Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt Book

Why is it that the first-person books set in ancient times invariably have a hyper-simple, naive narrative style? This is supposed to be Jesus telling his own story, not as a child but as a man (there are some nods to "when I was a child, I spoke as a child" in the narrative, just in case you didn't catch on that this is JESUS THE CHRIST narrating, even though I believe it was Paul who was supposed to have written those words), and I'm just not buying that Jesus was Forrest Gump with a better copy editor. Many people say it's written in the voice of a seven-year-old, but the narrator at one point actually writes something like, "But I was a child then and there were many things I didn't understand." Rice depicts him as having received a good education in Greek, educated in the literary tradition of Old Testament, so if you take that along with the stories Jesus tells in the Gospels, there's no reason to think his narrative style would not be more complex, perhaps even lyrical.

But, no, it's the same narrative voice as I've found in C.S. Lewis's Till We Have Faces (one of my favorite books, mind) or Martha Rofeheart's first-person novels about Cleopatra and Sappho or The Red Tent. It's the "I am a person in the ancient world. Even though I am an educated and worldly Queen or a celebrated poet or the Messiah, I am a simple person because you see, I live in the ancient world" voice.

And in this simple voice, Jesus tells you about his childhood, about his need to know who he is and why. This is the most enjoyable part about the book, the struggle of a little boy who knows that there is something different about him. I only regret that Jesus the boy is a bit too serious. We get to see so much of serious Jesus in the Bible, and I wish Rice had chosen to show parts of his personality that might have been neglected. However, she chooses to take up the story just as Jesus decides he won't have fun and play like other children, which makes him nearly the same as the Jesus of the Bible, just smaller and not yet filled in on the details of his birth and parentage. You want to give the kid a ball and tell him to have some fun. Sure, you're the Messiah, but you don't need to worry about that just yet.

The historical details are interesting and seem well-researched. Some of that research really wants you to know it was there because you see, you really ought to be clear on the fact that there were many languages spoken in Jerusalem in the early first century. Even Latin! Did I mention that there were many languages spoken in Jerusalem in the early first century? Even Latin? Oh, and Mary is so innocent, like a child! Very innocent. Because she's a virgin, you know. Innocent, just like a child.

I found Anne Rice's author's note annoying. She writes against New Testament scholars who "hate Jesus Christ" and offer faulty arguments against him and yet doesn't mention who these scholars are and in what way their arguments are "based on assumptions." (If it's the assumption that perhaps Jesus was not the Son of God, I think that's a fine assumption for an academic to make in doing research.) And all the personal stuff about her return to Christianity made the book seem so damned earnest that I just couldn't even enjoy it as a story.