Grappling with a Russian

The Greatest Story Ever Told

1-15-23

Theologian Karl Barth allegedly got challenged by a woman who had attended one of his lectures, "Doctor Barth," she asked, "do you really believe a snake spoke to Eve?"

He replied, "Ma'am, I don't care whether a snake spoke. I care what it said."

I can only suppose he meant that no story should be limited to its literal meaning. The obvious stuff, usually presented in sensory terms -- we see a snake and hear its raspy voice -- is often only context,  the entertaining part of a story meant to hook us or hold our interest while giving us the opportunity to wrestle with the substance, what the story is really about. Good stories are, above all, invitations to explore.

My son Cody, at age thirteen, who hadn't been much of a churchgoer but who was quite a reader, got inspired to read the Bible from the beginning. I expect he skimmed some genealogies and other details, but he persevered. Then one evening, he broke from reading just long enough to announce, "I thought this Bible would be mostly preaching, but it's a great story."

In fact, some of us consider it the greatest story ever told.

You might have come upon the The Greatest Story Ever Told  film from 1965 based upon a 1949 novel based upon a 1947-1953 radio series (thanks, Wikipedia). With all due respect to these works, I will argue that the title is misleading because the subject matter, at least in the film, is all from the gospels, the life of Jesus. And while the life and message of Jesus are the heart of the Bible, they aren't the whole story. To grasp the astonishing significance of his time on earth, we need to recognize just how mean, ungrateful, heroic, passionate, greedy, lustful, generous, perverse, and so on humanity can be.

Meaning we ought to read the whole book, even if it's not one of those "keep you up all night" blockbusters.

Remember a few weeks ago I quoted Feodor Dostoyevski's somewhat bewildering claim:

“If someone proved to me that Christ is outside the truth and that in reality the truth were outside of Christ, then I should prefer to remain with Christ rather than with the truth.”

And I noted my goal of one day coming to understand that attitude.

Well, here's one way I have found to understand it:

It seems clear to me that everything we consider knowledge or belief is actually a story or based upon a story. We simply don't see the whole tapestry in which we are a tiny stitch. All we get are glimpses. From my perspective, science, art, history and all other areas of endeavor or inquiry are collections of glimpses that, at best, get gathered into intriguing stories. So since, if I prefer to deliver my life from chaos to harmony, I ought to consider living in accord with a story that helps me do so; and since I consider the Bible the greatest story ever told, the one that makes me most eager to explore, it's my best bet.

No doubt many people would consider this answer nonsense. But to some of us who, like me and Dostoyevski, are devoted to the mysterious phenomenon we call stories, it makes perfect sense.

In upcoming messages, I'll try for some even better answers.

Happy forever,

Ken