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Posted on 10/30/2003 7:46:04 PM PST by mhking
NEW YORK — ABC News correspondent Elizabeth Vargas concedes her network is stepping into a theological minefield with its one-hour exploration of whether Jesus Christ had a wife.
The ABC News special, "Jesus, Mary and DaVinci," is scheduled to air Monday at 8 p.m. ET.
"You can't talk about this subject without intriguing people or offending people," Vargas said Thursday. "We're trying to do it as respectfully as we can."
ABC screened the special for some reporters and religious leaders on Thursday. The program is based on the best-selling novel, "The DaVinci Code," which claims to be partly grounded on historical fact.
The book asserts that Mary Magdalene was Jesus' wife — not a prostitute, as in some teachings — and that she fled Jerusalem with his child following his crucifixion.
The story was kept alive for centuries by a secret society that included the painter Leonardo DaVinci, who supposedly inserted clues about it in his art, the book claimed.
The ABC special outlines the theories and speaks to several theologians who either discount the story or assert that it is possible.
The show unravels like a mystery perpetuated by secondhand gossip. Vargas said ABC found no proof that Jesus had a wife, but couldn't completely discount it, either.
Vargas, who was raised a Roman Catholic, said her own parents said to her, "Oh, my goodness, what are you doing?" when they found out she was working on the story.
She said she was never aware of the power struggles and political intrigue that went into how her faith is taught today.
"For me, it's made religion more real and, ironically, much more interesting — which is what we're hoping to do for our viewers," she said.
It drew some immediate criticism, particularly from a representative of the Catholic League, who said ABC News relied too heavily on the opinion of Father Richard McBrien of Notre Dame, who believes Mary Magdalene's importance has been historically understated and that it's possible she was his wife.
"I think it was not sufficiently balanced," said Joseph DeFeo, policy analyst for the Catholic League. "The majority of the people who spoke believed in either the plausibility or the outright truth of (book author) Dan Brown's claims. The facts themselves scream out that this is a crackpot theory."
The show even drew criticism from Nikki Stephanopoulos, mother of ABC News correspondent George and the communications director for the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. She the special might offend people who believe that women have a more prominent role in the church.
Et In Arcadia
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LOL! And she hyphates her name last name, and goes by the title of Ms.
McBrien again??!!! Why doesn't that man just shut up and go home?
Why doesn't the Pope come here and personally kick "Father" McBrien out of the pulpit? I am not a Catholic myself, but it seems to me that with Christians like this who needs atheists?
OR--how are they going to explain not even saying a word about allowing this nation given to us by the Almighty to be turned over to a judicial oligarchy--because this wasn't Politically Correct
If somebody just came up with this theory now, no. However, there is evidence, that the Merovingian line believed they were the descendents of Mary Magdalene and Christ. As wrong as they most likely were, it is a historical fact, and it is interesting.
I find the history of the Rosenberg's interesting, even though they were on the wrong side of history. I am going to withold judgement on this one, until the report airs.
If it is done respectfully, and balanced in the sense that it shows how much of a minority this position is, while at the same time, dealing with the history of those who believed this to be true, it could be compelling viewing. The Knights Templar were most likely kooks. It doesn't make them uninteresting though. There was alot of strange stuff being believed. I find the history of the late middle ages to be intriguing. You had witches, alchemists, and secret societies. What's boring there? You can study this, without taking it to be Gospel truth.
There's a whole lotta problems caused by the evolutionary theory--and the myth that just because we are the latest issue of homo sapiens makes us the best and brightest is the worst result.
Howard Dean's platform. Pure fiction.
I dunno about that.
One could argue that the virtue of continence was exemplified by Christ's perfection of the virtue.
That's an interesting discussion...
this is true. But the REAL implication behind the show is that the gospels are wrong, because they didn't mention his marriage.
Marriage was normal among rabbis, so there is no reason for gospel writers, especially scientifically oriented people like Luke, to leave such a fact out of the gospels.
But the PC imply that the gospels had a political agenda: i.e. to oppress women.
The gnostic sects had women priests...and gospels. So the argument now is that these early writings are more "true" than the bible.
Jenkins points out the agenda
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0195135091/ref=pd_sim_books_3/102-3465719-0004166?v=glance&s=books
Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost Its Way
From Publishers Weekly
In addition to attempting to find postmodern, multiple, nontraditional interpretations of traditional biblical texts, the renowned Jesus Seminar has published texts from outside the traditional canon, heralding them as new discoveries that suggest reinterpretation of traditional Christian theology and practice.
In this book, Jenkins counters the interpretations of Jesus Seminar scholars, concisely and evenhandedly introducing their theories and presenting historical and textual evidence to contradict them. He questions their "discoveries" of texts that have been known to biblical scholars for at least two hundred years, challenges their dating of texts in order to impart them greater weight and traces many of their purportedly new interpretations to age-old traditions ("heresies" to the early Church) such as Gnosticism.
He ascribes to the seminar scholars "inverted fundamentalism," claiming that these critics, ironically, assign great authority to historically questionable noncanonical texts, such as The Gospel of Thomas, while simultaneously challenging the authority and validity of the long-established canon. He attributes this bias to both a postmodern search for meaning and a lay audience hungry for religious truth, while noting that only new interpretations advance academic careers and attract media attention.
In short, he argues that the Jesus Seminar offers nothing new under the sun. Jenkins closes out this forceful critique by noting "we can only hope" that when new biblical texts surface, they might be "evaluated on their merits, and not solely for their value in cultural battles."
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Aha! I think you've got it! Something along the lines of the Moses Project, a branch of the Jesus Project, has found through the use of 'modern' scholarship, that the 400 years of eledged salvery was actually a clever Zionist plot to loot Egypt! HA! There ya go! Moses turnes out to be the father of the Irish Travelers! O the possibilities. Quick! Somebody hand me pencil, I've gotta right this stuff down!
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