Biblia uwikłana w przemoc. „Mroczne strony” Biblii w nauczaniu religii
Authors: Korzec Cezary , Lemek Katarzyna , Mazur Radosław 
Published: March 2024

The book prepared by a team composed of a Biblicist and catechists answers the problem of the violent content in the Bible in the teaching of religion. This publication transcends the issue of &ldquo;dark and difficult, containing violent and amoral content&rdquo; biblical texts (VD 42), and transfers it to the field of transmitting faith and religious knowledge, which take place in the catechesis and the teaching of religion. The book is divided into two parts; in the first, the theoretical one, it presents issues concerning the Bible and teaching religion (catechesis). Chapter first, The conception of the biblical catechesis as per the Directory for Catechesis, written by Radosław Mazur, broadly examines the current situation of the biblical catechesis in Poland. In chapter two, The interpretation of the biblical texts containing violent content in the teaching of religion, Katarzyna Lemek, based on the analysis of the modern catechisms, presents the state of reception of the discussed issue. A particular advantage of this chapter is discussing the survey conducted among the students, which concerned their awareness of the presence of such texts and difficulties with understanding them. The chapter titled David and Goliath (1 Sm): two faces and one severed head is an exegetic study of a well-known and frequently recurring biblical text. The analysis of the pericope allows reflection on the catechetic practice, which often employs omitting strategies when it comes to the violent content. In the conclusion the author recognises the approach concerning the text which is presented in the second part of the book. The second part of the book is a collection of eight lesson scenarios, which take into account the dark fragments of the Bible. These are the tales of: the deluge (Gen 6-9), the binding of Isaac (Gen 22), the death of the firstborn sons (Ex 12), the fight of David and Goliath (1 Sm 17), the martyrdom of the Maccabee brothers (2 Macc 7) and New Testament&rsquo;s Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5). The collection is supplemented by two syllabi: one concerns the curse of the law (Jos 6; 8; 11) and the second one deals with the psalms containing imprecating (Ps 58; 137; 143). The selection of the texts is the result of the conducted survey.The combination of the discussion concerning the issues of violence in the biblical texts and the syllabi which take into account the darker pages of the Bible is a novelty. The awareness of the presence of such texts in the Bible is nothing new. However, in practice of teaching those texts were often censored. Some of them were present in the teaching, but their challenging aspects were either omitted or knowingly &ldquo;half-read&rdquo; (e.g., the tale of the deluge or David and Goliath). Others were completely absent, e.g., the imprecating psalms or the tale of Ananias and Sapphira. This book not only fills in the blanks, but also offers a tool which can help in this arduous process of including &ldquo;dark biblical texts&rdquo; in the teaching of religion.