Already released in the USA by Zondervan, it officially hits UK bookstores courtesy of Hodder Faith on 12th November 2009 at a special introductory price of £49.99, regular price to be £59.99. USA stock apparently sold out within two weeks, and at LST we’ve already pre-sold our initial stock order and reordered: if you plan to stock it and haven’t already placed your orders, now is the time! As I write, the introductory price on single units only seems to be available when placing orders direct with Hodder/Bookpoint: STL UK list it at £59.99, but offer the 4-copy counterpack with LCD screen at £199.96 retail. Demo CDs are also available in packs of 15, free of charge.

From what I’ve seen and the feedback I’ve heard so far from those who attended the launch event at LICC earlier this week, the hype has not been overdone: this looks like a corker of a package that — to those who can afford it — will be well worth the asking price:

All that said, however — and you just knew this was coming — I have my reservations about it, starting with the simple fact that it’s yet another edition of the Bible for those who already have more versions, translations and special editions than they know what to do with, for whom Bibles have become hardly anything more than fashion accessories: the rich continue to get richer whilst the poor continue to struggle and do without; and that, gentle reader, is plain wrong.

Yes, I’m back on my favourite hobby horse: what exactly is going on in the English speaking world — what exactly is wrong with the church, the body of Christ in this part of the world — that makes it invest so much time and energy in producing still more English versions and hi-falutin’ editions of the Bible when there are millions of people who do not yet have the Bible available in their language?

Let’s face it: the ‘digital generation’ being targeted by Glo is not exactly deprived or needy, is it? Anyone with a mouse and a bit of nouse is perfectly capable of doing their own research and discovering most if not all of what they’ll be spoon-fed by Glo.

Then we have the unfortunate fact that it’s based on the NIV, a “demonstrably flawed translation” (Tom Wright) that really ought to be consigned to history, not recycled electronically. A longer quote:

When the New International Version was published in 1980 [sic], I was one of those who hailed it with delight. I believed its own claim about itself, that it was determined to translate exactly what was there, and inject no extra paraphrasing or interpretative glosses. [...] Disillusion set in over the next two years, as I lectured verse by verse through several of Paul’s letters, not least Galatians and Romans. Again and again, with the Greek text in front of me and the NIV beside it, I discovered that the translators had had another principle, considerably higher than the stated one: to make sure that Paul should say what the broadly Protestant and evangelical tradition said he said. [...] if a church only, or mainly, relies on the NIV it will, quite simply, never understand what Paul was talking about. [...] those blown along by this wind may well come to forget that they are reading a visibly and demonstrably flawed translation…

- Justification: God’s Plan and Paul’s Vision, pp.35-36.

Glo is undoubtedly an excellent resource and I do not doubt the good intentions of those who have invested so much money, time and effort in developing it. But I do think that all of that money, time and effort would have been far better spent in working with an organisation such as Wycliffe, in helping them towards their Vision 2025.

As Coldplay sing so evocatively, we live in a beautiful world: all of us are done for … because we also live in a profoundly unjust world, and we as the church — including Bible publishers — should surely be working to counter that injustice, not propagate it by widening the rift between the haves and the have-nots. It seems more than a tad ironic that the very Scriptures that frequently cry out so powerfully on behalf of the poor have now become yet another rich person’s plaything; and as for me, stocking and selling it: the word ‘hypocrite’ comes to mind…

• Follow Glo on twitter
• Follow Wycliffe UK on twitter
• Hodder Faith: Glo installation help and contact details

And so we move from

I’ve blogged this topic before. No, not breast cancer: Bibles. Blue Bibles, pink Bibles, rainbow hued Bibles, Bibles for banana lovers, Bibles for cat lovers and mouse haters and Bibles printed on recycled paper for those who value the environment more than high quality print. No doubt there are even Bibles especially designed for balancing on your nose at fancy dress parties so that when the bouncers ask what you’ve come as you can say, “God knows.” Don’t worry, it’s late at night and my mind is running wild…

Seriously, do we need this? When does use of the Bible become abuse of the Bible as publishers set out to exploit every human weakness simply to sell another Bible? Or is this a genuine attempt by HarperCollins to meet a sector of the community where they are? Not a commercial decision, then, but one born out an honest desire to reach people with the words of eternal life? Except I look at the cover of that Bible and see those immortal words, Limited Edition: no, this isn’t about making the Bible available, it’s about making the most from a sales pitch targeted towards a particularly vulnerable group of people.

