The Challenge

These are pretty strong statements to be made about a book, especially when you consider that all sixty-six books of the Bible were written between 2,000 and 3,500 years ago. In addition, there were no printing presses back then and every word had to be manually written and handed down from generation to generation on scrolls and by word of mouth.

Yet the amazing thing is that this book is still around today, despite its ancient beginnings and despite some of the most tenacious attacks ever made by mankind to see that it would never circulate again.

No book has been banned more than this one volume, from its very first printing right up until today. No book has been burned more often by its detractors than this one book. No book has been bombarded with more criticism and mocked for its content than this one book. Finally no book has been bought by more people, yet remained unopened and unread in their own homes, than the Bible.

The attempts made by people and even whole nations to destroy the Bible are so numerous, and in some cases quite hilarious, that only a few will be mentioned below.

When Nero fiddled, it is said that Rome burned. Right from the start of the completion of the Bible, sometime during the first century A.D., Christians were persecuted for their belief in this book. Nero’s intense persecution of Christians around A.D. 64 was one of the earliest attempts to silence the message and the Book. However, while Rome burned, God’s word continued to spread.

In A.D. 303 the Roman Emperor Diocletian tried to exterminate the Bible from Roman society by issuing a decree that every biblical manuscript be burned. But the people still held on to their precious beliefs and manuscripts, with the result that many Christians were killed and many Bibles torched. Diocletian, thinking he had accomplished what he had set out to do, erected a huge triumph column stating that this was to be a memorial proclaiming to all that the Holy Scriptures had been extinguished. However, he was a little premature since twenty-two years later a church council, meeting at Nicea, established the Bible as the only infallible judge of truth in the world.

Voltaire, the great French writer and poet, back in the eighteenth century, holding a copy of the Bible in his hand, said, "In 100 years this book will be forgotten, eliminated." Funny thing, 100 years later, his house was made into the headquarters of the Geneva Bible Society.

One man who had no love for this book tried to exterminate an entire race of people who cherished its Old Testament beliefs. Adolf Hitler killed 6 million Jews during the Second World War; but the living Word of God could not be silenced.

Throughout the centuries men have used their great intellects, philosophy, hatred and even force to silence this most remarkable and resilient book. Their remains have long ago vanished and their feeble attempts to destroy this "Book of books" are now and forever recorded in the annals of history for all to see and be amused by.