Museum of the Bible to add Trump’s Bible to inauguration-themed exhibit

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 20, 2025 / 12:35 pm

In tandem with the inauguration of President Donald Trump, the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., is preparing to offer visitors an up-close glimpse of a uniquely personal element used during the presidential swearing-in ceremony.

Museum of the Bible Chief Curatorial Officer Robert Duke told CNA that beginning Tuesday, Trump’s personal Bible, which First Lady Melania Trump held while Trump took the oath of office on Monday, will be added to the set of U.S. presidential inauguration Bibles currently on display at the museum.

Given to him in 1955 to mark his Sunday Church Primary School graduation, Trump’s personal Bible is a 1953 Revised Standard Version published by Thomas Nelson and Sons in New York, according to the Trump-Vance Inaugural Committee.

It is embossed with his name on the bottom corner of the front cover and is signed by church officials on the inside alongside an inscription with the details of when it was presented to him.

Trump was also sworn in with the revered Lincoln Bible, which he also used during his 2017 inauguration. The Lincoln Bible is unique in that Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama, and Trump are the only presidents to have used it for their swearing-in ceremonies.

The revered Lincoln Bible was used by President Abraham Lincoln during his inauguration in 1861. Credit: Michaela McNichol, Library of Congress, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

“The Bible’s played such a pivotal role in the history of presidential inaugurations,” Duke said. “So we thought, for this year, it’d be great on our first floor to have a mini exhibit on the inauguration.”

In addition to the Trump and Lincoln Bibles, other Bibles featured in the exhibit include the one used by the late President Jimmy Carter. His Bible is opened to Micah 6:8: “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good, / And what does the Lord require of you? / To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God,” which he quoted during his 1977 inaugural address.

“We also have on display the Grover Cleveland Bible,” Duke pointed out, noting that Cleveland “was the only other president that had four intervening years between their two presidencies.”

Meanwhile, newly sworn-in Vice President JD Vance used a family Bible that belonged to his maternal great-grandmother, which had been given to him in 2003 on the day he left home for the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in South Carolina, according to the Trump-Vance Inaugural Committee.