Overpriced Bibles

[Akheia]

I'm a history wonk so I don't think $70 isn't that out of hand for a nicely-made book. I've got plenty of books that cost several times that and I didn't mind paying it. The production values of some of these pricey Bibles is really nice, but you're not buying the text at all. You're buying the binding and the pretty gilded edges and the special nice paper. And, of course, the status boost you'll get when your church friends see you with it. What's sad is that the $400 jewelry reference I have is actually worth $400 not purely because its production values are very high but because its images and text just aren't available otherwise. Hell, I even have book versions of free books--I like having a physical reference and I also appreciate the scholarship that usually prefaces or footnotes these works. But Bibles can't really say any of that. That $75 Bible isn't expensive due to scarcity; the material in it is pretty much freely available; and the commentary section of it isn't going to be saying anything really new or groundbreaking. It's a 100% vanity situation. I admit it steams me pretty royally that there is even a market for this crap. Don't get me started about the specialty Bibles--it doesn't take a genius to see that those are made purely to tap new markets. But expensive books aren't necessarily all evil.

 

This is where I mention that once, right after a HUGE blowup fight with my Evil Ex, he tried to make nice by buying me one of these ridiculously overpriced Bibles. (The fight had been about his abysmal money management skills and our constant leap from financial disaster to financial disaster.) I hated using it.

[Crow]

My current bible is a Thompson Chain Reference, KJV. I got it for $39.95 on sale six or seven years ago. I don't believe it anymore, but is a really nice book. The whole chain reference was really well done and all the extras in the back are impressive. So, it was worth the money to me. I don't plan on getting rid of it, but now I may have to start reworking the notes in it. Lies, more lies, and damn lies.

 

All that being said, it has always upset me how expensive some of them were. And that you'd go broke trying to get all the different translations. Kind of like pokemon with a blood sacrifice.

 

Anyways, me and another guy had discussed making the "Pirate Bible" I have a kindle and wanted to be able to have many versions cross linked to each other. Kind of like those Greek-Hebrew-English bibles. We never did it, but it still sounds like fun to steal all the different versions, link them together and put it on a torrent.

[qadeshet]

Free is too high a price for a piece of crap.

[Akheia]

Ah, the Thompson Chain Reference... that's the mark of a good fundie. I had one too, but Evil Ex got it when we broke up. I liked the links in it. What's hilarious is that years after getting it I discovered that when the initial books of the NT were written, a lot of stuff got reworked to make it "fit" better with the OT; that was a real stumbling-block for me at the time. One thing that killed inerrancy for me was the story about just what Jesus rode into Jerusalem--was it a foal or a donkey? One NT writer just hedged his bets and went with "both." WTF?

 

But it's still a nice Bible, even if it wears blinkers as bad as any other type of Bible scholarship book.

[Suzanne]

Only today I ordered a King James bible for 6 pounds, so my vote is no. (I'm going to study English next fall and all the bibles I have from my Christian time are not in English, I figured I'd buy one for reference purposes.) If you want one for cheap, you can have it, if you want to spend hundreds of pounds/dollars on a fancy one, sure go ahead. Really, everyone who wants one can have one, so I don't see the problem.

[hereticzero]

I'm probably in the minority, but I think that prices are dictated by supply and demand. What will the market bear?

....

Bibles are stock piled in warehouses because the demand for them is so great, there really is no burden on the market. There are many publishing companies, most have their own copyrighted version of the Bible they print. Then they get their hucksters, er uhm preachers to promote their goods and sell them through the church. I could order for you perhaps 10,000 bibles and have them to you in a week. Some distributors pass them out for free because churches donate money for the bibles to be made. So, even with a high demand, the bible is something that is readily available and not in short supply. They are not made to order, except in rare occasions and then they are pricey. But for a run of the mill KJV, you can get one for free.

[TotalWreck]

Tabula, I'm glad you brought this topic up because I always wondered the same thing when I was in Christianity. There is no way bibles should be as expensive as they are. Even the ones that don't have a leather cover and are all paper can be ridiculously overpriced. But as I got out of religion, I realized why they're so overpriced: Christianity is a business. Everything is about making money.

[blackpudd1n]

I think bibles are over-priced. But then, a bible has no actual value to me. E.M. Forster's Maurice, on the other hand, I have bought twice so far, and if a first edition came my way, I'd fork out for it. So my view is really irrelevant.

[FeelHappy]

You also have to realize that many bibles are also printed on high quality acid free paper (1300-2300 pages of it) and that alone makes the far more expensive than your average paperback. Like I said, I can go get a cheap paperback with yellowing paper, paper back, with a glued binding which falls apart with extensive use from most christian book stores for under $5, but then I can also get a sewn bound, leather, acid free paper copy for $40-80, the quality drives the price, its up to you.

[Akheia]

I think bibles are over-priced. But then, a bible has no actual value to me. E.M. Forster's Maurice, on the other hand, I have bought twice so far, and if a first edition came my way, I'd fork out for it. So my view is really irrelevant.

Exactly! I've read my way through two copies of The Last Unicorn, three copies of The Princess Bride, and I need a new copy of The Blue Castle as it's falling apart. Ain't worth rebinding 'em as the paper itself is shit. I need to find these damn things in hardback--this is ridiculous. At least I had the forethought to grab library-bound copies of the history references I use most often.

 

Most of us don't mind having nice copies of books we value and use often. Even when I don't value a book inherently, I still don't want to just toss it. When I found out there was no Red Bull, no Amalthea, no singing butterflies, I didn't burn The Last Unicorn. I don't feel animosity toward the Bibles themselves; they're just books, albeit books with really awful things to say. They don't have power in and of themselves unless I let them have it.

