Genesis Rejuvenated [Paperback]

Bill Jemas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 15, 2008

This ground-breaking translation project begins with the oldest complete manuscript of the ancient scripture that has survived into modern times - the Leningrad Codex. Freewarebible.com provides laypeople with a unique set of translation tools that they can use to read the Word, word-for-word, along with detailed historical annotations that they can use to understand the original ideas.

According to a recent Gallup Poll, 32% of Americans believe that the Bible is literally true, but, less than 1% of us has actually read a verbatim translation, says Bill Jemas, 360ie s CEO. This is not for lack of trying. Americans are voracious Bible readers: nearly 90% of American households own at least one Bible and the average household owns four. With annual Bible sales at a staggering 25,000,000 books per year, the Bible is not only the best selling book of all time, but also America s best selling book every year.

We all read what other people say the Bible says, believing that we are getting a verbatim translation, Jemas added, but, once you read the ancient scripture for yourself, you won t believe that any more but, hopefully, you will gain new insights into the Bible.

"I saw a beautiful vision of God, a way to reconcile Creationism and Evolutionism, and a blueprint for how the human race can transform the earth into a place that's very good for all of us, for our children and for our fellow creatures.

What will you see?"

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Hello, my name is Bill Jemas, I was the President and Publisher of Marvel from 2000 to 2004. We had lots of luck rewriting old stories that made you look at what our classic heroes were doing lately. Peter Parker/Spider-Man was changing jobs at the newspaper - from photographer to webmaster. Logan/Wolverine had been an abused child. The first Captain America was really black, and the Rawhide Kid was gay.

People noticed us. Bloggers, journalists, t-shirt makers, game developers, movie producers, Barnes & Noble, Game-Stop, Wal-Mart, Target, you name it, all started doing what they do about Marvel, and our once-bankrupt business started to make money.

In 2005, I took some of that money, left that job and started up a new business with some friends. We thought we could do our thing about the Bible. We would use Eve and Adam to make a lot of money and have a lot of fun without doing a lot of work. They had made the ultimate sacrifice for all of us. We would cash in on movies, games and merchandise.

So, the writers started typing scripts, the artists started drawing pages and I started doing research. It would be good I thought, to surface the stuff of scholarly debate for the pop culture market. Did God intend, from the beginning, for Eve and Adam to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge? In the Bible, is knowledge a synonym for sex ? Was the serpent a metaphor for Eve s inner voice, urging her to grow up and have children?

I thought all I had to do was skim Bible literature for a couple of weeks and surface a bunch of controversial quotes for the PR campaign.

I was way wrong.

The literature made me look at the original text. And I have not been able to take my eyes off the Bible ever since. Reading the Words made me dig deeper and deeper into their meanings until . . . now, years later, the comic book pages are still on the drawing board and my team and I are dedicated to an entirely new project that takes the Creation story about as seriously as possible.

Our project is called the Freeware Bible because its key data is in the public domain and free for you to use as you see fit. As you will see, I used it to write both a verbatim and poetic version of the creation story. You will be able to do that to, and publish it on your own if you like.

The Freeware Bible project launches with the publication of this book, Genesis Rejuvenated. I know for sure that the ideas in here really are good ones because they all come from a verbatim translation of the oldest surviving manuscript of the Aramaic/Hebrew Bible. I have tried my best to do a good job at expressing those ideas in this book.

Product Details

• Paperback: 117 pages
• Publisher: 360ie; 1 edition (November 15, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0977258912
• ISBN-13: 978-0977258918
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.9 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,936,283 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A cultural eye-opener, August 23, 2010

By 

Gordon L. Anderson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Genesis Rejuvenated (Paperback)

This book was a rare and unexpected pleasure to discover. With a Ph.D. in the Philosophy of Religion, from a leading university, I was not expecting much from a theological work written by the former CEO of Marvel Comics. I was surprised. This book provides the grist for a revolution in theology by providing translation of the Leningrad Codex, a Hebrew Bible compiled from lost ancient sources that predates the King James translation of the Bible that has dominated the Christian worldview.

By offering fresh interpretations of ancient texts, the Freeware Bible enables us to see how the King James Version was translated through glasses colored by Church doctrine and political monarchy. The possibilities of substituting alternative words both enable the reader to take off those glasses and reconstruct passages in ways that are more consistent with contemporary scientific worldviews.

Genesis Rejuvenated contains Bill Jemas' attempt to reconstruct the creation story in Genesis 1 in a way that is far more natural and commonsense than the version we inherited in the King James Bible and the English translations that followed it. It gives us far greater appreciation for the ancient civilizations that predated the Babylonian exile of the Jewish people that created the Hebrew Bible.

The main problem the reader faces is to try to figure out how to reassemble the words in the Freeware Bible database to take it beyond the postmodern information age of "Wikipedia"--where anyone's interpretation can be presented--to what is becoming called an integral worldview that applies generally recognized natural and social principles to the volumes of information available.

Jemas takes up this challenge and creates his own translation of Genesis 1 in a way that describes the story of the Creation that removes the polarization in the current Creation -Evolution debates. While his rendition must be considered experimental and not some new authoritative consensus on the best translation our present world is capable of rendering, I found is surprisingly preferable to the inherited English Bible.

I think this work is going to be difficult to find an audience in established circles because it challenges the foundations of Christian Civilization and offers a new ways of conceiving basic doctrines relating to Creation, the Fall, and Human Society. Jemas is a pioneer, ahead of the curve, I hope he gets some recognition for what he has contributed to the foundation of a new integral Bible that is at once both more true to the original writings and to the human soul.

5.0 out of 5 stars A New Take on a Timeless Classic, February 23, 2009

By 

Michael E. Martucci (Trenton, NJ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Genesis Rejuvenated (Paperback)

I've been working with Mr. Jemas for awhile now, helping him put together the Freeware Bible database and website, and I must say, it is quite an interesting project. He takes the oldest known complete manuscript of the Old Testament -- The Leningrad Codex, and translates each word into every possible English synonym. He provides the layperson with a verbatim translation of The Leningrad Codex, but also with an "English Synonyms" column, which people can use to pick out words and create their own verse for the first 7 days of the Bible. While the Rejuvenation verse may be quite subjective, the English Synonyms column removes subjectivity from the Bible almost entirely, allowing the reader to draw his/her own conclusions.

I only pray that this project makes it beyond Genesis all the way through Revelations.

Here are just a few of the things people are saying about Genesis Rejuvenated:

"Genesis Rejuvenated is a labour of love and a gift to all those who seek clarity within the ancient teachings of Judaism and Christianity. The quest of the soul is to find its own connection with the Divine and this is an excellent tool to use in that great journey. My own joy has been to find the magic in reinterpreting the texts by applying the Jewish mystical training that I have together with my studies of the cultural and social mores of those times."

--Rev Maggy Whitehouse author of The Marriage of Jesus, The Book of Deborah and Living Kabbalah.

"Well, I just finished reading Genesis Rejuvenated -- what an AMAZING book you created! My wife, who's pretty scholarly, was even blown away by it. Really really good work.

Not only for myself, but for anyone who wants to dig back into the Bible with their OWN hands and heart -- Thank You."

--Eric Coble

"I read your book last night and I was very impressed. I am not a religious person, mostly due to the bigotry and manipulation that world religions insist upon, which I feel you have made a good case against.

I particularly appreciate revealing the history of gender bias and a strong case for being a vegetarian (which my wife and I are!). I have always been annoyed at that whole "dominion over animals" section as a reason for Christians to be so anti-vegan.

I hope there is more to come!"

--Layne C. Harris