Ken's Guide to the Bible

by Ken Smith

An insider's guide to the Bible with a focus on sex, gore and lunacy.

Genres: Religion, Nonfiction, Atheism, Humor, Christianity, History

143 pages, Paperback

First published September 18, 1995

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name
This profile may contain books from multiple authors of this name

Reviews

[Skallagrimsen]

Ken's Guide to the Bible is an anti-theist's delight, an amusing, user friendly romp through the innumerable inconsistencies, absurdities, and barbarities of the world's best-selling and most influential book. Ken Smith, it must be stressed, has an ax to grind with Christianity. I'd treat his textual assessments with caution. I'd never cite him as a source. Still, even after making every allowance for bias, he's amassed plenty of ammunition here to wage rhetorical battle against just about any aggressive Bible thumper bent upon converting or judging you. If you're looking for a good primer on theological self-defense, this book might be for you.

Yet while Ken's Guide to the Bible appealed to me at a certain age, it's the kind of book I've long-since left behind. Looking back after decades of reflection and experience, it seems to embody what the great Spanish American philosopher George Santayana called: "the enlightenment common to young wits and worm-eaten old satirists, who plume themselves on detecting the scientific ineptitude of religion—something which the blindest half see."

Santayana was no more a believer than Smith. Yet his views on religion were quite different. He didn’t sneer and jeer at it like a petulant adolescent. He made a lifetime study of religion, its psychology, sociology, and aesthetics. He observed the centrality of religion to the human experience and thought hard and deep about why. I find Santayana's assessment of Christianity infinitely more insightful, sympathetic, and interesting than that of a snarky new atheist like Ken Smith.

On the subject of religion, believers and non-believers alike, in my opinion, would derive more profit from reading George Santayana.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Author Ken Smith picks out the choicest quotes, stories and gossip from the Bible. The stuff they didn't teach you in Sunday school! Guaranteed to embarrass your right-wing relatives at Thanksgiving!

[Amy Faust · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such an excellent book. It is one of those kinds that as you read it, you just HAVE to share with someone nearby. I could feel the "!?" over my head as a read and that would almost always lead me to the phone where I'd call someone and share. I kept a KJV bible by me to make sure the quotes were in there and to see how it was phrased in ye olden terms.

It is unbelievable to me, an atheist, how little of the bible Christians seem to know. They know the ten commandments (one of the two sets God came up with) and the bits that encourage their homophobic inclinations, but I am damn sure they don't realize just how generally evil, contradictory, or confusing the bible is.

My father, Christian of course, says that the reason that this book doesn't work is because you have to take the bible "as a whole" and not just pick out weird excerpts. I disagree in this case. We are talking about a "non-fiction" (ha ha) book that many turn to for guidance in their daily lives. If that book proceeds to talk about how homicide is not only permissible, but morally healthy and belittlement of women is a necessity, then I find those excerpts to be enough to condemn the entire book. A Christians' manual of ethics contains passages commanding busting babies' heads over rocks, governing the usage of slaves, and legislating marriage between rapists and their victims. I don't care if in between these passages there are hundreds of pages of happy happy love love (which there isn't)! It is abominable regardless of what "the rest" is.

Um, but this book is also funny, in a kind of scary way.

[Gina · Rating 4 out of 5]

ken has read the bible and picked out the scandalous, lurid and nonsensical parts, so we don't have to. back in the day he might have been burned at the stake for some of his comments, but he's hilarious (and his observations are often spot on). i've actually used this book when i was writing sermons -- don't tell!

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very irreverent Bible read along that highlights some of the weirder passages in the Bible. I read it alongside the NIV. It was like having a confused friend Bible book club.

[Shawn Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an excellent, accessible, entertaining resource. It's a rapid-fire chronological guide to all of the contradictions, unexplainable weirdness, sadism, sexism, and swept-under-the-rug stuff in the Bible (with quotes and citations). This is something that you could give to a Bible literalist to make them do some double-takes (if they're at all sane, thinking people).

[Valerie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the funniest synopsis of the bible ever. Please, don't read this if you have no sense of the absurd.

[James West · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ridiculously funny. Also very handy.

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book on many of the inconsistencies and falsehoods of the bible.

[Jsrott · Rating 3 out of 5]

A tongue-firmly-planted-in-cheek review of the Bible that focuses on the negative and outright at times weird stories included in the Bible. A good reminder that when reading the Bible, historical and cultural context are major keys, and that there is a LOT of danger in taking the text as literally as some do. Reading this after reading a scholar's work on contextual criticism was a solid reminder of that.

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

All the kooky bits from the Bible.

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not as amusing or educational as I had hoped

[Matthew Picchietti · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good. Works well as a bathroom reader. Points out a lot of hypocrisy.

[Ross Blocher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Detailed review to come.

[Madame Pamita · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only bible you'll ever need!

