Liquid Scripture: The Bible in a Digital World - Softcover

Jeffrey S. Siker

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1506407862 ISBN 13: 9781506407869

Publisher: Fortress Press, 2017

Synopsis

The electronic Bible is here to stay??packaged in software on personal computers, available as apps on tablets and cell phones. Increasingly, students look at glowing screens to consult the Bible in class, and congregants do the same in Bible study and worship. Jeffrey S. Siker asks, what difference does it make to our experience of Scripture if we no longer hold a book in our hands, if we again "scroll" through Scripture? How does the "flow" of electronic Scripture change our perception of the Bible's authority and significance? Siker discusses the difference made when early Christians adopted the codex rather than the scroll and Gutenberg began the mass production of printed Bibles. He also reviews the latest research on how the reading brain processes digital texts and how churches use digital Bibles, including American Bible Society research and his own surveys of church leaders. Siker asks, does the proliferation of electronic translations reduce the perceived seriousness of Scripture? Does it promote an individualistic response to the Bible? How does the change from a physical Bible affect liturgical practice? His synthesis of the advantages and risks of the digitized Bible merit serious reflection in classrooms and churches alike.

About this title

About the Author

Jeffrey S. Siker is professor of biblical studies at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles. The founding chair of the Early JewishChristian Relations section of the SBL, he is the author of Jesus, Sin, and Perfection in Early Christianity (2015), Scripture and Ethics: Twentieth-Century Portraits (1996), and Disinheriting the Jews: Abraham in Early Christian Controversy (1991). He has written numerous articles, and he is also the editor of Homosexuality and Religion: An Encyclopedia (2006) and Homosexuality in the Church: Both Sides of the Debate (1994). An ordained Presbyterian minister (PCUSA), Siker and his wife reside in Los Angeles.

Edition details

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Publication date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1506407862
• ISBN 13: 9781506407869
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 328