The ultimate story

Dear Tom,

Let’s return to the story of Jesus. Jonathon Pageau made the claim that the christian story is the ultimate story; that it’s technically impossible to tell a better one. Although I’d completely changed my opinion on Christianity, I still scoffed at this claim the first time I heard it. But as he explained his thinking, Pageau persuaded me that it might be true: almost by definition, the christian story is the ultimate story; the tale of Jesus is narratively unsurpassable.

Jesus’ is the ultimate story is because it reaches the boundaries of what’s possible in storytelling. A good story revolves around a protagonist who overcomes obstacles and challenges; one who undergoes a Hero’s Journey. In the story of Jesus, this formula is pushed to its limit: we have the best possible protagonist facing the most difficult of challenges and overcoming the ultimate obstacle. That’s why there can’t be a better story: we know what makes a story worth listening to, and the christian story takes all the variables to their max. The best you can do is re-tell the story (think Harry Potter), but you cannot do better.

In the story, Jesus is God himself incarnate in human form, which makes Jesus the perfect man. In Genesis we learned that man was made in the image of God, but was corrupted by Eve’s eating of the fruit. God in human form is man uncorrupted; in the words of Tim Mackie, he’s an example of what each of could be but constantly fail to be. In our story telling formula Jesus is the ultimate protagonist because he is, by definition, the perfect person.

As the perfect person, Jesus is least deserving of disdain and punishment by the people around him. Despite his innocence, Jesus is arrested, put on trial and sentenced to death. The chasm between who Jesus is and what eventually happens to him creates enormous tension in the story. (With that said, however, GK Chesterton pointed out that being the perfect person also makes him the most deserving of disdain and punishment in the eyes of everyone around him. Compared to Jesus, everyone’s flaws are brought to light; everyone becomes aware of where and how far they fall short, and no one can be comfortable in his presence. Jordan Peterson said, quite entertainingly, “You have to kill somebody like that.”)

To add even more to the story, before he’s arrested, Jesus knows exactly what’s going to happen to him. He’s known it for years. For the most part this unbearable weight doesn’t slow him down a bit. Nonetheless, in the garden of Gethsemane Jesus realises that the moment he’s been waiting for has finally come, and he breaks. Tim Mackie says that Jesus has a panic attack in the garden, and his panic attack is for perfectly understandable reasons! It’s a great example of how the biblical text asks you to meet it halfway. It coldly reports that Jesus sweated blood and was greatly distressed, and you have to do the work of actually imagining his situation to try and get a glimpse of the terror he must have been feeling.

To make matters worse, Jesus never gets a response from God in the garden of Gethsemane. He pleads to be let of the hook and spared this terrible fate, but bravely adds that he’ll do it if he really has to. God sends an angel to comfort him, but Jesus has to make the decision on his own. I can imagine the much more probable story of Jesus rubbing his hands together and beaming as he says, “Great, Dad didn’t say I have to. Crisis avoided! Come boys, let’s grab a beer.” That’s not what happens, of course; against all odds Jesus accepts his fate and moves to meet his betrayer.

In the next scene Jesus is arrested. Of course—this being the ultimate story—he isn’t simply arrested. He’s instead betrayed by someone who should have been one of his twelve closest friends. He’s identified with a kiss by a man who walks towards him with the wide smile of someone 30 pieces of silver richer: “Teacher!” Again, we have to imagine the scene: the most punchable character walking with his arms open towards Jesus to betray him, and Jesus responding to him as a friend. . . Jesus is arrested, and while the other eleven disciples aren’t as bad as Judas, they all flee and Jesus is left quite alone.

We know the pain and humiliation Jesus—the man least deserving of punishment—endures after he’s arrested. Later, Pilot gives the Jews the opportunity to spare him. We all hold our breathes as the Jews have the chance to rescue the very saviour they’ve been expecting: the man born of a virgin prophesied by Isaiah, the saviour of the world promised to Abraham and David, the seed of Eve that will crush the serpent’s head. Instead, they choose to release a criminal.

Finally, Jesus is nailed to the cross—the Roman torture device reserved at the time for those who deserved a humiliating death. It’s one of the worst ways to die, not only for the humiliation of being nailed to a cross but for how inefficient that cross is at killing you: the innocent Jesus hangs there for 6 hours. Finally, Jesus screams his famous line: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” I’ll leave the commentary to GK Chesterton, because he captures the strangeness of this particular line so well:

Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point and does not break. In this indeed I approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly feared to approach. But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows too difficult for human speech,) but let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant to be an atheist.

Jesus dies. So far, his story has ticked a good many boxes in the storytelling formula: we have the ultimate protagonist—God become man—who has suffered the ultimate of challenges—betrayal by his closest friends, wrongful conviction, torture, humiliation, and a slow and painful death. At this point, we probably have the greatest tragedy ever told.

But the christian story isn’t a tragedy: it has a happy ending. If we’re composing the ultimate story, then we should have Jesus take on the ultimate enemy. And what could be better than Jesus taking on Death itself? The eternal enemy of all mankind; the greatest foe imaginable. Jesus dies, descends to hell, and prepares for battle; he takes the fight to Death’s home turf, and wins. In doing so, he not only spares himself—as evidenced by his resurrection—but rescues all of mankind—past, present and future—from their hitherto inevitable demise. It is the ultimate victory for the ultimate prize, won on our behalf—despite our treatment of him—by the ultimate hero.

So yes, I think Jonathon Pageau is right. Regardless of how much of the story is historically true, it seems to be the greatest story.

But I’d be interested to know what you think—perhaps I’m missing something or not thinking about this right. In any case, thank you for entertaining my rambling, Tom. I hope you’re well. Enjoy your day.

James