A Major Miss for NPR

• At least 20 million Bibles are currently sold each year in the U.S. in addition to tens of millions that are distributed free. In 1956, that number was about 8 million in the U.S.
• The American Bible Society advises that they distributed 60.2 million Bibles last year in the U.S.
• The American Bible Society advises that since their inception in 1816, they have distributed over 7 billion Bibles worldwide in conjunction with the United Bible Societies. – That’s 1 Bible for every person on earth.
• More Bible Facts

Last week National Public Radio ran a story about Mike Huckabee’s use of language while campaigning. The reporter said that Huckabee was using his own “separate dialect”, stressing the fact that no one knew what Huckabee was talking about. The reporter went to great lengths to make it sound like Huckabee was talking in code…a mystery…and that he is isolating himself in the process.

This stemmed from Huckabee's comparing himself to David by saying, "sometimes it only takes a smooth stone and a sling-shot," from the OT story of David and Goliath. He also made a comparison to the woman portrayed in the New Testament who humbly offered only a coin when giving to the Temple offering. References such as these stories evidently mystified some of the listeners of Huckabee's speeches.

The “story” the reporter revealed was that Huckabee uses allegories and references to Bible stories in order to make a point. Unfortunately, that limited, myopic, view was it. That was the entire revelation of the story.

So, heads-up, Barbara Bradley Hagerty: the real story is the revelation that with so many Bibles in distribution in the United States it’s even possible that Huckabee can be misunderstood. The real “story” is that people who have the Book in their possession are obviously not reading it. The real story is that Mike Huckabee is exposing the great horrible truth about most Christians and Jews: we don’t walk our talk. We buy the Bible or Talmud (which is basically the source of the OT), and don’t read it.

The stories that Huckabee is quoting are, statistically, common to every human being on earth. We all have the text. By virtue of this fact, we must all at some level believe the Bible is at least important enough to have in our homes. What other text in the history of Humankind can say that?

Mike Huckabee (who I do NOT endorse, by the way) is not a separatist in quoting a text that we all have in our hands. He’s a separatist in showing us that he actually reads a book that we all share in common.