We live in pretty radical times, and so we need some pretty radical solutions for all that ails us. And many people think that our biggest problems include a lack of tolerance and inclusion, and being offended all the time. So how can we deal with these bigtime problems?
Well, one way is to rewrite all our literature to ensure that we all feel safe, included, loved and accepted. We must make sure there is nothing left that might offend us or make us feel bad. Above all, we want only that which will make us happy to be available – all else must be banned.
Given that so much which is found in the Bible is clearly so offensive and hateful, an obvious solution would be to radically rewrite it, if not ban it altogether. Maybe we could make a homosexual-friendly Bible for example to keep all gays – and Rugby Australia – happy.
Hmm, the problem with trying to do a bit of satire is that more often than not, reality has already beat us to it. Too often what we want to poke fun at has already occurred! Make a homosexual Bible? Um, sorry, its already been done. Really! Consider an article I wrote seven years ago: “The New Revised Perversion Bible”.
Yes one can already buy a “Bible” that has had all the inconvenient truths about homosexuality conveniently taken out – or radically rewritten. See my piece here: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2012/12/14/the-new-revised-perversion-bible/
But the forever aggrieved, forever offended, and forever PC mobs keep crying for more. So the place for satire to deal with all this will forever be required. Speaking of which, my friend Peter Barnes put out a brief satire piece on all this yesterday.
In it he refers specifically to Rugby Australia’s ugly crusade against Israel Folau and its hatred of Scripture. They have of course made it clear that Folau was wholly evil in quoting from the Bible – at least those bits that they disapprove of.
So Barnes had a go at this. Entitled, “Rugby Australia to release the ‘New Rugby Revised Version’ of the Bible,” it is so short I can offer the entire piece here:
There are well-substantiated rumours that Australian Rugby is seeking to produce a coffee table revision of the Christian Scriptures, to be called the New Rugby Revised Version (NRRV). Some of the contents have had to be changed. Sodom and Gomorrah are showered with blessings, and Lot’s wife is turned into a pillar of the PC establishment.
No real place could be found for John the Baptist, who has been relegated to a footnote while Herod Antipas receives an unusually favourable press. But the enduring message remains the same: Christ Jesus came into the world to try to make people nice.
https://caldronpool.com/rugby-australia-to-release-the-new-rugby-revised-version-of-the-bible/
Brilliant. But we can keep adding to this of course. Or, more accurately, we can keep taking away – from Scripture. To make it completely palatable to everyone, to make sure we offend no one, and to keep everyone happy just as they are, we can do a whole lot more to make the Bible PC-friendly.
So let’s look at some of the passages and themes found in Scripture that have to go – all in the name of tolerance and inclusion.
It is clear that all the passages discussing homosexuality would have to be given the heave-ho. That includes texts from both the Old and New Testaments. But we cannot stop there. It is obvious that all the biblical passages on marriage will have to go as well. After all, heterosexual marriage is just so bigoted and discriminatory.
But that is only the beginning. All those verses about sexual sin and immorality must be expunged as well. Just think how many people feel bad when they see those verses! We need to create safe spaces for adulterers and fornicators and those into polyamory and incest and even bestiality. It is time to stop offending people!
And don’t forget about all those verses on holiness. There would be heaps of those sorts of texts. How many people are made to feel judged and excluded when they read such stuff? It is not nice to offend so many people with all these demands for godliness, holiness and the like.
For that matter, everything that focuses on notions such as sin really must go. After all, why pick on sinners? Why should we make them feel so bad about themselves? So it is high time we delete all references to sin. OK, I realise that plenty of popular preachers already do this – but here we are talking about cleaning up an offensive and intolerant Bible!
And then there are all those ghastly verses in the Bible about judging! Good grief – those gotta go, and now! The worst thing we can ever do is dare to judge someone, dare to say what they are doing is wrong, and dare to point out perceived faults. Live and let live is the message of the Bible – isn’t it!?
While we are at it, it is clear that all those nasty passages about the wrath of God and about hell to come must be scrapped immediately. How dare we suggest that God is ever angered – and angered by something like sin? How dare we suggest that those who fully reject God and shake their fist at him in this life with spend the next life fully apart from him?
