I listened to a programme, this morning, on Radio 4, about interpretations of the Bible. One contributor imagined a black Jesus (in contrast to the Jesus of traditional western iconography, who, despite being a Middle Eastern man, is depicted as white… with blue eyes and long, wavy, honey-blond hair). Another contributor had written a book to “give a voice” to the (mostly un-named) women in the Bible. They are few in number and even fewer if you only count women with significant speaking roles. And Giles Fraser, Radio 4’s ‘go-to guy’ for almost any aspect of theology, waffled on about giving more emphasis to the “Jewishness” of Jesus.
They all seemed to be missing the most salient points by a country mile. Jesus is traditionally depicted as a white male because we created God in our image (and not the other way round). Women play subordinate roles in the Bible because all the book’s authors - reckoned to number about forty - were men. And Giles Fraser will say just about anything to claim his appearance fee from the BBC.
The sheer length of the Bible (783,137 words in the King James version) allows anyone, no matter what they believe, to find quotes to support their position. However, the skin-colour of a character from fiction is heroically irrelevant, and no feminist revision can wash the Bible clean of its raging misogyny.
A quiet corner of Cottingham, yesterday...
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