The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is rewriting the Bible to portray Jesus in a negative way, according to CBN News. While the CCP announced that they would be releasing a “new translation” of the Bible in 2019 which would include Confucian and Buddhist principles, a spokesman for The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM), Todd Nettleton, explained that their intention was to ensure the new translation only promoted the communist party.
CBN News reports that “last year, VOM shared the reimagined version of John 8, the Bible story centered on Jesus’ love and corrective compassion for a woman caught in adultery.” In the actual version of the Bible, Jesus says, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her” and the crowd begins to leave. Jesus tells her, “Go now and sin no more.” In China’s new translation, however, they change the text to falsely teach that “When everyone went out, Jesus stoned the woman himself.”
Tina Ramirez is the founder and president of Hardwired, “a group that has been a vocal critic of the Chinese Communist Party and its persecution of religious groups and political minorities.” Ramirez explained that the Chinese government may be taking this step to ensure Chinese children are full supporters of the CCP and do not become Christians. Chinese reeducation camps may not be succeeding in the way the government wants them to because “Christians see it as a badge of honor to go through these camps or be tortured and (they know) that is the test of what it means to be a Christian in China.”
Ramirez explained that brainwashing is crucial to the CCP which does not tolerate any dissidents. While the CCP is making an effort to confuse Christians by rewriting the Bible, Ramirez pointed out that they will not be successful because Christians know “the word of God is more than a book. It’s a living…it’s Jesus Christ himself.”