Asimov's Guide to the Bible: A Historical Look at the Old and New Testaments - Isaac Asimov

Fascinating glimpse into the history of the Bible, with some flaws

As other reviewers have noted, "Asimov's Guide to the Bible" provides an interesting historical context for many of the people and places described in the Bible. It does so unevenly, sometimes providing pages of analysis on a single word, then skipping whole chapters. But this is an inevitable necessity given the length and depth of the subject; even with its selective focus, the book comes in at over 1200 pages. If Mr. Asimov had covered all topics equally, it would have spanned a dozen volumes and he never would have had time to write all the wonderfully imaginative science fiction he's deservedly famous for.

Which leads me to my only serious complaint about the book: Asimov occasionally allows his imagination to get the better of him. There are several points where he offers a possible scientific explanation for Biblical events that are apparently completely unfounded speculation.

For example he offers his own hypothesis that Noah's flood may have been caused by a meteor strike in the Persian Gulf. Possible, but he gives no supporting evidence to back this unnecessarily exotic explanation.

Later, he suggests that Joshua may have brought down the walls of Jericho with sappers while his marching army distracted the city's guards with horns and shouting. Again, he doesn't give any evidence (in fact, archaeological evidence suggests Jericho was uninhabited at the time the events in Joshua take place).

Despite these occasional unsupported injections, for the large part Asimov's writing is clear, engaging and most importantly, educating. While it might not be my first choice for an historical bible companion, I would definitely recommend it.

Asimov's Guide

My daughter suggested that I give her a Bible concordance as a Christmas gift. I bought one for her and then looked for Asimov's guide, which I have in my library and consider the best available guide to the Bible. Fortunately, I found it on Amazon. She was fascinated with it. Asimov knew what he was writing about. He wrote 200 books and I consider this among his best. He didn't just "translate the King James version into modern English"; he shared his vast knowledge of ancient history, geography, and languages.

Asimov's outdated guide; it's still a good read

This work was published in 2 volumes: OT 1967 and NT 1969 and sadly, the information in this book is outdated because so many new discoveries and evidence about this subject has exploded in the 1990s and 2000s. So, to a student of biblical criticism this book was rather a bore at times but, if you are new to the game I would recommend this book to get you started.
I am sure this would have been a great read in the 1960s - 1980s.

Must have hot Biblical Historicity students

This book can be only described with one word. AMAZING!

The insight and knowledge of the late Isaac Asimov is shown here with such an amazing simplicity. He can explain the mystery of life in laymen's terms with extreme ease.

This book, while vast and detailed, is a must have for all the people that have that itch to understand all the mysteries of the bible and only find books that only confuses them more.

Fascinating Historical Background of Biblical Times

Isaac Asimov was widely considered the best science writer of the 20th century, because of his outstanding ability to make his subject matter interesting and understandable to the layman. This book gives the reader the historical background of the writing of the Bible and of the events recounted therein. Knowing this background material makes the Bible more readable and more understandable. Having been written by Isaac Asimov, the Guide is so interesting that you may have difficulty putting it down, but it is also a valuable reference work, to be kept handy whenever you read from the Bible.

This is not a scholarly work of biblical criticism, nor does it attempt or pretend to be. If you are looking for such, look to books by such as:
Marcus Borg (e.g. Reading the Bible Again For the First Time ),
John Dominic Crossan (e.g. Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography),
Michael Goulder (e.g. St. Paul Versus St. Peter: A Tale of Two Missions),
Burton Mack (e.g. The Lost Gospel: The Book of Q and Christian Origins), snd
John Shelby Spong (e.g. Liberating the Gospels). THIS IS A MUST READ before reading (or rereading) any of the gospels.
These are all excellent books, well worth reading, but they don't give the reader the background Asimov does.(nor are they to be faulted because they don't, any more than Asimov's guide should be faulted for not being serious biblical criticism).

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