I have finished reading the whole bible in a year

February 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment

And so, as with all good things, my journey through the bible has come to an end*. I set out on 1st January 2011 to follow a reading plan and work through the whole bible in a year. Okay so there appear to have been a few days when I didn’t manage it but there were good reasons, being unwell, being too busy or away and being not-bothered to name a few. However I have now reached the end. I have also written mini book reviews of each book of the bible along the way. I tried to review them in the light of what they were about and how they read, in other words to be quite subjective. I didn’t write any theology along the way… well I may have lapsed once or thirty odd times. I haven’t checked but I think I managed to write something about every book, so not bad going.

Bible read

Thoughts

As I read through the whole bible I did have one or two thoughts that I will share. The first is how much emphasis my own religious tradition puts on certain passages above others. I suppose this is only natural but you can see where over the years the church and its various incarnations and denominations have chosen one passage to have significant importance above others. The whole faith verses works issue is one that springs immediately to mind.

In a similar vein is how some people take some passages literally and others not. This is quite difficult and people far more cleverer than I spend time mulling this over. The problem, in my humble opinion, is when people far less cleverer than them decide what verses they will or will not take literally.

Finally, and this did make me think quite a lot about how I live each day. There is far, far more in the bible about how we should live our lives full of justice, mercy and love to one another than getting into heaven. I don’t want to make light of the eternal nature of the bible, but it does put a much bigger emphasis on  how we live now, than how we will live one day.

Ever onwards

I’ll probably return to some of the issues that I have mentioned above, but not for a little while. I thank you for sharing this journey with me. I decided to create these posts to make myself accountable, so dear reader, thank you for keeping me to account.

If you want to see all the posts they are tagged ‘bible in a year‘ so you can browse through them at your leisure.

As a pre-cursor to my footnote below, when I say the whole bible I haven’t actually read the apocrypha in this reading plan… what did I say above about my tradition ;)
*I have read the whole bible before, but it has been a few years since I sat down and did it in such a short period of time. I do recommend it.
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I’d like to teach the world to sing – Psalms: a review

February 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment

I like writing songs, I have since I was knee-high to Richard Kiel. I also like poetry although I don’t spend nearly enough time writing it to be particularly good. What I love is the emotive side of songs and poems. I love the way they can evoke strong emotions, vivid memories and spiritual awareness. Now if only there was something similar in the bible… ta da!

Time to sing

This isn’t Karaoke

And so I come to the final review in my journey through the bible in a year. Psalms is the other book that has accompanied the reading plan of Old and New Testament books. It is a collection of songs and prayers, that cover a wide range of emotions and feelings. We have unbridled joy, deep despair and calls to God to exact Godness on the writer’s enemies. At times theses are easy to read, Psalm 23 is pretty well-known and a couple of lines quoted when the going gets tough can be quite reassuring. But other Psalms are a little uneasy, the ending of the Psalm that Boney M immortalised in their song, By the rivers of Babylon, is often quoted by those who have a few questions about the whole, God is love thing (Psalm 137).

Psalms isn’t written by any one person, although many of the them are given an author and King David gets quite a share of the royalties for this lot. Whether he actually wrote them or his ‘band’ we’re not sure, but many relate to specific incidents in his life. The saying and singing of Psalms played quite a role in Jewish worship, so it involved ‘professional’ people within the religion.

The word of God?

One thing that hit me while reading the Psalms was the nature of what the bible is. One end of the Christian spectrum would say that the bible is God’s Word. However these Psalms are so personal to humans, and their individual experiences and feelings, that to say it is God speaking would not be true. But I am getting a little off track, this is supposed to be a review and not a theological treatise on what the bible is. However, it once again points out the humanity of the words on the page.

I liked the Psalms, they are real, authentic contain real human emotions and real human failure. They are colourful and raw, inspiring and devotional. I wouldn’t say I enjoyed reading them, but I was moved.

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The numbers of the beast – Revelation: a review

February 18, 2012 By Leave a Comment

We love a good conspiracy theory. We like a good mystery. We simply adore being able to work something out and prove it. This is the human condition and it has helped us discover gravity, atoms and many other wonders. It has also led us to make amazing claims about the book of Revelation, the last New Testament book in my journey through the bible in a year.

The beast

Algebra and calculus

I was taught a lot of mathematics at school that I have never been able to use in my life since. What might have been helpful was if I had been taught how to understand the numbers of the book of Revelation, because they seem quite important. To be honest any help I could get to try to understand what is going on here would help!

The apocalypse

Revelation is written by John, although exactly which John can’t be proved. It begins in the form of letters to seven churches, or their angels, and then turns into something that is more difficult to understand than an episode of Noel Fielding’s Luxury Comedy. Once again we have strange language that is similar to the book of Daniel and some of Ezekiel. We have beasts, dragons, prostitutes, crowns, horns, multiple heads, a lake of fire and 666. And the thrust of the book is essentially that there will be suffering but then God will sort everything out.

So what does it mean?

