What is the Bible?: How an Ancient Library of Poems, Letters and Stories Can Transform the Way You Think and Feel About Everything

by Rob Bell

The New York Times bestselling author Rob Bell, using his inspired and inquisitive approach, focuses on the most widely read book of all time. He provides surprising insights and answers about how the Bible actually works as a source of faith and guidance, showing a brand-new way of reading this sacred text.

Rob Bell, the beloved author of Love Wins and What We Talk About When We Talk About God, goes deep into the Bible to show how it is more revelatory, revolutionary, and relevant than we ever imagined – and offers a cogent argument for why we need to look at it in a fresh, new way.

In Love Wins, Rob Bell confronted the troubling questions that many people of faith were afraid to ask about heaven, hell, fate, and faith. Using the same inspired, inquisitive approach, he now turns to our most sacred book, the Bible. What Is the Bible? provides insights and answers that make clear why the Bible is so revered and what makes it truly inspiring and essential to our lives.

Rob takes us deep into actual passages to reveal the humanity behind the Scriptures. You cannot get to the holy without going through the human, Rob tells us. When considering a passage, we shouldn’t ask ‘Why did God say …? To get to the heart of the Bible’s meaning, we should be asking: ‘What’s the story that’s unfolding here and why did people find it important to tell it? What was it that moved them to record these words? What was happening in the world at that time? What does this passage/story/poem/verse/book tell us about how people understood who they were and who God was at that time?’ In asking these questions, Rob goes beyond the one-dimensional question of ‘Is it true?’ to reveal the Bible’s authentic transformative power.

Rob addresses the concerns of all those who see the Bible as God’s Word but are troubled by the ethical dilemmas, errors, and inconsistencies in Scripture. With What Is the Bible?, he recaptures the Good Book’s magic and reaffirms its power and inspiration to shape and inspire our lives today.

Genres: Religion, Nonfiction, Theology, Christian, Spirituality, Christianity, Faith

282 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2017

About the author

Rob Bell is a bestselling author, international teacher, and highly sought after public speaker. His books include The New York Times bestsellers What Is the Bible?, What We Talk About When We Talk About God, Love Wins, as well as The Zimzum of Love, Velvet Elvis, Sex God, Jesus Wants to Save Christians, and Drops Like Stars.

At age 28, Bell founded Mars Hill Bible Church in Michigan, and under his leadership it was one of the fastest-growing churches in America. In 2011, he was profiled in Time Magazine as one of their 100 most influential people. Rob was featured on Oprah's 2014 Life You Want Tour and will be speaking at venues around the world in 2015 on the Everything is Spiritual Tour. He and his wife Kristen have three children and live in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Annette · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is dangerous. You should read it

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

(3.75) One of Bell’s stronger books. Still not as fresh and vibrant as Velvet Elvis, but I think it will have a big impact on teens and twenty-somethings who are starting to question the narrow interpretations of the Bible they’ve grown up with in conservative churches. Bell stresses the importance of reading the Bible literately rather than literally: always looking deeper than surface facts to see what’s really going on here; seeking to understand the background of Jewish practice and Roman occupation at the time of Jesus.

Bell emphasizes that this is a disparate set of books written by fallible people who were defined by their own historical context, yet if you ask why they wrote down these stories of their interactions with the divine in this way – why they mattered to them then – you might get a glimpse of why they might still matter to us now. The “haphazard humanity” of the Bible, then, is for him stronger evidence of its reliability than some rigid perfection would be.

He chooses a number of the more unusual incidents in the Bible to illuminate with a closer reading, such as Jesus writing in the dust, Ehud assassinating tubby King Eglon, the few odd mentions of Melchizedek, and the Book of Revelation. Part 4 is usefully structured around FAQs (e.g. “So how would you define the word of God? The creative action of God speaking in and through the world, bringing new creation and new life into being”) in a way that will help readers look beyond preconceptions.

I’m sure many in Evangelical circles long ago dismissed Bell as a heretic for denying eternal damnation. Others are probably turned off by his gimmicks (sparse page layout; lots of bits in italics, bold, or parentheses), but I choose to take his chatty, accessible style as proof that he’s achieved what Christopher Hitchens labeled the mark of good writing: writing just as you speak. Having seen Bell speak at Greenbelt Festival some years ago, I can attest that I hear his voice and intonation in every line. This is like listening to a really good sermon series.

[R.W. · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you love Brian McLaren and Peter Enns on how to read the Bible, you'll probably appreciate this book. And if you have no idea who either of these guys are but still want to find out why people still read this strange and wild library called the Bible, you might love this book.

To my ear, Rob Bell is a preacher, a poet, and a scholar, drawing from a wide range of disciplines without ever making me feel like I'm reading a textbook. The style and format are poetic, moving, and almost breezy at times. In short chapters of 4-5 pages, he tackles the sorts of questions we should be asking about the ancient settings of the texts, why their message has endured, and how incorporating this progressive and ancient story into our lives can change the way we think.

I grew up in circles that were ready to kick Bell out of Evangelicalism when he started publishing, especially his book Love Wins. Though I wish he'd been a tad clearer about his (apparent) affirmation of the bodily Resurrection of Jesus, for the life of me I couldn't find anything heretical (anything that disagrees with the Apostles and Nicene Creeds), anything that contradicts the Gospel.Though it is often implicit, Bell makes no bones about pointing his readers to Jesus the Christ as the way to determine the character of God. And that tendency alone, expressed repeatedly and beautifully, is worth the read.

A recent struggle of mine has been how to speak of Jesus in a pluralistic religious world, and Rob's reading of several passages of Scripture is very helpful to me on that journey. I once heard him preach a sermon in which he said he wanted to teach "historic, orthodox Christian faith." Though some people might be forgiven for thinking that a friend of Oprah can't possibly be doing that, I really think he is. Beautifully. I really hope that because of this book, hurting people might find that the Book is Good after all--and how much more the fully human, fully God Messiah written about in its pages.

