On the Subject of Reading- Biff & Perspective

While I'm on the subject of reading...

I just finished the funniest book- Lamb: the Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, by Christopher Moore.  This book was one of those that made me actually laugh out loud, not figuratively, but a full-on burst of laughter, even when I was reading on the subway or in the doctor's office.

Here's the premise-
     For a significant anniversary (the book was published in 2002, so maybe it was the millennium) Biff is resurrected by anger Raziel to write a gospel.  The gospel focuses most of its efforts on the missing years of Jesus' (or Joshua's, as he is called here) life.

The book is not meant to be a sacrilege or poke fun at religion.  Mr. Moore takes his writing seriously, and has done his research.  He is portraying Jesus/Joshua as a real person, albeit with special powers and knowledge.  He has curiosity, fears, desires, love, questions, and misgivings.

The boys first meet when they are six years old.  Jesus/Joshua is resurrecting a lizard his younger sibling keeps killing (it's not on purpose, but through rough play).  Imagine a six year old boy left to care for his younger brother.  Rather than trying to take the lizard away, and to explain to the younger child that he can't have what he wants, Jesus/Joshua has resigned himself to simply bring the thing back to life.  He is the ever-suffering big brother put in charge of his younger siblings.  In a world where people were adults by age 12 or 13, we see them grow up as adults, but with the quirks and interests of the teens they are.

It helps to have some understanding of religion- Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, and Hindi, but you don't need much.  Added knowledge of the history of Israel at the Temple times can enhance the experience, but, again, it's not necessary.

What the book also does is give an insight into Jesus/Joshua as a real person.  In teaching I have often spoke of the DreamWorks movies Prince of Egypt and Joseph: King of Dreams.  They are wonderful teaching tools because they portray these great figures as real people.  Moshe loves and worships (as a younger sibling to an older) the man who would one day become Pharaoh.  Joseph's brothers are thrilled that Rachel is finally having a child, and are equally excited that they are to have a new brother, until their father tunes them out.  These historic figures are not two dimensional.  They had lives and emotions.  Many do not want to picture Jesus as interested in sex, but he was once a 18 year old boy.  Whether you believe he was celibate all his life or not, he went through adolescence and puberty, and wondered.

From Biff, his childhood friend, you get an insight into what it was to be around Jesus/Joshua.  I loved how the miracles become normal.  Biff has seen it all.  It's just a talent his friend has, and sometimes he appreciates it a little less than most true believers would like to think about.

Sean and I had a discussion last night about Moshe and the first set of tablets.  The pasuk says that Moshe flung (or sent) them from his hands.  The Mishnah uses the passive verb "they became broken." Discussions that follow give Moshe all sorts of outs, from the most far-fetched (aka miraculous),
            that when Moshe looked upon the celebrations surrounding the golden calf, the letters on the  
            tablets flew off to Heaven.  With the divine letters gone, the tablets took on their real weight, and  
            Moshe was unable to hold them.
to the simplest,
             in shock, they slipped from his hands.

I believe the Rabbis had great trouble seeing Moshe as a real person.  He was surrounded by the divine light of God (from which my daughter gets her name).  Isn't someone chosen by God somehow more holy than we?  The same problem happens with David.  Any reader of the Tanakh can tell you that David (and Solomon after him) did a lot of not so okay things, but God loves him.  Many commentators try to make him better than he was.

But they, and Jesus/Joshua too, were human with all our gifts and all our faults.  Just like them, we too have the divine in us, if we would just reach inside.

Read the book.  No matter your religion or lack thereof it will give you two gifts- laughter and perspective.