In part one of this reflection, I explained why the Chosen was so revolutionary in the
world of religious movies and gave it a huge stamp of approval.
In this video, however, I’d like to point out a feature of the show that is extremely
frustrating to me, both as a viewer of entertainment and as a priest in the Catholic Church.
[Bumper—Chosen intro]
The Chosen is a show of meticulous detail, which is why the biggest problem I have with
it isn’t a major plot point, but in one of the subtle background decisions they’ve
decided to make.
Here’s an example of what I mean, see if you can catch it.
(clip of John writing with Nicodemus)
(paused) It’s subtle.
Did you see it? (rewind)
Here’s another example (Matthew getting interviews)
What about that time?
Right there.
Throughout the series, the creators of the Chosen are intent on presenting the Gospels
as if they were eye-witness accounts, written down as they were happening.
Both Matthew and John are seen periodically pulling out notebooks, jotting things down,
and interviewing witnesses as if they were newspaper reporters.
There is a sense, even as the mission is beginning and the disciples still have no idea what’s
going to happen, that they are aware of their role as evangelists, that they have been entrusted
with sharing the Good News in written form.
Folks… this is just not right, on a lot of different levels.
It is pretty well agreed upon that the Gospels were not written until long after the events
took place, between 80 and 90 AD for Matthew and between 90 and 100AD for John.
That makes it pretty foolish to think that disciples were writing it as they saw it,
and nearly impossible that the disciples themselves were the ones actually doing the writing.
But let’s say we disagree on the dating and authorship, as some want to argue that
the Gospels are much older.
The idea that the disciples were writing as they were going, that they had the foresight
to think that a written account would be useful later, is really hard to accept.
These are men who are portrayed both in scripture and the series as having no idea what’s
going on.
They don’t understand the mission, they can’t grasp the big picture, and they most
certainly don’t know what their lives are going to look like in ten years.
Some still think that Jesus is going to lead a military expedition to forcefully institute
his new kingdom.
If that’s the case, why would anyone have need for specific details of little miracles?
Most Christians in the early days after the resurrection believed that Jesus was returning
shortly.
There would have been no reason to write anything down or establish structures because the world
was about to end as they knew it.
Rather, the Gospels were written down much later, by people who never witnessed Jesus
themselves.
They realized that the second coming wasn’t as imminent as they first thought, and they
needed a way to preserve the experience and oral tradition of the early witnesses.
The disciples weren’t reporters.
They didn’t think with modern conceptions of history and story-telling like we do, concerned
with capturing the facts exactly as they happened.
The people who wrote the Gospels, whoever they were and whenever they did it, were theologians.
They were writers.
They were people not unlike the creators of the Chosen, writing years after the fact,
with the benefit lived experience and community reflection, as a means of capturing the SIGNIFICANCE
of Jesus and salvation.
John absolutely did not go around after the resurrection interviewing the others and Matthew
would most certainly not have said something like this.
For some, this might seem like small detail.
Why does this matter?
Because it fundamentally affects the way we interpret scripture and approach the authority
of the Church.
If we accept the idea that the disciples were charged with this mission from the beginning
and that they wrote down exactly what happened, scripture comes to be treated as nothing more
than a literal, entirely straightforward account of events.
And so, if what we’re reading is just a retelling of the facts, all we’re concerned
with is memorizing and recreating exactly what we read as it’s written.
But what about the numerous contradictions in the Gospels, the minor discrepancies over
details and the major structural differences between the Synoptics and John?
What about taking the time to ask the question, “Who was this written for?
Why was this story told differently in Luke as opposed to Matthew?
Why are certain stories omitted while others seem completely unbelievable and out of character?”
When we read the Gospels properly, we recognize that we are not reading the literal, eye-witness
accounts of people who were there—we are reading the reflections of faith communities,
years after the fact, trying to convince others of Good News.
We must remind ourselves over and over that these are not works of history as we would
find in textbooks today, but highly symbolic, artfully crafted, works of theology and literature.
Not everything has to make factual sense.
Not every story needs to fit neatly together into one large narrative.
