This is thinking in public, a program dedicated to intelligent conversation about front-line

theological and cultural issues with the people who are shaping them.

I'm Albert Moller, your host and president of the

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. Words matter. They move individuals

to tears and action. They make or break communities.

So writes Professor Stephen Protharo

in his new book, The American Bible.

He's professor in the Department of Religion

at Boston University, the author of numerous books

and one of the most quoted academics in America.

Professor Protharo, welcome to Thinking in Public.

Thanks for having me.

You wrote this book entitled it The American Bible.

Many people looking at it are going to assume this is mostly about the Christian

scriptures, the Judeo-Christian scriptures, the Old and New Testament.

Actually, you're using the word Bible in a very different sense.

Explain that to us.

Right. It's a little more of a religious study sense sort of as scripture. So it might have been called American scripture or American public scripture or something like that.

The idea is that I'm looking not at Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but I'm looking at Washington, Lincoln,

King, and Jefferson on the great expressions in American public life, and not only those words but the

commentaries on them which really take up most of the books on I'm just as

interested in what people have said about the Declaration of Independence

...