{"id":31779,"date":"2024-01-17T09:33:19","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T14:33:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=31779"},"modified":"2024-01-17T09:33:19","modified_gmt":"2024-01-17T14:33:19","slug":"author-joyce-carol-oates-blasted-for-calling-the-bible-fiction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2024\/01\/author-joyce-carol-oates-blasted-for-calling-the-bible-fiction.html","title":{"rendered":"Author Joyce Carol Oates Blasted for Calling the Bible \u201cFiction\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"
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shawncalhoun \/ Flickr<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Author Joyce Carol Oates was blasted on social media after getting into a spat over caring for widows and orphans and calling the Bible a work of fiction. The spat began when Matthew Sitman, a writer and cohost of the liberal podcast \u201cKnow Your Enemy,\u201d made a comment on the <\/span>breaking story<\/span><\/a>\u00a0of Alabama families alleging the Alabama Department of Corrections returned the bodies of their deceased loved ones in accelerated states of decomposition and allegedly with internal organs missing. \u201cThe state of our prisons, and our treatment of incarcerated people, is such an abomination\u2014we cage, torture, and exploit so many and call it justice when really it is a profound sin that calls out for God’s wrath upon us,\u201d wrote Sitman regarding the story.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

He later\u00a0<\/span>posted<\/span><\/a>, \u201cWidows, orphans, prisoners\u2014no Christian can, without doing great violence to Scripture, get around the extremely clear obligations we have to such people.\u201d The statement caught the attention of the Pulitzer nominated author. \u201c\u2018widows, orphans, prisoners\u2019–really, these entirely disparate categories have something in common?\u201d she wrote, to which Sitman replied, \u201cThey do, actually\u2014they’re all people in vulnerable situations who it’s easy to abuse and neglect.\u201d Sitman\u2019s cohost, Sam Adler-Bell, also responded, telling Oates she needed to read the Bible. Oates then criticized the Bible. \u201cthe bible, as you call it, is a work of fiction; or rather, an anthology of fictions,\u201d she wrote. \u201cit is not \u2018the\u2019 bible for much of the world’s population & those who claim it as their own select those verses that appeal to them while ignoring other verses. fertile ground for hypocrisy.\u201d She also argued that widows of millionaires and billionaires don\u2019t need help.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The responses to Oates\u2019s post against the Bible were mostly critical, with some calling Oates a bigot or uninformed. One\u00a0<\/span>user<\/span><\/a>\u00a0wrote, \u201cThe Bible, as I call it, is an anthology of revelation, history and poetry. Revelation and poetry are categories defined by faith and taste. History, however, can be compared to parallel accounts from other civilizations. The accounts record the same events from different viewpoints, as is to be expected.\u201d Oates, however, doubled down on her comments, continuing to argue against the need for help for widows of wealthy men. Sittman stated the criticism was almost a surprise. \u201cI almost tweeted that I’d never have expected a tweet that expressed support for caring for orphans, widows, and prisoners would be controversial, but actually, that’s exactly what I should have expected in the society we actually live in now,\u201d he wrote. One of his followers stated it was odd to see criticism coming from \u201cthat quarter in particular.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author Joyce Carol Oates was blasted on social media after getting into a spat over caring for widows and orphans and calling the Bible a work of fiction. The spat began when Matthew Sitman, a writer and cohost of the liberal podcast \u201cKnow Your Enemy,\u201d made a comment on the breaking story\u00a0of Alabama families alleging…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":31785,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-television"],"yoast_head":"\nAuthor Joyce Carol Oates Blasted for Calling the Bible \u201cFiction\u201d<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Author Joyce Carol Oates was blasted on social media after getting into a spat over caring for widows and orphans and calling the Bible a work of fiction.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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