Well said, Alex.
Certainly worth a read as a historical and cultural artifact though which has been so often referenced in Western literature over the centuries.
@Alexandrec: “…all the horrific deeds it calls for…”
The question is whether it calls YOU to do these “horrific deeds” today in the year 2012…??
What about the New Testament? Does that call you to do horrific deeds too? Or does it call you to love your enemies and do good unto all men?
And let’s be honest: I bet you hate the New Testament every bit as much as the Old Testament, don’t you? (You’d be quite an unusual Atheist if you don’t, in my experience…)
JayB
look at the republican presidential candidate race. Look how often they cite their beliefs as the basis for their positions and you cannot deny that words written in this book influence positions and opinions on today’s problems for a large portion of the American population. I do think there are fascinating stories in the Bible but I reject a lot of the moral advice and value system presented there.
I was deeply religious in my teens but have gotten over that a long time ago. I believe religions are dangerous since they put themselves above any rational reasoning. To me religions represent a belief system based on superstition and an outdated interpretation of nature and the universe.
I have to agree with Vera that I find the language in the bible somewhat outdated and of little use for contemporary language learning, but I havn’t been much into poetry and literature either.
ad LMY (…) I apologise for reacting in that way, as I see now that you didn’t intend to say that. (…)
Thanks for your apology (I apologize for my quite emotional reaction as well). I really felt terrible after having been publicly accused of being anti-semitic (especially considering my personal history). Since I would never even dream of saying or writing what you thought I meant it simply did not cross my mind that my sentence could be interpreted that way. I do understand though that it was phrased ambiguously and I will be more careful next time. I’m very, very glad we cleared that misunderstanding.
ad JayB: (…) And let’s be honest: I bet you hate the New Testament every bit as much as the Old Testament, don’t you? (You’d be quite an unusual Atheist if you don’t, in my experience…) (…)
Back from packing my suitcase and just waiting for the plane (just kidding, I still have some hours before I leave) 
I know your comment above referred to Alex, but I think I’m in a similar position.
Jay, I don’t know if I’m what you’d call an atheist but I certainly do not believe in any of the religions anymore I have been in contact with. But, and this is a very important difference, I DO NOT HATE any of the “holy scriptures” (since you kind of suggested that most atheists hate the NT as much as the OT). I agree with Friedemann, there are far more people still literally interpreting the Bible than one might think after having read your posts. You are obviously religious but I have not heard you call for any atrocities to be committed against other people for whatever reason and fortunately you are not the only religious person with a “sound mind”. Just as there are people who commit crimes without believing in any religion.
Of course the Bible and other scriptures require proper exegesis but it is more than obvious that numerous people holding important positions in society do not seem to care much about this. In my second post in this thread I mentioned the example of the priest who consistently preaches hatred against gay people. He does the same with Jews and Muslims and he ALWAYS cites from the Bible when doing so. There are many politicians in the US and other countries that use a more than doubtful rhetoric when talking about “their” God and members of other faiths and/or non-believers.
You could now argue that it is these people that turn the words of the Bible into some sort of weapon against others and that it is not the Bible that is to be blamed for what they think and/or do. Just as one could use a knife to kill someone but also for much less harmful things (or very useful ones for that matter). I have heard religious people make that comparison lots of time and to a certain degree they might be right. But personally I think the Bible contains way too many calls for a behaviour I cannot agree with than for things I find acceptable. At the end of the day, my rejection of the Bible as a guideline for my life is a very personal choice and as long as I’m given that choice without having to fear repression I’m fine with the Bible still being out there although I wish it was used less often to divide people.
The bottom line is that it all depends on what YOU as a person say and do. This is why I don’t really care if somebody is religious, an atheist, a Muslim, Jewish etc. As long as they treat me with respect and understand that I just want to live in peace, I have no problem with them (and, of course, I want them to respect others as well). Respecting somebody does not automatically mean that you have to agree with him. I certainly respect you and yet we disagree quite often. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. The world would be a boring place if we all were to agree on everything but there are things that are not up for discussion and these things, at least for me, include basic human rights which are not always guaranteed everywhere and by everybody (irrespective of whether people do believe in God or not).
There are passages in the Bible that are beautiful as for their wording. Just take the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, chapter 13, 1-13. I’m afraid I don’t remember what this passage is called in English, in German we call it “das Hohelied der Liebe”.