[Kelsey Mech · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book not because I identify as being Christian, but because I am so curious about why so many people flock to the bible and read it so religiously. I was raised Christian, and have a basic understanding of the bible and the major stories contained within it, and now identify as agnostic. But I still do not understand the commitment so many people have to the Bible. So, I picked this book up to try and gain some clarity around that.

Holy shit. This book has totally revolutionized the way I see the Bible. No, I'm not going to jump back on board the Christian train any time soon. No, I'm not suddenly a believer, at least not in an organized religion sense (I'll believe in the way I want to believe thank you very much). But I have so much more respect for the Bible as a library of stories than I ever have. And I understand so much more about why and how it can still be relevant to us today. And I possibly have more anger and frustration than ever for people who mis-use the Bible for their own gain, or even just ignorantly misunderstand it, because now more than ever I actually get how it IS relevant. And how the parts that aren't relevant are totally forgivable because.... IT WAS WRITTEN BY HUMANS and IT WAS COMPILED BY HUMANS. Which, is obvious. But, suddenly so much more clear to me after reading this book.

A couple quotes, because I like quotes, and even if you don't read the book, you will have these:

"Other times people want to know the right answer to a passage in the Bible. As if there is a right and wrong reading of each verse in the Bible. There are, of course, lots of ways to miss the point and truly read it wrongly. But to say that there's a right way may unnecessarily limit your reading of the Bible.
There are lot's of right ways to read it.
In fact, right isn't even the best way to think about the Bible.
How about dancing?
You dance with it.
And to dance, you have to hear its music.
And then you move in response to it."

Gold. Also, here's own more good one about the story of Jonah being swallowed by a whale. Just FYI, the Bible never actually says whale. It was a fish. Fish does not equal whale. It was Dory in Finding Nemo who got swallowed by a whale. Get it right people.

"It's possible to affirm the literal fact of a man being swallowed by a fish, making that the crux of the story in such a way that you defend that, believe that, argue about that - and in spending your energies on the defend-the-fish part miss the point of the story, the point about allowing God's redeeming love to flow through us with such power and grace that we are able to love and bless even our worst enemies. Arguing about how it literally happened can be an easy way to avoid facing the people in your life you need to forgive."

AMEN.

I think, if you have ever wondered at all a little bit little bitty bit about the Bible, you should read this book. I would say, it may have been a bit of a challenging read without at least a basic understanding of some key Bible stories, but I honestly think it would be accessible even for a total Bible beginner. AND it made me laugh, multiple times. Which, usually books about the Bible don't. (Not that I've read many, let's be real, but I'm assuming). So. Preach, Rob Bell. Preach.

[Nick Charalambous · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is an intriguing, irresistible, dangerous book that turns the Bible inside out and upside down.

Rob Bell is a great writer. This book is probably the high-point of his efforts over the years to teach the Bible in an intriguing, refreshing and irresistible way. And it's hard to argue he doesn't achieve what he sets out to do. The only problem is that the Bible he teaches does not point to the glory of God but the glory of man's "evolving view of God." That's like taking a love letter you wrote to your wife and sending it to a woman you want to be your lover. The words work the same, but one has a hideous, sickening result. Rob Bell's book turns the Bible inside out and upside down.
Whether your time is profitably spent with this book comes down to a simple question: Are you a person who sincerely desires to find out what God really has to say? Or are you a person who would like to learn more about the Bible as a book, good for dinner party conversation with your eclectic friends? If it's the first, reading this book is dangerous and spiritually deadly. If it's the latter, you'll have a wonderful time discovering that the Bible's has some truly radical, life-giving and amazing things to say to us even today.
If you hold to orthodox Christian beliefs, you are likely to spend your time being by turns astonished, fascinated and infuriated by the way he presents the Bible's central teaching. His exposition of certain Bible stories does a great job of confronting the shallow, reductive ways many atheists approach the Bible. Often, his exposition truly and fully reveals God's message of love and grace. We see a God desperate to breakdown tribal divisions, and who is eager for us to stop trying to appease him with "religious works" and instead embrace Him as God who has your human flourishing at heart.
But as the book moves toward its conclusion, Rob Bell's grisly motives come into sharper relief until, by the end, a Christian will feel heartbroken and nauseated. The spiritual seeker will experience a sense of triumph, feeling as though they have new evidence to support the folly of Christians and their lack of sophistication about reading the Bible as God's word to them.
The Bible itself deserves the last word on Rob Bell's magnum opus, since it provides a chilling prediction of how and why books like this will get written by smart, funny, winsome people. It describes the Rob Bells of this world as wolves dressed in sheep's clothing, peddling God's word by tickling ears with new and strange teaching. Speakers and writers who would twist God's very words to prove God is a fiction, part of man's "evolving view of God," are being used by Satan to lead people away from God and toward destruction. May the Lord have mercy on everyone who reads this book.

[Collin Huber · Rating 2 out of 5]

In his latest, Rob Bell aims to cast the Bible as less a "religious" book and more of a human book in order to make it accessible to all. He describes the Bible as "a book about what it means to be human," which ends up being his guiding thesis throughout the rest of his work.

I appreciated Bell's urge to read the Bible "literately" rather than "literally," a literate reader being one who appreciates context and form in the process of attempting to understand the text. Literate reading is in fact a form of literal reading because doing so means to read metaphorical poetry differently than narrative or wisdom literature. This was the strongest part about his book and falls in line with his plea to let the Bible be what it claims to be, but it also proves to be the greatest liability of his book.

