The Life and Morals of Jesus of
Nazareth, commonly referred to as the
Jefferson Bible, was a book constructed
by Thomas Jefferson in the later years
of his life by cutting and pasting with
a razor and glue numerous sections from
the New Testament as extractions of the
doctrine of Jesus. Jefferson's condensed
composition is especially notable for
its exclusion of all miracles by Jesus
and most mentions of the supernatural,
including sections of the four gospels
which contain the Resurrection and most
other miracles, and passages indicating
Jesus was divine.
Early draft
In an 1803 letter to Joseph Priestley,
Jefferson stated that he conceived the
idea of writing his view of the
"Christian System" in a conversation
with Dr. Benjamin Rush during 1798–99.
He proposes beginning with a review of
the morals of the ancient philosophers,
moving on to the "deism and ethics of
the Jews," and concluding with the
"principles of a pure deism" taught by
Jesus, "omitting the question of his
deity." Jefferson explains that he does
not have the time, and urges the task on
Priestley as the person best equipped to
accomplish the task.
Jefferson accomplished a more limited
goal in 1804 with The Philosophy of
Jesus of Nazareth, the predecessor to
The Life and Morals of Jesus of
Nazareth. He described it in a letter to
John Adams dated October 13, 1813:
In extracting the pure principles which
he taught, we should have to strip off
the artificial vestments in which they
have been muffled by priests, who have
travestied them into various forms, as
instruments of riches and power to
themselves. We must dismiss the
Platonists and Plotinists, the
Stagyrites and Gamalielites, the
Eclectics, the Gnostics and Scholastics,
their essences and emanations, their
logos and demiurges, aeons and daemons,
male and female, with a long train of …
or, shall I say at once, of nonsense. We
must reduce our volume to the simple
evangelists, select, even from them, the
very words only of Jesus, paring off the
amphibologisms into which they have been
led, by forgetting often, or not
understanding, what had fallen from him,
by giving their own misconceptions as
his dicta, and expressing unintelligibly
for others what they had not understood
themselves. There will be found
remaining the most sublime and
benevolent code of morals which has ever
been offered to man. I have performed
this operation for my own use, by
cutting verse by verse out of the
printed book, and arranging the matter
which is evidently his, and which is as
easily distinguishable as diamonds in a
dunghill. The result is an octavo of
forty-six pages, of pure and
unsophisticated doctrines.
Jefferson wrote that “Jesus did not mean
to impose himself on mankind as the son
of God.” He called the writers of the
New Testament “ignorant, unlettered men”
who produced “superstitions,
fanaticisms, and fabrications.” He
called the Apostle Paul the “first
corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus.” He
dismissed the concept of the Trinity as
“mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks
calling themselves the priests of
Jesus.” He believed that the clergy used
religion as a “mere contrivance to filch
wealth and power to themselves” and that
“in every country and in every age, the
priest has been hostile to liberty.” And
he wrote in a letter to John Adams that
“the day will come when the mystical
generation of Jesus, by the supreme
being as his father in the womb of a
virgin, will be classed with the fable
of the generation of Minerva in the
brain of Jupiter.”
Jefferson never referred to his work as
a bible, and the full title of this 1804
version was, The Philosophy of Jesus of
Nazareth, being Extracted from the
Account of His Life and Doctrines Given
by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; Being
an Abridgement of the New Testament for
the Use of the Indians, Unembarrased
[uncomplicated] with Matters of Fact or
Faith beyond the Level of their
Comprehensions.
Jefferson frequently expressed
discontent with this earlier version.
The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth
represents the fulfillment of his desire
to produce a more carefully assembled
edition.
Content
Using a razor, Jefferson cut and pasted
his arrangement of selected verses from
the King James Version of the books of
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in
chronological order, putting together
excerpts from one text to those of
another in order to create a single
narrative. Thus he begins with Luke 2
and Luke 3, then follows with Mark 1 and
Matthew 3. He provides a record of which
verses he selected and of the order in
which he arranged them in his "Table of
the Texts from the Evangelists employed
in this Narrative and of the order of
their arrangement".
Consistent with his naturalistic outlook
and intent, most supernatural events are
not included in Jefferson's heavily
edited compilation. Paul K. Conkin
states that "For the teachings of Jesus
he concentrated on his milder
admonitions and his most memorable
parables. What resulted is a reasonably
coherent, but at places oddly truncated,
biography. If necessary to exclude the
miraculous, Jefferson would cut the text
even in mid-verse." Historian Edwin
Scott Gaustad explains, "If a moral
lesson was embedded in a miracle, the
lesson survived in Jeffersonian
scripture, but the miracle did not. Even
when this took some rather careful
cutting with scissors or razor,
Jefferson managed to maintain Jesus'
role as a great moral teacher, not as a
shaman or faith healer."
Therefore The Life and Morals of Jesus
of Nazareth begins with an account of
Jesus’s birth without references to
angels, genealogy, or prophecy.
Miracles, references to the Trinity and
the divinity of Jesus, and Jesus'
resurrection are also absent from his
collection.
No supernatural acts of Christ are
included at all in this regard, while
the few things of a supernatural nature
include receiving of the Holy Spirit,
angels, Noah's Ark and the Great Flood,
the Tribulation, the Second Coming, the
resurrection of the dead, a future
kingdom, and eternal life, Heaven, Hell
and punishment in everlasting fire, the
Devil, and the soldiers falling
backwards to the ground in response to
Jesus stating, "I am he."
Rejecting the resurrection of Jesus, the
work ends with the words: "Now, in the
place where He was crucified, there was
a garden; and in the garden a new
sepulchre, wherein was never man yet
laid. There laid they Jesus. And rolled
a great stone to the door of the
sepulchre, and departed." These words
correspond to the ending of John 19 in
the Bible.
