Actor Tim Allen announced he had finally completed his “word-for-word” reading of the entire Bible. “Finished the entire Bible it’s been a 13 month word by word page by page no skimming journey,” wrote Allen on X. “Humbled, enlightened and amazed at what I read and what I learned. I will rest and meditate on so much. I will begin it again.” Allen’s supporters praised the actor for the accomplishment. “Going through the Bible and letting it go through you. How wonderful, Tim. God bless,” wrote one follower. “For those who are aware this is an accomplishment, reading the entire Bible ‘word by word’ and page by page isn’t for the weak. Great job Mr. Allen,” wrote another.

Allen announced he had started reading the Bible in August 2024. “Never took the time in all my years to ever read and really read the Bible,” he wrote. “Currently almost through the Jerusalem Bible Old Testament and almost done with the Prophets. Next up to New Testament. So far amazing and not at all what I was expecting.” He kept his followers updated on his progress, noting in October he had “Finished a rather intense Ezekiel now on to Daniel.” In February 2025, he shared that he’d re-read the Old Testament and was preparing to start the New Testament. “After nearly a year, I have finished the entire Old Testament, and the experience of re-reading, dedicated focus, and no drifting has made this a humbling, overwhelming experience. What a treasure. Three days into the New Testament,” he wrote.

Allen has been more outspoken about his faith later in his career, including discussing his Bible reading with proud atheist Bill Maher on his “Club Random” podcast. “Paul said something very intuitive that I’m still studying, because he says law was basically invented to develop sin. Without law, you don’t know what sinful is. So, law was basically just to give you guardrails of what the world is,” he said, adding that faith had given him more clarity than philosophy ever had. “Philosophy gets run in these circles. It can’t explain anything, really,” he said.

It’s quite a change for a man that had faced life imprisonment for cocaine possession in 1978. He spent two years in federal prison for drug trafficking until he accepted a plea deal for revealing the names of other dealers in exchange for his freedom. His father’s death in a car accident when Allen was just 11 years old had set his life on a dangerous trajectory. Being sent to prison was a big wake up call. “When I went to jail, reality hit so hard that it took my breath away, took my stance away, took my strength away,” he said in an interview with Esquire. “I was put in a holding cell with twenty other guys — we had to crap in the same crapper in the middle of the room — and I just told myself, I can’t do this for seven and a half years. I want to kill myself.” He was able to use his sense of humor to entertain his prison mates and guards, which his was able to take with him outside of prison before eventually making his way on the stand-up comedy circuit and landing him his breakout role as Tim Taylor on “Home Improvement.” Now, it seems, Allen is adding “Spiritual improvement” to his list of achievements.