In the process of underscoring its human aspects, Bell removes any sense of unique revelation from the Bible, thereby dismissing millennia of Christian orthodoxy, something he considers dangerous. Rather than introducing readers to the saving person and work of Jesus Christ, Bell contends that the Bible is a compilation of evolutionary thought regarding the divine and reflects a concerted effort on the part of its human authors to preserve a progressive ethic aimed at raising the consciousness of its readers.

His conclusions arise from breaking his own rule of letting the Bible be what it claims to be. Rather than treating it as a unique, timeless, divine revelation from God (which is how it describes itself), his presuppositions drive his conclusions about the text, which explains some of the more sweeping statements he makes throughout, like:

1) The book of Judges is about showing us the senselessness of violence and encouraging pacifism.

2) The Old Testament was arranged by Israelites during exile in Babylon, primarily as an alternative to the violent forms of polytheism in their midst.

3) The animal sacrificial system was a human creation instituted to deal with a community's feelings of guilt and fear, though entirely unnecessary.

4) Christ did not die purposefully, but was murdered and his followers explained his death in light of the sacrificial system to make sense of it.

These are only a few of the huge interpretive leaps he makes along with some bizarre Hebrew/Greek word studies, for which I could find no precedent regarding his conclusions. He also includes no footnotes for his points. We're simply expected to take him at his word.

Ultimately, Bell robs the Bible of any unique sense of revelation and reduces it to a human book that has the potential for offering personal enlightenment to its readers. In that way, it reads much like the tomes of German liberalism obscuring the revelatory purposes of Scripture. In the end, Bell does not let the Bible be what it claims to be. Rather, he redefines its message and purpose to fit what he claims it to be. His presuppositions clearly reign supreme, which makes for an unfortunate, misguided, and largely lifeless method for reading the Bible.

[Adam Lorenz · Rating 4 out of 5]

As much as I hate to say it, there isn’t much middle ground when it comes to Rob Bell. And really none of that comes from Rob himself or at least the ideas he puts forth have always striven to continue what he has called God’s always expanding ‘inclusivity in the exclusivity’ (I might also add is a very Barthian way of thinking for you fellow theology nerds). Though early on in my exposure to Rob I was resistant to this thought, as the years have passed I discovered a deep and ever growing need for this, God’s most scandalous action, grace.

I say all of this, to acknowledge that most who read this book or engage it have probably already made up their mind on how they will receive it. And when I say most, I include myself, regardless of which side or perspective you find yourself in we come to the book being open or closed to what it holds. But then there is there is this small slice who will pick up this book who don’t know Rob, who don’t know the controversy that was Love Wins, who have a longing for connection with something larger than themselves, or who have been hurt by the structures and systems that have become the ‘church’. This latter group, I would argue, is who Rob has always deeply desired to connect with and bring a needed fresh and good word to. Of course, I believe he also hopes to challenge the machine that has become American Christianity and he hopes to keep journeying alongside those who have resonated with his message but I believe that this is only secondary to that smaller 'slice'.

With all this in mind, as a pastor and preacher that has drawn attention for his provocative engagement of the Bible throughout the years, Rob set out to answer many of the questions he has been asked throughout the years from individuals and groups concerning it. These questions helped form this book and ultimately gave it, it’s title. Below are a few my thoughts on What is the Bible? that I hope are helpful if you are considering reading it (and if you decide to read the book, I would love to hear your thoughts as well).

The Writing:

To receive Rob’s writing well, you have to be familiar with his speech and cadence. If you are not, the formatting of the text alone will drive you up the wall. But if you have heard him speak, for only 10 minutes on an old Nooma or part of an interview, all of a sudden his books have the ability to become very conversational and dare I say intimate.

Through this conversational approach, Rob willingly engages topics, subjects, and struggles that many are often afraid to address – especially leaders within the Church. Rob doesn’t run from the complexity found in the text but invites readers to breathe a sigh of relief that whatever question or doubt that might come to mind won’t and can’t scare off God, and reminds readers that God actually welcomes them.

The Content:

First, a familiar critique of Rob is that he asks a lot of questions but doesn't offer many answers. I might suggest that this critique can’t really be applied to this book as each chapter dives into answering either a stated question or there is an implied thought or question Rob addresses as he champions the complexity of the text, of humanity, and of God. Rob even goes as far early on in the book, as if to address this very thing, by saying “Great Question. Now, an answer.” (73) before diving into a topic.

Second, one of the main criticisms of Rob is often that individuals and groups will often say that he doesn’t take the Bible seriously, or seriously enough. For one, I must say if anyone can dedicate writing 300+ pages on the Bible alone, I think their argument might be a bit off.

The big three topics I see that individuals will have more questions or resistance with are on the Bible’s authority, inspiration, and inerrancy. Each of these topics can be discussed separately but are intimately linked to one another. Because they are so linked, these three topics ( taking an illustration from Rob’s first book Velvet Elvis) are often viewed as major sections or foundational blocks that make up a ‘wall’ that is the Christian faith. For some removing, challenging, or tweaking any of these blocks causes the whole wall of faith to fall apart and in turn, at the very worst, make the Christian faith useless. While for others, finally being given permission to think deeply on these matters and yes, even to question them is such a freeing opportunity.

For those who find themselves in more of the former camp, I believe it would be helpful if you read first NT Wright’s “How Can the Bible Be Authoritative”. In this short 25 page article, Wright puts forth a similar argument to Bell by arguing that the Bible is not the ‘Word of God’ but rather is the word of God because The Word of God (Jesus) has chosen to work in and through the pages, poems, and people found within. Often, especially in Protestant streams of thought, we have conflated Scripture and preaching to a place of authority that only God can dwell and this is where Bell and Wright invite readers to rethink this approach.

