Review: The Bible Episode 1

            I will readily admit that having heard that The History Channel was going to air a miniseries entitled The Bible (italics throughout refer to the TV show, not the Scripture) produced by Mark Burnett (of Survivor fame) my expectations were very low.  But I was wrong, the first episode was far worse than I could have possibly imagined.  It wasn’t just low quality television and inaccurate, it has laid the foundation for a denial of the Gospel and impugned the character of God. 

            The episode began with a montage that covered the first eleven chapters of Genesis.  And that alone is a huge problem.  While I understand that any film adaptation of the entire Bible (and whether that is a good idea to even attempt is highly debatable and an entirely different subject) is going to have to pick and choose what  to include and what to omit, the decision to ignore the fall is catastrophic.

            Genesis 3 is one of the key chapters in all of scripture, and it is foundational for the rest of God’s revelation.  If there is no fall the rest of Scripture just seems pointless.  Although there was of course a brief clip of a very sultry Eve biting into a juicy plum, the narrator simply said that man now knew both good and evil, with no reference to disobedience to God.  In fact there was (to my recollection) no mention at all that the fruit was forbidden, or that eating it was an act of disobedience.  And thus the foundation was laid for a denial of the Gospel.  If there is no sin, then there is no need for a savior and certainly no need for repentance. 

            And the denial of sin continues and worsens in the opening montage when in a leaky ark Noah (presumably) explains to his family (presumably) that the “this (the flood) has happened because of mistakes and wrong decisions.”  Not only is this ignoring sin, it is an outright denial of scripture.  The flood did not come because people made mistakes, it came because man was sinful and had become so evil, that God saw that “every intention of the thoughts of his (man’s) heart was only evil continually.”Judgment comes as a result of sin, not as result of mistakes and poor decisions.  

And that is a central theme in the Bible, a holy and just God cannot overlook sin but must punish it.  If that is missing, there is no basis for a Holy and just God who is rich in mercy and love, sending his Son to die as an atoning sacrifice so that whoever would repent and believe in Christ, and trust solely in His sacrifice for salvation would not perish but have eternal life.  If the concept of God’s just wrath against sin is scrubbed from The Bible then I truly fear that it will serve to inoculate sinners in desperate need of a savior against the actual Gospel.  

If it is possible to get worse after the opening montage it does.  The retelling of the story of Abram/Abraham in addition to being shot through with errors, seems to be a protracted assault on the character of both God and Abraham.  The relationship between them is portrayed essentially in terms of a capricious God who repeatedly puts a begrudgingly obedient and joyless Abraham to the test.  In the scene of Abraham’s sacrifice of Issac Abraham looks up to the sky and angrily shouts “have I not done enough to prove my faith?”  That is awfully far afield from Abraham believed and it was counted to him as righteousness.  

[And I can’t resist mentioning that Sodom was judged kung fu style by a Jet-Li             look-a-like angel. Of course judged for what is left vague.]

After this awful scene the series again goes into montage mode, and skips ahead to the story of the exodus, and Moses also gets a significant character makeover.  The Bible essentially portrays Moses as a Hebrew William Wallace (the Brave Heart version that is), and it starts with a ridiculous back story.  After the conclusion of a montage of the Egyptians killing the Israelite male children and the discovery of the baby Moses in the rushes by Pharaoh’s daughter, we are introduced to a teenage Moses fighting a palace duel with the son of Pharaoh.  He subsequently learns he is an Israelite, sees their condition and kills an Egyptian overseer.  But rather than following the biblical account The Bible has an Israelite slave offering to hide the body and telling Moses to flee, which he does. 

The story then skips ahead to the Burning Bush, and rather than following the biblical account (are you sensing a theme yet?) Moses militantly proclaims that he (not He) will free his (not His) people.  And he carries this prideful freedom fighter attitude into Egypt.  

He gives rousing speeches to convince the Israelites to follow him rather than relying on the authenticating signs that the Lord had given him to convince the people that he was sent by God. Moses sneak attacks Pharaoh by turning the Nile into blood while concealed in the reeds on the opposite bank while Pharaoh (sporting a facial scar from his duel with the teenage Moses) is floating on his back in the river, and the confrontation with the magicians of Egypt before Pharaoh is also completely missing and the subsequent plague montage bafflingly includes maggots. And all the while he is still giving rousing revolutionary speeches and recruiting Joshua, who is “the future” of Israel.  Eventually the final plague comes, in the form of a killing fog (I assume in a nod to the classic film The Ten Commandments).

To its credit The Bible does actually have the Israelites crossing a parted Red Sea, and the Egyptians being crushed under the waves, but to its shame it montages Israel at Sinai, and completely ignores the wilderness wanderings.  Again a key chapter of the Bible dealing with Sin and the need for a savior (Exodus 20) is completely ignored other than the tablets of the Law being shown emerging from a boulder during montage (again ignoring the biblical account, are you sensing the theme yet).  And of course there is no mention of what the tablets actually say.

And at the end of this montage we are given a few closing scenes: one of an armor clad Joshua praying, then of him staring menacingly at Jericho, and then one of Rahab being mistreated by the towns people of Jericho and of the spies getting into a sword fight inside of Jericho (that is the cliff hanger ending). 

My general impression of the first episode was one of a sustained attack on the character of God and on the “heroes” of the bible.  (To be clear the only hero of Scripture and the main actor in every story is God.)  God’s holiness is ignored, as is sin and His wrath against sin.  He is seen as occasionally wrathful, but the cause for his wrath is never discussed.  The flood is the result of mistakes and Sodom is dangerous, not wicked, so God’s wrath could be easily seen as being out of proportion or arbitrary.  The faith of Abraham is consistently portrayed as weak and grudgingly given, and Moses comes off as a prideful action hero rather the meekest man onthe face of the earth.

All of this gives a profound misunderstanding of who God is, and what kind of men he uses.  Faithful, trusting and broken men who realize they are not worthy of being used by God are the ones that He tends to use (as recorded in Scripture) and The Bible seems to be sending the message that He uses men of action who trust in themselves and who have faltering or reluctant faith.

My chief concern is this, if The Bible gets sin wrong, God’s character wrong, the narrative of Scripture wrong, the nature of man wrong and the fundamental character of key biblical figures wrong, what is there left for it to get right?  And it is getting this wrong before unbelievers and interspersed with commercials for the Roman Catholic Church (who claimed to have “compiled” the bible by the way) and Word of Faith churches (at least in the Metro DC market).  If an unbeliever, who was curious about the Bible sees this show, then goes to a church advertised during the show, they may never hear the Gospel, and they may actually be inoculated against it because they may believe they have actually learned what is in the Bible from The Bible.

The good news is this though; there may be increased opportunity to share the Gospel as unbelievers may have questions about the things they have seen on TV.  And you needn’t have seen the show to answer the questions because they need to hear the message of the Bible, not the message of The Bible.