What Do You Do With a Chocolate Jesus? (9 page)

Another controversy rages over whether or not Jesus had siblings. If he did, they must’ve spent years in therapy after trying to compete with their overachieving brother. Clues in Scripture about this issue are inconclusive. References to James as “the brother of the Lord,” or to Jesus as Mary’s “firstborn son” are hotly debated. For traditional Catholics, the idea of Mary having additional children is blasphemous. As the Holy Virgin, she had to be a virgin for life, virginity again being equated with purity. Some even claim that, after she gave birth, her virginity was restored. There’s a doctor in Beverly Hills who does this, too.

John the Baptist

“Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way;
the voice of one crying in the wilderness:
Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight—” [Mark 1:2–3]

 

Before rolling out a feature event, it helps to generate some advance buzz with previews of coming attractions. For Jesus, this meant John the Baptist. Essentially the warm-up act for God’s headliner, John was the quintessential ranting holy man, and one of the few biblical personalities mentioned by writers outside of the Bible. His job was to “prepare the way” for Jesus, and Matthew describes him as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” That he was. He wore camel skins and ate locusts. He was barking mad. Not the advance man most of us would prefer. But Mark, which first gives us this story, borrows from Old Testament prophecy:

“Behold, I send my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come into his temple;” [Malachi 3:1]

 

A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”
[Isaiah 40:3]

 

If prophecy says The Messiah needs a voice crying in the wilderness, he gets one. Except it doesn’t say that. It says “a voice cries.” And what does it cry? “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord.” It’s
the way of the Lord
that’s in the wilderness, not the crying voice. Crying in the wilderness is stupid because nobody lives in the wilderness. John would be preaching to mountain gazelles. Much better for the voice to cry in the center of town where there’d be crowds to hear it. Unfortunately, “A voice crying in a bus station” lacks a certain zing. So, the wilderness it is.

This is a nice example, by the way, of how the New Testament writers disingenuously employ the Hebrew Bible. They unapologetically lift phrases from it to reinforce their stories, and if they have to change the meaning of the line or plug it into a new context, well…God will understand.

The story paints the character of John the Baptist with Old Testament material. John is described with the same language the
Septuagint
uses to describe the prophet Elijah. They even wear the same leather belt (
zonen dematinen
) around the waist (
peri ten osphyn autou
).

John preaches a Gospel of repentance, baptism, and the coming of The Messiah:

“After me comes he who is mightier than I, the thong of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
[Mark 1:7–8]

 

He claims a mighty one is coming who will separate the wheat from the chaff, and that “the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” [Matt. 3:12] This is the New Testament’s first reference to hell, which isn’t yet an actual place run by Satan. It’s just a vague notion of a dire fate. But stay tuned.

Today, we react to a sidewalk doomsayer like J-the-B by handing him a dollar or prescribing lithium. But in days of yore, a pious wild man screaming the apocalypse pulled in the crowds. John was a master at this.

John pleaded for everyone to confess their sins and come to the Jordan River to be baptized—a purification rite to wash away sin without the need for pricey oils. Christianity was more affordable than Judaism. But baptism didn’t start with John. Sumerians, Greeks, and Persians had been doing it for millennia.

When Jesus shows up to be baptized, John recognizes him, which is quite a feat because they last met while both were in their mothers’ wombs. Since John was born six months before Jesus, he also survived the slaughter of the innocents, though we never learn how. But when he baptizes Jesus, it’s a special moment:

And when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens opened and the Spirit descending upon him like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, “Thou art my beloved Son; with thee I am well pleased.” [Mark 1:10–11]

 

Mark says the Spirit, or Holy Spirit, descended like a dove, while Luke says it descended “
in bodily form
like a dove upon him.” Whether it was a metaphor or an actual bird, both the vision and the voice were only experienced by Jesus.

My question is: Who was this voice from heaven? God? I thought he and Jesus were one and the same. Is Jesus talking to himself? Like a ventriloquist act? No, that wouldn’t work because only Jesus hears the voice. So, I guess, he was listening to a voice in his head that was actually himself talking as if he were his own father. You wonder why people didn’t get him at first.

The Holy Spirit

So, what exactly is this Holy Spirit that descends like a dove? It’s mentioned many times in both the Old and New Testaments, and there have been big fights over what it’s supposed to be. It’s never clearly defined, but it seems to work as a kind of otherworldly tutor:

…do not be anxious how or what you are…to say; for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say. [Luke 12:11–12]

 

It sounds like a state of mind, mysterious and awesome—a feeling of God’s presence. Jesus, the king of forgiveness, takes it very seriously:

“…all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin…” [Mark 3:28]

 

Yeow! That’s heavy duty. For centuries after, Christians would stay up late at night arguing over what exactly Jesus is referring to when he says “Holy Spirit.”

These are the popular choices:

     1. The presence of God

     2. Something that emanates from God

     3. The same thing as God

     4. One third of God

     5. A separate entity that sort of works for God

Since you can’t see it, touch it, or stuff it in a box, it’s hard to define. But, whatever you do, don’t blaspheme against it because it’s the only sin that even Jesus won’t forgive. This Christianity business is starting to look like a bit of a minefield.

