Nobody's Perfect

"Nobody's perfect. Well, there was this one guy, but we had him killed..."
~ Anonymous

The other night, I finished reading Lamb by Christopher Moore (no relation to my boss...I think). After triumphing over the 900-page behemoth that is Lincoln by Gore Vidal (don't let anyone ever tell you that Mr. Vidal is a man of few words), I needed something light, funny, with just a smidgen of relevance for me. When I found out that Lamb was being marketed as, "The Gospel according to Biff, Christ's childhood pal," how could I resist?

This book is funny. Written from the point of view of a fictional character named Biff (Who knows? Maybe Jesus did have a pal named Biff. Is Biff traditionally a Jewish name? These are things I need to know), the book tells the story of Christ's forgotten years, from childhood to age 33, when he gets duped by a bunch of uppity Sanhedrin-types (you know the story).

The bulk of the book attempts, in it's own way, to fill in the blanks of Jesus' life prior to his preaching. Apparently, the author suggests that maybe He and Biff travelled east to China, India, and Tibet, in search of the three kings who visited Christ on the night of his birth. Along the way, Jesus and Biff pick up some knowledge on topics like alchemy, kung-fu, and the Divine Spirit. The big J-man then returns home to gather his flock and preach the good word, and all the while Biff is faithfully by his side, all the way to the bitter end (I don't want to give away the ending, but there's something about Jesus getting nailed to a huge wooden plus sign. I guess he wasn't too good at math).

So after I finished the book and laid my head down to rest, I got to thinking: what about this book is so far-fetched? No one really knows what Jesus did for basically his entire life, and what he do know about him was written by four guys long after he did his whole get-crucified-then-resurrect thing. And, after comparing the basic tenants of His teachings to that of Buddhism, Hinduism, etc., it would support the theory that Jesus was at least exposed to Eastern thought. The more I think about it, the more I like the idea that Jesus was a worldly man, that he spent some time tooling around distant lands, picking up morsels of knowledge otherwise unknown to his people in the Middle East. I'm no expert on Jesus (yet, at least). All I'm saying is, it would be pretty cool if we found out that the great Jesus H. Christ (in the book, Biff thinks the H. stands for Harvey. I think it's Herman) was also a full-fledged Buddhist monk, or that he spent years meditating in a Himalayan cave. It would at least serve as a great connector of all the world religions (not that we really need one, I mean, "Love One Another" should be a pretty universal thing, right?)

And that got me thinking some more (don't worry, I did eventually sleep that night). With so many people today getting caught up in meeting every minute "standard" of their religion, we are losing sight of the big picture. Let's not forget that most of what we have come to accept as religion (i.e. the various rules, dogmas, principles) have been created in the minds of men. Now I'm not saying that all religious leaders were sneaky little guys trying to brainwash all of humanity (although that may have been the case for some), I'm just saying "Errare Humanum Est" ("To Err is Human," for those of you who didn't take Latin in high school). Humans, for all their wonderful and amazing powers, make mistakes, and through the sands of time (I love that phrase, "Sands of Time." So important-sounding.), I'm pretty sure at least one or two were made when trying to put the Word of God down on paper. So while all these religious texts and writings we have are useful and should be carefully thought upon, let's not forget that it was Man who wrote them. Man is not God, Man was created by God (or Yahweh, or Allah, or...).

Needless to say, Lamb will get you thinking. Even if you don't believe a word in the book (after all, Christopher Moore would be a member of the "Man" I was referring to in the preceding paragraph), his story is at least fun to think about. Even if Jesus the man means nothing to you, even if you don't believe he walked on water, multiplied the bread, or turned water into chocolate milk (or was it wine?), his message should still have relevance for you. Just the idea that someone could care so much for his fellow man that he would lay down his life should serve as some sort of inspiration for all of us. Not, of course, to go and try to get crucified for your neighbor (do we still crucify people these days?), but maybe we can use his story to make a sacrifice in our own lives that will help the marginalized and neglected members of our society. Because after all, no matter what beliefs you hold, what colors you wear, what team you root for, at our most basic level, shouldn't we just "Love One Another"?



(If you have a conception of Jesus from which you are totally unwilling to budge, then you probably won't like this book. If you are looking for an interesting take on the life of a well-known man, then try it!)