Saturday Sisters: Reading Biblical Fiction

  i've been reading Biblical fiction since i was ten or twelve years old.
  It's a very uplifting experience.
  But there's a problem with it.

 The Problem

   Especially when i was younger, it can be hard to not say, "OH YES! That's exactly how it happened!"
  Which in effect is to make the novel, the product of an author's informed, "sanctified imagination"* on the same level as inspired Scripture.
  Not good.

 One Solution

  Of course, you could avoid that by simply not reading Biblical fiction, or any fiction.  Some people choose that route, and it is a valid one.  
  But total avoidance is not the only way of guarding your heart.  i, and many others, have found that fiction helps flesh out the sketchy narratives in Scripture, so that we can remember these folks were real people just like we are.

 Two from Galilee

  When i was what is now called a tween, my mom and her friends were passing around various novels of Biblical fiction.  They shared some with me, including Two from Galilee.  It may not have been the first such novel i read, but it was the first about Mary - and of course Joseph.

  It focuses on them as teens in love, dealing with a Major Obstacle in their lives in a world where an engagement lasted as long as it took for the man to build his bride a home, and was considered as binding as a marriage without "husbandly prerogatives."

 Viewpoints

  Most novels about Jesus' earthly parents look at them in this way:  documenting the difficulties with their courtship and early marriaage.   The variations come in which set of grandparents is more well-to-do, how many siblings Mary and Joseph have, the relative ages of the couple, and how Jesus' siblings are presented.
  Most of these books show Mary as very young, with Joseph is only a few years older, though occasionally he is much older, a widower.

Variations

  Usually these books have a third person omniscient narrator.   Unafraid and  The Handmaid and the Carpenter are very different books, but both adhere to this convention.

  A notable exception is My Name is Mary: The Story of the Mother of Jesus.  Here, we are meeting with an elderly Mary, telling us her lifestory, from childhood to recent years in Ephesus in with John.  Unlike the other books, this one is in effect a conversation in and of itself, so we do not have conversations with other people.  Also different is this is the only one i have come across in which Mary is the perpetual virgin, understandable when you realize that the author entered the Orthodox traditon as an adult.

Mary's Little Donkey

  Vastly different is the children's novel, Mary's Little Donkey.  Originally published in Swedish in 1962, it would not take the fancy of many children, or adults, today.  This is another third person omniscient story, from the viewpoint of the donkey and other animals.
  i came across it when my own children were tiny.  It's charming.
  Like the Mary in The Handmaid and the Carpenter, this Mary is childlike and what might be called fey, in theotherworldly or visionary sense. 
  This story begins with a misunderstood donkey, owned by Nazareth's richest man, whose groom keeps the proud donkey dirty.  Because the donkey is dirty and lazy, Joseph is allowed to buy him for the little he can afford.  In Mary's hands, the donkey becomes the best little donkey, guiding their way to Bethlehem and Egypt and back with the help of angels.  

i wish innoculations in the doctor's office were this much fun.


 *This is a term used by the late Bible teacher Dr. J. Vernon McGee.  His teachings are well worth becoming acquainted with.