Much hilarity at the revelation, so to speak, that Michael Gove's copies of the King James Bible, now sent to every state school in England, feature a reference to Gove himself, or at least to his office, on their very spines. Is there a picture of him? If not, why not? There is, after all, a foreword by him. That's right. "The Bible, with a foreword by Michael Gove." I am not making this up.
Oh, well, at least it keeps him out of the way of foreign policy, I suppose. As a very hardline neoconservative, he looks to a certain concept of the country that until the 1950s, when the practice was quietly discontinued but never abolished, presented every new member of Congress with a copy of The Jefferson Bible, from which the eponymous author had excised all reference to Our Lord's miracles, Resurrection or Divinity. I am not aware that anyone ever declined it, or that there was even any sense that it was voluntary. Did any of them swear their Oaths of Office on it? Did any of them not?
If The Jefferson Bible, then why not The Book of Mormon? Or why not the King James Bible, but with a foreword by Michael Gove, and with a reference to that Prophet, Apostle, Seer and Revelator on the spine? To be presented to every new member of either House of Parliament, and on which they would swear their Oaths of Office. I ask again, is there a picture of him? And I ask again, if not, why not?
tbh, at this stage I'm happy to see the Authorized Version present in schools at all. Most have now decided to use some ugly new translation which robs the Scripture of all its beauty and power.
ReplyDeleteOh, that one. I was not going to have it on this thread, but I might as well get it out of the way at this early stage. The usual, purely aesthetic, argument for the King James Bible is theologically worthless.
ReplyDeleteIt is not, which is the main point, a very accurate translation of the Greek and Hebrew texts; whatever beauty and power it might have is in many parts hardly that of Scripture at all, and is tellingly not lost on Richard Dawkins, as it was not on Christopher Hitchens, either.
But the King James, like the Book of Common Prayer, was specifically designed to be universally understood at the time, and in fact it has a history of fostering popular religion in early Methodism, in Nonconformity generally, in much of the American Bible Belt to this day, and elsewhere.
Yet in the country of its origin, the argument advanced for it, even for its use in church, is that it is the text preferred by atheist aesthetes. What does it say about it, that that is the case? And is its literary impact even that great, certainly compared to Shakespeare, and no one suggests that he should be read in church?
Yes, many modern translations are heavily politicised both theologically and in a wider sense, as are certain lectionary arrangements of their material. So was, and is, the King James. So will any translation always be. All translation is exegetical, whether of the Bible or of anything else.
Again I appeal for someone, somewhere to reissue the Missal's RSV Edition, using by far the most edifying translation of the Bible into modern English. "The Bible as literature" is always, ultimately, a refusal to engage with the Bible as the Bible, at least if one allows oneself to stop there.
There are theological arguments to be made for the King James Bible, based on its design specifically for liturgical use and in order to aid theological scholarship within the eclessial community as such, based on the authority that Authorised it, and based on fidelity to the Textus Receptus, a position which, whatever else may be said of it, also has adherents in several other language-groups, including a particularly strong following among the Finns.
The first of those points is a very good one indeed, to which the answer is the affirmed superiority of other meetings of that same need. The second and third are also theological points, the answers to which are likewise theological.
And that, alas, is why they were not the points made all over Radio Four and the better newspapers last year. They do these things much better in America, in Northern Ireland, and on the ultraconservative fringes of English, Scottish and Welsh Calvinism. I may not agree with them. But at least I can respect them.
It is a complete waste of money, kjm. Most schools will literally bin it, or raffle it as a booby prize or something.
ReplyDeleteFor one thing, many of the best state schools are Catholic anyway and A-level RE is now heavily confined to them. School sixth forms instead of enormous tertiary colleges are now quite rare in the state sector. Except in the Catholic bit of it. Who, then, is going to read these copies?
Gove is the most hated Secretary of State in memory and that is quite an achievement. Are you really happy that many of these Bibles will be defaced or worse, and I do not mean by the pupils?
This is a great post, perfectly capturing the hubris of the man. If he or his devotees like Toby Young read the concluding suggestion, they would think it was entirely serious. The way Young's father's targets took his satire entirely seriously.
You are very kind. The rest of what you say is perfectly true.
ReplyDeleteAt best, these Bibles will be given away as booby prizes. Many will simply be put in the recycling bin. And the hostility towards Gove will cause a number to be put to rather worse use than any of that.
Do not be surprised if effigies of him are clutching them atop bonfires come 5th November. In fact, be very surprised if that does not happen at least somewhere. That sort of thing will not, or very rarely, be anything against the Bible. It will be against Michael Gove.
Those sent to the Catholic and a few other schools will be respectfully enough placed on a library shelf, never to leave it. The number that will ever be seen by pupils is negligible. Seen by them when, exactly?
But none of that is really what this post is about.
Any pupil interested in looking up a Bible verse could reach for the Bible of the library shelf. Perhaps the reason that this will rarely, if ever, happen is because so few of the young people in schools, Catholic or otherwise, have any interest in scripture.
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