So, if Peter is still reading this, yes, this is a beautiful passage worth reading. If it will be beneficial to you from a linguistic point of view, I don’t know. I still think there are many texts out there which are just as beautiful without the many disturbing things you will read in the Bible.
Again, people may believe whatever they want but their words and actions ought to reflect respect for others and at the least they need to refrain from violence and not justify it with their “holy scriptures”. And, let’s face it Jay, there is an increasing number of people who try to impose their religious beliefs upon others and the way they choose to do this is not always a peaceful one. When I was in Taiwan studying Chinese at a private language school, the vast majority of language students there were Western missionaries of different religious groups (mostly American evangelists). When I talked to them I could not help but wonder how people could be as ignorant as to wipe away another people’s entire history and cultural heritage by declaring that finally they will be “saved” since Jesus will wash away all their sins and help them break with their oh so sinful past.
I never suggested that religious people in general are inclined to commit crimes as you wrote in one of your posts. To think something like that or, even worse, accuse religious people in general of such crimes would be ridiculous and simply wrong.
I was very religious myself and I would have never dreamt of attacking others or hurting them based on what I believed in. But, yes, I was sometimes heavily criticized for not being a “warrier of God” (they actually used that term just as they used the expression “spiritual warfare”; there are even books out there teaching you the “strategies” to use when fighting your “enemies”).
I have friends in high-ranking positions in the catholic church. They are believers but they are also respectful people. Just as atheists can be very respectful.
Getting back to the orginal question Peter asked I must admit that except for English (since I was in an American evangelical group as well) I have not read the Bible in any other language but German. I have not found reading the Bible in English useful for my language studies. It has not done anything to help me better understand the English language. It did turn out to be useful for the odd inter-religious conference where I interpreted since you need to understand the biblical “code” to be able to interpret at such meetings properly.
It would take another thread (or thousands of them to talk in detail about how the Bible is interpreted and (sometimes) misused (intentionally). I just don’t understand how people can base their entire life on words that obviously have been written by men, that contain errors of translation and that were put together and called “holy scriptures” by men while there are many texts that were not included into what today is called the “Bible”.
I enjoy reading books about the Bible by religious and by non-religious people. It is always interesting to compare sometimes diametrically opposed points of view. The only thing I won’t read are pamphlets calling for violence and hatred. Being aware of what is going on around you and keeping a critical mind as to what people say and do, however, is always good advice in my opinion.
This is one of my favourite subjects.
First off, the Bible is not a book - it is a collection of books, psalms, letters, etc., and some are good for learning languages and some are not. So do not treat it as a single book that is either good for learning languages or not.
The best book for learning languages in the Bible, by far, is Ecclesiastes. After that probably the Gospels, Proverbs, and Paul’s letters. Maybe Job too.
The New Testament is by far the easiest to find audio content for though. Sites like wordproject.org have the New Testament recorded in a few languages and sometimes the Old as well, but the best site by far is this one:
www.faithcomesbyhearing.com/features/link-to-us
www.bible.is
(both owned by the same group)
As a fan of some quite rare languages, this site is a godsend. Where else can one find the entire New Testament recorded in Kalmyk, in Ossetian, in Haitian Creole, in Low German, in Afrikaans, in Kazakh? Not only that but also European Portuguese (not always easy to find), Canadian and African French, Romanian, and so on.
Then there are sites like this one:
which allows you to compare translations side by side, up to nine at one time. The Bible is a fantastic resource for learners of certain languages - generally either small languages with few resources, or languages that played a large part in Christian/European history.
The rest of the discussion is not relevant - I see no reason to avoid reading books that I don’t agree with simply because of political or religious reasons. If it has truth in it then read it as that, if it is a collection of fairy tales then read it as a collection of fairy tales.
ad Mithridates: (…) The rest of the discussion is not relevant - I see no reason to avoid reading books that I don’t agree with simply because of political or religious reasons. (…)
I don’t AVOID reading books since I first have to know about things to be able to say if I don’t like them or not but I certainly STOP reading books if I don’t like their content for whatever reason. Just the same way as I won’t keep eating food I have found to be tasteless or even harmful for me (I might actually be allergic to it ;-).