This is a major shift in thinking for many, which cause the other two topics to have to be addressed and thankfully Rob takes the time to go there.

Third, nothing Rob is saying is new (I think I could say this for everyone one of Rob's books). What we see with Rob is simply one of Christianity’s best communicators acting as a springboard for individuals to dive deep in the stream of thought and discussions many thoughtful people have been having since it all began. This would be where I would have my biggest criticism of the book, in that I would love for it to be footnoted or for a footnoted version to become available. This would allow individuals, like myself, who want to explore more on some of things Rob touches on, to be able to engage the source material he is references throughout.

My Takeaway:

In short, I believe this to be Rob Bell’s best work to date.

Like so much of what he does, Rob has the ability to start conversations with individuals and groups that have often felt disregarded or have left behind the Church for whatever reason. His writing invites everyone, regardless of religious stripe (or no stripe at all) into conversation and challenges those like myself, to find a fresh way to articulate the complexities of the Divine and life without simply glossing over or minimizing it. I do not say this lightly, but his closing section of the book called ‘A Note on Growing and Changing’ might contain some of the most important words he has ever written – these are words anyone who is or has or will wrestle with their faith and community need to hear again and again.

At it’s very best, this book challenged me to fall in love again with the Bible and at it’s worst, humbled me and reminded me that there is so much more to learn and experience of God in the Bible and in the world we live.

[Jeremy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm glad I read this challenging book. I benefited from this book, but probably not in the way he intended. Rob Bell makes many points I agree with. However, he's also logically inconsistent, at times condescending, and most strangely, he leaves the reader with virtually no direction on how to take next steps related the points he's trying to make.

He wants readers to look deeper in the Bible for meaning that isn't apparent on first reading, but gives virtually no useful guidance on how to do this. He forcefully shares his ideas about what this deeper meaning is, but ironically, at the same time warns against listening to what others tell you the Bible means. In Ch. 42 he says even authors of the Bible are only giving you their perspective on God's perspective and not to confuse their perspective with God's perspective. How he expects readers to truly understand what God's perspective is not entirely clear. In Ch. 39 he makes valid points that the Bible requires interpretation but at the same time wants the reader to be wary of someone else's interpretation. The problem here is that he's asking you to trust his interpretation throughout the book.

He gives examples of how words in the original language might mean something different than what Christian traditions would say, but, again, leaves the reader with no footnotes or resources on how to examine the Bible further using this method. He also hopes you won't apply the other parts of his book (where he claims that no one really knows what the Bible means (Ch. 21, 38)) to the first half of the book because that would render the whole thing kind of pointless.

In Ch. 34 he pulls four words and phrases out of Romans 11 and puts them together as though they were meant to be read that way. He then has the courage to say ,"Can you see how easy it is to grab a few words from the Bible and make it say pretty much whatever you want it to?". I can't tell if he meant it ironically, because if he did, the point he was trying to make can't be taken seriously.

My patience with his personality was also wearing thin by the end of the book. He starts the last third of the book by saying the book that helps you read the Bible in a whole new way is over. And then he says that he's going to spend the last third of the book answering all of the 'weird' questions people have asked (like 'Is the Bible authoritative?'). He's proposing a whole new way to read the Bible and is baffled that people have questions about the implications of what he's advocating? I just don't buy it.

He ends Ch. 39 with this smug line, "So is the Bible inerrant? I have a higher view of the Bible than that.". Good golly! It's hard not be annoyed with someone who writes like that.

Lastly, I think Rob leaves very little guidance for readers on how to know if their new ideas and interpretations are sound. Rob's main direction to the reader seems to be that old ideas are primitive and anything new is good because it's progress and evolution.

I think Rob Bell has some very keen observations and good hopes for this book. Unfortunately, his methods of exposition, lack of consistency, and writing style really brought the book down for me. Despite that, this book did encourage me to look deeper into the Bible and challenged me to think about whether I agreed with Rob Bell's statements.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an amazing and eye opening book, particularly in regards to the Old Testament and lots of the 'problems' it presents (at least from my personal perspective).

It saddens me that from what I can tell, the target audience of this book, and those who would reap the most benefit from reading it are likely either uninterested, or vehemently opposed to reading such a book. One such audience is atheists or non-believers, (of which I belonged to for quite some time) who think they know all they need or want to know about the Bible, thank you very much. They will see this book as an unwanted invitation to challenge their notion that God is a vicious, bloodthirsty entity, who delights in enslavement, killing, sacrifice, and capriciousness.

The other audience, people who regularly attend church, say their prayers, and vote 'correctly,' will not want to read this book because A) Rob Bell is a heretic, and whose worm-tongue cannot be trusted lest he lead them astray, B) They've already gotten everything in the Bible figured out and are content in their certitude, or C) Take issue with the Bible being anything other than the inerrant, word-for-word, end-all-be-all guide to living on earth and that's the end of the story, everyone else be damned (literally).

Both these cases are a shame, because this is a wonderful book on understanding what the Bible is 'all about,' and what not to get hung up on/bogged down with.

[J.L. Neyhart · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was torn between giving it 4 or 5 stars. In my head it's probably 4.5.

I listened to Rob Bell read this audiobook which is a much more enjoyable experience for me than trying to read his books.

I do not like his
actual writing style.

Where there are breaks
all over the place.

Dramatic pauses.

And such.

But it works when he's the one reading it to me. Because it is a conversational style.

As for the content of the book, I probably don't agree with Bell's take on everything, but I'm probably pretty close with most of what he said in this book. He emphasizes asking the right questions and letting the Bible be what it is: a library of ancient books of different genres that need to be read accordingly. (Read it literately, not always literally.)

What Rob Bell also does really well here, is make me want to read my Bible more again. His enthusiasm for the Bible is contagious.

