The Jefferson Bible [Unabridged] [Audible Audio Edition] Author: | Language: English | ISBN:
B006TQVGOS | Format: PDF, EPUB
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Here is Thomas Jefferson's classic abridgment of the Bible, in which Jefferson sculpted the words and ideas of Christ into a resounding moral philosophy.
"To the corruptions of Christianity I am indeed opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself." Thomas Jefferson, 1803
With these words, written to a personal friend, Thomas Jefferson began one of the most audacious religious experiments in American history. On and off for the next 17 years (including his term in the White House), Jefferson cut and pasted the philosophy of Jesus Christ, as recorded in Scripture, into one compact statement. He purposefully omitted any references to the virgin birth, miraculous healings, demonic possession, or supernatural events of any kind. His aim was to distinguish the moral philosophy of Christ from the religion that was later created around Christ.
This volume includes the original 1940 foreword by editor Douglas E. Lurton, which provides an engaging introduction to the history behind Jefferson's effort. Jefferson's selections are beautifully recomposed in a dignified yet pleasing style for a gem of compactness and clarity.
Direct download links available for The Jefferson Bible [Unabridged] [Audible Audio Edition] Free PDF
- Audible Audio Edition
- Listening Length: 2 hours and 38 minutes
- Program Type: Audiobook
- Version: Unabridged
- Publisher: Penguin Audio
- Audible.com Release Date: January 5, 2012
- Whispersync for Voice: Ready
- Language: English
- ASIN: B006TQVGOS
Thomas Jefferson was no Christian. Like many of the most famous of the founding fathers, he was a Deist, and counted himself a Unitarian, but he often said he was the sole member of a sect including no one but himself. He had confidence in his own reason and conscience. He did admire Jesus, saying, "Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being." It was Jefferson's view that he himself could sort the truth from the imposture, for he felt that the real words applicable to Jesus were "as distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill." He thought about the process of doing so for many years, did a quick job around 1800 and did a thorough one in 1820. His purpose was to make his own version of the gospels, an extraction that would summarize Jesus's life and morals, for "I hold the precepts of Jesus, as delivered by himself, to be the most pure, benevolent, and sublime which have ever been preached to man. I adhere to the principles of the first age; and consider all subsequent innovations as corruptions of his religion, having no foundation in what came from him."
It was not enough for the polyglot Jefferson to make such a distillation from the King James Version; he also bought a couple of Greek, French, and Latin versions to use, two volumes of each, for his plan was to cut and paste the parts that he found useful into one volume, but using all four languages.
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