Of course, the Bible is composed of a series of scriptures as I pointed out when I mentioned that there are lots of texts that were not included in what today is called the Bible but it is also commonly referred to as “the holy book” (also by theologists). The mere fact that a text is available in multiple languages to me does not mean that it automatically is a good tool to learn languages. But as I and many others have said before, if you find the content of the Bible interesting, then go for it. You will only marginally benefit from such study when it comes to the current usage of a language but then again this may not be what you are looking for when you read the Bible.
And as for your statement according to which “The rest of the discussion is not relevant” I guess it is not relevant to you and your point of view but many others have found it quite interesting and worthwhile.
Peter - “I might try the “Samuel” and “Kings” sections. One question, though. Would reading these “books” make sense if I haven’t read the preceding ones?”
@Peter: IMHO, no, they won’t make sense. It would be like reading a novel starting at the middle. In order to understanding all the historical background, you should start from Genesis, at least from the story of Abram.
For beginners, I would recommend starting from some New Testament books. The Gospel of Mark is the shortest among the 4 Gospels. Simple letters such 1 John and James and are also good for beginners.
If you insist on reading Old Testament, perhaps Ruth and Jonah are short and simple enough.
Choosing a translation is also very important. For purely language learner propose, I would choose a more recent translation than an old one, a more paraphrased version than a literal one.
You will only marginally benefit from such study when it comes to the current usage of a language but then again this may not be what you are looking for when you read the Bible.
How useful it is depends on two things: the book you are using, and the translation. Parole de Vie is much more useful than Darby for a beginner in French, for example. Avoid French translations that have “point” written everywhere.
And as for your statement according to which “The rest of the discussion is not relevant” I guess it is not relevant to you and your point of view but many others have found it quite interesting and worthwhile.
Not my point of view: it is irrelevant to learning languages. I see no reason to avoid any possibly good material when learning one.
ad Mithridates: (…) Not my point of view: it is irrelevant to learning languages. I see no reason to avoid any possibly good material when learning one. (…)
Hmh, “good material” to me means that I find it interesting so I very much believe that the content does matter. Even more so if I consider the fact that there is a myriad of texts out there I can choose from. So, why should I choose something I find boring, harmful whatever?
From a merely linguistic point of view there is absolutely nothing you can learn from the Bible which you cannot learn from many other texts. So, of course the content is relevant or do you just read anything because it is made up of words put together according to a specific grammatical system? We all base our choices on personal preferences. When you call the Bible “good material” you must also base your statement on what you personally consider to be good and useful for your language learning process. Or is there any specific linguistic structure contained in the Bible which is essential for language learners and which you won’t find in any other book? If not, why should it be irrelevant to argue that it is good advice to see if you find the content interesting or not?
The Bible is indeed very heterogenous since the texts it is composed of were written at different times and by different people. I have read it many times and I still think it is of very little use to language learners unless they are interested in the religious aspect. But I’m sure Peter will find out very soon if he benefits linguistically from reading the Bible or if he can reap much more benefit by reading other material. Personally, I would never recommend it as a tool to learn or practise a language since there is much better material out there. But, of course, many people will find it intriguing precisely for its content. I’m just not one of them.
I am not the “Bible-reader” type of person, but at school we had to read the Bible in German and Ancient Greek. I remember that my German school bible (in the 1970s) was called “Die gute Nachricht” and was written in a modern way.
Two weeks ago I received two children’s bibles, one in Spanish and one in Italian for language practise purposes with the titles:
- Biblia Infantil para colorear, pintar y leer (español)
- Bibbia da colorare e leggere per i bambini (italiano)
It’s always one page of text on the left side with a picture on the right side and the texts are NOT childish, but written in clear and modern Spanish or Italian language. There are not too many but some unknown words for me in these short texts.
These two books seem useful for my language reading practise and the comprehension will be easier because I have some previous knowledge of my Bible lessons at school in the 1970s.
Fasulye
Ad Fasulye: Great, if you have found material you are interested in and if it turns out to be useful for you, then that’s the way to go. But just out of curiosity, do you think you have learnt anything from reading the Bible in these languages that you could not have learned by reading other texts? If not, then I guess the main reason for you to choose the Bible was its content and don’t get me wrong, that’s absolutely fine. We all need to choose learning material based on our own interests.
Hmh, “good material” to me means that I find it interesting so I very much believe that the content does matter. Even more so if I consider the fact that there is a myriad of texts out there I can choose from. So, why should I choose something I find boring, harmful whatever?
