Warning: contains language which may offend

Controversy is raging over the decision, taken by Puffin Books, to purge from Roald Dahl’s stories language which their team of sensitivity readers has deemed to be offensive. One of the casualties of this policy is the word ‘fat’, which has been excised from all new editions of his work: the character Augustus Gloop in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is now described as ‘enormous’, and in James and the Giant Peach, Aunt Sponge is now ‘a nasty old brute’, instead of being ‘terrifically fat’. Whether this means that the unexpurgated versions of his books will now be cast aside, or valued as collectors’ items, remains to be seen.

Yet it is difficult to see how the Bible account of Ehud killing Eglon in Judges 3 could be rewritten in such a way as to avoid the reference to Eglon being so fat that when Ehud stabbed him the hilt of his dagger went in after the blade: Ehud did not bother pulling his sword out again, and the fat closed over the blade (3:22). It is a gory detail beloved by Sunday School teachers who want to try and pique the interest of young boys in Bible stories, but we may wonder why this part of the scripture was inspired by God or what its purpose is in teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16). Yet, for all its capacity to offend, this gross detail has its place in Holy Writ.

What has been edited out of some modern translations (following the squeamishness of those who first translated Hebrew into Greek all those centuries ago) is the extra detail that when Eglon died ‘the dung came out’, which is how the ESV translates a phrase, the meaning of which is (admittedly) not entirely clear. Yet, given that this is what often happens when people die, it is a very plausible conjecture, not least because it adds to the morbid humour when, later in the story, Eglon’s servants conjecture that their master was taking so long to come out of his upper room because he was relieving himself (3:24). The comedy is ‘earthy’, deliberately so: it is worthy of Roald Dahl, and I recognise it will not be to everyone’s liking.

So, let’s be honest, some bits of the Bible are offensive, but that does not mean that we should excise them from the text. The ‘yuk’ factor here is deliberate. We are supposed to be disgusted by the details of Eglon’s fate. Scripture should retain its capacity to provoke, shock and disturb. If we sanitise the Bible and leave out all the bits that could offend a team of sensitivity readers, then we end up sacrificing God on the altar of our own political correctness.

But, as I tell my students, when we run across difficult texts in the Bible, we should ask ourselves, as Augustine did, ‘Why is it there?’ So – why do we have Eglon’s death recounted in such unpalatably graphic detail? Well, it brings home to us in vivid detail that there is something ignominious about dying, that our bodies are weak and mortal, and naturally subject to decomposition after death. Whether we joke about death, fear it, or are indifferent to it, the reality is that we are dirt, and to the dirt we shall return (Genesis 3:19). We may instinctively recoil from that idea: I remember thinking, the first time I saw the bits of bone and ash left after a cremation, ‘There must be more to us than this.’ If that is true, and not just a forlorn hope, then that realisation may cause us to put our hope in the promise of resurrection through Jesus Christ, who promises us that because he lives, we will live as well, not in these mortal bodies which are subject to corruption and decay, but in resurrection bodies, characterised by glory, power, and imperishability. Because of Jesus, death does not nullify our identity.

So, the gallows humour of Eglon’s violent death provides us with an unflinching picture of just how degrading death can be, but in doing so it also provides us with a valuable insight into the human plight. It reminds us that death is horrible, but it does so in the context of the whole biblical narrative which assures us that death does not define us. Like it or not, I am my body (whatever my size), but the good news of Jesus says I am also more than my body: it is in Christ that we find our true dignity, our real value, even in the face of our own mortality and death.
Tim Carter