Another key set of verses which are just unacceptable for us tolerant and progressive types are those which speak about the exclusiveness of Christ. Come on man, don’t you know that all roads lead to God, and Jesus is just one of many great religious leaders, moral teachers and gurus?
Of course we must also ban any mention about the deity of Christ – and the Trinity. Jesus is just our buddy and a cool inspiration, but nothing more. All talk about deity and divinity is simply discriminatory and arrogant. Besides, all people are already divine anyway!
And it goes without saying that of course atheists don’t even wanna hear about God, so we gotta whole lotta pruning to do here. A fully anthropomorphic Bible would be much more fitting in our tolerant and inclusive age. No more talk about some God who exists and made us and who we are accountable to.
Needless to say, evolutionists also need to be placated here. They do not like the idea of creation, so it is time to ditch the book of Genesis and all those other offensive passages that speak of a God who has created everything. And the sooner the better!
Relativists sure do not like the idea of absolute truth, so those kazillions of texts that affirm truth and absolutes certainly have to go. We do not want to offend all those folks who believe truth is subjective and personal, and want to be left alone to believe whatever they want.
And pacifists do not like hearing about warfare and killing, so we must delete everything involving war and death. Clearly much of the Old Testament needs to go. We need a book that is uplifting and makes us happy. Enough of all this blood-shedding! Speaking of which, everything about a bloody cross also has to go.
Plenty of other objectionable bits need to be pulled as well. But I think you get my drift. Hmm, by the time we do a good thorough clean out of all those narrowminded, bigoted and offensive passages, we should be down to a much more manageable Bible: about 6 words all up – fragments of just two verses.
We would have a wee bit of Matthew 7:1 of course; “judge not” and then four words from 1 Corinthians 13 “the greatest is love.” Well, there you have it my friends: The New Progressive Revised Version. It’s gotta be a winner. Everyone should love it. It will offend no one and please everybody. It should quickly become a best-seller.
We can also call it The New Non-Offensive Bible. What a terrific idea! Why didn’t someone think of this sooner? Just imagine a world where no one gets offended anymore! How wonderful.
Sure, God might get offended by all this – but so what?
29 Replies to “A Bible for Today: The New Progressive Revised Version”
Brilliant Bill. The new revised Bible that does not offend the World but only offends the one who created it. I really enjoy your wit and very much respect your commitment to telling ‘the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth:’ God bless you and your family with all the protection of Psalm 91. You are in the front line of defending the Gospel and you do so with great integrity. Thank you!!
The NIV Bible, which was translated by a lesbian is the Non-Offensive International Version (NIV) Bible.
3222 times the King James Bible mentions the word “men.” But in the feminist perversion of the NIV 2011, the word “men” appears 1027 times in their entire Bible.
4538 times that the King James Bible mentions the word “man.” But in the feminist perversion of the NIV 2011, the word “man” appears 1989 times in their entire Bible.
Thanks Tay. But we need to be a bit more careful here. Such remarks are not all that helpful and in fact are quite misleading. Many critics – both Christian and non-Christian – would rightly counter much of this. Questions arise about which versions did what exactly, and why. For example, the NIV was NOT translated by a lesbian. Not even close.
The lesbian activist Virginia Mollenkott is often mentioned in this regard by the critics. But she was NOT on the NIV translation committee. She was only one of a number of literary style consultants, and only worked for them briefly during the late 60’s and early 70’s. Furthermore, she never revealed her lesbianism to the NIV committee during this time.
As to “deleting” words, this is also rather inaccurate and misleading. For example, changing some cases of ‘man’ to ‘people’ or whatever is not always a bad thing of course. But I also said this about the matter in my article:
And of course there are various versions of the NIV now. The first edition appeared in 1978. It underwent a minor revision in 1984. In 1997 a new version was published in the UK as the New International Version Inclusive Language Edition, but was not published in the U.S. because of opposition from conservative evangelical groups there to inclusive language.
A revised English edition titled Today’s New International Version (TNIV) released a New Testament in March 2002, with the complete Bible published February 2005. In 2011, an updated version of the NIV was released. So we have more than one NIV to deal with.
