The Holy Bible: Abridged Beyond the Point of Usefulness

by Zach Weinersmith

For your convenience, every book of the holy word has been reduced to a few sentences, in what we're calling "The Holy Bible: Abridged Beyond the Point of Usefulness." Your abridged bible will be pocket-sized for maximum convenience.

Genres: Humor, Religion, Nonfiction, Ebooks, Comics, History, Comedy

72 pages, ebook

First published January 1, 2015

About the author

Zachary Weinersmith (born Zachary Alexander Weiner) is an American cartoonist, who is best known for his webcomic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal (SMBC). He is the author of two other webcomics, the completed Captain Stupendous with artist Chris Jones, and Snowflakes, co-written by James Ashby and also illustrated by Chris Jones. He also founded the sketch comedy group SMBC Theater with James Ashby and Marty Weiner in 2009.

Weinersmith has been involved in writing and drawing comics since his high school years, but he first published on the internet in the late 1990s. His early comics usually had three or more panels, but after 2002, he switched to drawing predominantly one panel comics. He stated in a 2009 interview that he was glad to have decided to draw one panel comics because he felt three panel webcomics had become a webcomic cliche by that time, and that there were almost no decent one panel comics on the internet. More recently, he has drawn a mixture of single and multi panel comics for SMBC.

Weinersmith's webcomic was recognized in 2006, and 2007 with the Web Cartoonists' Choice Award for Outstanding Single Panel Comic,[3] and received nominations in 2003,[4] and 2008.[5]

SMBC is at heart a geek comic, which nevertheless addresses a broad range of topics, such as love, relationships, economics, politics, religion, science, and philosophy. As shown by the diverse range of blogs listed above, it appeals to many different groups.

SMBC has around 250,000 daily readers, served over 300,000,000 comics in 2010, and is one of the fastest growing comics online (has sextupled in readership since 2008). The comics have been featured on many important blogs, including The Economist, Glamour, BoingBoing, Bad Astronomy, Blastr, Blues News, Joystiq, Washington Post, Freakonomics, and more.

Zach has a degree in Literature and 3/8ths of a degree in physics. He enjoys reading about math, logic, science, history, fiction, and philosophy. His hobbies are space travel, dinosaur riding, and wishful thinking. He currently lives in southern California with his beautiful and brilliant wife.

Note: Zach publishes SMBC and SMBC material under both "Zach Weiner" and "Zach Weinersmith".

Reviews

[Dubi Kanengisser · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just read the entire Bible (both testaments!), and it was much funnier than I remembered. Also shorter. I feel fully equipped to engage in religious debate with any Jewish or Christian authority. At least, as equipped as most of them seem to be to engage in scientific debates, and that didn't seem to stop them.

[Mara · Rating 5 out of 5]

This reads like my favorite Goodreads reviews, which (in case you haven't been following the likes of Kemper, Becky, and various other unsavory characters on here) are hilarious.
I may actually die from laughing this hard... So, Zach Weinersmith, prepare to check "be someone's actual cause of death" off your bucket list.

JONAH Jonah doesn't want to be a prophet, so God has him eaten by a whale. At this point, Jonah changes his mind and God has the whale puke him up. Jonah cooperates, but remains irritated.

[Nacho Iribarnegaray · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is conveniently short.

[Eric Mesa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is like God Is Disappointed in You except each book of the Bible is only 1-2 setences. Like the other book, the humor comes from finding a funny way to express what's actually in there. I think this book (if you bought the e-book version) makes for a bunch of fun pages to put up on your cubicle or print up in a calendar with one book per month for a few years. But I enjoyed GiDiY more because the extra text allowed the satire to be a bit deeper by being even more truthful to content of the Bible. That said, it was pretty fun to read the entire Bible in about five minutes.

[Joseph Wetterling · Rating 2 out of 5]

My review, abridged:
The book was worth the price I paid for it.
The first three pages are funny. So are a few in the middle.
If Zach was Catholic, this book would be six pages longer; you're all missing out. They're in the middle, so they might be funny.
"Made of meat" is an oddly close and humorous translation of "incarnation".
Paul did in fact ask for funding.
The author is not a scripture scholar (nor is he Ryan North).

Also, he once married a girl and made a funnier last name out of his funny last name and her not-funny last name.

[লোচন · Rating 3 out of 5]

বাইবেলের ইতিহাস সুদীর্ঘ, জটিল; এবং উইকি আর্টিকেল পড়তে গেলেও ক্ষেত্রবিশেষে ধৈর্য ধরে রাখা কঠিন হয়া যায়। কোন শিষ্য কোনটা লিখছেন, ওল্ড/নিউ টেস্টামেন্টের ফ্যাকড়া, কোনটা ক্যানন কোনটা রিজেক্টেড এইসব ফ্যাসাদ ভাল্লাগে না।