Purpose
It is understood by some historians that
Jefferson composed it for his own
satisfaction, supporting the Christian
faith as he saw it. Gaustad states, "The
retired President did not produce his
small book to shock or offend a
somnolent world; he composed it for
himself, for his devotion, for his
assurance, for a more restful sleep at
nights and a more confident greeting of
the mornings." 
There is no record of this or its
successor being for "the Use of the
Indians," despite the stated intent of
the 1804 version being that purpose.
Although the government long supported
Christian activity among Indians, and in
Notes on the State of Virginia Jefferson
supported "a perpetual mission among the
Indian tribes," at least in the interest
of anthropology, and as President
sanctioned financial support for a
priest and church for the Kaskaskia
Indians, Jefferson did not make these
works public. Instead, he acknowledged
the existence of The Life and Morals of
Jesus of Nazareth to only a few friends,
saying that he read it before retiring
at night, as he found this project
intensely personal and private.
Ainsworth Rand Spofford, Librarian of
Congress stated: "His original idea was
to have the life and teachings of the
Saviour, told in similar excerpts,
prepared for the Indians, thinking this
simple form would suit them best. But,
abandoning this, the formal execution of
his plan took the shape above described,
which was for his individual use. He
used the four languages that he might
have the texts in them side by side,
convenient for comparison. In the book
he pasted a map of the ancient world and
the Holy Land, with which he studied the
New Testament." 
Some speculate that the reference to
"Indians" in the 1804 title may have
been an allusion to Jefferson's
Federalist opponents, as he likewise
used this indirect tactic against them
at least once before, that being in his
second inaugural address. Or that he was
providing himself a cover story in case
this work became public.
Also referring to the 1804 version,
Jefferson wrote, "A more beautiful or
precious morsel of ethics I have never
seen; it is a document in proof that I
am a real Christian, that is to say, a
disciple of the doctrines of Jesus."
Jefferson's claim to be a Christian was
made in response to those who accused
him of being otherwise, due to his
unorthodox view of the Bible and
conception of Christ. Recognizing his
rather unique views, Jefferson stated in
a letter to Ezra Stiles Ely, "You say
you are a Calvinist. I am not. I am of a
sect by myself, as far as I know."
Publication history
After completion of the Life and Morals,
about 1820, Jefferson shared it with a
number of friends, but he never allowed
it to be published during his lifetime.
The most complete form Jefferson
produced was inherited by his grandson,
Thomas Jefferson Randolph, and was
published in 1895 by the National Museum
in Washington. The book was later
published as a lithographic reproduction
by an act of the United States Congress
in 1904. Beginning in 1904 and
continuing every other year until the
1950s, new members of Congress were
given a copy of the Jefferson Bible.
Until the practice first stopped, copies
were provided by the Government Printing
Office. A private organization, the
Libertarian Press, revived the practice
in 1997.
In January 2013, the American Humanist
Association published an edition of the
Jefferson Bible, distributing a free
copy to every member of Congress and
President Barack Obama. A Jefferson
Bible For the Twenty-First Century adds
samples of passages that Jefferson chose
to omit, as well as examples of the
"best" and "worst" from the Hebrew
Bible, the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita, the
Buddhist Sūtras, and the Book of Mormon.
The Smithsonian published the first
full-color facsimile of the Jefferson
Bible on November 1, 2011. Released in
tandem with a Jefferson Bible exhibit at
the National Museum of American History,
the reproduction features introductory
essays by Smithsonian Political History
curators Harry R. Rubenstein and Barbara
Clark Smith, and Smithsonian Senior
Paper Conservator Janice Stagnitto
Ellis. The book's pages were digitized
using a Hasselblad H4D50-50 megapixel
DSLR camera and a Zeiss 120 macro lens,
and were photographed by Smithsonian
photographer, Hugh Talman.
The entire Jefferson Bible is available
to view, page-by-page, on the
Smithsonian National Museum of American
History's website. The high-resolution
digitization enables the public to see
the minute details and anomalies of each
page, and uniquely experience the book.
The text is in the public domain and
freely available on the Internet.
Recent history
In 1895, the Smithsonian Institution
under the leadership of librarian Cyrus
Adler purchased the original Jefferson
Bible from Jefferson's
great-granddaughter Carolina Randolph
for $400. A conservation effort
commencing in 2009, in partnership with
the museum's Political History
department, allowed for a public
unveiling in an exhibit open from
November 11, 2011, through May 28, 2012,
at the National Museum of American
History. Also displayed were the source
books from which Jefferson cut his
selected passages, and the 1904 edition
of the Jefferson Bible requested and
distributed by the United States
Congress. The exhibit was accompanied by
an interactive digital facsimile
available on the museum's public
website. On February 20, 2012, the
Smithsonian Channel premiered the
documentary Jefferson's Secret Bible.
The Jefferson Bible at the Smithsonian
National Museum of American History
Editions in print
Facsimile
Text
See also
The Age of Reason
Bibliography of Thomas Jefferson
Jesuism
The Jesus Seminar
Rationalism
Thomas Jefferson and religion
Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom
References
External links
Official Smithsonian Jefferson Bible
website: "Thomas Jefferson's Bible" – at
National Museum of American History
Online text of the Jefferson Bible: Life
and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth – at
University of Virginia Library
Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth –
at Google Books
"Jefferson’s Religious Beliefs".
Monticello.org. Retrieved Sep 26, 2012. 
Thomas Jefferson and his Bible from
Frontline
The two copies of the Bible that
Jefferson cut up to make the book reside
at the Albert and Shirley Small Special
Collections Library at the University of
Virginia
