An Atheist's Guide to the Bible
What is the Bible?
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Most of us have had some exposure to the Bible at some time in our lives, perhaps at school. But for many people this fleeting contact leaves them little the wiser. What is this book, and why is it so important? Why do some revile it or ignore it, while some regard it with such awe that they wish to convert everyone to their belief?
In itself, the Bible is an ancient collection of inspiring and morally instructive literature. It is comparable perhaps to the works of Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey, or to the Hindu epics Ramayana and Mahabharata. Works of art like these have rendered into words the spiritual sensibility of their culture, and they speak to us across the centuries.
Old and New Testaments
The Bible, as far as Christians are concerned, is divided into Old and New Testaments. For Jews, however, the "Old" Testament is the Bible, founded on the Torah or Law, the most sacred portion of the book.
In the Old Testament (OT), the central character is Yahweh, who is the god of the Israelites. The story describes his continual struggle to stop his chosen people from turning away from him to worship foreign gods. We are presented with repeated episodes of repentance, faith, compassion, promise and Yahweh's wrath and punishment.
The New Testament (NT) is the story of Jesus of Nazareth, who had a short but glittering career as a preacher in first-century Palestine, and was then executed for rebellion by the Romans. His kind of missionary activity tended to stir up the hopes of the Jewish people for a deliverer (a "Messiah", meaning "anointed one"), based on their reading of scriptures.
The Old and New Testaments really are very different, but of course closely related. In Christian versions you will generally find both of them in one volume, or perhaps just the NT on its own.
Things to remember about the Bible
- The Bible is a collection of religious writings sacred to Jews and Christians
- It is a combination of poetic, historical, bizarre, tragic, comic, uplifting and obscure texts
- It can be (wrongly or rightly) used to support all kinds of beliefs
- It was written and edited by many people over several centuries
- All of them had strong ideological agendas, so don't take it all at face value
- It is not infallible
- A lot of rubbish is talked about it
- It contains a lot of rubbish of its own!
- But it's also got some good bits
When was it written?
The Jewish Bible consists of what is now known to Christians as the Old Testament. It was collected together over two thousand years ago, assuming its modern form sometime around 500 BCE or thereafter. However, some parts of it are probably older, possibly much older. The age of the oldest sections is subject to huge scholarly dispute. To this day, as in ancient times, it is read in synagogues on scrolls, or for individual worship in book form.
As Christianity developed from being a Jewish sect into a separate religion, the New Testament writings were added. These were originally written in the first and second centuries of the Common Era (CE). For some time after that there was argument about which books could be included as scriptural and which could not. An agreed version, consisting like today's Christian Bible of Old and New Testaments together was finalised around the 4th Century CE. Some very old copies still exist more or less intact, like the great codices of Alexandria, Vatican and Sinai.
Who wrote it?
Almost all of the Bible is anonymous. In common with many books from the ancient world we don't usually know exactly who wrote which part, but there are ways of telling some things about the writers and editors. For more detail, see history of the Biblical text.
Who cares?
The entire Atheist Guide is based on the opinion (which you may or may not share) that the Bible is not divinely inspired or in any way sacred. It is an amazing and endlessly fascinating book which atheists can benefit from reading because we can gain insights into our human lives from it. Read more about why atheists should read the Bible.
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