The Bible, clear as mud

Peering through the most recent edition of the peerless Books and Culture, I came across a three-quarter page ad for Beeson Divinity School. Forgive me, but I don’t think this ad works for an evangelical institution. What does it say about the perspicuity of Scripture, for instance, that the commentaries are in focus and the Bible is clear as mud?

“We believe the Bible is God’s word written,” says the ad copy (not pictured above). “It is therefore fully trustworthy and able to teach us how to know our Lord and serve his people.” So long as you supplement it with a raft of commentaries because it’s otherwise fuzzy and indecipherable, says the image.

The headline only underscores the incongruity. “The Bible cannot be read like any other book,” it says, leaving the reader to finish, “because you apparently need dozens of other books to make sense of it.”