by Robert W. McDonald

Created on: December 20, 2009   Last Updated: December 21, 2009

Obviously the “Bible-Believers,” as demonstrated by the 4:1 ratio of “Nay” to “Yea” responses in this debate, have rushed forward to defend their favorite book against the question “is the Bible outdated and irrelevant?” In this essay I will take the position that the majority of respondents to the question at hand are wrong and that the Bible is indeed “outdated and irrelevant” in contemporary society.

Is the Bible outdated? My answer, of course, must be a resounding “yes.” In support of my answer I, offer the following observations.

How else would you describe a book that has existed, in its current form, for the better part of two thousand years without undergoing at least one major editorial revision? The Bible’s supporters will, of course, jump to their feet and loudly proclaim that their book is so perfect that it never requires revision except for new translations that will make it “easier to understand.” Although the pro-Bible crowd will invariably try to ignore them, there are two points where this defense fails.

Its defenders routinely fail to mention that the collection of individual manuscripts we know as the Bible were written over a span of close to a thousand years and in at least three languages (Archaic Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek). On top of that, all copies of Biblical manuscripts were made by hand until well after the New World was discovered. In this process of translating from one language to another and then making handwritten copies, it was inevitable that errors were made during this very complicated process. In fact, some parts of the Biblical narratives were added well after the original works were written (such as the entire second half of Daniel, Jesus of Nazareth’s alleged self-identification as being “one with the father,” and the story of the “woman taken in adultery,” with the latter two “editorial updates” inserted into the gospel attributed to John’s gospel alone). Isn’t it at least possible, if not likely, that such later additions were made to justify changes in religious doctrine rather to correct transcription errors?

Secondly, doesn’t it appear odd that if the Bible is God’s “handbook for living” that it would need to be simplified or made “easier to understand” on a regular basis? Rather than cite the numerous logical arguments that destroy

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