Random The Original Bible Is Drastically Different From Version You Grew Up With (14 items)

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  (#3) Exodus Got A Political Revamp In Service Of The Pro-Life Movement

  This fairly recent change to Exodus 21:22-25 is interesting in how a few simple words can entirely alter the meaning of a verse. In the 1977 version of the New American Standard Bible, the verse read: "And if men struggle with each other and strike a woman with child so that she has a miscarriage, yet there is not further injury, he shall surely be fined as the woman’s husband may demand of him; and he shall pay as the judges decide."

  In 1995, the verse was changed to read: "If men struggle with each other and strike a woman with child so that she gives birth prematurely, yet there is no injury..." 

  One explanation for this may be that, between 1977 and 1995, American politics had changed so that the GOP and Christian Right had essentially coalesced around the issue of how much dominion a woman has over her own body. If they were going around with Bibles that specifically stated it wasn't a huge deal for a fetus to be killed (resulting in a miscarriage), that wouldn't exactly work for their platform.

  The texts were changed in the 1995 version in order to make it so the fetus doesn't die in the verse, thus supporting the Christian Right's pro-life message that killing a fetus was the same as killing a human—and now the Bible said so. 
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  (#2) The Dead Sea Scrolls Continue To Confuse Modern Scholars—And They Don't Include A Seventh Day Of Rest

  When studying the Bible, one of the biggest complications is that there's no "original" version of the text to use as a standard edition. Most of the stories were passed down through oral tradition and then written down by people who had their own variations of the stories.

  For a long time, there were two "master" texts (the Greek Septuagint and the Masoretic Text) that scholars could work from, but between 1946 and 1956, the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls seriously complicated everything. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain a sizable portion of the Bible, and they predate the Masoretic text by about 1,000 years, making them the closest thing scholars have to a definitive version of the Old Testament.

  While the Scrolls are more likely to be a "pure" version of the Bible, they offer some large variations on stories many people know. For instance, rather than finishing work on the sixth day and resting on the seventh, God may have finished work on the seventh day and rested during a sort of late philosophical evening. 
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  (#7) We Should Probably Throw Luke Out Since It's Such A Pieced-Together Amalgamation

  Though there's no book in the Bible that hasn't been severely edited, there may not be one that's as inconsistent in its revisions as Luke. Today, we know Luke is actually an amalgamation of the Western and the Alexandrian versions of the text. To further complicate matters, a third version of Luke exists that was written by a 2nd-century heretic who made his own version of Luke that somehow got mixed into the scripture.
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  (#5) No One Can Make Up Their Mind About Tobit

  Of all the books that have been edited out of the Old Testament, the Book of Tobit stands out for the tale it tells. Initially, this story of a marriage that helped capture a demon was left out of the Biblical canon because of its late authorship. Recently, however, scholars have its omission was because Raguel, the bride's father, wrote the story's marriage document instead of the bridegroom, as was required by Jewish rabbinical law.

  It's worth noting that the Midrash Bereishit Rabbah, a commentary on the book of Genesis written around 400 CE, contains a summary of the Book of Tobit—so it's not like no one knew about this book until they read it in the Dead Sea Scrolls. 
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  (#1) The Gospel Of Mary Of Magdala Doesn't Fit With The Rest Of The Bible, So It Doesn't Get Included

  The Gospel of Mary Magdalene is an apocryphal text that Biblical scholars really don't want to include in the Bible—not because it was written in the 2nd or 3rd century (plenty of books in the Biblical canon weren't even finished until the 2nd century), but because it offers a different take on spiritualism than the rest of the books.

  In this book, Mary describes a discussion she has with Jesus and the disciples where Jesus explains that people have a spirit, a mind, and a second spirit that connects them with God. Many Biblical scholars believe that by adding this book to the Bible, the message of the book would be convoluted with conflicting philosophies that would teach people to find an inner harmony, rather than only to seek salvation from a higher power. 
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  (#11) Mary Might Not Be A Virgin Anymore Thanks To Changes From 2011

  One of the most significant changes to the Bible in the 21st century was a simple line of text that heavily alters the idea of Jesus' immaculate conception. In 2011, the New American Bible changed “The virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel,” to "The young woman shall be with child."

  It seems like this could create all kind of trouble for the story of Jesus and his holy birth, but a representative for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops told Time Magazine, "It doesn’t mean the bishops are changing their mind on the virgin birth of Jesus or the perpetual virginity of Mary. That doctrine stands, and will probably stand until the end of time.” 

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