Elvis Presley's faith highlighted at auction sale of his personal Bible for $120,000

(Elvis Presley: Unknown author, Wikimedia Commons)Elvis Presley

The Bible on Elvis Presley's bedroom nightstand the night he died at Graceland in 1977 has sold at auction for $120,000.

Hobby Listings said that the Bible received 23 bids before the final gavel came down on the Memorial Day weekend in the United States.

The Bible was one of three found on the singer's bedside table the night he died at his home in Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee, at the age of 42, Premier Christian News reported.

After Elvis' death, his cousin, Patsy Presley, kept the rock-and-roll legend's Bible.

Faith was a cornerstone of his life, according to Premier.

Premier reported that the Bible provided comfort and inspiration for him, and was a testament to his deep-rooted Christian beliefs.

He was known to say a prayer before each performance, and his Bible is considered as significant for musical history.

"The Bible is embossed with 'Elvis Aaron Presley' in gold and contains a large amount of bookmarked pages and underlined passages that seemingly spoke to Elvis," Kruse GWS Auctions wrote in the description lot.

"One of these underlined passages, in particular, is from the book of Job, 31:24-26.

It reads, "If I have made gold my hope, or have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence; If I rejoiced because my wealth was great and because mine hand has gotten much; If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness."

In 2016, another Presley Bible — one he used while he was a patient at Baptist Memorial Hospital in April 1977 — sold for $2,560 at Julien's Auctions, Hobby Listings reported. 

(Elvis Presley Bible: Kruse GWS Auctions)Elivs Bible

The Bible has underlined passages and bookmarked pages, including one from the book of Job, 31:24-28:

"If I have put my trust in gold or said to pure gold, 'You are my security,' if I have rejoiced over my great wealth, the fortune my hands had gained, if I have regarded the sun in its radiance or the moon moving in splendor, so that my heart was secretly enticed and my hand offered them a kiss of homage, then these also would be sins to be judged, for I would have been unfaithful to God on high."

The Bible is embossed in gold with the Elvis' name, was discovered by the singer's cousin Patsy Presley and his father Vernon as they sorted through his personal belongings.

A letter written by Patsy accompanies the Bible: "Shortly after Elvis' passing, my uncle Vernon (Elvis' dad) and I went up into Elvis' bedroom at Graceland to organize and pack many of his personal belongings.

"This Holy Bible was one of three that Elvis had on his night table. After packing them, Uncle Vernon had me take them home for safekeeping and eventually gave them to me."

When Elvis was a child, his parents took him to church where he sang Gospel.

ELVIS ALWAY LIKED MUSIC

He said in a 1977 interview, "I've always liked music."

"My mother and dad both loved to sing. And they did tell me that when I was about three or four years old, I got away from them in church and walked in front of the choir and started beating time," CNN reported.

"When I got old enough, I started to sing in church. That is one of the ways I got into singing... It's just part of you. You don't even think about it."

"And when we get through work, what we have to do, we usually end up doing gospel," he added. "Because we wanna do it. We do two shows a lot of times and afterward we will go upstairs and sing gospel songs, until daylight."

The Blackwood Brothers gospel quartet shared the same church with Presley, and the group's soothing harmonies and rousing lyrics transfixed the young boy, CNN reported.

"By age 17 or 18, Elvis was sneaking around some of the blues and country clubs on Beale Street, but his dream was to be in a gospel quartet," said Jason Freeman, 29, a tour guide at the Legendary Sun Studio in Memphis where Presley first recorded."

His stepbrother, Billy Stanley told Faithwire: "He was a Christian, and most people don't know that...When I say 'Christian,' he was a Bible-carrying Christian...wherever he went, he took the Bible with him," according to Premier.

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