Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Why is it that you can't write a book on Christianity without it becoming either blasphemy or canon?
A few centuries ago a guy named Dante Alighieri wrote a book on what he thought the afterlife would be like, and to this day people speak of the nine circles of hell as though they were real. Lord knows what Dante really thought - was he serious, or just the JRR Tolkein of his time?
In recent times, books like The DaVinci Code and the Left Behind series are being taken far too seriously. The former has all the airy data of a Von Daniken book. It is not a serious idea - it is a James Bond vs. The Vatican story. As for Left Behind, I have met people who are convinced that the book is prophecy - even down to believing that the characters described are living out there, somewhere. It's a good thing nobody has named their child Nicolae Carpathia - his life would be in danger.
Does nobody out there understand that it is possible to write fiction based on the Bible? That having Jesus as your protagonist does not make the story real, or even sensible.
Get real, people. They are interesting stories (mostly), but that is all they are. Their writers are not prophets, the world is not ending, and if Jesus did have a child, neither the Masons nor the Knights Templar ever had anything to do with him.
And Dante managed to make hell seem more interesting than Heaven. Somehow, I don't think that's correct.

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