Sure, many of us had some real problems with the 2011 NIV, mainly over the gender-neutral issue. And it was a mixed bag actually, with some other aspects actually strengthened. But as I say, I have no interest in mounting a full defence of the NIV. Aside from that unhelpful gender-neutral edition, if the others are not to your liking, don’t use them.
So it is best not to just run with various criticisms and circulate them as hardcore fact without doing a bit more checking up on them first. We can hurt our cause by sharing that which is not true, or at least quite misleading. But thanks for writing in.
During the era of Nazi Germany, pro-Nazi Protestants known as “Deutsche Christen” sought to “Nazify” the Bible to bring it into line with Nazi anti-Semitism: Scholar, Susannah Heschel’s The Aryan Jesus deals with the Deutsche Christen movement and their apostate surrender to Nazism [https://press.princeton.edu/titles/8820.html See a review at: https://origins.osu.edu/review/god-nazis ].
progressive version – “Marx who art in utopia Fabbbbbbbulous be they name….”
For many many years we in the west, mainly read, and studied from the KJV. The English Bible written in our own language, which William Tyndale and others gave their lives for. These days, we have many various translations and versions of the “Bible” some good and some not so good. Omissions – : words and whole verses left out when comparing some of them to the KJV.
No wonder our Lord wrote in Scripture, by the Prophet Amos 8.11 . KJV. Behold, the days come, says the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD. mmmmmm.
Now On a different note: When we were children at school (some years ago). Our Educators taught us CHILDREN that if we didn’t attend church every Sunday (unless we were sick) we were destined for Hell. We didn’t go ballistic when we heard the word Hell, nor did we blame God, the Bible, nor our Teachers nor anyone. We either believed the Teachers or we didn’t , and it didn’t bother us at all.
Bill. Your excellent DIY project obviously has support.
The sad thing about Bill’s excellent ‘non-offensive’ (yet God-offensive) version of the Bible is that the majority of those who read it would still find something offensive about it. Perhaps it would be the actual word ‘Bible’! And yet if those changes were made, it would no longer BE the Bible! The thing is, today’s activist generation feed off offense. They are never happy unless they find something to offend them. Of course that also means that in the process, they offend us ‘traditional’ Christians – but that’s ok. You can’t please everybody. Taking offence and being politically correct are, after all, today’s non-negotiables – or so it seems.
Yes quite right Ann.
I wonder how many times the ruse that we cannot discuss any of the problems with homosexuality because they might kill themselves if we do, will be used before people start to wake up.
Thanks Michael. Yes I have a chapter on that in my book, as well as in some articles, eg:
Bill Thank you for your work and your article on ‘Just what is behind these suicides’
We are all created to be attracted to members of the opposite sex. I believe anyone who believes they are attracted to persons of the same sex, (homosexuals) will inevitably have an internal conflict.
We are all created – with each of our 36 trillion cells, which contain our XY or XX chromosomes – as either male or female. (and to be attracted to members of the opposite sex). I believe anyone who believes they are of the opposite sex (transsexuals) will inevitably have a large internal conflict.
I believe that it is these factors which underlie much of the LGBTQ depression and anger.
Can I have a genuine leather, red letter version with concordance and maps?
Should be about $2.50, sorry, genuine leather $5, and we can judge the book by it’s cover.
Yes, not much left after all the placating is done, probably about a page and a half.
All this illustrates why it is true that when we consider reconciliation with God, that it is most true that we are to be reconciled to God, 100%.
God doesn’t need to be reconciled to us, as though he needs to change, and there is something about us that doesn’t.
Nor is it an 90/10 deal, let alone 50/50 as some try to think.
Change subject.
I have long been offended, bemused, confused, & upset by the “off side” rule.
It was really embarrassing when playing a “friendly” to have people shout at me “off side”.
My question was, “off side to what?”
The answer was always gobble-de-gook to me, and left me fuming.
I nearly went home!
Understand, that my definition of the game of Rugby League is that you grab the ball, run like the blazes, and then for some strange reason, throw it behind you! – really now!
— and it is called “football?”
Then, I suppose, netball doesn’t have nets, so maybe it has something to do with that.
Anyway.