আংরেজি ফিলিম দেখে দেখে আমি নামে চিনছিলাম তিনটারে— জেনেসিস, এক্সোডাস, আর রেভলেশন। জেনেসিস মানে জন্ম, দুনিয়ার জন্ম কেম্নে হইল সেই আলাপ। এক্সোডাস মানে দলবেঁধে ভাগা, বনি ইসরাইল কেম্নে মিশর ছেড়ে আলাদা সম্প্রদায় হইল সেই আলাপ। মানে মোজেস কর্তৃক সমুদ্র দুই ভাগ হইয়া যাওয়া, ফারাওর মৃত্যু, আকাশ হইতে মান্না-সালওয়া বর্ষণ ইত্যাদি ইত্যাদি। আর রেভলেশন শুধু নাম শুনছিলাম, অর্থ-আলাপ জানা ছিল না।

আশা করি আমার গিয়ানের লেভেল বুঝাইতে পারছি।

এই বই গিয়ানের সেই একই লেভেলে নাইমা আইসা, নিউ/ওল্ড টেস্টামেন্টের সাতান্নটা বই এক জায়গায় ঢুকাইছে, এবং একেক বইরে ঠাট্টামাখা ৪-৫ লাইনে বর্ণিত করছে। সকল রেফারেন্স মোটেও ধরতে পারি নাই, জ্ঞানের অভাব। কিন্তু পড়তে পড়তে বুঝতাছিলাম: বাইবেলের অধ্যায়সংক্রান্ত জটিলতার প্রতি প্রাক্তন বিরাগ, বর্তমানের অনুসন্ধিৎসু অনুরাগে পরিণত হইতাছে আস্তে আস্তে। মজা পাইছি।

পাশাপাশি এইটুক বুচ্ছি যে রেভলেশন বইতে কিয়ামতের আলামত/সতর্কবাণী বর্ণিত হইছে, আর বাকি বইগুলায় নানা প্রফেটের কাহিনি বলা হইছে। এইটাই উক্ত বই পড়ে আমার অর্জিত বিদ্যা।

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

An amusing read.

[Stephanie]

Best bible I've ever read. It still doesn't deserve a rating though.

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

Had me chuckling from start to finish (which took about fifteen minutes!)

[Danielius Goriunovas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Way too accurate (and not that funny) for my taste. Liked other books from this series more.

[Sebastian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hummm, since the original is, in fact, hardly any use other than as a doorstop, I don't think it really can be abridged beyond the point of usefulness, but YMMV. Plus this does serve as a handy reminder of what some of the more forgettable books are all about.

[Benjamin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Satire is a fine line between comedy and offense. While I can't fault The Holy Bible: Abridged Beyond the Point of Usefulness for being precisely what it says—abridged beyond the point of usefulness—there's definitely a bias present in its scant 72 pages. I can take a joke about my faith pretty well, mostly because I understand the reference being made and can identify what's funny about it. Sure, The Holy Bible: Abridged has a few amusing bits in it, but there are almost too many portions that feel too irreverent to be funny.

The Bible is a long book, and I know most people probably haven't read through the entire thing. This book tries to remedy this situation by providing a brief comedic sentence about each book in the Bible. Sure, it gets the point across quite succinctly sometimes, but it misses the point in many of its summaries. I think what it fails to capture is the overall story of the Bible, which itself cannot be adequately represented in 66 witty sentences.

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure who this book is for. Is it for people who believe the Bible (and have probably already read it) looking for a few cheap laughs? Is it for people who are against what the Bible says, looking for a few pointed jabs at Christianity? I have a feeling it's probably the latter, but it's at least a somewhat amusing exercise in trying to condense down a notoriously complex topic into highly abridged summaries. In the end, it's a short book, and I welcome others to form their own opinions of it. For me, I found it kind of "meh."

A complex book abridged down to uselessness; I give The Holy Bible: Abridged 2.5 stars out of 5.
  1/2

[M.W. Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Zach Weinersmith's _The Holy Bible: Abridged Beyond the Point of Usefulness_ receives three stars from me. It is fun, funny, and creative. However, not very useful (which is kind of the point).

Well, not useful in the way a Christian might need it to be. Seriously, this would be a great idea for anyone who loves the Bible--write a brief summary of each book. It would make studying it easier.

But this book is not that book. It is, however, fun to read and funny at times. I enjoyed it a lot. I felt it was kind of brutally honest. For example, the summaries of Chronicles keeps in line with the boredom of those two book. I also liked the informal tone he employed. Definitely a fun read.

Recommend? Yes, for anyone who likes making fun of religion (although I'm not sure this actually does that). For any Christian who can laugh at being tongue in cheek with the Bible.

Not recommended for anyone who cannot stand criticism of Christianity. This book is in no way critical; however, the nature of the book clearly would upset them. Therefore, I don't recommend this for anyone with this frame of mind. Otherwise, find a copy and have a good read.

[BozCitac · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was rather disappointing, since this book(let) contains not only glaring abridgments and omissions (which I expected), but also factual errors. For example, you include the term "Anti-Christ" in the "Tessalionians" (written by St Paul), although it is a known fact that St Paul never used that term, and that only 2 "catholic" (and not Paulian) epistles mention it. Furthermore, you completely ignore how the tale with the fiery furnace has nothing to do with Daniel and was instead obviously shoehorned into that book. Besides, many of the Epistles are so short and simple themselves, that you did not even abridge them in the true sense of the word (if anything, you actually expanded some of them). This is just my opinion, but I was expecting this humoresque piece to be backed up with more research and to include some more profound jokes and comments.