Had it been about making the Bible more accessible, about highlighting its relevance to their needs then yes, in this case, I think that I could actually see it. I’ve lost friends and family to cancer. I have friends who’ve had mastectomies and live with the constant fear of their cancer recurring. Would or could a special — special, not limited — edition Bible have brought or bring them some comfort?

But in the meantime as we seek to serve more and more niche markets with niche products, millions of people remain without the Bible in their own language, and if but a fraction of the investment made by publishers such as HarperCollins in these fancy dress accessory styled Bibles were to be made in Wycliffe’s Bible translation projects then, perhaps, some real light would begin to shine in humanity’s darkness.

Now, if you haven’t already done so, go read Alicia Cohn’s Breast Cancer and the Bible for even more questions; and as for beating breast cancer — and other forms of cancer — there are surely better ways than branding (or brandishing!) the Bible: run10k.org for one amongst many.

• Response from Eddie Arthur: Exploitative Bibles?

If you’d like some for your shop or to give away at your church to help raise awareness of those people who do not yet have the Bible available in their own language, please contact Wycliffe. More details on the Wycliffe Blog: Bible-less Bible Bookmarks: Now available

And if you’d like some LST bookmarks, I’ll gladly send you some of those too: you have only to ask.

• Bibles and Bookmarks
• Bibles and Bookmarks: Part 2

Vision 2025: The Bookmark (Side 1)

Back in April I protested the seemingly endless proliferation of new and revised English Bible translations when, according to Wycliffe Bible Translators, there are still more than 2,200 languages — representing some 193 million people — which do not yet have the Bible available:

Vision 2025: The Bookmark (Side 1)

I put it to you that if a fraction of the creative energy that’s put into hyping up the Bible for English language speakers and readers went into translation programmes, Vision 2025 could be realised by 2012 if not sooner — and what a gift that would be to the world, far greater than Britain hosting the Olympics will ever be! 

So next time a publisher or a sales rep shows you yet another English edition of the Bible, do the world a favour: just say no. Refuse the gimmickisation of the Bible!

Instead, ask them for a bookmark — for a pack of bookmarks to give away! If you’re anything like me, you can never have too many bookmarks. I usually have about half a dozen books on the go at any one time and without my bookmarks I’d be lost. What’s more, my customers at LST can never seem to get enough bookmarks.

I finished that post with a suggestion:

And finally, a suggestion for the good folk at Wycliffe: instead of flyers, produce lots of bookmarks promoting Vision 2025. I promise you, if you supply me with a stack of Vision 2025 bookmarks, I will put one in every Bible I sell from now on.

I’m delighted to say that Wycliffe have now produced a Vision 2025 bookmark — and you’ve already seen it here. If you’d like a pack of bookmarks to give away to your customers or at your church, I’m sure Wycliffe would love to hear from you — so what are you waiting for? Contact Wycliffe today!

How ironic, I thought, that the fishing Poles can’t read our regular ‘No Fishing’ notices: they need their own. It made me think of  those photographs I’m sure we’ve all seen of kingfishers perched on those same notices. It also set me thinking about the number of Poles (or should I be saying Polish people? No doubt someone will set me right) and other immigrants who would be completely lost if they visited most UK Christian bookshops, my own included, with the vast majority of our stock in English.

There’s good news for the Poles, however, and good news for us as booksellers: one positive spin-off from STL’s recent merger with IBS (International Bible Society) to form IBS-STL is an increase in their stock range to include other language Bibles — Polish as well as Arabic, Chinese, French, Kurdish, Spanish and Urdu. That’s a Polish New Testament shown on the left.

Honourable mention must go to my good friend Roger Compton, a member of STL’s sales team, official STL mugshot on the right, for showing me these when he called in at LST last week. I invited Roger to contribute a guest blog introducing himself but he told me he’s a “grumpy old man” (his words!) who doesn’t do blogs! Sorry, Roger: there’s no escape — it’s blog or be blogged in today’s world.

