WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Bible is being challenged in school libraries in Palm Beach County.
"You want to censor books? Start with the one that you like the best," Rabbi Barry Silver, a parent who said he is challenging the Bible. "We don't like book banning and we don't like censorship and we're going to challenge it every step of the way."
Silver has compiled pages of Bible verses he says contain violence and sexuality, meeting the criteria of the Parental Rights in Education Act.
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The law bans classroom instruction on subjects such as sexual orientation or gender identity, causing leaders in the School District of Palm Beach County to send a letter to teachers in May, asking them to go through their classroom libraries and remove books that may be questionable.
On Silver's list of Bible verses were:
Child abuse
Psalms 137:8–9 ESV
"Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock!"
Isaiah 13:16 King James Version (KJV)
"Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled, and their wives ravished.”
Sex trafficking
Exodus 21:7-11
"When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she will not be freed at the end of six years as the men are. If she does not satisfy her owner, he must allow her to be bought back again. Exodus 21:7-11"
Death penalty for homosexuals
Leviticus 20:13 New Living Translation
"If a man practices homosexuality, having sex with another man as with a woman, both men have committed a detestable act. They must both be put to death, for they are guilty of a capital offense."
"It looks like you have a diversity of examples here, tell me why," WPTV reporter Joel Lopez said.
"Because I'm showing that every single category that Gov. (Ron) DeSantis comes up with to ban a book, the Bible is at the top of the list of all of them," Silver said.
"Don't ban books just because you don't like them, don't fail to ban a book because you do like it," he said. "If you're going to go around banning books, which I don't think you should, you need to do it objectively, otherwise it's censorship. You're censoring a point of view that you don't like."
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Silver said Superintendent Michael Burke rejected his request to challenge the Bible.
With his announcement, the board is on official notice and wants a meeting for the board to hear his argument in July.
"I hope that they either ban the Bible and it creates such an outrage that people say the law has to go, or they won't ban the Bible and people say this is outrageous this is censorship," Silver said.