The rules for rugby, netball, basketball…. should all be changed to have the “off side” rule removed altogether.
WikiP.. says that the “off side” rule in “Union” is “complex”; and League…?
It is a huge problem to those who are embarrassed, to those who don’t like it, who don’t understand it, who think it is an obnoxious and demeaning part of the game, after all it is regressive and hinders the possibilities for better and smoother progress towards our goal.
Aren’t we all after points in the end?
Just think what rugby would be like if it was a bit more like Aussie Rules. Fantastic.
It is certain that the “League” rule-book needs to be revised again, after all there have been many revisions over the years, and those playing the dangerous version 50 years ago would be fouled out quickly if they tried to play now, by the rules back then.
So, no problem, it is time again to make the famous game much more user friendly.
We need to remove all the rules that people don’t like, that people can’t understand, that people can’t keep, (sorry– don’t want to keep).
Typical of this, quite apart from the “off side” rule, are the people not in team colours; these people get in the way and, distract everyone by blowing whistles, and expect everyone to do what they say. I mean!! Anathema!
C’mon Raelene, what about it?
Just think about the money!
However you are strictly forbidden to move from Homosexual to Hetrosexual. (incidentally neither Homosexual or Hetrosexual are on the Facebook list ?)
Why is this so?
John,
I think the key is in the word “options”.
Homosexuality is not regarded as an option in many quarters.
And about the bibles you suggested, the imitation leather is nowhere as violence tolerant as real leather, so it is a bit hypocritical for me.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg, on 18 March 2019 deemed that you must not say anything against Muhammad. Just waiting for the ECHR to say that you must not say anything against homosexuality. Islamophobia and Homophobia are not dissimilar.
Of note, Islam does not tolerate homosexuality and vice versa.
Seems after all I really AM living on another planet where things have progressively, perhaps now exponentially, warmed up. I wonder if the realm of Hell is nearby (of course only for those who pretend it doesn’t exist since we’re all going to end up in a ‘nice’ place). Thanks for the blend of tragedy and entertainment, Bill.
Dear Bill, i still read you first, you definitely set the tone, find the mark and show us where the bar is supposed to be. An added bonus is your additional posts. Keep them coming John Miller and all the others it is better than Australia All Over – of which I was once a fan.
God bless you all
Mark Bryant
I noticed under sexual sins you left out incest. Are you discriminating against ‘family love’?? Are you a bigoted incestophobe??
Bill this is a great read for me this morning I have never had such a breakfast as your write up to day
Can I copy and share?
Yes feel free Sunday.
I appreciate your comments. Very helpful.
Thanks Keith.
Thank you for your comments on a Bible for today.
Many do not have the gift of expression that you have but fully support your exposure of such issues.
As someone who came under condemnation of sin, my life was transformed when I accepted the Atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ in my place. Consequently I have taken that truth and the Bible to many countries and seen other lives transformed by God’s Holy Spirit.
Brilliant Bill. The new revised Bible that does not offend the World but only offends the one who created it. I really enjoy your wit and very much respect your commitment to telling ‘the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth:’ God bless you and your family with all the protection of Psalm 91. You are in the front line of defending the Gospel and you do so with great integrity. Thank you!!
The NIV Bible, which was translated by a lesbian is the Non-Offensive International Version (NIV) Bible.
3222 times the King James Bible mentions the word “men.” But in the feminist perversion of the NIV 2011, the word “men” appears 1027 times in their entire Bible.
4538 times that the King James Bible mentions the word “man.” But in the feminist perversion of the NIV 2011, the word “man” appears 1989 times in their entire Bible.
Thanks Tay. But we need to be a bit more careful here. Such remarks are not all that helpful and in fact are quite misleading. Many critics – both Christian and non-Christian – would rightly counter much of this. Questions arise about which versions did what exactly, and why. For example, the NIV was NOT translated by a lesbian. Not even close.
I deal with this and other points you raise in great detail in a long four-part article. See here for example: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2018/05/07/the-king-james-only-controversy-part-3/
As I said there about the lesbian charge:
As to “deleting” words, this is also rather inaccurate and misleading. For example, changing some cases of ‘man’ to ‘people’ or whatever is not always a bad thing of course. But I also said this about the matter in my article:
So it is best not to just run with various criticisms and circulate them as hardcore fact without doing a bit more checking up on them first. We can hurt our cause by sharing that which is not true, or at least quite misleading. But thanks for writing in.