You’re not paying attention to anything I’ve written. Nowhere did I say you “should” choose a book from the Bible to learn from: I said that some of the books there are better than others, and they are particularly good when learning certain languages. If you can find a “myriad of texts” in Kalmyk with matching audio or if you can go live in Kalmykia then go for it. If not, the NT is your largest source of such material online.
When you call the Bible “good material” you must also base your statement on what you personally consider to be good and useful for your language learning process.
I did not call the Bible good material - I said some books of the Bible are great for learning languages (Ecclesiastes), others are fairly good and others are not so good. That is all.
When you call the Bible “good material” you must also base your statement on what you personally consider to be good and useful for your language learning process.
If you are going to use quotes, you’ll need to quote something I’ve actually written. Nowhere does the phrase “good material” appear in the last page.
So aside from any desire to read the books of the Bible for personal reasons, let’s summarize where it is helpful and where it is not.
Helpful: minor languages, languages without a great deal of audio and matching text. Helpful with major languages of historical Christian Europe, such as German. There’s no way to get through Hesse’s Demian for example without at least some understanding of it. Helpful with comparing many translations at one time.
Not helpful: unrelated languages with lots of other content. Japanese and Korean are my two best languages, and I simply can’t sit down and read the Bible in them because it is a largely unrelated culture to that in the Bible, the transliterated names are awkward, and there is so much other interesting and relevant content in these languages that the Bible is a poor and limited substitute.
I haven’t read in the Spanish and Italian Bible yet, but I intend to read a page here and then. It’s a kind of book which hasn’t to be read chronlogically, so I can just pick up one chapter as for example “Il ritorno di Giacobbe” (Italian) or “Un joven pastor debe ser rey” (Spanish) and that’s it. For me it’s just text material which is devided into small chunks, so it’s easy to digest. It’s different from reading a novel because there you have to read the whole book.
I would compare it with reading foreign newspaper articles, because there you can also decide to read just ONE article. Qua personal interest I would prefer newspaper articles. It’s not worthwhile buying “El Pais” or similar newspapers for me, because they are expensive in Germany and I don’t have such reading fluency in these languages that I can read lots of articles. I should add that I got these two Bible books as freebies, whereas for “El Pais” you would pay 3-4 EUR here in Germany.
Fasulye
ad Mithridates: (…) I did not call the Bible good material - I said some books of the Bible are great for learning languages (…)
You have perfected hair-splitting to an art. If that’s the way you want to argue, ok.
(…) You’re not paying attention to anything I’ve written. (…)
That comment is merely an assumption on your part and quite an arrogant one I might add.
As for the rest of your post, I’m happy to know you find interesting material to learn languages with. Good luck to you.
P.S. You seem to think of yourself as someone quite authoritative when it comes to the Bible: “let’s summarize where it is helpful and where it is not”. A more humble person might have said: let’s summarize where I think it is …
ad Fasulye: Thanks for your answer.
@Friedemann: “…I believe religions are dangerous since they put themselves above any rational reasoning. To me religions represent a belief system based on superstition and an outdated interpretation of nature and the universe.”
That is quite a sweeping statement, Friedemann!
(Anyway what about scientsts? I believe the so called ‘Climategate’ episode rather clearly shows that, behind closed doors, many of them are as much motivated by politics and prejudice as by “rational reasoning”…)
@Robert: “…I think the Bible contains way too many calls for a behaviour I cannot agree with than for things I find acceptable.”
Well, what about the New Testament?
Yes, I know people can always fish out some out-of-context verse (from a parable, etc.) But 99.99% of what the NT is all about is mercy, love, peace, non-violence, healing, fairness, doing good to others, etc.
Would it really be such a terrible person who behaved this way?
JayB,
I am not saying that scientists are better people per se but in science a debate can eventually be settled and put to rest. That is because in science you have an impartial judge, the experiment. In some cases it might take some time but it will happen eventually. In religion that is not possible. As far as I know, “climategate” did not change the mainstream scientific consensus on climate change.
How can one settle the question whether same sex marriage is moral or immoral if one argues only on a religious basis? On the other hand the question whether water is made up of either oxygen and hydrogen or nitrogen and helium can be settled using the scientific approach.
I also find that the logic behind many parts of the bible is really hard to accept. God created everything but somehow there is evil in his grand opus. God is almighty but does not interfere to correct injustice and suffering? I never could buy this and eventually lost my faith alltogether.