The Bible as Literature

As I read C.S. Lewis’ article, “The Literary Impact of the Authorised Version,” I frequently thought about my husband’s family. For them, the King James version of the Bible is the end-all of sacred texts pertaining to Christianity; it is the gospel truth of the Lord in the most literal sense, and it is not to be questioned. But the fact is, as Lewis pointed out, the Bible as a work of literature and as a sacred text has a much more complex and politically motivated history than my in-laws seem to realize.

I always argue with my impressionable nieces and nephews about how problematic the Bible is; the ancient Jews kept an oral history for thousands of years before they finally began writing stuff down. I don’t think I need to point out that this is like playing the most epic game of “Telephone” in history. Further compound this communication problem with all the translations the Bible has gone through since the beginning, and consider that each language has its own colloquialisms that won’t be translated perfectly into a different tongue. That’s like playing the aforementioned game of “Telephone” with no two people speaking the same language. Then there are the politics of an Empire; to keep Rome from falling into civil war, Constantine the Great forced the warring Christian tribes to come to an agreement about all Christian dogma. So the Council of Nicaea grudgingly compromised about what books would be included in the Bible, and what books would get the axe. Fast forward nearly 1,300 years to King James’ Hampton Court Conference, who, in trying to solve translation problems with the Bible, further butchered this already broken thing by throwing out even more books to perpetuate an agenda.

The point of me bringing this up is that C.S. Lewis spoke with disdain for people who read the Bible as a piece of literature and nothing more, arguing that “those who read the Bible as literature do not read the Bible” (23). But knowing just a tiny fraction of its history is enough cause for skepticism. The King James Bible is a work of fiction, not because of its content, but because it is incomplete and has been garbled with time. It must be taken with a grain of salt until we, as scholars, can look at it in its proper context and its totality. Of course, until archaeologists can find all the missing books lost and historians can filter out all the garbled messages that have accumulated through time, this will prove difficult. Still, I appreciated Lewis’ sentiment that the Bible is a spiritual guide, so if you’re reading it for purely secular reasons, you’re missing the point.

But since we’re talking about the literary merit of the Bible, I’d like to say that I don’t think the King James version is nearly as interesting as the Catholic version. This belief stems from my experience as a creative writer. The Apocrypha, those books that King James tossed out, better expanded on events mentioned only in passing, such as the fall of man. In the KJV of Genesis, Adam and Eve’s story only warrants a blip in one chapter of the book. That’s not a story with literary merit, that’s a news report, and not even a headline. You halfway expect some bored reporter at the scene talking about how Adam and Eve were evicted from their apartment but went quietly. Yawn. In the Catholic Bible, on the other hand, that entire story takes its own book to tell, and it involves more shenanigans with the Devil, the archangel Michael playing doctor to Eve when she was giving birth, not to mention murder, betrayal, incest, etc. That’s the ancient equivalent of a blockbuster movie! Now, whether you believe the story is up to you, and King James probably did not. But you can’t deny that it sounds a heck of a lot more fun to read than a couple of lines that vaguely talk about humanity’s fall from grace over a piece of fruit. The Catholic version of this story and many others gives the reader the style, tone, dialogue, character development, plot development, poetics, and aesthetics that he/she needs. The point is that if we’re looking at the stories of the Bible for their literariness alone, I think it’s fair to demand that we look at them in totality. Reading only two chapters in Genesis to learn about the fall of mankind is like reading the line, “To be, or not to be,” from Hamlet and trying to glean the entire theme of revenge from it.

But, I grudgingly acknowledge that the KJV, even with all its faults, inspired and influenced (I’m still not clear on Lewis’ distinctions) a gamut of religious fiction that was interesting, works like Paradise Lost. The quality I admire the most in it is how Lucifer’s fall from grace mirrors mankind’s fall from grace in Genesis. And so the phrase, “paradise lost” doesn’t just refer to Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden, it refers to Lucifer’s expulsion from Heaven as well. Lucifer mirrors humanity as well, especially in pride and determination. There’s this passage:

His utmost power with adverse power oppos'd
In dubious Battel on the Plains of Heav'n,
And shook his throne. What though the field be lost? [ 105 ]
All is not lost; the unconquerable Will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate,
And courage never to submit or yield:
And what is else not to be overcome?

I think this sums up the struggle between Lucifer and humanity. Though they are constantly injuring each other in an eternal battle, the two are more alike than they realize. Pride forced them to fall, but it also forced them to stand. What choice was there? For Lucifer, lay on the banks of a hellish lake for all eternity? For mankind, wallow and die outside the gates of Eden? The way I see it, they only had one option…“awake, arise, or be forever fallen” (Milton 330).

Works Cited:

Lewis, C.S. “The Literary Impact of the Authorised Version.” University of London, London, England. 20 March 1950. The Ethel M. Wood Lecture.

Milton, John. “Paradise Lost.” The Paradise Lost Study Guide. New Arts Library. 1999. Web. 30 August 2011.