John’s baptism of Jesus raises an embarrassing theological question for the early Christians. Baptism is a ritual of purification, the washing away of sin. Well, if Jesus was born without sin, why did he need to be baptized? Even J-the-B says that it’s
he
who should be baptized by Jesus. Perhaps as an acknowledgement of this dilemma, Matthew has Jesus being a good sport and saying they should just roll with it for the moment. But this still doesn’t solve the problem.

The easiest way to untangle this conundrum is to write it out of the story. In Mark’s baptism scene, Jesus seems like a normal person who is suddenly possessed by the Holy Spirit. This is called the Adoptionist Theory—the notion that he was baptized into perfection at this moment. The idea later became a heresy when it was decided that Jesus had always been divine.

By the time the author of John writes his Gospel, about thirty years after Mark, John the Baptist sees the Spirit descending as a dove while
talking
to Jesus about baptism, but he never actually performs one. Theological problem solved. See how easy it is?

Jesus vs. Satan: Round 1

The Holy Spirit leads Jesus to the desert where he fasts for forty days and nights. This being the Middle East, the desert was the usual testing ground for holy men-in-training—Moses, Elijah the prophet, John the Baptist, and others. You may recall that, after they crossed the Red Sea, the Israelites spent forty years being tested in the Sinai, living such tidy lives that they left no evidence of their stay.

While out there, Jesus meets the devil himself, who is given a much bigger role in the New Testament than he played in the Hebrew Bible. Now, you’d think a meeting like this would be a kind of “King Kong vs. Godzilla” clash of titans. But no, that will come at some unspecified future time—the Second Coming. This first confrontation isn’t very thrilling. Mark keeps the story simple: it says Satan tempted Jesus—that’s it. Matthew expands the scene with invented dialogue, but still keeps it brief. There’s no Old Testament prophecy for this event, you see, so Matt, writing for Jews, isn’t going to dwell on it.

Luke, however, embellishes it even more. Satan tempts Jesus by turning a stone into bread, and Jesus responds, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.” Frankly, this isn’t much of a temptation. After weeks in a parched desert, the last thing you’d want is a French roll. Now, if Satan had turned up with a keg of cold beer, history might have been very different.

The devil then offers Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in exchange for worship. If you buy the traditional theology, this makes no sense. The Gospel of John says Jesus was “the Word of God” who existed from the beginning of time. This means Jesus and Satan have known each other for ages, which means Satan knew that Jesus was God. How could he tempt God with a piece of the Lord’s own creation? Did God give the devil the pink slip to earth? And if he did, why would he want it back? He could just whip up another planet.

The scene doesn’t work unless Jesus had no idea he was God. That’s not something you forget. God knows everything, so Jesus had to know who he was, right? Or was Jesus’ lack of knowledge about himself part of his human condition? If so, then how did he know he was The Messiah? Are you getting a headache yet?

Jesus makes it clear that The Messiah will be a spiritual king, not a political one. He essentially tells the devil to go to hell, and Satan departs “until an opportune time.” In other words…he’ll be back. Why Jesus allowed this, I don’t know. He could have saved us all a lot of trouble if he had just killed the bastard then and there.

A Fish Story

You know what they call a leader with no followers? A guy taking a walk. If Jesus was going to spread his message in an age before junk mail, viral videos, or Twitter, he had to put together a team. Otherwise, how would the Gospel writers have learned about his life story three generations later? In fact, we don’t really know how they knew it. They never credit their sources, which would have helped their credibility. We can only assume they heard it through the grapevine, which makes them about as reliable as your average blogger.

Since twelve was the number of Israelite tribes in the Old Testament, that’s how many disciples Jesus decides to enlist. The four Gospels greatly disagree on the order of events surrounding his recruitment drive, but he doesn’t sugarcoat the job of becoming a disciple:

“Beware of men; for they will deliver you up to councils, and flog you in their synagogues…” [Matt. 10:17]

 

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation, and put you to death; and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake.” [Matt. 24:9]

 

Gee…hold me back. This doesn’t sound like a cruise gig. But if the work was hazardous and the pay was lousy, the fringe benefits were awesome. A front row seat to eternal life. With this promise, Jesus turns out to be a master recruiter. His first two conscripts are brothers: Simon Peter and Andrew. Both are fishermen.

And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him. [Mark 1:17–18]

 

What’s striking is how easily Jesus convinces these rough-hewn fishermen to drop their nets and become wandering peaceniks. How many working stiffs could you convert into homeless philosophers with that “fishers of men” pun? In Luke
, Jesus fills their net with fish before they sign on. It’s odd that such an impressive miracle isn’t mentioned in the two earlier Gospels. But, as with any fish story, maybe it gets bigger with each retelling.

Among the twelve disciples are:

     1) Simon Peter: A fisherman also nicknamed “the rock,” which makes him sound like a wrestling star. He’ll become the foundation stone of the Catholic Church. (“Peter” comes from “petros,” the Greek word for rock.) Technically, he was the first pope, and he’s allegedly buried under St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican, where you can see his alleged tomb. Allegedly. I’m not sure why he isn’t called Simon.