There were several times I found myself wanting footnotes so I could do further research and see where Bell got his information, but overall, I really enjoyed this book and I'm sure I will revisit it.

[Marty Solomon · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's going to be hard to review this book, but I'll give it my best try. I'll review it around a few themes that rose to the top for me throughout the read.

POWERFUL MYSTERY: Rob did a great job of communicating the empowered mystery of this ancient library of texts. The power of the Text is that it is the record of real people in real places at real times. Hearing those stories and what they are communicating is full of incredible mystery.

HUMILITY: There is so much depth and complexity to these ancient eastern stories. Rob would send time (somehow concisely) pulling apart a passage and showing how many layers were in the language, the context, and the movement of a passage of Scripture. Because of how much is going on, one has to approach the Text with a sense of humility and wonder.

RESPECT: There is a very, very high regard for Scripture and what it is capable of. He works hard to remove the conversation away from unhelpful categories (like inerrancy) and towards it's unbelievable ability to change the reader and understand who God is and what He's doing in the world. There seemed to be a hundred times that Rob said, "anyone who thinks this is just primitive nonsense simply hasn't read and truly wrestled with the literature of the Bible."

About 15 years ago, Rob helped me articulate the faith that I was trying to pursue in my own personal journey. After years of his teaching (and him leading me to the teaching of others), my own body of work was shaped deeply by what I learned through people like Rob. For anyone familiar with my ministry (www.BEMAdiscipleship.com), I would say that this is like "the heart and soul of BEMA in a book."

[Bonnie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This just did not do it for me. Bell brings up some interesting ideas in the beginning and then skates over them to exclaim how cool and interesting something else is. His writing style is conversational, which is fine, but the liberal italics and bolded phrases become exhausting.

And here's what I as a Christian am really concerned about: Bell continually emphasizes the Bible's being written by humans. Again and again, with very little discussion on the Divine that causes us to read and form doctrines from it. That's true, yes, but it was also inspired by God. That's why we read it in the first place. I feel like this is only going to confirm secular bias about the Bible being a book of fairy stories.

Ultimately, Bell is entertaining and brings up a few salient points, but this is not spiritually meaty.

[Dave Minor · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you have everything figured out don't read this. If you are capable of admitting the possibility and validity of different perspectives you may gain some new insights. Love the sources at the end.

[Aaron Carlberg · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't even know where to begin because Rob Bell holds such promise, but his theology sends him spiraling the wrong way. I gave it 2 stars because there are some brilliant things in this book in terms of analogies (sorry, I just changed it to 1 star), but he always stops short of the truth of redemption as found in the Good News of Jesus.

If I had to title this book, I would call it the Gospel of Human Enlightenment. I say this because he does mention God when talking about the bible, but it is almost as if God seems irrelevant to the continuing evolution of the human psyche in regard to "religion." Rob Bell moves forward through his book speaking about human enlightenment in terms of our view of God, as if us figuring out who God is becomes what makes God who He is. It is heresy when he finally gets to the point that the crucifixion of Jesus didn't have to happen for our salvation. He intimates that the only reason it did happen was PEOPLE wanted Jesus dead (not anything to do with God's grace, God's love, or God bringing His people home) and his disciples used His death to try to reinterpret all the Old Testament scriptures to make it have some meaning.

Everything in the book moves right up to point where it brushes against the goodness of God, but then turns abruptly away to look more deeply into the face of humanity...which I would like to remind you has always been the problem. Sin causes us to look at ourselves as if we have the answers, when the truth is we are the ones who have kept messing everything up. We need real truth. Sometimes truth is hard, sometimes it isn't palatable as easily as we would like, but this book squashes truth behind a veneer of humanistic refocusing of who God is.

Tim Keller once wrote, "One reason was that Christians were ridiculed as too exclusive and different. And yet many were drawn to Christianity because it was different. If a religion is not different from the surrounding culture, if it does not critique and offer an alternative to it, it dies because it is seen as unnecessary." Rob Bell's book tries to make the Bible and Christianity just like everything else in this world, "your way," which makes it unnecessary...but we will never truly live new and real life as found in the person of Jesus that way.

[MARK · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bummer of a book. Bell boils the Bible down to a human written library of books, containing biases and errors, with old ideas presented next to new ideas, that tells the story of humanity. Its ultimate purpose is human enlightenment and elevated consciousness. Meh. That view does not inspire me to live a faith that I would die for.

This book is full of weak arguments. Bell brings up lots of good points and questions and just when he starts to get somewhere the chapter ends with a hasty conclusion and a “Boom...see what I just did there!?!” I wish he did less patting of his own back and spent more time building his arguments and actually citing a source or two for further study. It is hard to take his conclusions seriously when he is dismissing centuries of orthodoxy and brilliant theologians in chapters that are 600 words or less. To that point...Bell references several authors and theologians in his further reading section who would vehemently disagree with many of the points in this book. I don’t get it.

Something I did like is that he puts importance on reading the Bible within the cultural and historical context of the original authors. But this is nothing new. There are better books that talk about this. He also does a good job of emphasizing the timelessness of the stories in the Bible - that they are just as fresh and relevant to us as they were to the original audience. He does a good job of advocating that the Bible is relevant to people today....even if you don’t believe in “religion”.

But ultimately this book felt like relativistic pop-religion. If you take Bell’s conclusions to heart it leaves you looking inward for salvation and the solution to the human condition - rather than outward to a God who desperately wants His people to know Him and trust Him.

If you want a resource that that will truly blow your mind and categories about God and the Bible but stays faithful to orthodoxy and the heart of Christianity check out Tim Mackie and Jon Collins’ The Bible Project.
https://thebibleproject.com/

[Mehrsa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very well written and very very good--except for just one sentence that undermined the entire thing for me. Take out that one sentence, and this is probably the best book about the bible and about the beauty of Christian doctrine that I have ever read.

