Wholly Buyable
Advertising Creative Director Chas Bayfield takes you on a road trip through the Bible, leaving one significant item of baggage at home- religion. He tells the story from Genesis to Revelation and explains how this more than any other book has impacted western culture. Wholly Buyable is a podcast for people who might never normally pick up a Bible but who feel they should perhaps know a little more about it than they currently do. After all, the Bible is a book for everyone, not just believers. Listeners will be taken through action sequences worthy of a 21st century TV drama. They will be seduced by erotic poetry and bombarded with hallucinatory visions. Fill your boots with betrayal, brutality, beauty and, believe it or not, comedy. This isn’t your average Bible podcast; no one will be told what to believe but everyone who joins in the journey will hopefully feel that they know the world’s best-selling book a little better.
Episodes
178 episodes
172: Damburst (Isaiah 55-59)
Doom is coming.The days of all those who fail to follow God wholeheartedly are numbered.Nor is this any kind of fair-weather following.Performative box ticking gets nowhere with God, it seems.Isaiah wants his people ...
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Season 19
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Episode 172
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23:37
171: The Man Who Saw Through Centuries (Isaiah 51-54)
A childless old woman who is drunk on wine is about as defenceless and vulnerable as life can get in Old Testament times. This woman who represents the city of Jerusalem has been brought down by her own personal four horsemen: ruin,...
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Season 18
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Episode 171
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22:13
170: Drunk on Blood (Isaiah 48-50)
Hard as it may be to believe that freedom and a return to Jerusalem are just around the corner for Israel's exiled Jews, Isaiah does what he can to impress upon his readers that this is exactly what is about to happen.He also appears to ...
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Season 19
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Episode 170
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24:01
169: The Raptor (Isaiah 44-47)
A shamed princess having to hoist her skirts in order to cross streams, and who sits in the dirt like a commoner.This is how the prophet Isaiah sees the proud empire of Babylon.It seems improbable, but Isaiah believes anything is ...
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Season 19
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Episode 169
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22:17
168: Manumission (Isaiah 41-44)
A man who will be "a light to the Gentiles" and who will "open the eyes of the blind and set the prisoners free."It's easy to see how Christians believe Isaiah was predicting the arrival of Jesus.But the prophet promise...
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Season 19
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Episode 168
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22:00
167: Adam's Other Wife (Isaiah 35-41)
In this episode, we identify Lilith, a Jewish myth figure believed to have been married both to Adam and the Angel of Death.Isaiah also appears to predict New Testament holy man, John the Baptist, writes my favourite verse in the entire ...
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Season 19
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Episode 167
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23:01
166: Swimming in the Cesspool (Isaiah 24-28)
As the title suggests, Isaiah doesn't pull any punches.If graphic and repulsive use of bodily fluids as a metaphor get his readers' attention, the prophet is all in.However, anyone looking for action and adventure may be disappoin...
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Season 19
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Episode 166
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20:07
165: Drunken Vomit (Isaiah 19-23)
Isaiah's tirade against Israel's neighbours continues, and with it come vivid descriptions of Near Eastern Mediterranean trade in the eighth century BC.But God's fury doesn't stop with pagan kingdoms and empires; Judah too is in the firi...
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Season 19
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Episode 165
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22:07
164: Night Terror (Isaiah 10-18)
If you picture in your head a robed, beared prophet raging with florid language at at a nation that isn't listening to him, you are probably thinking of Isaiah.In this episode, he launches a broadside against nations who he believes are ...
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Season 19
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Episode 164
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21:53
163: Whiplash (Isaiah 9-11)
"Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."It's no wonder that these words written some 800 years before the birth of Jesus make the prophet Isaiah such a favourite with Christians, especially at Christmas.&n...
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Season 19
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Episode 163
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21:41
162: The Ruined and the Rich (Isaiah 5-8)
It's easy to see the Bible as fable, a kind of religious fairy tale with a moralistic sting in its tail.Passages like this one show that much of the book is rooted in actual historical events.These chapters are a snapshot of the l...
