Biblical literacy
Posted by Anthony at June 16th, 2006
Did you ever wonder what the Bible literacy rates are amongst the believers? Aside from anecdotal accounts, I couldn’t find too many studies on that. My gut feeling is - it’s not very high. It’s no surprise really: will every devoted Christian reading this who’ve read both Old and New Testament from the beginning to the end please stand up? I’d even venture to say that nowadays non-believers actually have more incentives to read the bible than the believers do.
Onto the main topic that brought this up: this oh-so-bright (as you are about to see) congressman Westmoreland from Georgia (wouldn’t you know it?) co-sponsored a bill to require the display of 10 Commandments in the House of Representatives. So, Stephen Colbert set up an interview and asked him non-chalantly what the 10 Commandments actually were. Since I’m posting this you can pretty much guess what the answer was:
I have. From cover to cover, even.
You can draw whatever conclusions you like from that fact.
Mando
Puzzling indeed. Well then, I think we should put you under the glass, extensive empirical studies commencing in 3…2…1…
On a serious note. How long did it take you from cover to cover? I remember trying that feat when I was a teenager. I initially strted about 3-4 times unsuccessfully, making it no further than Psalms I believe.
Anthony
About a year.
Now, this was just reading: not studying. I barely remember Deuteronomy, and there were some parts of Psalms that got little more than a skim, but all in all I made it through.
Whatever you do, don’t try to read it nightly before bed. That’s a recipe for failure
.
Mando