Some things may have happened exactly as they’re written, but some things may be the work of
the evangelist including insights after the fact, making connections that weren’t explicit
at the time, fashioning stories together in a particular way to present the Truth of the
Good News in the way their readers needed to hear it.
What the evangelists created were beautiful tapestries.
We mustn’t get lost in the individual threads.
For a show so free with its details and imaginative with its narratives, comfortable making up
entire scenes and characters, it seems so odd, so contradictory, to also have this insistence
on assuring us modern people that the stories are exactly as they appear.
There seems to be a fear among the creators that people won’t believe the story, that
they’ll begin to question the Gospels themselves, unless it can be proven that everything in
Scripture is a fact-checked eye-witness account of things that actually happened.
I fear that, in order to maintain this idea, the show is going to have to engage in some
major mental gymnastics to make it all work.
This is unnecessary and damaging to faith, not only in its interpretation of individual
passages of scripture, but in the way it exalts Scripture as the primary, foundational source
of the Christian faith.
In choosing to present the inception of Scripture as fundamentally connected to the mission
of Christ—existing from the beginning and taking shape before even the community of
believers is established—what the creators of The Chosen are doing is subtly… or not
so subtly… making an argument for sola scriptura, the Protestant idea that Scripture is the
supreme and only authority for divine revelation, that the community of faith flows from the
authority of Scripture.
With this belief, Scripture becomes the charter, the text that existed before the community,
meant to guide the community.
Christian life becomes governed by its adherence to the text, and thus, is always looking backwards
to its inception.
Authority is fixed and the goal of the community itself is to remain static.
But this forgets how things actually happened.
Look to Matthew 16:18 and John 20:21-23 for what I mean.
In both cases, Jesus gives authority to the disciples to govern.
He says that whatever they bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever they loose
on earth will be loosed in heaven.
Look at the Pentecost event in Luke, the commissioning at the end of Matthew—in all of these cases,
Jesus doesn’t say, “and now, be sure to read your Bibles and do exactly as it’s
written.”
No.
He leaves the faith community in charge.
Anointed with the Holy Spirit and reminded that Jesus will always be with them, the community
is sent off with the authority to make its own decisions.
The faith community existed for generations before any Gospel or letter was written.
It was the community of faith, instituted by Jesus, grounded in prayer and table fellowship,
and anointed with the Holy Spirit that wrote Scripture as a means of preserving what already
existed, that decided what was authentically revealed, that continues to interpret the
proper meaning of Scripture.
Rather than a community looking backwards, statically bound to live as people did in
a particular time and place, what we see here is a far more dynamic sense of authority,
one that moves forward, that engages with the world and adapts to be more effective
in it.
Scripture, being the inspired Word of God, remains a fundamental guide in living as a
Christian, but we remember that it flows from the more PRIMARY authority, which is the living
God existing in and inspiring the worshiping community that Jesus established.
In this sense, the Church is not just a group of individuals each seeking to live the Gospel,
the Church is the manifestation of and inspiration for the written word.
That is a fundamentally different approach to scripture and church.
Now, does this ruin the show?
Is this a fatal flaw that leaves me saying “Don’t watch The Chosen”?
Not at all.
The very genius of the show is that it is NOT a mere recreation of Scripture, that it
is more than just a dramatic retelling.
One of its guiding principles seems to be the power of imagination in Christian life,
and I’m okay with it not being 100% factual all the time.
Just remember that it is a work of fiction.
Just remember that it was created by men and woman with their own particular theology,
their own lens on the Gospel, their own agendas, conscious or unconscious.
There are definitely moments where their Evangelical theology sneaks in, and it can subtly affect
us if we’re not careful.
Taking that into consideration, I absolutely love the series.
It’s not just another passable production to be used in religious education classes;
it’s a legitimately good show that I look forward to watching.
There are scenes in this show that have enriched my prayer.
It has its flaws, yes, and I don’t support everything, but if the first two seasons are
any indication of what we can expect the rest of the way, I’m excited.
And hey, maybe when they’re done with this series, we’ll get an equally well-crafted
mini series on the life of St. Francis.
THAT would be pretty cool.