The Illustrated Family Bible

The Illustrated Family Bible is a gorgeous bible. The pictures are amazing and eye catching. It is filled with full-color photos and illustrations. The text is easy-to-read. Most of the stories cover a two-page spread that describes biblical history that are easy to understand for all ages. It has lots of information on the Biblical times, customs, and geography in the Old and New Testaments. The bible stories are told in the NIV version.

This book is a reprint from the 2008 version The Children’s Bible from DK. Dorling Kindersley are wonderful books and we love them and have several in our home. That being said-DK is a secular company that doesn’t embrace a Christian view.


There are some slight changes that deviate from the actual scriptures. I think when you are looking at a bible that is attended for children it is the nature of such a book. I wish it wasn’t the case. I don’t think I have picked up one children’s bible that I don’t cringe at on occasion.

What I like in the book is that some of the reference pages has some accurate facts about the bible and history and how it changed Christianity. A few examples are the following: The first Christians were Jews, who didn’t see themselves as followers of a new religion. The reference page: The Church and Rome states that Constantine worshipped the Sun god before becoming a Christian and decided that the birthday of the sun on Dec. 25^th should be Christ birthday and that Sunday, sacred to the Sun. became the Christian day of rest. The covenants of God are explained in one section. At the end of the book is an index with all the people in the OT and NT covered in this bible.

Some of the things that I don’t care for are the statement about two testaments in a reference page. It makes it sound as the OT is for the Jewish people and the NT is attended for the Christians. The reference page, The Christians states that, “Christianity was given a new start by Paul.” In the story of Garden of Eden it states that,” God worries“. There are a few other places that make it sound like God is not in control and that he worried. Some wording in the book I thought made God seem like He isn’t God. Occasionally certain verses are left out in this version of the Bible contain crucial information, altering the meaning.

Would I recommend this Bible to you? You will have to decide that for yourself. What I like and dislike may not be and issue for you.

We have started using this as our bedtime bible after having read the kids old version several times. I feel that I can work around the flaws in this bible. Overall most of the stories are correct and I expect this when reading just about any kid version bible. The illustrations and photos are exciting to the kids and they ask a lot of question because of the photos that lead to a deeper discussion.

Disclaimer: I provided a copy of this book from New Leaf Publishing Group/Master Books for free in order to write this review. All thoughts and opinions are mine and were not subject to editing from the publisher.