So what is the one sentence? Toward the end, Bell says something like--the bible is not meant to be taken literally, but it's a complicated origin myth written by a people in exile that was just way better than the myths of the babylonians that were all about brutality. So the point here is that the bible is just leaps and bounds better than any other myth around so let's not be too hard on it. So I totally agree that we have to take the genesis story and much of the old testament in context and within that context, the bible is about social progress. BUT....after he's spent a bunch of pages talking about how the surface stories are not what they appear to be in the bible and you have to look at context and purpose and layers of thought and culture as you interpret the bible, he just dismisses all of the other myths as simplistic, brutish, and just plain inferior. But that's just not the case. I've read many books that have done the same sort of explication of the babylonian, persian, egyptian and assyrian myths. He says himself that the bible borrowed from these other stories. Why not give these other myths the same treatment offered to the bible? I am not saying that the bible doesn't still stand for progress after the comparison, but in one phrase, he just dismisses everything else that preceded the bible as just not even worth contemplating. It's too bad because I really love what he did with the bible stories and I love that he's so open minded in his interpretation. I just wish he had taken his own advice as it applied to other religious text.

[Julianna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reviewed for THC Reviews
I’ve been eager to try a Rob Bell book for quite a while, so when his newest one, What Is the Bible? was chosen as our latest church book club read, I dove right in. I can easily say that I was not disappointed. I may have mentioned in some of my previous reviews of Christian books that I’ve been on a spiritual journey for the last sixteen years, and throughout that time, my thinking has evolved beyond the general beliefs of the traditional evangelical church in which I was raised. I no longer think that a literal interpretation of the Bible is the only way to read it. Not to mention, as one of our other book club members pointed out, whose interpretation is truly literal? Depending on who you talk to, what church denomination they come from, and what translation of the Bible they’re reading, a single verse could have multiple interpretations. That’s why I’ve come to believe that it’s not just up to ministers and other authority figures in the church to interpret Biblical meaning. We each have to look at it on an individual basis and figure out for ourselves what it means to us.

In What Is the Bible?, that’s largely what Rob Bell encourages us to do. Our pastor who leads our books club, as a parallel, told us how the children’s ministry of our church works with regards to teaching the little ones. She explained that rather than telling them a story and what the takeaway message is from that story, the lessons are designed to get the kids asking questions. So why shouldn’t we, as adults, do the same? Yes, I know some faith leaders of a more authoritarian mindset feel that questioning God’s Word is subversive, but as Rob Bell points out, many stories in the Bible are subversive. Personally, I feel that when we ask questions, we show that we’re open and seeking answers, and it’s in those teachable moments that we can grow spiritually. Can asking questions lead us away from our faith as some believe? Possibly, but I think that it can also strengthen faith if we let it. After all, faith is all about believing in a power greater than ourselves, and as long as you have that foundation, then learning more about where the Bible comes from and what it has to say shouldn’t cause that faith to waver even if you find something that seems to disprove what you previously knew.

Rob Bell has a fresh and interesting way of looking at the Bible. While I was reading the main chapters, the heavens opened up, light shone down, and angels sang.;-) Yeah, I know I’m being pretty hyperbolic there, but that is how I felt through most of the first three sections of the book. I learned so much and saw both old favorite Bible stories and passages with which I was less familiar illuminated in a whole different light. Occasionally I might feel just a tad uncomfortable, and I realized it was because my old way of thinking was being challenged. Yet at the same time, everything Rev. Bell said somehow made perfect sense in a way it never had before. For the first time in years, I felt excited about the Bible, because I was seeing something new that was worth exploring.

I know in recent years Rob Bell has become a controversial figure in the Christian church, but I also know that he has a lot of followers, many of whom are like myself. We’ve seen contradictions in our reading of the Bible, or can’t reconcile it with our knowledge of known history, science, or other facts, or we simply struggle with some of the things it seems to be saying, which is one of the dangers associated with trying to adhere to a literal interpretation. Critical thinkers like myself eventually hit the proverbial wall where things just don’t make sense anymore. What I appreciate about Rev. Bell is that he seems to understand all these doubts. I love his use of “turning the gem” as a metaphor for needing to look at the Bible from many different angles to see all of its facets. In using this imagery he also illuminates the idea that the Bible is the living Word of God that is still speaking to us and revealing things to us centuries or even millennia after it was first recorded. Part of my issue has been that I didn’t know the right questions to ask to find some of the answers I’m seeking, but What Is the Bible? gave me some great questions with which to begin. Although where to find the answers, since I’m not a biblical scholar, is perhaps a little murkier, there is also a recommended reading list at the end of the book, at which I’m planning to take a closer look. At the very least, this book has given me a jumping off point on where to start, and after reading this book, I’m definitely leaning toward becoming a Rob Bell fan. At the very least, I’m very much looking forward to checking out his other books, and if they’re half as illuminating at this one was, I’m sure I’ll enjoy them as well.

[Lynne Stringer · Rating 5 out of 5]

In spite of the fact that I have been sitting in pews since I was old enough to do so, Rob Bell still managed to bring to life many of the bible stories I've read time and time again, bringing out things that I'd never even considered.
He even cleared up some mysteries. I'd always wondered what the heck Abraham was doing cutting those animals in half and then God sending a flaming torch between them. Um ... weird! Not if you were born at that time, apparently.
Also, I'd never expected to be able to view Leviticus as a radical book. Whenever I'd read it, I'd always viewed it with more than a little horror and simply been thankful that we're not expected to do that anymore. But to believe that it was revolutionary for its time? Never! It's amazing what a bit of perspective and context will do. Highly recommended.

