Ebook: The Sins of Scripture

In the history of the Western World, the Bible has been a perpetual source of inspiration and guidance for countless Christians. However, this Bible has also left a trail of pain. It is undeniable that the Bible is not always used for good. Sometimes the Bible can seem overtly evil. Sometimes its texts are terrible. Bishop John Shelby Spong boldly approaches those texts that have been used through history to justify the denigration or persecution of others while carrying with them the implied and imposed authority of the claim that they were the "Word of God." As he exposes and challenges what he calls the "terrible texts of the Bible", laying bare the evil done by these texts in the name of God, he also seeks to redeem these texts, hoping to recover their ultimate depth and purpose. Spong looks specifically at texts used to justify homophobia, anti-Semitism, treating women as second-class humans, corporal punishment, and environmental degradation, but he also delivers a new picture of how Christians can use the Bible today. As Spong battles against the way the Bible has been used throughout history, he provides a new framework, introducing people to a proper way to engage this holy book of the Judeo-Christian tradition.;The word of God: Why this book, this theme, this author. A claim that cannot endure -- The Bible and the environment: The ethics of overbreeding. The virtue of birth control. The earth fights back. Bad theology creates bad ecology -- The Bible and women. Creation : the woman is not made in the image of God. Sexism in Christian history. The woman as the source of evil. Menstruation and the male fear of blood. Recasting the negativity -- The Bible and homosexuality. The ecclesiastical battle over homosexuality : intense, irrational, threatening, and hysterical. The holiness code from the Book of Leviticus. The story of Sodom. The homophobia of Paul -- The Bible and children. The appeal in the text "Spare the rod." Violence is always violent, whether the victim be child or adult. God as judge : searching for the source of the human need to suffer. God as divine child abuser : the sadomasochism in the heart of Christianity. Moving beyond the demeaning God into the God of life -- The Bible and anti-semitism: Searching for the origins of Christian anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism in the Gospels. The role of Judas Iscariot in the rise of anti-Semitism. The circumstances that brought Judas into the Jesus story -- The Bible and certainity. The symptoms : conversion, missionary expansion and religious bigotry. Creedal development in the Christian Church. Since I have the truth, "No one comes to the Father, but by me." My vision of an interfaith future -- Reading scripture as epic history: The Hebrew scriptures come into being. Escaping the limits of the epic : the prophets, the writings, the dream. Jesus and the Jewish epic. Jesus beyond religion : the sign of the Kingdom of God -- the epic universalized and humanized.