The Bible Elfriede Wilde's grandfather gave her was nearly destroyed half a dozen times. That it survived is a story much like those the Bible itself tells -- a story of faith lost and found.

For as long as she can remember, Wilde has been schooled in the history of her family's Bible -- a 1686 German edition translated by Martin Luther, the leader of the Protestant Reformation whose much-admired translation is still heard today.

A native of Germany now living in Texas, Wilde recently donated the 322-year-old tome to Mars Hill College, a small Baptist school 16 miles north of Asheville.

There, she hopes, its turbulent journey will find a restful end, while enlightening future generations. They may never know about its World War II escape, its trans-Atlantic journey, and the personal upheavals of faith of those who owned it. But it will at least avoid the threat of destruction that had seemed a part of its fate.

The good book's tale begins with Wilde's grandfather, Adolf Ludwig, a proud Lutheran who lived in Stuttgart, Germany. Ludwig had a friend, whom Wilde knew as Herr Neff, with whom he studied the Bible. Neff's Bible, almost 2 feet long and weighing 22 pounds, was an heirloom he treasured.

How he got it is unknown. What Wilde does know is that her grandfather and Neff attended a Lutheran church together and, in their spare time, spent hours studying this Bible, its map of Jerusalem and its detailed drawings of the interior of Noah's Ark. The volume, which bears the name of a duke named Friedrich who financed the edition as well as a Nuremberg printer who dedicated it on Aug. 24, 1686, was bound in white leather pigskin, and contained a biography of Luther.

World War II, however, ended the two men's Bible study. The Ludwigs, who lived in an apartment in Stuttgart, fled to the country after Allied air raids reduced most of the city to rubble. Miraculously, the Neffs' home remained standing.

Sometime after the war, Neff died. Following the funeral, Ludwig asked Neff's son what he intended to do with the Luther Bible. Throw it out or burn it, the younger Neff said. He had no need for the old faith.

Aghast, Ludwig asked if he could have it and was directed to the attic. There he dug it out, wrapped it in his coat and took it home. Although the Bible survived the war, its journey was far from over.

As a teenager, Wilde remembers her grandfather, then in his late 60s, telling her the Bible would be hers when he died.

"If you sell the word of the Lord for profit, it will not bring you any luck," Ludwig said.

She promised she never would.

But little known to her grandfather, Wilde, like Neff's son, had given up on her faith, too.

"If you look at my generation, my parents' generation, that's what happened," she said. "That's what Hitler accomplished."

The war, she said, made it impossible for her to believe in God.

In 1957, Wilde, who married an American serviceman, settled outside Fort Hood in Texas.

There she found Americans open to belief in God. And she faced social pressure to join a church. She took her two little boys to a Baptist congregation. For years she sat in the sanctuary struggling with what she called a wall of resistance. Eventually, she began to listen to the sermons.

Then in 1967, her grandfather died in Germany. Though unable to attend the funeral, Wilde never forgot her grandfather's request or his ardent faith. Two months after his funeral, the mail carrier brought a box to her door. Inside was the Bible.

Although Wilde had grown more receptive to faith and was later baptized, her life was in transition. A rough divorce from her husband followed, and Wilde eventually found her way to North Carolina, where she married Harold Wilde.

Living in Hendersonville, 20 miles south of Asheville, Wilde fell in love with the North Carolina mountains and began to take interest in her husband's genealogy. Harold Wilde was a native of Madison County, and his ancestors were involved with Mars Hill College. Wilde made friends with a college history buff and a connection to the college formed.

These days, she often wonders what would have been the Bible's fate had she stayed in Germany.

"None of my friends are Christian," said Wilde. "They go to church on holidays or for weddings. I couldn't tell you one that's sincere about it. It's sad. I would have been the same if I stayed there."

Four years ago, after her husband died, Wilde, 78, moved to Texarkana to be closer to her son. Last year, he reminded her that she won't be around to care for the Bible forever. "I need to know what to do with it when you're gone." He suggested she donate it to Mars Hill College.

The idea instantly appealed to Wilde and her promise to her grandfather that she would not sell it came back to her. Although the Bible is probably worth thousands of dollars -- she found a similar Bible selling for $90,000 on eBay -- she gave it to the college.

It is now undergoing conservation treatment because about 80 of its pages are coming loose. The college plans to display it, sometime in the fall semester.

But Wilde is happy that it has found a permanent home where it will receive the kind of reverence and respect her grandfather lavished on it.