During the era of Nazi Germany, pro-Nazi Protestants known as “Deutsche Christen” sought to “Nazify” the Bible to bring it into line with Nazi anti-Semitism: Scholar, Susannah Heschel’s The Aryan Jesus deals with the Deutsche Christen movement and their apostate surrender to Nazism [https://press.princeton.edu/titles/8820.html See a review at: https://origins.osu.edu/review/god-nazis ].
progressive version – “Marx who art in utopia Fabbbbbbbulous be they name….”
For many many years we in the west, mainly read, and studied from the KJV. The English Bible written in our own language, which William Tyndale and others gave their lives for. These days, we have many various translations and versions of the “Bible” some good and some not so good. Omissions – : words and whole verses left out when comparing some of them to the KJV.
No wonder our Lord wrote in Scripture, by the Prophet Amos 8.11 . KJV. Behold, the days come, says the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD. mmmmmm.
Now On a different note: When we were children at school (some years ago). Our Educators taught us CHILDREN that if we didn’t attend church every Sunday (unless we were sick) we were destined for Hell. We didn’t go ballistic when we heard the word Hell, nor did we blame God, the Bible, nor our Teachers nor anyone. We either believed the Teachers or we didn’t , and it didn’t bother us at all.
Bill. Your excellent DIY project obviously has support.
New Progressive Bible Prints All References To Pride In Rainbow Colors
https://babylonbee.com/news/new-progressive-bible-prints-all-references-to-pride-in-rainbow-colors
New WikiBible Lets Anyone Edit The Scriptures
https://babylonbee.com/news/new-wikibible-lets-anyone-edit-the-inspired-scriptures
Very facetious, Bill! Well written!
The sad thing about Bill’s excellent ‘non-offensive’ (yet God-offensive) version of the Bible is that the majority of those who read it would still find something offensive about it. Perhaps it would be the actual word ‘Bible’! And yet if those changes were made, it would no longer BE the Bible! The thing is, today’s activist generation feed off offense. They are never happy unless they find something to offend them. Of course that also means that in the process, they offend us ‘traditional’ Christians – but that’s ok. You can’t please everybody. Taking offence and being politically correct are, after all, today’s non-negotiables – or so it seems.
Yes quite right Ann.
I wonder how many times the ruse that we cannot discuss any of the problems with homosexuality because they might kill themselves if we do, will be used before people start to wake up.
Thanks Michael. Yes I have a chapter on that in my book, as well as in some articles, eg:
https://billmuehlenberg.com/2010/10/21/just-what-is-behind-these-suicides/
Bill Thank you for your work and your article on ‘Just what is behind these suicides’
We are all created to be attracted to members of the opposite sex. I believe anyone who believes they are attracted to persons of the same sex, (homosexuals) will inevitably have an internal conflict.
We are all created – with each of our 36 trillion cells, which contain our XY or XX chromosomes – as either male or female. (and to be attracted to members of the opposite sex). I believe anyone who believes they are of the opposite sex (transsexuals) will inevitably have a large internal conflict.
I believe that it is these factors which underlie much of the LGBTQ depression and anger.
Can I have a genuine leather, red letter version with concordance and maps?
Should be about $2.50, sorry, genuine leather $5, and we can judge the book by it’s cover.
Yes, not much left after all the placating is done, probably about a page and a half.
All this illustrates why it is true that when we consider reconciliation with God, that it is most true that we are to be reconciled to God, 100%.
God doesn’t need to be reconciled to us, as though he needs to change, and there is something about us that doesn’t.
Nor is it an 90/10 deal, let alone 50/50 as some try to think.
Change subject.
I have long been offended, bemused, confused, & upset by the “off side” rule.
It was really embarrassing when playing a “friendly” to have people shout at me “off side”.
My question was, “off side to what?”
The answer was always gobble-de-gook to me, and left me fuming.
I nearly went home!
Understand, that my definition of the game of Rugby League is that you grab the ball, run like the blazes, and then for some strange reason, throw it behind you! – really now!