[Jed Moody · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll say this first: I'm glad this book exists. Do I agree with everything he says? Not even close. Do I wish he would be more willing to take a stance, even if it risks offending someone? yes. Do I like Rob Bell less and less every time I read something he wrote or listen to him speak? Yes. Is this thing I'm doing where I'm listing questions and then answering them for myself a tongue-in-cheek reference to one of my least favorite tropes in his writing? Yes, yes it is.
I really am glad this book exists. Bell exhibits a real excitement for the Bible and reading it well. I benefitted from his reminder to read it with the full story in mind, keeping the lives of the characters, the culture they lived in, and radical things God was doing within those cultures in mind. And there are nuggets in this book that will benefit everyone, even if like me you've heard a large chunk of what he presents elsewhere.
It would be a specific group of people to whom I would recommend this book. I could see this book being a great introduction to those who are not sure what to think of the Bible or who are generally opposed to it but open to new perspectives. It could be a good conversation starter. If you feel you have a decent grasp of the world the Bible was written in, or are equipped to learn about it, I'd recommend to use your time on that instead.
Really, most of my complaints are probably personal and against his writing style and the ways in which he chooses to communicate. But yeah. That's all.

[Grant Klinefelter · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember seeing this book on the shelf at Shakespeare and Co. in the summer of 2017. I sat by myself and read the first chapter transfixed. Rob Bell is a beautifully engaging writer. But I didn’t buy it. I was probably too afraid to read it. Now, over five years later, I picked it up at a used bookstore and thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s funny how time heals fear of “the other.” Or at least it can.

This book is primed and ready for skeptics and Christians with malnourished biblical literacy. I don’t agree with everything, but find me a book anyone does. It really is a great read with some really valuable tools for how best to engage the collection of books we call the Bible.

[Alanna Schwartz · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best Rob Bell I’ve ever read. I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to read the Bible as I read my English anthologies; read the poems as poems, the letters as letters, the stories as stories. Poems are truer than true. Things can be True without being literal.
Thank you Rob for giving me the understanding to reincorporate the Bible back into my faith, along with all other True teachings.

[Isabelle reads a book a day because she has no friends · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was really enjoying this as a solid 4-star read but the line “some Christians are full of shit” really sent it over the edge. This is a great read for anyone hoping to understand the Bible, make sense of its wild and violent stories, or really for anyone who ever reads the Bible.

[Spencer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rob Bell is someone that conservative evangelicals love to hate. This book got a lot of negative press around the blogosphere, mostly by people that know they can quickly quote an edgy passage to label him something and move on. Bell's is a fascinating story of an evangelical rock star that slowly questioned the tenets of conservatism, whether biblical inerrancy (Velvet Elvis and this book), American nationalism and militarianism (God Wants to Save Christians), eternal conscious torment (Love Wins), or penal substitutionary atonement (The God's Aren't Angry DVD and in this book again). Whenever someone used to hold to such things but now just finds them unconvincing, no matter how nice they are (which one thing I deeply appreciate about Bell is his resolve to take the high road through terrible words against him), those that don't want to hear a critique of their own position or be reminded that there are those that frankly don't find conservative evangelicalism all that thoughtful, Christ-like or even, dare I say, biblical, well, they tend to get really upset and start shouting names. "Heretic" or "liberal" gets thrown around, often with little understanding of what those words historically even mean.

For instance, people have criticized Rob Bell for being a universalist, but that ignores that fact that (1) Bell pulls back from the position since he does believe strongly in free will, and (2) there is orthodox versions of universalism in church history where only one radical form was condemned as heretical. So, it is stuff like that which is being said about him. Frankly it is often deeply ignorant.

I think that is what was going on with this book: people just want to find a way to write him off.

What is this book about? It is a series of reflections about interesting biblical passages, a presentation of the grand sweep of the Bible, and particular reflections on important theological topics like the meaning of predestination or atonement or biblical inspiration.

Bell says this book is intended to get people reading the Bible again. In fact he says that if you read the Bible and find it boring, you are simply not reading the Bible well. Amen!

I think this is a commendable effort. He is trying to get a largely biblically illiterate generation interested in reading the Bible again. Second, perhaps his best points is that we should be reading the Bible not merely "literally" but "literately." That is reading the Bible thoughtfully, asking why was this written down, how what it written, and what literary clues do we see that helps us read it more deeply. In doing so, he endeavors to say that the Bible is not irrelevant or archaic, it is a book that pushes humanity forward.

Most of the book did a great book discussing biblical stories and tough passages in thoughtful and even surprisingly fun ways. Often criticized for being "too dumbed down," Bell's writing style is often so down to earth and fresh, I think it makes his critics jealous. Whether it is understanding the stories of Babel, Jonah, or Noah, Bell is always an engaging writer. Any book that takes an ancient biblical story and shows how it is relevant today is always worth a look.

Where people started to criticize I think was the last chapters of the book, which I share in. His chapters on the meaning of the cross, predestination, inspiration, and the nature of the Word of God were disappointing for me. I get what he was saying, much of which he worked out in earlier stuff, but he just did not say enough here. For instance, when he talks about the death of Christ, he makes a point that, no, God the Father did not need to kill anything, namely his own son, in order to love humanity. That is not what the cross is doing. Even those that hold to penal substitution atonement should say, "amen," to that. But, Bell closes the reflection off way too quick to explain what he meant there. Similarly, when he talks about the nature of the "Word of God," he points out that the Bible regards many things as the word from God. That is true. However, in doing so, he neglects to talk about what does it mean that the Bible is the canonical Word of God, which means the Bible has a regulative and authoritative function for Christians. That is kind of important. His treatment of inspiration was similarly too surface level.