The book could be historical, all about events that concern the first readers at the end of the 1st century AD. It could be prophetic, beginning with the time of the first readers and ending when the world ends (2012 isn’t mentioned). Or it could simply be symbolic and mean very little to any specific historical events. The other option is to see it as futuristic, with no relevance to the first recipients and only dealing with events to come. How you choose to see it has a lot to do with whatever church tradition you are currently with. Personally, I am uneasy with making any literal predictions based on something so weird and wonderful.

And the point is?

I suppose there are two opposite approaches that are unhelpful. The first is that we obsess and worry about what and when these sometimes frightening events have taken or could take place. The second is that we simply ignore the book as mumbo jumbo, because it’s too difficult to make out any sense. If there is any point to the book being in the bible then we have to find some mid point. What did help, once again, was reading it over a relatively short period.

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Planning permission – Nehemiah: a review

February 18, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The Jews who wanted to, have returned from exile. Jerusalem is once again being lived in. However the city needs a little bit of urban regeneration. The once mighty city is still little more than ruined shell of its former glory. Step forward Nehemiah, royal cupbearer (an important and trusted role in Persia) and now civil governor.

Build the wall

Dear diary

The penultimate Old Testament review in my bible in a year is a little strange. The book is a mixture of narrative, more lists of names and quite a few prayers. In fact it felt like it was a personal diary. I could imagine Nehemiah using live journal if he had been around a few years back.

Nationalism?

I found some of the content a little difficult too. There was an emphasis on nationalism that I found a little uncomfortable, but then I have never been much of a nationalist. Nehemiah’s concern was that the nation had been exiled because they had not followed the law. This included the marrying of Jews to other nations. It also meant that the law, and the application of the law needed to be followed a little stricter in the future.

In short Nehemiah institutes a national purity based on the law. At the same time he makes sure the city of Jerusalem is fit to keep this reborn nation. He organises the people to fix the broken city wall and protect the city from those who want to see it remain a ruin.

Nehemiah is dedicated, he is a visionary and he is focussed on the job at hand. He isn’t swayed by popular opinion or discouraged when others turn against him. All attributes that make great leaders both in the past and today.

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A fool such as I – Proverbs: a review

February 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Isaac Newton’s third law states

To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions

My physics 101 brain likes to interpret that as, if you do something to something there will be a reaction. In turn I like to think that this is also my summary of the book of Proverbs.

The domino effect

Collected wisdom

During my journey through the bible in a (almost) year, I have been reading some Old Testament and New Testament each day. The reading plan has also thrown in a little something extra each day too. Proverbs is one of the books that has been thrown in and I’ve now come to the end of it.

The book is basically a collection, from multiple authors, of common sense sayings. They can pretty much all be summarised as ‘if’ ‘then’ statements, for they almost always fall into this parallel pattern. There is a definite cause and effect style, which would fit very well into a National Curriculum for young Jewish children at the time of Solomon.

Live long and prosper

One of the main characters in Proverbs is the fool. He is ridiculed and compared unfavourably with the wise person. And that really is what the book is all about. It instructs the reader to live life to the fullest. It is an instruction manual, a sort of 3,000 habits of highly successful people. As I read I couldn’t help comparing the black and white of Proverbs with the grey of Ecclesiastes. Just like Newton’s laws have been developed by later physicists, the cause and effect of Proverbs isn’t the whole story for a wise life.

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I am a number and a free man – Ezra: a review

February 12, 2012 By Leave a Comment

If you like 1 Chronicles then Ezra will be right up your street. If like me, you have the odd book in the bible that you are not too keen on… such as 1 Chronicles, then your heart may just dip a little. Ezra is pretty similar in style and content to the aforementioned Chronicles part une.

Could you come to a meeting?

Just like 1 Chronicles, Ezra is pretty full of names and numbers. It heralds the return of the family tree and lists all the good and dutiful. It also contains letters of authority and permission. This makes it more like a local council’s minutes than a piece of sacred writing. Perhaps a little context is required. Ezra was an official in the court of Artaxerxes, and was in charge of Jewish affairs. The book that bears his name talks of two accounts of exiles returning to Jerusalem, to rebuild the Temple and to then rebuild their spiritual lives. With this in mind it is no wonder that it reads the way it does.

The minutes

I’m not a lover of minutes and business meetings. I do like knowing what to do though. I like my meetings to have outcomes and action points. Ezra does have that. There is a lot about dealing with opposition, both physical and spiritual. The whole point of Ezra is to show that merely being somewhere isn’t enough, there has to be related action. Now if only that could have been said without all the names and numbers :)

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The best of the best sir – Malachi: a review

February 9, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Welcome to another one of the prophets whose name I associate with the wonderful beards of the Amish. Although actually now that I think about it, I believe it may have more to do with Stephen King and Children of the Corn than any religious community (okay Children of the Corn is about a religious community albeit of a slightly different outlook).

You looking at me?

Malachi is another prophet and his style fits right along with the traditional Old Testament type. Malachi is the most recent of the Old Testament prophets. He probably spoke after the Temple had been rebuilt once the Jews had returned from exile. So new Temple, new start… but same old people.

