Using the Bible as a Political Prop is a Mistake
Oklahoma schools must incorporate the Bible into lesson plans for all public-school students in grades five through 12, multiple other states are considering or trying to pass similar legislation. They claim that such a law or mandate is necessary for the moral well-being of the nation. While I agree that if more Americans read and actually practiced what was in the Bible, we’d all be better off, these proposals will not accomplish a single thing. Firstly, which version of the bible? There are currently over 3,142 versions of the Bible in more than 2,073 languages, which one should be used? The major ones here in the United States are (ranked by popularity):
New International Version
King James Version
English Standard Version
New Living Translation
Christian Standard Bible
New King James Version
Reina-Valera (Spanish)
New International Reader’s Version
New American Standard Bible
New Revised Standard Version
If I’m a Catholic parent I wouldn’t want them to use the Protestant Bible, I’d want the Latin Vulgate Bible, which is the one used by the church; but isn’t even on the list of the most popular. If I’m an Evangelical I’m going to want them to use either the King James or the Revised King James. If I’m a mainstream Protestant I’m going to want them to use the NIV. If I’m a liberal Protestant I’m going to want them to use the New Living Translation. While the Catholic churches have more books than the others, the text inside the common books mostly match what’s inside the Protestant ones. In other words, they are the same while also being different. Who gets to decide? People will say it doesn’t matter, but it does.
I know ministers who absolutely refuse to accept some versions because they believe they are heresies. Whenever I wrote a sermon or delivered a message, I always used the New American Standard Bible. I preferred its literal accuracy with the original texts. I’ve had people come up to me after a service and tell me they had never heard a particular scripture being read like that. That the words didn’t match what they had in their personal bibles. I was able to explain the differences to them but then I’ve studied the Bible, Bible history, and the history of Christianity. How many of those teaching in the schools have done the same? Probably not many.
It’s not their fault, they aren’t Sunday school teachers, they are there to teach children how to read, write, and, as they used to say, do arithmetic. For example, so how would they be able to answer questions about why there are so many different versions and what about the 16 verses in the KJV and some other older versions of the New Testament that missing or edited or relegated to footnotes in modern translations? Yes, over the years manuscripts have appeared that pre-dated the manuscript the King James Version was translated from. Some of those manuscripts actually did not have the same verses as the one that was used. For example, Mark 16:9–20 is missing from the two oldest manuscripts of the New Testament, the Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, which date back to the fourth century. Those verses do appear in later ones which leads many scholars to think they had been added by other writers. Another verse is Matthew 18:11, “For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.”. In the NIV this has been made into a footnote. These are just two examples, so will the teachers be forced to explain the differences? The issue runs far beyond just the various versions of the bible, what about other faiths?
Will the state mandate the teaching and placing of the Quran in every classroom for the Muslim students? How about the Torah for the Jewish students? For students who are from one of the multiple native tribes will there be teachings of their moral code and beliefs? How about the agnostic or atheistic student, will you provide skeptical literature? How will the Hindu, Confucius, or other eastern religion or moral code be represented? If you fail to do so you are discriminating against those students and their families.
I understand the politicians and some parents are scared of the world and think they can ‘fix’ things by passing simple laws, the reality is they can’t. Complex problems require real well-thought out solutions, not feel-good laws that only serve to temporarily satisfy any moral outrage of their constituents. If politicians would spend more time behaving as moral human beings, there might not be as much of a need for these draconian and ill-advised laws.
We need to leave teaching the Bible to the parents and the churches. If both parents attended church on Sunday with their children, it would set a much better example than forcing a teacher to work on a subject he/she isn’t trained in. I say this out of love and the experience of delivering over 1000+ messages from a pulpit and having written 5 books on living a Christian life.