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Season 19
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Episode 162
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20:52
161: Real Housewives of Jerusalem (Isaiah 1-4)
The poetry books are over and now it's time for the prophets to step up.These are the maverick outsiders, the truth tellers who appear able to channel the word of God and to warn their nations of the danger of turning their backs on him....
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Season 19
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Episode 161
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21:41
160: The Lovemakers (Song of Songs 1-8)
How this book made it into the Bible is a mystery.Why it rarely gets a outing in church services us not surprising.;The Song of Songs is steamy stuff, so much so we've had to put an 'explicit content' warning on this episode.<...
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Season 19
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Episode 160
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22:25
159: A Little Bird (Ecclesiastes 9-12)
In a book that rarely veers away from blank negativity and abject realism, the Teacher in Ecclesiastes gives readers yet another reality check:The fast don’t always win the race nor are the strong guaranteed to prevail in battle.
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Season 19
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Episode 159
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20:34
158: The Man with 100 Children (Ecclesiastes 4-8)
Suffering is part of the human condition.But is it part of God's plan for his people?Why, if he is all powerful, doesn't he stop it?Yes listeners, we go there.Written and produced by Chas BayfieldMu...
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Season 19
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Episode 158
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21:17
Special: The Bible of the Handmaid's Tale
Gilead. Marthas. Handmaids. Eyes. They sound biblical but if they are, where and what do these references mean? Are actual slave women co-opted as surrogate baby providers in the Bible? Do they truly lie in their mistresses' laps to conceive an...
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10:56
157: A Time to Die (Ecclesiastes 1-4)
Meaningless! Meaningless! There aren't many books in the Bible or otherwise that begin as bleakly as this one.And, plot spoiler, the vibe doesn't lift much as Ecclesiastes progresses.There is no point to life it seems than for a p...
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Season 19
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Episode 157
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19:51
156: The Leech's Daughter (Proverbs 29-31)
Unexpectedly, given that the only women described in the Book of Proverbs so far have been an adulteress and a quarrelsome wife, the book's finale is a eulogy to a character referred to as "the Wife of Noble Character".This woman is a st...
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Season 18
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Episode 156
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20:20
155: Tough Love (Proverbs 27-29)
Death and Destruction are never satisfied, a fool can be crushed into powder yet still not lose his foolishness, and good friends sharpen each other with honest feedback.The Bible's proverbs are universal and speak to people outside of a...
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Season 18
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Episode 155
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22:53
154: A Little Sleep, a Little Slumber (Proverbs 24-26)
The wisdom of other ancients continues in the second part of the Thirty Sayings of the Wise. A later king of Israel, Hezekiah then adds some more of Solomon's proverbs. Fools, sluggards, neighbours, messengers and wives a...
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Season 18
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Episode 154
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23:05
153: The Guilty and the Greedy. (Proverbs 21-23)
Loose tongues cost lives, a bribe pacifies the angry and those with a fondness of wine will never be rich.Many of Solomon's wise sayings are as true today as when they were written three millennia ago.In this episode, the rhythm c...
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Season 18
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Episode 153
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23:18
152: The Sluggard (Proverbs 18-20)
The wealthy person who loses friends when they lose their money.The gossip who betrays a friend's confidence.And the person who is too lazy to lift their spoon to their mouth.The torrent of timeless, poetic and sometimes co...
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Season 18
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Episode 152
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22:59
151: The Wicked and the Wise (Proverbs 16-18)
Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. Pride comes before a fall.Grey hair is a crown of splendour. Even the fool who keeps silent is seen as wise.The proverbs that popu...
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Season 18
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Episode 151
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22:50
150: Bone-Rotting Envy (Proverbs 14-15)
Sometimes terse, sometimes poetic, sometimes enigmatic, these often two-line sayings balance the good against the bad, the preferable against the undesirable.Some of these proverbs offer wisdom, others state the blindingly obvious. Eithe...
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Season 18
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Episode 150
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20:15
