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Evan asks: When did the practice of burning books start? To a writer, a bookworm, or a believer in the freedom of press and knowledge, there is nothing quite as horrifying as hearing about piles of books getting eaten by flames, never to be read again, particularly in instances in history where some of the books being burned were extremely [...]

When People Started Burning Books January 2, 2014 Emily Upton Evan asks: When did the practice of burning books start? Burning of “Un-German” books. Berlin, Germany May 10, 1933. To a writer, a bookworm, or a believer in the freedom of press and knowledge, there is nothing quite as horrifying as hearing about piles of books getting eaten by flames, never to be read again, particularly in instances in history where some of the books being burned were extremely rare and since lost to us other than passing references in surviving works. Book burning is one of the most extreme forms of censorship, suppressing opposing views to religious and secular authorities by ceremoniously burning written text. Unfortunately, book burning has a long history and the practice is still very much alive today, despite the ironic nature of what it accomplishes now vs. in the past when the books in question were rare. One of the earliest references of an intentional “book” burning comes from a story in the Bible (Jeremiah 36) in which Jehoiakim, King of Judah, burns one of Jeremiah’s scrolls. The event supposedly happened in the 7th century B.C. Jeremiah had dictated words to Baruch, who wrote the words down on the scroll and read them aloud at the Lord’s temple. The speech was an attempt to convince the people to turn from their wicked ways and embrace the Lord. When the king heard of the scroll: It was the ninth month and the king was sitting in the winter apartment, with a fire burning in the firepot in front of him. Whenever Jehudi had read three or four columns of the scroll, the king cut them off with a scribe’s knife and threw them into the firepot, until the entire scroll was burned in the fire. The king and all his attendants who heard all these words showed no fear, nor did they tear their clothes. Even though Elnathan, Delaiah and Gemariah urged the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them. Instead, the king commanded Jerahmeel, a son of the king, Seraiah son of Azriel and Shelemiah son of Abdeel to arrest Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet. In response, the Lord told Jeremiah to dictate the same words again and a new scroll was written. Of course, many would question whether or not this event actually happened, but either way it seems to be the first mention of an intentional “book” burning, even if you factor in the theorized edits that were made to the Book of Jeremiah over the next five centuries or so. However, with those edits (if adding in the part about burning scrolls was one of them), it’s possible that an event in China could usurp the title of “first”, but we can’t be sure. The first recorded book burning there was sponsored by the government and happened around 213 BC. So what was burned? Lots of things, but mainly Confucian books. Nearly every copy of Confucius’ books and related works were burned, save for one copy of each which was kept in the Chinese State Library, so that the knowledge at least wouldn’t be lost. It was simply dangerous knowledge for the public to have. Supposedly, the burning took place in conjunction with persecuting Confucians in an attempt to consolidate the Qin dynasty. The books were probably considered unsuitable for the public because of the political and social change proposed within them. Emperor Shi Huang even went as far as to bury alive many of the scholars who wrote the books so that their knowledge wouldn’t be replicated and those that might try would think twice about it given the fate the perhaps awaited them if they were discovered. This suppression of knowledge ended up being a little too effective. When the capital city was attacked in 207 BC, much of the imperial library was destroyed in a fire, resulting in a huge loss of human knowledge up to that point, including parts of the history of the region of present day China. The Bible itself is a book that was commonly burned throughout history as well. In one such case, William Tyndale printed the very first English translation of the Bible in 1526 and began distributing copies of it throughout England. This enraged the Bishop of London, who began to hunt down the new Bibles and destroy them. Soon, only two remained and Tyndale himself was burned at the stake in 1536. On the surface, the main issue the Catholic church had with the book was that elements of the translation were considered incorrect due to subtle meanings being lost in the conversion to English. Thus, Catholic officials believed that Tyndale’s translation promoted “heretical” and “anti-clerical” ideals. Of course, the much more pertinent issue was that the English edition made the Bible available to commoners who, if literate in English, would not need the church to interpret the scripture for them, as was often the case before. The church had recently had a major problem with this sort of thing when Martin Luther’s 95 thesis was translated from Latin and read to the masses. Rather than serving as fodder for internal discussions ...