The Bible Tells Me So

I actually really enjoyed this one a lot better. I found this one easier to follow and while I didn't agree with everything he said I really enjoyed the thought exercises and book overall

For many people the bible tells a story of a god that is completely incomprehensible. This book finally looks at these issues head on, starting with the God-ordained mass genocide of the Canaanites. 
Every chapter surprised me, offered much needed clarity, and usually left me with more questions than answers. That also happens to be the point, that we should give up looking for answers, and instead be looking for questions. And I was surprised that this approach actually helped me relax and gently nudged me toward reconsidering my failing faith. 

That is another strength of this book: it is for everyone. It is EQUALLY applicable, and even necessary, for christians, atheists, evangelicals, agnostics, whoever. It takes everything we THINK we know and gently (and humorously) invites us to kindly throw it out and start over, while maybe standing on our heads and squinting, to get a new perspective.

I adored this book and intend to read more by this author, and also maybe actually pick up my Bible again as well.

very thought provoking, reorders the way you think about things. need to re-read

Book Review: The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable to Read It by Peter Enns - Very good popular level book on biblical hermeneutics (how we read and interpret the bible.) It is well worth reading and at least today (March 24, 2015) it is on sale for $1.99 on kindle (blog link below has link to kindle).

The main point of the book is that the modern understanding of Scripture as rule book or guide-book or science book actually changes scripture to something that is different from what early Christians understood and how the writers seem to have intended. Some of the book is simply insight into biblical authors/reader's understanding and culture. Other parts are exploring difficult ideas (like Canaanite genocide) or New Testament author's use of the Old Testament.

Enns conclusion is that we need to allow the bible to be a collection of different voices and resist the impulse to harmonize and clean up scripture. God choose to give us a book written by many with a number of different voices and stories and attitudes and we need to deal with the bible we were given, not try to make it into something that is cleaner or more cohesive.


My full (nearly 1400 word) review is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/the-bible-tells-me-so-why-defending-scripture-has-made-us-unable-to-read-it-by-peter-enns/