Why I Despise Video Depictions of Scripture

Tamar and Amnon by LeSeur

I am choosing not to watch the History Channel's take on Bible stories, just like I really did not want to watch Mel Gibson's self-flagellatory version of the Passion. I make this decision based on very good life experiences that have led to my jaded expectations of such endeavors.

I can make two predictions:
One: The writers and directors of the episodes for this series will seriously mess up the stories that are in scripture. They may tell the story of Noah - but not his drunkenness  They may tell the story of David - but probably gloss over his wantonness.

Tamar and Judah by Horace Vernet

Two: They will pick and choose stories that people know. Not the stories that might make us uncomfortable. Will they tell the story of Tamar - who seduced her father-in-law as a prostitute (Genesis 28)? Will they tell the story of another Tamar who was raped by her brother Amnon (2 Samuel 13)? How about Jeremiah and his underwear (Jeremiah 13)? Sampson who committed suicide (Judges 16)? How about Jesus and his reaction to the Canaanite woman whose daughter was sick (Matthew 15)?
The problem is that very few people want to know that these stories exist in scripture. They would rather think that everything is just as they learned it in third grade Sunday School from Mrs. Knutson, whose favorite medium was the felt board.

Ruth and Boaz

The reality is that we adults really do need to hear and see these stories. What are we to make of the story of Ruth? Naomi instructed her widowed daughter-in-law to go to Boaz and "lay with him at his foot," that she should show how she was willing to be his concubine, to be taken into his household. What are we to make of Abraham shelling his wife about as his sister?

Close but ...

As a culture we would do well to ruminate on the real stories of the Bible and not the sanitized or overly romanticized versions. (I actually saw a show where the story of David and Bathsheba was a love story!) For in these stories we see ourselves reflected back in all our sinfulness and desires.

There are good stories in the Bible; of people who followed the Lord and were called righteous. The story of Daniel comes to mind. But these are few.

The real, and only, hero of scripture is God.