Peter Manseau’s Jefferson Bible

Two-hundred years ago, former President Thomas Jefferson finished a project he’d been thinking about for much of his life: a revised version of the gospels that would come to be known as the Jefferson Bible. His goal was to separate the teachings of Jesus from the miraculous and supernatural elements of the story.

Now comes Peter Manseau — the Lilly Endowment Curator of American Religious History at the National Museum of American History, which is part of the Smithsonian Institution. His new book is The Jefferson Bible: A Biography. 

Manseau writes: “Perhaps the last monumental work of a monumental Life, the Jefferson Bible is an ambivalent scripture that has taken on an outsized significance in a nation for which religious ambivalence is the one enduring creed.”

The 21st was joined by Manseau to talk more about his book. 

Guests:

Peter Manseau, Lilly Endowment Curator of American Religious History at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History, and author of the new release The Jefferson Bible: A Biography

Prepared for web by Zainab Qureshi

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