Stories, Folk Tales and Legends From The Bible

A request from my daughter several years ago to help her find an appropriate book for my ten year old grandson, who had expressed an interest in learning about stories from the Bible, led me to search diligently for a book that did an adequate job of presenting the stories as they were written, without trying to gloss over inconsistencies or ignoring the context of the story and therefore missing the point, or without an underlying theme or assumption that these stories were about actual events of the past. I was not successful. The few collections of bible stories for children that I could find were educationally useless, historically inaccurate, and unhelpful for understanding these culturally important stories in their literary and historical context.  Having found nothing useful for my grandchildren, I resolved to fill that gap.  The result of that resolution is Stories, Folk Tales and Legends from the Bible.    The paperback can be purchased from the publisher <here>.  Those who have a Kindle (Amazon e-book reader) can download it <here > (free for those with Prime accounts).   To read a sample of the stories or to learn more about this book click <here>.

I expect the book will find a place in the homes of Progressives and Humanists, both adults and teens alike, and in various Fellowship youth programs. It will make for some interesting discussions. Be warned: biblical stories are not for young children.  There is a lot of “X-rated” material in the Bible (rape, incest, murder, adultery, homosexuality, etc.) and I have not glossed over it to make it acceptable to parents of young readers.