BIBLIOLATRY: excessive reverence for the Bible as literally interpreted.
I learned this word from one of my professors in rabbinic school.
It sounded complex.
It also sounded like something I should never do.
I have tried to live up to that value (of “no excessive reverence”) throughout my rabbinate.
That is why I have led study sessions on biblical books with a wide range of translations in front of me, including the following: the new Jewish Publication Society translation; the New Revised Standard Version; the Revised English Bible; Robert Alter’s translation; Richard Elliot Friedman’s translation (Torah only); and the New American Bible, Revised Edition.
Of course, for me, and for the groups I have led, the Hebrew text has always been the starting point. If I am fortunate, there is someone present with a Greek text as well.
This multi-faceted approach to Bible study is an antidote to bibliolatry. Scholars continue to discover that ancient biblical texts were dynamic, rather than static. The Dead Sea Scrolls shed light on the long process of development of the wording itself that led to the Bible that we know today.
When I was a junior in high school, after my physical education class, we had a half-hour wait until we went upstairs for lunch. One of my classmates brought his Amplified Bible with him to school every day. That text was a catalyst for a lively discussion among several of us: a Reform Jew (me), an Orthodox Jew, an agnostic, a Mormon, a not-so-active Catholic, and our evangelical friend with the Bible. That went on for months. My classmate with the Bible did ask great questions when we sat together at lunch, after our locker-room discussions on the passages he presented didn’t resolve much, other than revealing our differences. I am not so sure that was okay with him, other than the fact that he fulfilled his desire to witness his faith. Yet, our diversity of opinion was fine with me. Wouldn’t you know that my Bible-carrying classmate sat next to me at my high school graduation!
I know that my classmate’s perspective on this holy book was heartfelt and, sometimes, piercingly insightful. He had ready answers to questions for which I am still formulating what I believe, because, sometimes, matters of faith require constant redefinition as we move along the life cycle.
One thing I know for sure: he read that book. He read a lot of it. Perhaps he focused on the commentary of one interpretation too much for my taste. But he read it.
And that is why it was upsetting to see the leader of the free world fashion a photo-op in front of a church near the White House with a Bible (not “his” Bible, “a” Bible, he reportedly said) in his hand. The manner in which he cleared the path to the church with his entourage of “power” continues to spark debate, but people who were nearby, PEACEFUL protesters, were forcibly moved away from this church which many past American presidents had visited as a matter of course. I said, “past,” not “present.”
Holding up a Bible that is, to the one holding it, just “a” Bible, makes that book an object. It also means that the person holding it is trying to merge with the object, perhaps to suggest that book and person should, together, elicit reverence from the people who see that image. I know that some people responded exactly that way.
In my view, that would be actual bibliolatry, where it’s just the image of the book, not what is inside, that makes the difference. The association of the person with the book is, perhaps, anthropomorphized bibliolatry, as if he (in this case), embodies teachings that some people believe to be primary in the text: order, strength, elimination of perceived enemies of God, and veneration towards people who are thought to pave the way for those whom they view as “true believers.”
Of course, what’s in that text? Off the top of my head, I would cite these verses:
“You shall have no other gods beside me.”
“You shall not take the name of your Eternal God in vain.
“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”
“Love your neighbor as yourself.”
“Justice, justice, shall you pursue.”
“Do not oppress the stranger, for you know the feelings of the stranger, having yourselves been strangers in the land of Egypt.”
“What does God require of you? Only this: to do justly, to love (acts of) mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”
“They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they again train for war.”
“Six things the Eternal One hates; seven are an abomination to God: a haughty bearing, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a mind that hatches evil plots, feet quick to run to evil, a false witness testifying lies, And one who incites fellow human beings to quarrel.”
Once we look at these and other texts, and speak of them over and over, we move beyond bibliolatry to true understanding.
In the Chapters of the Rabbis, Pirkei Avot, Ben Bag Bag declared: “Turn it, and turn it, for everything is in it. Reflect on it and grow old and gray with it. Don’t turn from it, for nothing is better than it.”
Here I am, old (but young at heart) and gray (well, my beard is), and I haven’t turned from it yet.
May new understandings continue to flow from this text for everyone one of us, so that the greatest wisdom of the book in our hands, and its teachings of love and peace, will always suffuse our hearts and souls.
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