[Jim Razinha · Rating 5 out of 5]

For every tome I’ve read, I deserve one of these. Weinersmith is simply brilliant and brilliant at the simply. Literal laugh out loud stuff.

Random OT selection...
Isaiah:
Things are going right to Hell in Judea. Isaiah declares that Jerusalem will not fall, but hedges his bets a little by not attaching a time stamp to that. Similarly, he says that at some point the Messiah will come.

Random NT selection:
Mark:
Basically Matthew’s Gospel, but with less boring, more ACTION, and your choice of two endings!

[DavidJimenezU · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tremendo resumen de las sagradas escrituras. El contenido de la biblia sin todas esas tediosas e inútiles expliaciones morales. Solo lo bueno: las muertes, Dios volviendose loco y Pablo escribiendo cartas a todo perry. Mis dieses.

[Pedro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Muy divertido y rápido de leer. En pocas líneas o frases resume la idea central de cada libro de la biblia de una manera bastante honesta y con vocabulario sencillo. Ideal para aparentar ser un experto en la materia.

[Laci · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh, it was okay, for such a short read. The Science: Abridged Beyond the Point of Usefulness was way better.

I find myself agreeing with this one: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a lifelong Lutheran, I had to admit this book was pretty much right on point. I especially loved the entry for the book of "Proverbs:"
DO do good stuff.
DON'T do bad stuff.
And for God's sake, LISTEN now and then.

[Solveig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Best version of the Bible I have ever come across, for two reasons: 1) It is not as tediously long as the others and 2) it doesn't take itself seriously. My main issue with it is the title, which implies there is some actual usefulness to the non-abridged version...

[Victor Villas · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was funny, though not as much as the other two in the series (Science and Shakespeare).

Having read the bible previously (or at least some familiarity) will help. Not following the faith might help too, but if you can take a joke it's not essential.

[Lucas Martinez · Rating 3 out of 5]

La biblia para los que no quieren leer la biblia. Hereticamente graciosa y exageradamente corta. El libro es tal cual lo que dice ser 😂

[Rob · Rating 4 out of 5]

Manages to be surprisingly accurate whilst entirely missing the point. Hilarious!

[N · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nothing like a good Pandemic quarantine to get you some religion. Or butt jokes. Zach Weinersmith, keen student of humanity, knows this better than anyone else and promptly made both these things freely available on his website for the occasion. I now know that the Bible was actually written by a British sketch comedy troupe, and freely confess without shame that I read each of these 72 pages in a slightly different accent from across the UK, all so badly that noone from the UK would recognize it as either an accent from there or English or any language known to man. All is metaphor after all.

I did have an original thought because of this book though. When Jesus died and his second coming was prophesied, one doesn't realize just how hopeful people in that same generation must have been to see the coming before they died. It must have been like the promise of space travel in the 50s, time travel in the 90s, and artificial intelligence today. Except they waited and waited and nothing happened. Then they waited and waited and died. Then the next generation must have thought perfect, now we are in pole position to see the second coming when we're still in our prime years. Then they waited and waited and nothing happened. It's now been 2000 years and each generation still probably thinks they're in pole position. Not as sad as Futurama's episode with Fry's dog waiting for him in the past, but a nice image nonetheless.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Summary
It's a mini book, so I'm going to give it a mini-review. Some of the summaries in here are hilarious. Many are insightful. It's definitely sacrilegious, so if you adhere to a Christian creed, keep that in mind when deciding whether to read it. It's a quick read, so there's also little opportunity cost. I recommend it as fun way to pass a half an hour for anyone who enjoys humor about Christian things who won't be offended by someone outside of Christianity poking fun at it.

[Petr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Same fun as the science abridged book. However, the presupposition is you have at least skimmed the Bible. Then it is really funny because Zach manages once again to capture the pure essence of the books without giving you an actual clue. Even worse, if you would use these summaries of the Bible with a Christian, you would probably upset him beyond redemption.

"P.S.: No chicks talking in church." 1 Corinthians 5:11

[James Brixey]

On one hand, it could probably be argued that this is straight up disrespectful.

On the other hand, this is comparatively well researched, most of what he says tracks, and I think that there are a number of my Christian friends who would find this both amusing and, at times, insightful. Once again, a very short read (say 15 minutes) and free online, so if anyone reading this gives it a go, I would be curious what you think.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obviously written sarcastically by someone I assume doesn’t really believe in the contents of the Bible - but…

With the exception of a few small things here and there actually does a pretty astute job or summing up each book of the Bible in 1-3 sentences.

Worth a glance. It will only take you a few minutes to read.

[Ambrose Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very clever and very funny.

[M · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect length for the bible. all other versions should be binned and this one distributed worldwide.