The Jefferson Bible: The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth by Thomas Jefferson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

PDF available online [Public Domain]

Thomas Jefferson (yes, the same one who wrote the Declaration of Independence) produced this book by cutting and pasting excerpts from the Gospels so as to produce a distillation of who he believed Jesus was and what Jesus’s essential teachings were. It mixes parables and other New Testament teachings with biographical description.

There is an introduction which offers the reader more specific insight into Jefferson’s thinking than can be gleaned merely from what he includes and what he trims. The Introduction also discusses the similarities and differences between Christian philosophy and that of the Jews, the Greeks, and the Romans.

If you’re looking for a condensed version of the New Testament, I’d highly recommend this book. Jefferson was obviously a sharp guy who looked at the Bible from the perspective of Enlightenment-era thinking.

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