This is my house

The main theme of Malachi is about being honest in worship. It is about the giving of the best to God. The people had been offering blemished animals for sacrifice when there were unblemished available. In other words the people were paying lip service by offering their least and worse to God.

However, like all good prophets Malachi can also look past the mess of today to see a better future. He uses the language of the Day of the Lord, to talk about when God will return to the Temple. And seeing as the next book in most bibles is Matthew in the New Testament, it makes you think once again about the significance of Jesus and the Temple. But that’s just a thought to leave you with. Next on my trip is Ezra, see you there.

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Has anyone seen God? – Esther: a review

February 8, 2012 By 2 Comments

Call me old-fashioned but surely, when it comes to the Bible, the main character should at least get a mention. I’ve just finished Esther and although I knew it before, once again it struck me that God doesn’t get a mention. There is celebration and praising so implicitly you could argue a case, but it would be a very weak one.

The girl who would be queen

A Queen at the right time

The story of Esther is that of a young Jewish girl who becomes Queen to Xerxes in Susa in Persia. When she is Queen she gets the King to reverse an order from Haman, who wants to kill the Jews. She then gets the King to go further and in the end Haman gets killed. And to round-up the story the Jews celebrate with the very first Feast of Purim.

Again, implicitly, you could read God into the events. Esther is placed into the royal household at just the right time to make an impact. Through Xerxes becoming distressed through a dream Mordecai, the other main character in the book, is brought to his attention. So looking back on the events you could say that God was working behind the scenes to make sure that the Jews weren’t destroyed as Haman wanted to.

Main character study

Once again though, I’m led to wonder who the main character of this book is. We can read God into it, and I have a little problem with that; if you believe in an interventionist God (as Nick Cave sings) then fine. However, it is very east to miss the other main character through this book and the rest of the bible… humanity! Esther suggests that life isn’t just about God getting on with things, but about humanity getting on with God’s things.

Oh and it’s a pretty good story to read, why not take a few minutes and try it yourself, it isn’t long.

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Thunder and brimstone lite – Zechariah: a review

February 4, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Do you get annoyed with adverts? I’m talking pop-ups on websites and applications. I do, but they are also quite useful. Software developers often off a free or lite version of a product for you to try, and this is often supported by ads. Either you like the software so much you pay for the full version or the ads are so annoying you remove the free version and wonder what the full version would have been like. Well here is the book of Zechariah, meet my most unfavourite prophet.

Your house is finished!

How cool is that? He’s a prophet and a priest

First of all a little bit of background and description. Zechariah was most likely a priest who was also a prophet. He spoke, and presumably priested, from 538 onwards, that’s BC not almost twenty to six. His message was to encourage the rebuilding of the Temple, as it seemed that this was lagging behind the rebuilding of the rest of the city, when the Jews returned to Jerusalem.

Ezekiel Lite

There were two things that left me polling Zechariah so low.

  1. Zechariah uses visions and powerful images and metaphors just like Ezekiel. The problem is he does it without the zest that I liked from the big E. Although perhaps my impression of Ezekiel is still too clouded by seeing him as Samuel L Jackson.
  2. I must admit that I really lost the flow of Zechariah. At times I had no idea what he was on about and where he was heading. Now this could be due to me being in a bad mood, a bit of a rush, or my own stupidity in prophetic hermeneutics.

Either way, I didn’t find Zechariah easy-going. If you’re looking for a prophet to read I think starting elsewhere would be helpful. Fortunately there are one or two to try. Now if only there was a book in the Bible that didn’t mention God every five minutes… Oh look, its Esther, the next stop in my trip through the Old Testament.

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Better, better, better, better – Jude: a review

February 3, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Sorry couldn’t resist that. Well here I am, the last little bit of the New Testament before the big one at the end. And it is nice and pleasant too, just like the Lennon and McCartney song. Well pleasant for those who are still holding on to the faith. For those who aren’t this little letter is a warning.

Flesh and blood

Flesh and blood

The letter concerns those who have rejected God’s grace. By that I mean the free gift of unconditional love, well I might be reading a little into this letter from elsewhere in the New Testament, but that is the thrust of things. This is something that is expected though, it comes as no surprise to the author that this will and has happened. The group that the letter is talking about are probably a sub-sect of the christian sect within Judaism (you can see how this begins to get complicated) who don’t take the body, or physical existence, as important. They were only concerned about the soul or spirit, therefore what you did with the body didn’t matter. But Jude points out that matter does matter.

Jude who?

So who was Jude? Well he says he is the brother of James, and the James he means is the brother of Jesus. What is interesting about this little letter is:

  1. It is very similar in language to 2 Peter, so there was likely some copying or adapting of either letter or an unknown common source.
  2. Jude quotes and makes allusions to non-biblical religious writings, using them to argue his point. Nothing wrong in that, but it is interesting. How often do we hear the Pope quoting the Dali Lama?

So, with Jude out of the way, onto the last book in the New Testament as my journey through the Bible nears its end.

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