— and it is called “football?”
Then, I suppose, netball doesn’t have nets, so maybe it has something to do with that.
Anyway.
The rules for rugby, netball, basketball…. should all be changed to have the “off side” rule removed altogether.
WikiP.. says that the “off side” rule in “Union” is “complex”; and League…?
It is a huge problem to those who are embarrassed, to those who don’t like it, who don’t understand it, who think it is an obnoxious and demeaning part of the game, after all it is regressive and hinders the possibilities for better and smoother progress towards our goal.
Aren’t we all after points in the end?
Just think what rugby would be like if it was a bit more like Aussie Rules. Fantastic.
It is certain that the “League” rule-book needs to be revised again, after all there have been many revisions over the years, and those playing the dangerous version 50 years ago would be fouled out quickly if they tried to play now, by the rules back then.
So, no problem, it is time again to make the famous game much more user friendly.
We need to remove all the rules that people don’t like, that people can’t understand, that people can’t keep, (sorry– don’t want to keep).
Typical of this, quite apart from the “off side” rule, are the people not in team colours; these people get in the way and, distract everyone by blowing whistles, and expect everyone to do what they say. I mean!! Anathema!
C’mon Raelene, what about it?
Just think about the money!
Bruce Knowling – have I got a deal for you.
How about the Violence-Free Version (VFV) Bible with an imitation brown leather cover, for just $79.99, with free shipping:
https://babylonbee.com/news/violence-free-bible-now-available
Or for your online convenience:
‘Tinder Creators Developing Bible App To Enable Swiping Left On Undesirable Verses’
https://babylonbee.com/news/tinder-creators-developing-bible-app-to-enable-swiping-left-on-undesirable-verses
Can anyone help me? There are a multitude of genders – with Facebook offering 58. https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2014/02/heres-a-list-of-58-gender-options-for-facebook-users/ Everything is fluid. You can move anywhere you like across the alphabet. Whatever suits.
However you are strictly forbidden to move from Homosexual to Hetrosexual. (incidentally neither Homosexual or Hetrosexual are on the Facebook list ?)
Why is this so?
John,
I think the key is in the word “options”.
Homosexuality is not regarded as an option in many quarters.
And about the bibles you suggested, the imitation leather is nowhere as violence tolerant as real leather, so it is a bit hypocritical for me.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg, on 18 March 2019 deemed that you must not say anything against Muhammad. Just waiting for the ECHR to say that you must not say anything against homosexuality. Islamophobia and Homophobia are not dissimilar.
Of note, Islam does not tolerate homosexuality and vice versa.
Guess this is inevitable:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1568588955
Brilliant Bill! We praise God for your razor-sharp mind!
Thanks Suzanna.
He created them male and female. Genesis 5:2
The ‘new improved’ Bible will have to incorporate Canadians who are transformed from male to (a kind of) female.
https://pulpitandpen.org/2019/07/09/canadian-provincial-government-to-pay-for-breast-implants-for-men/
Seems after all I really AM living on another planet where things have progressively, perhaps now exponentially, warmed up. I wonder if the realm of Hell is nearby (of course only for those who pretend it doesn’t exist since we’re all going to end up in a ‘nice’ place). Thanks for the blend of tragedy and entertainment, Bill.
Dear Bill, i still read you first, you definitely set the tone, find the mark and show us where the bar is supposed to be. An added bonus is your additional posts. Keep them coming John Miller and all the others it is better than Australia All Over – of which I was once a fan.
God bless you all
Mark Bryant
I noticed under sexual sins you left out incest. Are you discriminating against ‘family love’?? Are you a bigoted incestophobe??
Bill this is a great read for me this morning I have never had such a breakfast as your write up to day
Can I copy and share?
Yes feel free Sunday.
I appreciate your comments. Very helpful.
Thanks Keith.
Thank you for your comments on a Bible for today.
Many do not have the gift of expression that you have but fully support your exposure of such issues.
As someone who came under condemnation of sin, my life was transformed when I accepted the Atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ in my place. Consequently I have taken that truth and the Bible to many countries and seen other lives transformed by God’s Holy Spirit.