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History of the Bible

  1. Lesson One
    Revelation and Canon
    17 Activities
    |
    2 Assessments
  2. Lesson Two
    Transmission and Translation
    19 Activities
  3. Lesson Three
    Reformation and Publication
    16 Activities
  4. Lesson Four
    Modern Bible Translation
    15 Activities
    |
    2 Assessments
  5. Lesson Five
    The Bible Movement Today
    14 Activities
    |
    3 Assessments
  6. Course Wrap-Up
    Course Wrap-Up
    1 Activity
    |
    1 Assessment

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My co-worker Timothy sends his regards, as do my cousins Lou, Jake and Daddy-boy. (I, stenographer for this letter, greet you all in the Lord.) Garry, host to me and the whole fellowship, wants to be remembered by you. 

Perhaps those of you who have completed Study 5 will have identified this passage from Paul’s unmistakable letter to the church at Washington. As you’ll also know, the trials of Jake and Daddy-boy, and the generosity of Garry, have long been the subject of scholarly discussion.

This selection is from Dr. Clarence Jordan’s translation of Romans, which he addresses to an American city. Jordan was interested in breaking down the racial barriers and injustices that were typical of the American South. He found it incomprehensible that so many in the “Bible belt” could know the words of Scripture so well and yet participate in racism and bigotry.

Jordan’s solution was to recast the Bible in a paraphrased translation that anticipated later paraphrased Bibles like the Living Bible and The Message. The result is The Cotton Patch Gospel, a surprisingly readable version of the Gospels and letters of Paul that changes out the names and vocabulary of the traditional text with language more familiar to southern audiences. The parable of the Good Samaritan, for example, is set on the road to Albany, and the Good Samaritan is an African-American who rescues a dying man while “white preachers” speed past. 

Jordan, who had a PhD in biblical studies, based his Cotton Patch Gospel directly on early Greek manuscripts, and in the preface to his text he defends his approach compellingly, with reference to his Southern audience:

[A Southerner] would be perfectly understood if he wrote to a friend, “We had hot dogs and Coke for lunch, fish and hush puppies for supper, and then sat around shooting the bull until midnight.” But let that letter get lost for about two thousand years, then let some Ph.D. try to translate it into a non-English language of A.D. 3967. If he faithfully translated the words it might run something like this: “We had steaming canines and processed coal for the noon meal, and fish, and mute, immature dogs for the evening meal, followed by passively engaging until midnight in the brutish sport of bull-shooting.” For such exacting scholarship the good doctor may have won world renown as the foremost authority on twentieth-century English—without having the slightest idea what he actually said.

This commitment to the everyday language of the South was the rule for the Cotton Patch Gospel, with striking results. Romans 9:21 reads:

My dear fellow, you wouldn’t be giving God any sass, would you? Does the design say to the designer, “Why did you make me like this?”

Other biblical passages were used to target the disconnect that Jordan believed to exist in the minds of white Christians between the Bible’s messages of love and inclusion and the racial inequality and prejudice that was so prevalent in the South. His targeting of White American Protestants, “WAPs” (better known today as WASPs), is frequent and pointed throughout the letters of Paul. For example, Romans 9:31-32 reads:

And yet the WAPs, trying so hard at Bible religion, never quite caught on to the Bible. Why not? Because they were not people of faithful action but of religious activities.

Jordan was convinced that a better understanding of the Gospel was crucial to solving problems of racial inequality in the American South.

My translation of “Jew and Gentile” as “white man and Negro” is clear evidence of superimposing my own personal feelings, which is the unpardonable sin of a self-respecting translator. But in the Southern context, is there any other alternative?

The Cotton Patch Gospel may not be one of the better-known Bible translations, but it’s certainly one of the more interesting—and a reminder of the fact that the Bible was always meant to be understandable by common people. Jordan knew that the Bible was also meant to be understood by those in positions of privilege and control. He was aware that the Bible always has an edge for the recipient of the Word and for the messenger.

Source: Clarence Jordan, The Cotton Patch Gospel: Paul’s Epistles, pp. Xviii, p. 33.