The Chosen – maybe you’ve seen it, maybe you haven’t. But, chances are, if you’re a Christian, you’ve probably seen, or at least heard of it. It’s, largely, what you would expect. It’s a dramatic retelling, mostly through fictional events and dialogue, of the Gospels. And when I say “mostly through fictional events and dialogue” I mean “almost entirely”.
The Chosen is, essentially, Historical Fiction. And how we assess Historical Fiction as a genre is pretty complicated. Some find any deviation from “actual history” to be blasphemous and unacceptable. Those are the same kind of people who won’t shut up about how the book was better than the movie. How do you know who these people are, you might ask? You’ll know…oh yes, you’ll know. On the other hand there are people who will accept any piece of Historical Fiction because they don’t care about the History part, just the Fiction. These are the people who thought that Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter was really good, and gave them a new perspective on the Civil War. Now, there is a lot of in-between and most people are probably in-betweeners. Most people would like their Historical Fiction to have broad, predictable, and pretty close adherence to the events as we know them. We would like dialogue to be constructed in a manner that fits the actual characters. Most people understand that for sake of the page or the screen, perfect Historicity is impossible. But what we want is something that is largely true to the facts, but which is as true as possible to the spirit of history.
Now, the thing about The Chosen is that it’s Historical Fiction. It’s Art. And the Church has a long and sometimes tumultuous relationship with Art. The Old Testament forbade graven images made for worship. But there was still a lot of Art, just not images of God, or images made to worship. But the Church has had a much looser relationship. Because Christ came in the flesh and was visible, people since the very beginning, it seems, have been making mosaics and icons and images of Christ, of God, as a man.
But not everyone has been a big fan of this. Many, throughout history, have rejected images of Jesus, and some have rejected any imagery in the church whatsoever. And so we can see that believers are split. Some want icons and stained glass and others feel a little hinky when they see a bouquet of flowers. And then there are the inbetweeners.
So why am I talking about The Chosen? Because it is Historical Fiction, which is very present in our culture. It’s also Art – which is and always has been crucial to the life of God’s people. But these are things that the Church is very divided on, in implementation. And not for nothing.
Art is dangerous. I don’t merely say this because Art is often subversive (though it is); I say this because Art is powerful, and it works while bypassing the conscious mind. Only those who have trained themselves to analyze the aesthetics of a Church can take conscious control of what Art is doing, and even then, it might be beyond their power. Certain chords, especially certain chords in relationship to one another can almost FORCE and emotional response. And this power can be used for good or for ill. It can be used in serve of orthopathy, to ensure that we have the right emotional responses to certain truths. Or it can be used manipulatively to keep meat in the seats and hands in wallets. Architecture is all too often overlooked, but it is powerful. The lines and movement of a building speak just as powerfully as a sermon, but on the unconscious mind. Architecture matters. Aesthetics matter. Beauty matters.
So I repeat. Art is dangerous. And dangerous doesn’t mean bad. Christ is dangerous. But so is a serial killer.
Art is dangerous. The Chosen is dangerous.
That, in itself, is not enough to reject it – in my humble opinion. The question is, is it the good kind of dangerous or the bad kind?
Recently I was debating an issue with another pastor. And he referenced a scene from The Chosen. And when referencing this scene, he wasn’t talking about how the acting put a new spin on an old truth – which is what dramatizations are really good at…or really bad at. But he was referencing something that not only is not described in the Gospels, but that almost certainly never happened, and that almost certainly wouldn’t have happened, when using a broad-based Biblical theological analysis. The exact issue isn’t important. That’s not my point. My point is that The Chosen is powerful, influential, and dangerous – because all Art is.
My point is that my attitude towards The Chosen has cooled over the past months. Comments by Dallas Jenkins (whose clarifications just made things worse!) as well as subtle issues in the show, have given me pause and made me question how willing I am to watch this with my children. Because if you’re watching The Chosen with you’re children, you’d better recognize that Dallas Jenkins’ Jesus is going to likely be just as, if not more, formative of your child’s idea of Jesus as your teaching. Very few parents read their bibles to their children every day. Very few children are in Church every week. Very few children are given a thorough catechesis.
And I fear that substituting The Chosen for a well-formed, Bible-centric, church-soaked theological pedagogy is going to result in some very seriously erroneous images of Jesus. To the degree that Jenkins, et al., have skewed the image of Jesus – which the must – that’s on them. To the degree that they simply present a dramatization and the weak teaching of children, and new believers, and immature believers, that’s on us.
I don’t want to be unfair. Historical Fiction is a very difficult genre. Making a perfect show about Jesus is impossible. That doesn’t mean it can’t be done well, but it does mean it can’t be done perfectly. And the question for us as an audience is not whether it’s done perfectly, or even if there’s a place for dramatic representations, I think there most certainly is. The question is whether this, very powerful, very influential, very dangerous dramatic representation is sufficiently well done to allow the Art to form our theological imaginaries.
As for me…I’m not so sure, anymore.