Mocking the Sacred

The sequence that followed became predictable. The open mocking of the sacred by the modem critic culminated a long process of desacralizing life itself. First the world was de­nuded of transcendence, then the Scriptures were rendered irrelevant, and finally humankind was made nothing more than matter. In the name of progress and of supposed sensi­tivity to other systems of thought, much has been done to bully the Christian believer. The ravages of a diminished view of Scripture have gained even greater momentum, to the point of complete absurdity.

Few instances better illustrate this than one of the recent translations of the Bible. Referring to the Oxford University Press's release of a "culturally sensitive" version of the Bible, the religious editor of Newsweek recently quipped that the King James Bible "never looked so good before." These are his poignant comments:

Readers who find the Bible sexist, racist, elitist and insensitive to the physically challenged, take heart. Oxford University press's new "inclusive language version" of the New Testament and Psalms has cleaned up God's act. In this version, God is no longer "Father" and Jesus is no longer *Son.' The hierarchical title of "Lord" is excised as an archaic way to address God. Nor does God (male pronouns for the deity have been abolished) rule a "kingdom"; as the editors explain, the word has a 'blatantly androcentric and patriarchal character." . . . Even God's meta­phorical "right hand" has been amputated out of deference to the left-handed. Some examples:

• In the majestic opening of John's Gospel, “the glory he has from the Father as the only Son of the Father" becomes "the glory as of a parent's only child.”(John 1:14)
• The Lord's prayer now begins like this: “Father-­Mother, hallowed be your name. May your dominion come.”(Luke 11:2)
• Jesus' own self-understanding as God's only son is generalized to: "No one knows the Child except the Father-Mother, and no one knows the Father-Mother except the Child ... (Matthew 11:27)
• Avoiding another traditional phrase, "Son of Man," the Oxford text reads: "Then they will see the Human One' coming in clouds with great power and glory." (Mark 13:26)

The editors do not claim that Jesus spoke in gender-neutral language. But they obviously think he should have. The changes they have made are not merely cosmetic. They represent a fun­damental reinterpretation of what the New Testament says-and how it says it. The King James Bible never looked so good.

Truly noteworthy about such blatant ridicule is that it seems reserved only for the Christian. One is tempted to ask whether Oxford University Press would have dared to tamper with or so implicitly demean the Koran in this way.

Extracted from Ravi Zacharias’ Deliver Us From Evil.