Dont Know Much about the Bible: Everything You Need to Know about the Good Book but Never Learned Book

After reading this I know (wait for it...wait for it) much more about the Bible. Davis manages to touch on every book of the Bible and gives the appropriate context and meaning including potential authorship. I had no idea the vast time periods that separated not just different books of the Bible but different sections within the books.

The Bible itself seems to be the victim of well-intentioned fine tuning and embellishing. Someone took something that they believed in and said "Hey, If we add this part to the story it will go a long way in illustrating this point and will help bring people to the faith!" That's all well and good, except when too many people do this too many times and the original stories are lost to the sands of time.

What surprised me most were the differences and contradictions within the Bible itself. The stories of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are not just stylistically different, but often substantively too. I've always known to believe was to make a leap of faith. What frustrates me is having to choose what to believe from within the book that tells me what to believe. I literally can't choose to believe everything in the Bible because (much like the Koran) it often contradicts itself.

Ugg, to be a modern day believer struggling with this stuff. Now I see why the Catholic church liked it better before everybody could read.

Davis did a fine job with this book. I've seen some criticism about his super lame and cheesy sense of humor but it honestly reminded me of sitting through a college lecture. Professors are always trying to liven their talks up with pop culture references that they don't get quite right because they're old. It was endearing and didn't bother me at all.