“What do these stones mean?”
The large stones were arranged just so, a few short yards from the Jordan River. In the shadow of this rocky monument the people were to remember that “the LORD is mighty” (Joshua 4:24). This, of course, makes me want to ask, what things in my life do I arrange so that I will remember God’s good hand? My wedding band? Reflective glances from the doorway at my sleeping children? A note from a friend? Well, such things make a difference, and can be used of God to quietly convict us of His eternal presence and steadfast promises. What stones do you have for your spiritual journey?
Verhoeven is Toast
“Here we go again with idle speculation grounded in absolutely nothing,” states Catholic League president Bill Donohue regarding the ludicrous claim of screen director Paul Verhoeven that Jesus is the the product of a Roman soldier’s sexual assualt of Jesus’ mother Mary. And Mr. Donohoe is absolutely right. [see the Fox News article regarding Paul Verhoeven’s new book entitled, Jesus of Nazareth: A Realistic Portrait]
It what may be the latest popular attempt to undermine the veracity of Jesus and his life, Dutch movie director Paul Verhoeven is putting forward the notion that it was not a miraculous conception by which Jesus was conceived, but rape. He suggests that during some kind of Jewish uprising the young teenager Mary was attacked and raped by a Roman soldier. The idea is that this was a somewhat random and brutal attack; nothing more, other than that Jesus was conceived.
As suggested above, such drivel is not new. Ever since the bestselling novel The DaVinci Code came out a few short years ago, it has become somewhat of a fad to attempt on a popular, Hollywoodesque level to do what the so-called religious scholars have been trying but failing to do for decades, and that is create serious doubt about orthodox claims regarding Jesus. Being an athiest with an agenda against traditional views of Christ is profoundly “in;” to not have a tolerance for such assertions as Verhoeven’s is considered narrow.
And yet the narrowness really lies with those who seek to debunk historical understandings of Jesus. Consider, for example, Christopher Hitchens book, God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Regarding the context of Jesus’ birth, he writes:
Their multiple authors [referring to the four gospels of the New Testament]–none of whom published anything until many decades after the Crucifixion–cannot agree on anything of importance. Matthew and Luke cannot concur on the Virgin Birth or the genealogy of Jesus. They flatly contradict each other on the “Flight into Egypt,” Matthew saying that Joseph was “warned in a dream” to make an immediate escape and Luke saying that all three stayed in Bethlehem until Mary’s purification according to the laws of Moses,” which would make it forty days, and then went back to Nazareth via Jerusalem. (p. 111)
Herein is a large problem for the supposed experts on the person of Christ and Christianity in general. Their claim that the faithful are deluded simpletons who are “ulitmately grounded on wishful thinking” (Hitchens, 4), is better said of their own efforts. After all they are demonstrating a deep intellectual dishonesty manifested by a lack of serious inquiry into the hermeneutics of historical Christianity. The aforementioned quote from Hitchens implies a clear lack of understanding regarding the nature of witnesses and the gathering of the puzzle pieces regarding any story (in this case, the birth narrative). For instance, Hitchens makes no reference to the fact that Mary and Joseph were likely in Bethlehem for two years before their escape to Egypt (see Matthew 2:16), failing, for example, to distinguish between the “house” in which the wise men found Jesus in 2:11 (which would suggest that Mary and Joseph had chosen to reside for a time in Bethlehem) and the implied stable of Luke 2:7. And the genealogical contradictions that he asserts are squared when one recognizes that one genealogical list relates to Joseph’s ancestors and the other to Mary’s. That Matthew and Luke have differing points of view does not suggest a contradiction (particularly if the details are scrutinized) anymore than two witnesses to a car accident have diverging though ultimately complementary views; one witness seeing, perhaps, the initial collision, with the other witness observing the spot where the vehicle or vehicles finally stopped.
Oh well. So much more could be said about this whole effort to create a Jesus of our own liking. I suppose I really need not worry about Verhoeven’s book, however. After all, if they are the intellectual giants that everyone thinks they are, then people like Hitchens will no doubt debunk Verhoeven’s effort. Though reports are that Verhoeven has been working for twenty years on his literary portrait of Christ, it is still something being attempted nearly two thousand years after Jesus’ life. By Hitchens own words this makes Verhoeven’s work meritless. Remember, it is Hitchens who implies that an author lacks credibility if regarding Jesus he has “published anything until many decades after the Crucifixion.” With that standard in place, Verhoeven is toast.