Not the Onion: Right-Wing Group Seeks Help Rewriting the Bible Because It's Not Conservative Enough

[Bjorn Against]

Right-Wing Group Seeks Help Rewriting the Bible Because It's Not Conservative Enough
The King James Bible and more recent translations are veritable primers of progressive agitprop, according to the founder of Conservapedia.
AlterNet / By Richard Schiffman
December 20, 2013

Liberal bias in the media pales in comparison to what you’ll find in your standard-issue Bibles, according to Conservapedia.com, a kind of Wikipedia for the religious right. The King James Bible, not to mention more recent translations like the New International Version (NIV), are veritable primers of progressive agitprop, complains Andy Schlafly, the founder of Conservapedia.com. (His mother, Phyllis, is an activist best known for her opposition to feminism and the Equal Rights Amendment.)

But not to worry. Andy Schlafly’s group is on the case, and they have invited you to pitch in. Well, maybe not you, exactly, but the "best of the public,” whose assistance is solicited in proposing new wording for left-leaning Bible verses.

Don’t know Aramaic, Hebrew or ancient Greek? Not a problem. What they are looking for is not exactly egghead scholarship, but a knack for using words they've read in the Wall Street Journal. They have a list of promising candidates on their website— words like capitalism, work ethic, death penalty, anticompetitive, elitism, productivity, privatize, pro-life—all of which are conspicuously missing from those socialist-inspired Bibles we’ve been reading lately.

In the several years since their translation project was inaugurated, all of the New Testament and several books of the Old have been thoroughly revised. But lots still remains to be done. If you've got a soft spot for Leviticus, the Book of Amos, Lamentations or Numbers, they are all still available for rewrite, so get cracking!

http://www.alternet.org/belief/right-wing-group-seeks-help-rewriting-bible-because-its-not-conservative-enough

[SummerSnow]

1. speechless

[sakabatou]

2. WTF?

[tjwash]

3. They can always just toss the whole "new-testament" thing.

Besides - the bible is mostly just a steaming pile of made-to-suit exaggerations anyway.

[Kablooie]

7. So they are just continuing an age old tradition of rewriting God's word to say whatever you want.

Excellence in God-re-casting.

[longship]

28. The Bible as ventriloquist dummy. R&K nt

[arcane1]

4. I'd love to hear from the "The bible is inerrant" crowd on this.

So these fools are basically rewriting the English translations? That's just too much

[JHB]

8. It's already been done. I remember from back in the 80s...

...Pat Robertson hawking "The Book", going to absurd lengths to not use the word "translation". It retold the KJV in modern English -- a translation of a translation! But since they still claimed it to "really" be the KJV and Pat himself was flogging it, people bought it. That is, the people who gave rise to the term "shorn again".

[Pholus]

5. Revelations 22:18-19

Hey, I hope they try. Wonder how they're gonna react when they get to the last page?

18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll.
19 And if anyone takes words away from this scroll of prophecy, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life and in the Holy City, which are described in this scroll.

[Blanks]

6. Probably something like this...

18) warn everyone who hears the prophesy of this scroll: if anyone votes for anything but republicans, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll.
19) and if anyone votes for a democrat, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life and in the Holy City, which are described in this scroll.

There might be a section requiring that a specific number of duck dynasty episodes be viewed in a lifetime and a mention of mandatory Chick-Fil-A meals in a few of the other epistles, but I don't see any huge hurdles created by these particular passages.

[Pholus]

13. What, the Bible contradicts us? Certainly, it is just a problem in "translation."

Solves their hypocrisy problem neatly. You better add a section about Nascar too! Perhaps that's what brought
Jericho's walls down, 500 laps...

[NobodyHere]

9. I think it's better if you read straight from the horse's keyboard

http://conservapedia.com/Conservative_Bible_Project

My favorite guideline for a conservative bible:
"Accept the Logic of Hell: applying logic with its full force and effect, as in not denying or downplaying the very real existence of Hell or the Devil "

[HughBeaumont]

10. The PERFECT CANDIDATE to do so!!!

I mean, Andrew Schlafly and his crack brainchildren at Conservapedia . . . those guys are like the ARBITERS of all intelligent thought regarding the Almighty's role in . . . . everything . . . . imaginable . . .

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/The_Lenski_Affair

[YoungDemCA]

11. Of course....

Religion is secondary to politics for these assholes.

[newfie11]

12. This has probably been done many times over the centuries

Maybe or maybe not but knowing humans as I do I would bet it's been rewritten to the rulers of the day.

In this instance it is the losers of the day.

[EOTE]

22. Probably?

You're familiar with the King James Version of the Bible, right? The bible has DEFINITELY been rewritten in order to appeal to the rulers of the time.

[newfie11]

25. I agree!

There are lots of versions of THE BIBLE!
I'm pretty sure there will be lots more if humanity doesn't kill itself off.

[freshwest]

15. These dickweeds have been working on that for years... n/t

[Buns_of_Fire]

16. Why not just accept Betty Bowers' translation and leave it at that?

http://www.landoverbaptist.org/

It would free up more of the tithes to invest in offshore accounts in properly religious countries (those without satanistic extradition agreements with the US), jeroboams of Chateau Mouton-Rothschild 1945 holy communion wine, and weekend prayer retreats at The Ranch at Rock Creek (Philipsburg, Montana).

Just trying to help.

[Scuba]

17. When you have to preface something with "not the Onion" you know the wingnuts are at it again.

[B Calm]

18. How many times has the bible been rewritten?

[Enthusiast]

19. I am also speechless.

[URL=.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]

[CJCRANE]

20. If you need to rewrite the Bible...

Maybe you're in the wrong religion?

[Ganja Ninja]

21. So I guess it's official.

Conservatism is no longer a political movement. It's a full blown cult.

[Major Nikon]

23. Al Franken already did this

[DFW]

24. A guy named Joseph Smith did this in the 19th Century

Got away with it big time. Called it the Book of Mormon and planted the seeds for a very successful Broadway Musical nearly 200 years later.

[Shampoobra]

26. Their plan includes actually removing passages they don't like (LINK)

http://conservapedia.com/Conservative_Bible_Project#First_Example_-_Liberal-Promoted_Falsehood

First Example - Liberal-Promoted Falsehood

The earliest, most authentic manuscripts of the Gospel According to Luke lack this verse fragment set forth at the start of Luke 23:34:

Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."

Is this a corruption of the original, perhaps promoted by liberals without regard to its authenticity? This does not appear in any other Gospel, and the simple fact is that some of the persecutors of Jesus did know what they were doing. This quotation is a favorite of liberals, although it does not appear in the earliest and best manuscripts of the Gospel of Luke. It should not appear in a conservative Bible, because in point of fact Jesus might never had said it at all.

[LongTomH]

27. And I thought the people translating the Bible into Klingon needed to 'get a life!'

[Brother Buzz]

29. Frank Luntz, please pick up the nearest white courtesy telephone

[Feral Child]

30. Cool!

Keeps 'em to busy to troll DU is my hope...

[LTR]

31. This project proves two things that I have long believed

1. Hard-core conservatives always claim that the Bible is infallible, and should be followed verbatim (which would be impossible).

2. The Bible is a book written by people.

[Xolodno]

32. Scary thing is...

...the Bible was put together roughly 70 years after the first Ecumenical Council....there was no liberal bias. The first real English translation was the "Great Bible"...again, no liberal bias there.

These guys are to the right of the Roman Emperor Constantine and King Henry the VIII. The KJV was commissioned to placate the Puritans...and that isn't conservative enough?