( CNN ) -- When talking about so-called family values , pastors , popes , and politicians routinely quote the Bible as if it were an unassailable divine authority -- after all , they assume , God wrote the Bible , and therefore it is absolutely and literally true . But that is a misconception . As the Bible itself makes clear , its authors were human beings , many of whom are named : David , Isaiah , Luke , and Paul . These human writers wrote over the course of more than a thousand years , and their writings reflect their own views and the values they shared with their contemporaries . So it 's not surprising that inconsistencies are frequent in the Bible , both trivial and profound . Although Jews and Christians , individually and collectively , have for the last 2,000 years accepted the Bible as authoritative in principle , in practice many of its values have been rejected . On issues such as slavery , no one today would maintain that slavery is acceptable , even though , according to the Bible , it was a divinely sanctioned institution . In the debates about slavery in the 19th century those opposed to its abolition cited the Bible in support of their position , but despite such biblical warrant , their views were renounced . According to biblical law , a father could sell his daughter as a slave , and the last of the Ten Commandments lists as off-limits a neighbor 's possessions -- his house , wife , slaves , and livestock . But the majority of modern Jews and Christians no longer accept the biblical view of women as men 's property and hence subordinate to them , as they have also abandoned the biblical practice of polygamy . In current debates about family values , most of which have to do with sex , opponents of abortion and advocates of a woman 's right to choose both cite the Bible in support of their conflicting views , even though the Bible in fact says nothing specifically about the issue . And with regard to same-sex marriage , although the few biblical writers who mention same-sex relationships , especially between men , were unequivocally opposed to them , many contemporary believers would argue that , as with slavery and the status of women , it is time to recognize that the values of the biblical writers are no longer necessarily our own . Opponents of same-sex marriage cite Leviticus , which says that when a man sleeps with a man as with a woman it is an abomination . They 're right : It does say that . But it later calls for the death penalty for such activity , which only the most rabid opponents would insist on . The Bible also calls eating pork and a woman wearing a man 's clothes abominations , yet many would no longer enforce such prohibitions . Individual biblical texts should not be appealed to selectively : Such cherry-picking is all too easy because of the nature of the Bible as a multi-authored book . Rather , as with another formative text , the Constitution , one needs first to understand it historically -- what did its words mean when they were written -- and then attempt to determine what its underlying values are , not just what it says in a specific passage . Only in this sense can the Bible be considered to have timeless relevance that transcends the historical particularities of its authors . What are those underlying values ? I would argue that they are rooted in love of neighbor , which Jewish and Christian commentators over the ages have identified as the essential and enduring message of the Bible . Here are three of them . The great Rabbi Hillel , who when asked what the basic principle of the Torah was , replied : `` What is hateful to you do not do to your neighbor : That is the whole Torah ; the rest is commentary . '' His words are echoed both by his near-contemporary , another rabbi , Jesus of Nazareth , who put it this way : `` Whatever you wish people to do to you , so you should do to them : for this is the Law and the Prophets , '' and by an early leader in the movement that Jesus started , the rabbinically trained Paul , who pronounced that `` Love is the fulfilling of the law . '' So , I suggest , the essence of the Bible -- its ultimate authority -- is not in its individual pronouncements , but in its underlying message : equal , even loving , treatment of all persons , regardless of their age , gender , socio-economic status , ethnicity , or sexual orientation . The opinions in this commentary are solely those of Michael Coogan .
Michael Coogan : Bible seen as unassailable divine authority , but it was written by men , not God . Written over course of 1,000 years , each writer reflecting values of his day , he writes . Much in Bible rejected : Slavery , women as property , pork as abomination , Coogan says . Comment: Bible 's true timeless message is equal , even loving , treatment of all people .