The Year of Living Biblically

Since finishing the Bible in a Year challenge, I have been in the mood to read. I just polished off A.J. Jacobs' latest book - The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible. Jacobs is officially Jewish, but as he puts it, "Jewish in the same way Olive Garden is an Italian restaurant. Which is to say: not very." The description from the jacket cover is an apt one...

"Jacobs's extraordinary undertaking yields unexpected epiphanies and challenges. A book that will charm readers both secular and religious, The Year of Living Biblically is part CliffsNotes to the Bible, part memoir, and part look into worlds unimaginable. Thou shalt not be able to put it down."

As a pastor, I found the book to be one man's authentic pursuit of Biblical comprehension and application. It was an interesting - and much appreciated - view of the Bible and religion in general through his eyes. He has a keen awareness of his behavioral, emotional, and spiritual perceptions during the experiment. He is also well-aware of his own preconceived notions (this became painfully clear in the section on the New Testament).

I think the most unexpected aspect of this book was how much I laughed audibly while reading it - much to the amusement of my wife! Of course...many of these laughable sections involved his wife's sarcastic and not-so-amused responses to this undertaking. Reactions that Karen and I both agreed she would have if I were to pursue something similar.

My favorite episode was the time his wife sat in all the chairs in their apartment knowing that according to Leviticus 15:19-23 he would not be able sit in any of them. (Click on the link if you want to know the specifics...) In the same chapter, he shared some rabbinical teaching on this passage that I found extremely intriguing. I won't post that teaching here as I need to do some more research before stating my opinion on the teaching.

All in all, I enjoyed this book. I am confident that I am going to read his previous book - The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World. For that book, he read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica from A to Z - or more specifically, from a-ak (East Asian music) to Zywiec (a town in southern Poland known for its beer).