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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | Bible influenced generations of writers | Ps 119:101 | geof | 129259 | ||
How has the Bible influenced generations of writers both in style and meaning? | ||||||
2 | Bible influenced generations of writers | Ps 119:101 | Hank | 129260 | ||
A volume that has commanded a prominent place on my bookshelf for years is called "The Bible and the Common Reader," by Mary Ellen Chase. In this post, which proposes to speak to your question, I will quote some excerpts from her fine book. She speaks with enthusiasm about the Bible, and the King James Bible in particular, about which her admiration is unbridled. ......... "The King James, or Authorized Version, has been called by John Livingston Lowes 'the noblest monument of English prose.' ... The language of the Bible has placed its indelible stamp upon our best writers from Bacon to Lincoln, and even to the present day. Without it there would be no 'Paradise Lost,' no 'Pilgrim's Progress'; no William Blake; no Emerson or Thoreau, no Negro Spirituals, no Gettysburg Address. Without it the words of Burke and Washington, Patrick Henry and Winston Churchill would miss alike their eloquence and their meaning. Without a knowledge of it the best of our literature remains obscure, and many of the characteristic features and qualities of our spoken language are threatened with extinction. ... To all English-speaking peopls the Bible is a national as well as a noble monument, for much of their history is securely rooted and anchored within it. In 17th and 18th century America it supplied the stout precepts by which they lived. They walked by its guidance; their rough places were made plain by their trust in its compassionate promises. It was a lamp to their feet and a light to their path. It was the source of convictions that shaped the building of this country, of the faith that endured the first New England winters and later opened up the Great West. It laid the foundations of our educational system, built our earliest colleges, and dictated the training within our homes. The Bible is, indeed, so imbedded in our American heritage that not to recognize its place there becomes a kind of national apostasy, and not to know and understand it, an act unworthy of us as a people." .......... Mary Ellen Chase was professor of English at Smith College when she wrote these words in 1944. Sixty years have come and gone since then, during which the Bible largely has been banned from America's public life and schools, its banishment becoming what Miss Chase called a "national apostasy" sixty years ago. We have only begun to see the sweeping effects of this apostasy across our land. Unless resolute steps are taken to reverse this terrible apostasy, our children and our children's children no longer will be heirs of this rich and precious heritage of Bible literacy which has enriched the minds, guided the hearts, and shaped the lives of America's people for more than two centuries. But the bitter winds of change blow strong and cold in our time. The present course on which we find ourselves no longer passes the torch of Bible literacy from one generation to the next. This precious heritage is all but laid aside and forgotten. We are leaving our progeny no moral compass, no spiritual legacy. Our children will not inherit the rich legacy of a Bible-honoring God-fearing society. We are leaving them little -- precious little -- to inherit. To a greater degree than we care to think about or dare admit, they will inherit the wind. Nothing more. --Hank | ||||||
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Questions and/or Subjects for Ps 119:101 | Author | ||
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geof | ||
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Hank |