STL are not the only UK source of foreign language Bibles, of course: No Frontiers (a division of Kingsway) offer an impressive range of books and Bibles in an equally impressive range of more than 200 languages, from Albanian to Zulu. Their most recent project is a Macedonian edition of Red Moon Rising, the story of 24/7 prayer as told by Pete Greig and Dave Roberts of Soul Survivor — the 24/7 movement has created something of a buzz amongst the students at LST, but not many sales of the book (a good sign, I guess, if it means they’re too busy praying to read about praying!).

Other sources are Chapter Two Bible Distributors and the Bible Society UK (not to be confused with IBS, please note: they are separate organisations), distributed by IVP. IVP’s distribution department has gone downhill over the last year or so, unfortunately, with a tendency to run out of stock, send out the wrong products or invoice for products they haven’t sent: buyer beware — if you can source your stock elsewhere you may save yourself a lot of admin hassle.

Finally, all of this brings me back to my earlier post about Bibles and Bookmarks: the one thing we absolutely do not need, in my opinion, is more English language versions or editions of the Bible; what we do need is more Bibles in other languages, especially in those languages that don’t have them yet. If you’re looking for a career change and have an aptitude for languages, do get in touch with the folks at Wycliffe: the more people we have working on this, the sooner the job gets done!

Let’s look at this sensibly: how many English language versions of the Bible do we need? Bearing in mind that Americans don’t know how to spell words like ‘colour’ — let alone ‘Anglicise’ — I suppose we have to make concessions and allow them their own localised versions. But beyond that, do we really need so many different English language versions in so many different editions? Do we need Bibles that feel like handbags or look like hand grenades?

It’s not just a question of cluttering up our bookshelves and overwhelming people with too many choices, it’s about the sensible use of resources in a world that has more than enough to go round but is dominated by the Western world’s me-me-me-market-driven society; and nor is it simply about the abuse and waste of physical resources such as paper and everything else that goes into book manufacturing: it’s also about our use of human resources, of people and time.

As I write this I’m looking through a flyer from Wycliffe Bible Translators promoting their Vision 2025 initiative. It’s a wonderful vision, to have a Bible translation programme underway in every remaining language that does not yet have the Bible available, and to have this in place by 2025. According to Wycliffe, there are 6,912 languages currently spoken in the world: of these, 2,251 — representing 193 million people — do not yet have the Bible available. And yet here in the English speaking world we not only have so many different translations that we now need other books to help us choose between them, but we seem to have either another translation or another super-duper hip-hop trendy hot-water-bottle-wrapped must-have fashion accessory edition published every week.

Why?

I put it to you that if a fraction of the creative energy that’s put into hyping up the Bible for English language speakers and readers went into translation programmes, Vision 2025 could be realised by 2012 if not sooner — and what a gift that would be to the world, far greater than Britain hosting the Olympics will ever be!

So next time a publisher or a sales rep shows you yet another English edition of the Bible, do the world a favour: just say no. Refuse the gimmickisation of the Bible!

Instead, ask them for a bookmark — for a pack of bookmarks to give away! If you’re anything like me, you can never have too many bookmarks. I usually have about half a dozen books on the go at any one time and without my bookmarks I’d be lost. What’s more, my customers at LST can never seem to get enough bookmarks.

And unlike flyers and leaflets that end up in the recycling bin or littering the streets, bookmarks don’t get thrown away: they sit there quietly in your books, biding their time, waiting for the next time you open it — and suddenly, there they are, reminding you of where you bought the book or of who published it or of the other books in the same series. So simple yet so powerful!

Amazon understand it, of course: Amazon rarely miss a trick. Every book arrives with a brightly coloured Amazon bookmark, its irresistible siren song gently calling you back to order another.

So come on, publishers: wake up! Stop producing Bibles that nobody needs and give us more bookmarks.

And finally, a suggestion for the good folk at Wycliffe: instead of flyers, produce lots of bookmarks promoting Vision 2025. I promise you, if you supply me with a stack of Vision 2025 bookmarks, I will put one in every Bible I sell from now on.

• The Wycliffe Blog
• Kouya Chronicle

Follow-up Features

• Bibles and Bookmarks: Part 2
• Bibles and Bookmarks: Part 3