What happened with the gold Bible in The Righteous Gemstones? Details explored

HBO's comedy series The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 1 dropped on March 9, 2025. Directed by Danny McBride, the episode featured Bradley Cooper in the role of Elijah Gemstone, the patriarchal head of the televangelist Gemstones family. Among the other elements, this throwback episode, set in the 19th century, introduced the viewers to the gold-plated Bible.

Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers. Viewer discretion is advised.

The gold-plated Bible belonged to the preacher Abel Grieves (Josh McDermitt) and was stolen by Elijah Gemstone, a former con artist (Gemstone's patriarch) who killed the preacher.

As he was trying to flee, he was mistaken as a chaplain by the soldiers who took him to the Confederate camp. He was then tasked to pray for the dying soldiers. When the other soldiers were attacked by the Union soldier, his life was spared as he possessed Grives' gold Bible which proved him to be a clergyman.

The Gold Bible, thus, played an important role in Elijah's life as he was spared twice from being killed thanks to it. It was passed down among the generations of the Gemstones.

However, in The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 3, titled To Grieve Like the Rest of Men Who Have No Hope, it was shown via Kelvin's nightmare that the ancestral gold-plated Bible was stolen from the Gemstones' family home in 2002 by a masked intruder.

The final season of The Righteous Gemstones is based on the life of the dysfunctional televangelist family that includes the patriarch Eli Gemstone (John Goodman) and his children Judy (Edi Patterson), Jesse (Danny McBride), and Kelvin (Adam DeVine).

Here's what we know about what happened to the gold Bible as shown in The Righteous Gemstones Season 4

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What happened to the gold Bible as shown in The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 3?

The gold-plated Bible, an important and powerful savior-element of Elijah Gemstones' life, was passed down to his succeeding generations. However, as per Kelvin's dream sequence in The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 3, the gold Bible was stolen in 2002.

In his nightmarish dream, Kelvin, the youngest Gemstone sibling, saw a mysterious masked person with gloves forcefully enter the Gemstones' family house on a stormy night. The intruder with a baseball bat smashed the picture frames and other objects and took the gold-plated Bible from its casing.

The intruder then stole the gold Bible, and a terrified child witnessed the entire theft. When the intruder went closer to him, the child screamed. The terrified child is none other than the youngest Gemstone sibling, Kelvin. After such a terrifying dream Kelvin woke from his nightmare, sweating profusely when Keefe calmed him down and offered him solace.

Kelvin could not identify the masked man and in the later part of the episode this issue was not brought up. However, it can be decoded easily that the masked person might be one of the new characters introduced in the series. Could it be someone from the Grieves family? Or someone who knows about the pivotal role of the gold Bible in the lives of the Gemstones'?

The upcoming episode might shed more light on the identity of the enigmatic person who stole the gold Bible from the Gemstones, and the reason behind it.

To know more about the mysterious person behind the disappearance of the gold Bible, watch The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 4 on March 30, 2025, at 10 pm ET on HBO.

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Also Read: The Righteous Gemstones: Are the Gemstones based on a real family?