over;
- believer Stephen M. Miller’s heavily illustrated Complete Guide to the Bible (2007), with chapter by chapter glosses;
- academic Bart D. Ehrman’s The Bible: A Historical and Literary Introduction (2014), designed as a textbook for a semester-long introductory college course; and
- evolutionary biologist Carel van Schaik & historian Kai Michel’s The Good Book of Human Nature: An Evolutionary Reading of the Bible (2016), which applies recent findings in cognitive science and evolutionary biology to understand the how stories in Bible reflect the problems caused by the adoption thousands of years ago of a sedentary life (i.e. agriculture) and the solutions that were found
I read the New Testament over the Spring of 2016, then in early 2017 began from the beginning, with Genesis. Eventually I’ll return to the OT and proceed through the remaining books. Here are posts of this reading so far:
- Reading Around the Bible, 1 (Intro and descriptions of references and commentaries consulted)
- First half Genesis (Feb 2017)
- Earlier posts: Genesis, part 1; Genesis, part 2
- (tbd)
- Matthew
- Mark
- Luke
- John
- Acts
- Epistles, 1 (1 Thess, 2 Thess, Gal)
- Epistles, 2 (1 Cor, 2 Cor)
- Romans
- Col, Eph, 1 Tim, 2 Tim
- Hebrews, James
- 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, Revelation
Bible-Related
- Ehrman, Bart, Jesus Before the Gospels
- Paine, Thomas, The Age of Reason
- Founding Father Thomas Paine and the Bible (8 Apr 2016)
- Reading In and Around the Bible: Divorce and Homosexuality (18 Apr 2016)