[Ken Deshaies · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an awesome little book, a quick read if you simply go through it front to back. However, I had a bible handy and was able to compare quotes, and read the relevant text. Smith quotes snippets, but is able to show just how outlandish the bible is. First, that there have been many different versions over the years, each providing different interpretations of what each translator considers the "truth". Second, the lack of complicity between the different various authors, and their utter contradictory recountings of "history", is remarkable. Smith offers the entire gambit with a generous amount of humor, and you find that reading the entire book is truly laughable. It is interesting that those zealots who specialize in quoting the bible in order to get or keep followers are very selective in what they quote, and tend to keep away from those passages that one might consider impossible or absurd to the max.

Smith also offers a helpful list of "most embarrassing questions" about the bible that one might use in a discussing the veracity of the book with a true believer.

If you are an athiest, agnostic, a deist who disavows organized religion, or just questioning your faith, this is a must read.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book that delivers exactly as advertised. Concise, witty and well written; as indicated by Smith, could be considered a much more enjoyable experience than the real article. What will temper your impression of this book hinges upon your previous relationship with the Bible and Christianity at large. If you have stepped back to view the 'good book' as a muddled set of fallible advice and parables, you'll love it; if you believe that each word of the original is literal truth, you may find this work a little insulting. You have free will (or don't), decide for yourself.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hilarious! But not something you want to give to your religious Aunt Muriel for Christmas--or maybe it is.
Ken Smith does a brilliant over-view of the bible (just hitting the salacious, gory, exceptionally crazy and inconsistent parts). Starting with the Old Testament moving towards the New. He goes in the standardized order of The Holy Bible and he invites you to follow along with your own Good Book.

[Allen B. Lloyd · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining, but disturbing examination of the Old and New Testaments. While Ken makes amusing commentary throughout the tome, he lets the “Holy” books speak for themselves, revealing a litany of hypocrisy, narrative inconsistencies, very weird sex, violence, misogyny, racism, child abuse, and hate towards nonbelievers. Not recommended for believers easily offended by the actual contents of their beloved Testaments.

[Rory Leahy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this years ago, am looking into it again now for a research project.

Ken essentially reads the Bible so I don't have to, providing page by page commentary on Genesis to Revelations from a skeptical, irreverent contemporary perspective.

The Bible is totally screwed up, dude. Let Ken be your guide.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although there are many other books that deal with bible errancy far more in-depth, Ken's Guide is nice because it is simple, compact, and makes for an interesting addition to a rational minded person's coffeetable.

It has already been lampooned (although poorly) by creationists (making it seem a little dated), it is still a cute little book.

[strawberryluna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely entertaining and fairly interesting to learn that many quotes and dictums that I've always believed or been told were "from the Bible" are in fact, not. It's a good time, though there are moments where I almost feel badly for evangelicals, should one read this book. Slightly harsh at times, but worth the read.

[Tammy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Totally hirarious tour of the Bible. It reminds me that the Bible was written by PEOPLE and reflects their place in history and their impressions of God. My takeaway is that people put all kinds of human characteristics on God, none of which are true. We cannot understand the infinite, only be aware of it.

[Keith Davis · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brutally funny read through of the entire the Bible. Not just a vicious satire, it also has some valuable insight that cuts through a lot of the pomposity and piety that surrounds Bible study. I will be haunted for the rest of my life by Smith's image of Jesus as a fat Elvis based on the constant references to his eating in the gospels.

[Mike Dey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book I have read many times, and have given away to several friends. It is both funny and incite full. It's great as a companion to help make sense of the actual Bible. I would suggest anyone who wants to tackle the task of reading the Christian Bible from a more skeptical perspective, to read this book with it.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable summary of some of the more bizarre, absurd and unpleasant versus from the bible. They are usually in isolation, so it would be easy to dismiss them as being taken out of summary, but, if you read a more in depth book, such as "Secret Origins of the Bible", it is clear that the context either doesn't matter, or actually makes things worse

[Feydras · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cheatsheet pointing to most of the nasty, twisted, depraved stuff in the Bible. The stuff God endorses or commands. If i have to tell you what that stuff is then you've only been reading what your preacher/priest/minister tells you to.

A great reference book.

[Allison · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you can get over the blaspheme of this book and have an open mind, you will belly laugh through the whole thing. While following the facts of the bible, Ken gives a little of his input and perspective....which is SO wrong, but SO funny!!!

[Roman David]

Great book. If you've got preachy friends & family, this book is a must have. an athiest/agnostic is someone who has read the bible from cover to cover. It could take years to read the bible so read this. you can finish it from cover to cover on a subway ride from the Bronx to brooklyn.

[Leonard Pierce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bachelor of Arts Ken Smith has compiled a wonderful, accurate, hilarious, and surprisingly fair guide to all the incredibly crazy bullshit in the Bible.