Chinese authorities erased the words Bible, God and Christ from classic children’s stories including Robinson Crusoe and The Little Match Girl as part of moves to redact Christian references, it was reported in early August.
The stories are among four works by foreign writers to feature in a new Chinese school textbook that offers students an ‘understanding of other cultures’, according to the Ministry of Education.
Daniel Defoe’s description of how Robinson Crusoe recovers three Bibles from the remains of his shipwreck has been altered to read that Crusoe saved ‘a few books’. Hans Christian Anderson said in The Little Match Girl, that ‘when a star falls, a soul goes to be with God’. In the sinicised (made Chinese) version, the text reads: ‘When a star falls, a person leaves this world.’
