Twitter Provides Platform for Bible Resurrection

The attempts to tweet the Bible from start to finish are no mean feat. In fact, British web developer Chris Juby predicts that his undertaking of re-producing the c.800,000 words long biblical text into just 1,190 tweets will be a mammoth task, and is expecting to reach chapter 22 of the Book of Revelation in approximately 2 years.

Juby, who is director of worship at King's Church in Durham, began his @biblesummary project on the 8^th August. His inaugural tweet covered the beginnings of the world, with subsequent daily tweets following on in chronological order. Speaking of the reasons for his decision to produce a concise summary of the Bible, Juby explains that:

"It is my normal habit to read a chapter of the Bible each morning and I always read through from Genesis to Revelation. As I was coming to the end last time, I thought I needed a way of focusing my mind a little bit more on what I was reading. I already use Twitter to comment on my life and music, so I thought I would share my summaries."

He hopes that this re-introduction of scripture via a mainstay of the current tech-dominated culture will encourage people to get re-acquainted with the text which has become so obscure in recent times. By offering up the content in such a methodically segmented manner, Juby hopes to allow readers, himself included, to focus more effectively on each aspect of any chapter.

Whilst Juby relates the stories with the aim of popularising the Bible, and helping us re-focus on the important themes contained therein, other authors have adopted an alternative approach. Jana Reiss, a Mormon convert, provides a light-hearted take on the word of God via her own 'Twible' offering. She began tweeting her humorous interpretation after becoming aware of the writings of @WWGT( What Would God Tweet) via an Easter Sunday sermon.

The tongue-in-cheek rendition of the invariably staid Bible content was something of a revelation to Reiss, and influenced her in such a way that she began her own version or events, the latest of which reads:

“1 Kgs 22: Great Jehoshaphat! Kings of S & N join forces to fight Syrians. 1 Kgs ends on happy note of unity & peace. Won’t last.”

Such a comedic translation can also be found in @FakeBible's Biblical tweets. Whose stuttering characterisation of Moses offers an amusing alternative to the usual Charlton Heston image of the prophet as an unwavering leader of men.

The latest interpretations of the Bible available via Twitter represent a clever strategy by those involved for the revival of interest in the text, the influence of which is not what it once was.

However, their combined following of 15,981 pales in comparison with the numbers achieved by the new idols of the 21^st century such as Lady Gaga, whose record 5,738,056 followers recently topped that of the previous Twitter Queen, Britney Spears.