Watch The Bible
- TV-14
- 2013
- 1 Season
-
7.4 (11,955)
Spanning from Genesis to the Book of Revelation, this 10-hour miniseries is broken down into two-hour episodes. Narrated by Keith David, actor/voice-over artist and native New Yorker, each episode highlights two-to-three Bible stories. The first five segments focus on The Old Testament, with the ensuing five hours devoted to The New Testament. Scriptural texts are drawn from The New International Version and The New Revised Standard Version biblical translations. The producers, overall goal is to attract new viewers to the Bible and to challenged those more familiar with the Bible to view it from a different perspective. In their effort to execute a smooth transition, the producers appear to be relying on that old biblical adage "the new is in the old contained and the old is in the new explained." By personally selecting the stories to be used, the producers have consistently maintained that they do not wish the Bible to come off as a miss-mash of disconnected incidents or randomized chapter and verse tidbits. In the interest of accuracy and biblical correctness, each episode was read, researched and critiqued by a team of experts who also physically visited the filming sites. This accuracy team includes Craig Allen Evans, Professor of New Testament Studies in Nova Scotia and Mark Goodacre, New Testament Professor at Duke University. Additional team membership includes Sunday morning TV pastor, Joel Olsteen who possesses no formal religious education. Other members of the team include Rabbi Joshua Garroway, an associate of America's oldest, continuous Jewish seminary, Hebrew Union College, Catholic Cardinal Tunnicliffe, associated with World Evangelical Alliance and Rick Warren, the pastor of a California mega-church. According to Focus On The Family President, Jim Daly some Hollywood entities strongly urged the producers to leave Jesus out of the script. According to the latest online news, the first themed-segment entitled Beginnings recounts the story of Moses preaching on The Ark to a congregation of seven people as they escape the wrath of God. The other two stories center around the demise of Pharaoh's army in the Red Sea and Moses delivering The Ten Commandants to the Israelites waiting at the foot of Mt. Sinai. The Homeland segment introduces /reintroduces the stories of Samson & Delilah, David & Goliath, David & Bathsheba and Solomon leading in the temple erection. Although a bit sketchy, the third segment entitled Hope commences with the Jewish captivity in Babylon, moves on to the birth announcement by the Angel Gabriel and the Bethlehem birth and concludes with Jesus "ready to take on his mission - his revolution." Although there is plenty of room in the reviewers/critics corner, one interesting leak is that the production team's teenage family members have strongly urged them to be sure to get the special effects and the computer animation capabilities right. Nancy Dubuc of A&E Networks opines that a revelation of earthquake proportion is only a remote click away. In a Christian Science Monitor item, the Burnetts stated there is room for the Bible to be viewed from a literary perspective. In a recent item appearing in The Wall Street Journal, the producers expressed their dream goal that The Bible miniseries would ultimately act as the vehicle for a campaign for the mandatory inclusion of religious instruction in the curriculum of every public school in the United States of America. The Bible, a 10-hour miniseries airing on the History Channel, was co-produced by Roma Downey, of Touched By An Angel fame, and Mark Burnett, current producer of Survivor, Celebrity Apprentice and The Voice. The majority of the scenes were shot in Morocco. According to many sources, the idea for the miniseries was spawned as this husband/wife team viewed Cecil De Mille's Ten Commandants movie.