Vance Christiaanse’s Reviews > The Bible and the Believer: How to Read the Bible Critically and Religiously > Status Update

I wish everyone I know who identifies as a Christian could read this book.

Before I started reading this book, I assumed it was almost a “throwaway”—it would just be some fun trivia facts. But for someone deeply interested in the differences between how different people think (e.g., me), this book makes things clear that I never could have gotten from any “scholarly” book from one perspective.

Peter Enns challenges the assumption that a spiritual reading and a critical reading can be or must be at odds. Also, do people really assume that if Genesis is a myth then God couldn’t intend to teach us through it??? That would explain a lot.

In the Roman Catholic third of the book now. I remember how shocked I was 20 years ago when I first encountered the Roman Catholic idea that the church happened first and it was the church that produced the Bible. Hard to argue with!

Jesus said Moses wrote about him. And Paul, in Romans 5 and in 1 Corinthians 15, writes about Adam as a real person. Peter Enns points out that Christians have more challenges than Jews when trying to figure out how to read the Old Testament.

I’m going to buy my own copy of this book—I’m currently reading a copy checked out from the library. Just finished the Jewish essay—which is followed by a response from the Roman Catholic and then the Protestant (Peter Enns).

Couldn’t resist starting a sixth book. We’ll be starting with a Jewish perspective on the Tanakh, er Old Testament.