Reformations in Reading: Short Bibles and the Aesthetics of Abridgment
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Authors
Elser, Ashleigh
Issue Date
2019
Type
Journal Article
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Abstract
This article takes up a period in the Bible’s history of publication when the text was redacted to approximately half of its original size. In the mid-twentieth century, editors, publishers, and book designers worked to rebrand these shortened Bibles as works of modern literature. It considers the rise of short Bibles, looking at the editorial choices behind the creation of The Dartmouth Bible as one prominent example of the literary and social components of textual emendation required to make the Bible “readable” in modern terms. It then compares these short Bibles to analogous abridgement projects, looking at literary abridgment in general as well as other redactions of the biblical canon. It concludes by arguing that making the Bible “readable” by removing its hermeneutic difficulties abbreviates not only the text but also the interpretive tasks this canon poses to its reader – an abbreviation that is not without its cost. |Keywords: Bible, book history, hermeneutics, Christianity, reading
Description
Citation
Elser, A. (2019). Reformations in Reading: Short Bibles and the Aesthetics of Abridgment. Supplement Series for the Journal of Religion & Society Supplement Series, 18, 119-134.
Publisher
Rabbi Myer and Dorothy Kripke Center, Creighton University
License
The journal is open-access and freely allows users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of all published material for personal or academic purposes.
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ISSN
1941-8450