Perhaps that is the bee in my bonnet. As a person that grew up being told the Bible was "inerrant." Then going to Bible college where I found that theology grossly inaccurate to what the Bible taught about its own nature and how Christians for 2000 years have thought about it, I was frustrated. To date, I have probably read in the ball-park of 50 books on the subject of the doctrine of Scripture, all of which I have been ultimately disappointed with. The best book I have read on the nature of Scripture is John Goldingay's, Models of Scripture, if anyone is interested. At any rate, I think I am at the point where I will write my own.

So, with those were key chapters at the end, I disagreed with about 5 chapters total. But, 38/43 chapters is not bad at all. Because of its style, jumping from topic to topic with a broad over-arching theme, each chapter stands on its own. Many of which I absolutely loved. I think anyone reading this book will enjoy how Bell takes the reader through biblical stories.

Would I recommend this book to others? I think I would. It a great converstation starter. I'd preface it by saying that I don't agree with everything, but neither should we, even with the very best of authors.

[Brice Karickhoff · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was the best of books and it was the worst of books. The general topic of this book is so important, and I couldn’t be with Bell more that we need to understand the world the Bible was actually written in to get it out of our unnecessary boxes that rob it of it’s beautiful and prevailing message. SO base line 5 stars

Minus 1 star because i think he missed the most important and beautiful aspect of genesis 15 which might be my fav story in the OT, so that really bummed me out

Minus 1 star because I don’t jive with this modern writing style where you just list words and break paragraphs whenever you want. Maybe I’m just out of date but it’s just not the kind of writing that I think purveys beauty or logical arguments most clearly. That’s subjective I guess. But it’s not my thing.

Plus 1 star because of the final section where he asks hard questions.

Minus 1 star because of how he answers them. Not so much that I disagree with his answers (usually I don’t), but just that straw men are the bane of my existence.

And finally, minus 1 because why would you read this book when you could listen to the Bible Project instead. Same idea of contextualization and stuff... but better

5-1-1+1-1-1=2

[Ben Figueiredo · Rating 5 out of 5]

The thoughts and ideas Bell talks about in this book were not entirely new to me, though it helped ground me and guide me further on a journey I have been on for the past 2 years (really my whole life).

While obviously this is not a end all answer to questions you may have about the bible and what it is supposed to be, it's a great look into understanding that it is a book written by humans dealing with certain things at certain times in history. It's a story about the human experience, and how to live and love and learning who God is and what he is like. It's relevant today because we still experience the same things, we still ask the same questions, and we still struggle with doubt, hate, racism, tribalism, injustice, violence, etc. It's especially useful to see how as an American living in the most powerful empire of our time it's hard to actually understand how to read the bible without missing what people who wrote it, who lived within their culture and their understanding of the world, were trying to say.

I know it's a rather controversial subject, (to put it lightly 😏) but I highly recommend to at least hear it out. It's definitely a shift in thinking and worldview that will come with resistance in your own head, and rightfully so.

[Jon Beadle · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 is my true rating.

Heavy on fluff and self-congratulatory parenthetical statements. Very low on content. It's clearly an apologetic for a progressive culture. But in an attempt to communicate those truths, Rob seems to paint an image of the Bible that it is a collection of progressive ideas, and it those ideas which renew everything. God is not as involved as the people in the books make it out to be; and Jesus is a good teacher, but not much more than those who have done great things - like the other heroes of social justice...

This was a beautiful return to form for Rob. I enjoyed the reading experience, as I usually do, but I didn't find it a truly groundbreaking attempt at explaining the Bible.

Where was the teaching on marriage?
Nowhere.
Where was any teaching on sexuality?
Other than a weird chapter on Moses,
nothing.
Where was the teaching on textual criticism?
Nowhere.

Overall: meh.

[Jenny Wells · Rating 4 out of 5]

I listened to this on Audible and wanted to restart it as soon as I finished. Rob Bell narrates it. I wish everyone would read this book who has ever been exposed to the Bible, for better or worse. Haters and embracers will be left with a tilted head thinking, "Huh...". As a pastor in some form for almost 30 years, Bell does a good job of not promoting a certain agenda or using inflammatory language while challenging, again no matter our background, the way we experience and interact with the Bible. I left with language to know how to interpret, for example, a God that can easily be considered cruel and exclusive in the Old Testament. I understand better why faith and science do not have to be at odds with one another. And maybe, just maybe, Bell helped me think I might be able to read Saint Paul again. Bell's work gave this half century long experience with Christianity a glimmer that what I once treasured can be mine again.

[Noah · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a ton of great stuff in this book--the chapters on Jonah and how Jesus (may have) read the Old Testament jump out--and Rob Bell does a wonderful job considering context that's relevant to the passage he's writing about, yet not pulling from all over the place and playing a wild game of connect the dots. Some parts sort of give off a whiff of self-importance, but on the whole, it doesn't diminish the truth of what Bell writes about. It provides great perspective, and the extent to which you enjoy this really depends on how you want to read it. The vast majority of issues I've heard regarding this book stem from who authors it, which is really unfortunate. Learning from someone will never 100% constitute agreeing with someone, and much of the content of WITB is too good to let the name on the cover be what stops people from reading this.

[Heather Litzinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve always felt like there is an inner circle of folks who truly understand the Bible, most of whom know Hebrew and Greek and/or went to seminary. This book moved me closer to feeling like I get it. Good explanations of the arc of the books and the Jewish customs that surrounded Jesus and his companions.

[Erin Henry · Rating 5 out of 5]

His best book so far. I read it and underlined so much. So good! He has such a love and passion for Scripture that comes through his writing. Makes me excited to read the Bible.

2nd reading was for a book club so I did the audio version. Bell reads it and is fabulous.