The Twenty-Third Psalm (Alice in Bibleland)

 The Twenty-Third Psalm
An Alice in Bibleland Storybook
Written by Alice Joyce Davidson
Illustrated by Victoria Marshall
Copyright: 1988
Format: Hardback
Status: Not currently in print, but many pre-owned version are available at ebay
Conclusion: keep



Today we have yet another Alice in Bibleland book.  While I do love the Alice in Bibleland series, this one is not my favorite book.  The premise of most books in this series is that Alice reads a magic book and goes back in time to witness (but not participate in) events that happened in the Bible. This book is different, though. In this book, Alice reads Psalm 23, then write short poems to help explain what the verses mean. My husband likes the book, and the poems are quite accurate, but I feel like it takes too many steps away from the Bible to really be considered a Bible story. It's more like a commentary.  I have no problems with the book itself, but I question whether it should be considered a Bible story, or not.

The Good Points:
  • Each poem begins with the Bible passage that it is explaining. It is written in italics to make it distinctive from Alice's poetry. The translation for the Bible passages is King James.
  • Each poem first describes the Bible verse then applies the lesson to our own lives. Thus, each poem is accompanied by two pictures: one depicting the Bible verse and another one to illustrate the modern-day application.
  • This book ends with the entire Psalm 23 written on a single page.
The Discrepancies:
  • Aside from my previous complaint that this book seemed more like a commentary than a Bible story, I cannot find a single problem with it.  All of the poems fit within the spirit of the Psalm.
Okay, so despite my hesitancies,  this is an absolutely solid book. I'm still not sure if I really consider it a Bible story, but it is Biblically true and does have the original verses in it, so I see no reason to remove it from our collection. I recommend the book for ages 4-9.



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