 

 

Years and years ago my then-BF and I were in a bookstore hanging out in the New Age section. I was trying not to laugh at the Silver Ravenwolf shit and he was quietly reading some metaphysics thing he wanted to buy. A pair of scrawny scene kids came in behind us and began looking over the tarot cards. I barely noticed them till the girl asked him about the used tarot decks for sale. The heavily-gothed-out boy, who clearly was trying to impress her, said in a very ominous tone, "I could never use a used deck. It still bears all its previous owner's spiritual essence."

 

"Ooooooh," said the girl, looking up at him with the widest kitten eyes I've ever seen on a teenager.

 

The goth kid went on and on about this ridiculous shit while the girl ate it up like an audience member at a "Crossing Over" show. I mean for chrissakes we were in a HASTINGS, not some weird-ass witchcraft store. Finally I guess my BF had had enough. Without looking up, still with his back to the kids, he said very nonchalantly, "You know, Gerald Gardner once said that the best sword was an old sword."

 

I don't know if the quote's accurate (Gardner is/was one of the gurus of Wicca), but I've never seen a more effective cockblocking than I did that day, and certainly haven't ever seen a scene kid deflate that quickly. But it made me think a lot about the concept of used books/cards/whatever. Certainly the makers of Tarot decks have much to gain by convincing users that they just have to have a brand-new deck. I'd love to get a look at the profit margins of a Bible publishing house--though I'm the first to say that yes, a book can be expensive and be totally worth every penny, it does seem a tad excessive.

[norton65ca]

yup, wickedly expensive, but as previously noted, only if you want the fancy ones. I have to admit, back in my early "wok wit da Lawd", I did have a lust for a nice bible, I am a bit of a bibliophile, and I wanted all the trimmings. I've been through a few bibles, including one that was stolen(!)

I had a lovely sky blue leather bound Cambridge NASB, (That was the one that got nicked), Paid top whack for that one. I was given a big red Thompson Chain KJV that I still have by an ex Christian who I debated with at length years ago.

I lusted after the very first nicely bound NIV entire bible when they first came out, it was well put together and fit well with my long haired Jebus freak persona at the time. I ended up having at various times a couple of NT NIVs, soft bound and I would laminate the paper covers to give them durability. Still have one I think... I had a parallel New Testament using KJV, American Standard, NIV and I think Good News versions laid across the double pages (dumped that on a church steps two months ago along with a whole pile of other Xtian books I chucked upon deconverting.) There's a softcover NIV upstairs my wife has but doesn't look at often (mostly Psalms I think in her case), and a french bible somewhere.. got that for free... I have a New English Version NT that I found at a second hand bookstore, I had at some point a JB Phillips NT. I had a very old American Standard at some point about 20 years ago. I still have the Collins small bible I was given at my Church of the Nazarene Sunday School when I was nine in England with a fancy nameplate with my name elaborately inscribed on it "second prize, 46 marks" I think it was for memorizing bible verses but I can't remember. I was given the standard Gideons NT at school like everyone else. It's long gone now.

The biggie is a ferociously expensive top of the line Morroccan leather bound Oxford KJV that cost me a frikkin mint when I bought it to replace the sky blue NASB.

My, it is a bit much really to think I am deconverted but there's actually six of the damn things left in the house. I have a difficult time giving up books.

Most of the evangelical books are now gone but I have kept a very old (100 years or more) copy of E.G. White's The Great Controversy, Paul Tillich's History of Christian Thought, Foxe's Book of Martyrs, The Complete Works of Francis Schaeffer, The Christian in Complete Armour (1662) by William Gurnall, and I don't quite count CS Lewis, because all his stuff is in with my JRR Tolkien, George MacDonald and Mervyn Peake fantasy/mythopoeic stuff.

I'm thinking of getting rid of the Francis Schaeffer boxed set, and maybe some of the other stuff. It takes me a long time to rid myself of books, as I said...

[hereticzero]

When I passed my Dr. of Ministry, my wife bought a bible for me, leather, nice gold trimmed pages, leather covers, and my name on the front, Rev. Dr., for a little more than $200 and it was the first edition of this version.

[hereticzero]

Want a real eye-opener of the cost of collectable bibles or manuscripts?

Go to http://www.greatsite.com/ .

That website will show just how much your bible might be worth. I have been hanging onto some of mine to sell but I want a good price for mine. They are not antiques but I don't want to just toss them into the burner either.

[Akheia]

I don't care about Christianity anymore but the bibliophile in me has been drooling over these books for the last half hour. Old books make me squirm.

[TheBeast]

Any bible that costs more than toilet paper is overpriced.

 

In saying that, I remember paying over $100 for one of those things when I believed.

[FeelHappy]

I don't see why an atheist would throw away his bible anyways, the bible is the best tool an atheist can have, few things are better at disproving God. 

[3DollarBill]

If you can somehow charge a hundred bucks for something that's in the public domain...go for it!

 

In my opinion, it's a crime not to part the gullible from their money.

[Akheia]

Things are worth precisely what people are willing to pay for them. If Christians are stupid enough to buy stuff, someone's going to make stuff to sell them. Walk into any "Christian bookstore" and observe how much of the shop isn't even books. Half the floor if not more of it is clothes, merchandise, music, and gewgaws. Christians will buy anything if it's got the right slogan or picture on it or if their church leaders recommend it!