Ken's Guide to the Bible Paperback – September 18, 1995

This little book is a hoot. Ken takes the veil away from many of the less well advertised aspects of the biblical "message." Too bad the people this could really help either won't read it or won't get it.I'd have given it all five stars but for a couple of things. First, Ken misses some of the most outrageous "family values" tales in the OT. The one that tipped me off about the "value" of this book, way back when I was a little nipper, was the dreadful tale of Abraham and Isaac. The story of a god repulsive enough to command a man to murder his own son for no reason other than to prove what a brainless sheep he was, and a father who was perfectly ready to do it. This story should terrify any child with half a brain.Then there's the charming story of Lot, supposedly the only honorable man in Sodom, who, in order to preserve the dignity of a couple of God's angel spies, appeased a mob by throwing them his two virgin daughters. Oh, yes--this book is a great guide to high family values.The other reason I can't give Ken five stars is that he's a bit behind on his New Testament scholarship. It's been quite well established that (1) none of the gospels was written by anyone who ever knew Jesus, despite having the names of apostles, (2) in fact, there's not a single word of "eye witness" testimony re. Jesus in any part of the Bible, (3) the oldest part of the NT is, in fact, some of the stuff written by Paul, so arguably *his* version of the Jesus/Christianity stuff is more accurate (and this stuff was written many years after the death of Jesus--if, in fact, Jesus was a real person, which is quite questionable), and (4) the oldest of the four gospels was Mark; Matthew and Luke simply plagiarized Mark, beefed up and tweaked stuff to meet their particular liturgical needs, and invented stuff like birth myths to make Jesus seem more supernatural than Mark's rather pasturale depiction seems to indicate. So it's not very surprising that John is the odd man out--this is the only one of the four gospels that's somewhat independent of the others. Both of the (contradictory) birth myths are just that--completely fabricated. In fact, Joseph, the supposed father of Jesus, is probably also completely fabricated.Sorry, True Believers. Your faith is based on shifting sand. Were it not shielded by layer after layer of religious gauze, the Bible is a book which no one would consider to be suitable reading for anyone under the age of 21. Let's get those Bibles shelved where they belong--in the mythology section, right next to Bullfinch's.

Recently I got into a bit of a Facebook debate with a friend who claims that she "knows a lot about the Bible" and implied that any problems one has with it are based upon ignorance. That might be the case if you stick to reading Christian apologetics or listening to sermons, but there is a lot of secular scholarship out there that has uncovered various problematic aspects of the Good Book. "Ken's Guide to the Bible" is one of the easier and more humorous ones to use as an introductory reference when debating theists."Ken's Guide to the Bible" is kind of set up like a "Dummies" book, with various easy-reference icons used to highlight Biblical categories such as Weirdness, Bunk, Divine Wrath, and Gender Bashing. Mr. Smith goes through the Bible from start to finish and deals with most of the mayhem, madness, mix-ups, and malice that Christians tend to ignore, gloss over, rationalize, or defend with leaps of logic or soothing pastoral sound-bites. If you were once a Christian, as I was, you'll arrive at the end of this book wondering how you became a believer in the first place.After reading a couple chapters, you might ask yourself why Christians still hold the Bible in such high regard, or at least don't voice more concern about its contents. That's a valid question. One reason is because many Christians don't read their Bibles. Others read only certain parts, often focusing on the more palatable New Testament and a couple of Old Testament books. Devotional Bible reading is often accompanied by "helpful" commentary, and again usually centers around the more digestible passages. Finally, faith tends to require that the reader find ways to explain or rationalize the nasty parts, which is a whole different ballgame.If you want a good overview of Biblical wackiness but don't want to slog through the whole canon on your own, "Ken's Guide to the Bible" is just what you're looking for. I wouldn't rely upon it as the only resource for Biblical criticism or debate ammunition, but Mr. Smith has created an excellent starting point.

If you need a quick resource for Bible scripture when the moral police out and a about, this is your reference.

Going over a lot of this with my pastor. Will have to give a review update after we thoroughly discuss.

This is an awesome little book, a quick read if you simply go through it front to back. However, I had a bible handy and was able to compare quotes, and read the relevant text. Smith quotes snippets, but is able to show just how outlandish the bible is. First, that there have been many different versions over the years, each providing different interpretations of what each translator considers the "truth". Second, the lack of complicity between the different various authors, and their utter contradictory recountings of "history", is remarkable. Smith offers the entire gambit with a generous amount of humor, and you find that reading the entire book is truly laughable. It is interesting that those zealots who specialize in quoting the bible in order to get or keep followers are very selective in what they quote, and tend to keep away from those passages that one might consider impossible or absurd to the max.Smith also offers a helpful list of "most embarrassing questions" about the bible that one might use in discussing the veracity of the book with a true believer.If you are an atheist, agnostic, a deist who disavows organized religion, or just questioning your faith, this is a must read.

I found this book as I was thinking of churning something similar out myself and was checking to see if someone had thought it up first. Thankfully Ken Smith saved me the task of ploughing through the strange time which is the Bible!Having been discussing my religious upbringing (ha!) with my wife recently I had questioned my memory of much of the weird and seemingly immoral morality tales that had been espoused to me by my strict upright headteacher of lower school and the ultra-religious, ultra-celibate miserable-faced woman who was always talking about how much joy she felt of my C of E middle school (who later turned bulldyke and ran off with her girlfriend to the consternation of the whole church - whether she was outed on the annual church outing is anyone's guess!). Surely these tales were some trick of memory!?! Surely this little 6 year old sitting on the floor with hundreds of other 5-8 years olds were not subjected by law daily to tales of prostitutes and virgins (though no one actually told us what the terms meant as we were too awestruck to question the word of god), kings being struck by lightning for worshipping of idols (though everyone at school was "Christian" by default except the token Jewish kid and would never dream of worshipping a statue of a calf), seas being parted so Moses' mates could get across (never saw this on holiday at the seaside and no one dared question why he could not just take the ferry) and all manner of other weirdness. Thankfully my memory served me well and the strange, twisted parables of the Bible were efficiently transmitted to my junior mind as the law then demanded, and it gave much amusement to this heathen adult to reinspect the bucket of crap which we legally had to be dealt daily. Ken effectively points out The Bible really is a weird book filled with sex and violence and if it they just dropped the religion part it would probably be quite popular.

A must read... as alot of people don't know what is in the Bible and can't be bothered to read it but insist they know what's in it... Kens guide makes you want to read the Bible and see how really it's just like the games of thrones where the main characters are stranger than you ever imagined