The Begotten 3: Illuminate the Negative

(Yes, I know the song doesn't go that way.)

So what about Lisa T. Bergren's The Begotten almost made me hack up a hairball? Two main things: research and a kind of revisionism. They're closely related.

Research
Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a language geek. The Begotten has a large amount of Latin. Hands up, anyone who sees what's coming! I've got a long list of bugs in the text, but most of them would take way too long to explain. So let's hit a few examples.

In the prolog, an iconoclast Byzantine bishop (say that three times fast) encounters a Latin text and totally blows the translation for no discernible reason: "Abyssus ad abyssum invocat" (Bergren omits "ad" so I put it back at no extra charge). It's from Psalm 42:1, but he reads it as "Hell calls to Hell." Get real. "Abyssus" is a Greek loanword; however little Latin he may know (and he gets "invocat" right), if he read the Septuagint at all he'd recognize the reference: "Deep calls to deep."

We run into more Latin when the word for "wisdom" is given as "sapientiam" (p 174--why the accusative ending here?) and "healing" is rendered "sanem" (p 206). But "sanem" isn't even a noun: it's a verb meaning "(that) I might heal."

The Lady Daria has a habit of translating the Vulgate for us as text from the NIV. The two translations use different source texts and translation philosophies, so while they generally agree, there are amusing spots where they don't.

Non-linguistically, at various points there is concern expressed that the Gifted will be grabbed by the Inquisition for committing miracles without a license. However, this was more than a century before the Spanish Inquisition, so Cardinal Fang and the Comfy Chair hadn't been invented yet. All they had to play with at that point was the papal inquisition, which wasn't even in full swing, the Cathars and Waldensians having been reduced to occasionally recurring roles.

As a related point, Gianni supposedly has hauled away a lot of jaywalkers and other heretics in his career to date. But this was a lull period, heretic-wise: a century earlier or a century and a half later, sure, but not in the first half of the fourteenth century, so far as I can tell.

For that matter, the Catholic Church didn't mind people going around healing and such anyway; they just checked to make sure it wasn't a fraud and didn't lead people astray. Many saints did miracles. As to the teaching of heresy--well, the Lady Daria eventually shows that they may have had a point. We'll get to that in a bit. (If you're one of those rare individuals who would rather know the truth about the Inquisition than unquestioningly accept the usual myths--the Wikipedia site is helpful, but you might also check here.)

Another oddity is handfasting. It turns up at various points as an entrenched tradition in fourteenth-century Siena, but I find no reason to believe it was known then and there. It apparently originated in Ireland, migrated to Scotland, and from there eventually became known elsewhere. The sources I've checked say that it was either a quickie marriage for those who didn't want to wait for all the formalities or else simply a betrothal. It was not a trial marriage, which is implied in the book. I thought there was a clue in the Italian Wikipedia, which has an article on the topic, but the very fact that the title of the page is the English word argues that it wasn't a common practice in Italy--otherwise they would have a native word for it. The article doesn't say otherwise. Today, handfasting is mostly associated with Neo-pagans and Wiccans.

Revisionism
Remember what I said about the Church taking a dim view of unlicensed preachers? On pp 290-294, the Lady Daria gives a sermon on the topic "All You Need is Love." It certainly out-kumbayas Jesus' usual message about repentance as the warm fuzzies lead to belief and salvation. No repentance, though. Maybe they didn't need it. In any case, it sounds a lot like the fuzzy sermons you can hear in a lot of modern churches. Where are Cardinal Fang and the Comfy Chair when you need them?

Then there's the Raptured Pope Syndrome, named in honor(?) of Tim LaHaye. As Is Well Known, the more godly a Catholic becomes, the more Protestant he becomes. A sufficiently godly Catholic will turn into a Baptist or perhaps even Tim LaHaye. This shows up late in the story. It starts with Father Piero informing the Lady Daria that she doesn't need to confess to him; she can take it directly to God (pp 236-237). I'm not even Catholic, and I could present an extremely strong argument for the Catholic doctrine of confession. Why can't he? Answer: because his scriptwriter is a Protestant who doesn't seem to understand Catholicism. (Fiddly point: at the close of this section, we get an actual quote from the mysterious epistle. It refers to Jesus as the Word--more Johannine than Pauline.)

A more troubling case arises on pp 248-249: Believing that spiritual conflict is imminent, Father Piero decides to baptize a couple recruits without the usual waiting period and other niceties. Does the urgency of the situation justify the move? Consider a very similar case in 1 Sam 13:8-14. As Samuel noted in another, slightly less similar case, "Obedience is better than sacrifice" (1 Sam 15:22--and v. 23 too, as long as you're in the neighborhood). Why doesn't Piero simply commend them to the care of the God in whom they believe? This is almost salvation by works.

(For the curious: it's true that baptism in the NT was usually without ceremony, but it was also often done by people passing through the area quickly. I don't consider the preparation period necessary, but I do consider it wise. Meanwhile, flouting standard operating procedure out of panic sets a bad precedent. Piero does seem to have a rebellious streak.)

Conclusion
So what about the story as a whole? I doubt most people will read it at the same level I did, but they will still pick up good and bad ideas. The problems are annoying, but they aren't fatal. I just wish Bergren would take the time to understand the Catholic and medieval viewpoints. They weren't idiots back then, and (Thank God!) they weren't precursive clones of us. C. S. Lewis said that every age has its own errors and that it is blind to its own and misunderstands those of other ages. The Begotten proves him right, but perhaps the sequel will do better.

So as a yarn with some good points, I'll recommend it with reservations and hope for an improvement in the sequel.

Other blogs on the tour:
Brandon Barr
Jim Black
Justin Boyer
Jackie Castle
Karri Compton
CSFF Blog Tour
Gene Curtis
D. G. D. Davidson
Jeff Draper
April Erwin
Karina Fabian
Beth Goddard
Marcus Goodyear
Todd Michael Greene
Michael Heald
Christopher Hopper
Joleen Howell
Jason Joyner
Kait
Carol Keen
Mike Lynch
Terri Main
Margaret
Melissa Meeks
Pamela Morrisson
John W. Otte
Rachelle
Ashley Rutherford
Chawna Schroeder
James Somers
Rachelle Sperling
Stuart Stockton
Steve Trower
Speculative Faith
Robert Treskillard
Laura Williams
Timothy Wise

The Shadow and Night 4: The Postmill Setting

I've had a few postmill characters, and in one of my stories--the only "End-Times" novel I've written--there's even a postmill movement called Millennium Now. Unfortunately, MN was split: the ordinary people who went around evangelizing in its name had a very silly, simplistic view of its teachings, while the actual teaching tended to be known only to the more scholarly. I liked the real version, though only the silly version actually cropped up much in the story. (The token brain stated clearly that the zealots were ill-informed and easy to beat in an argument, while the real MN people were far better informed and much more formidable in debate.)
Similarly, a proposed alternative history series features a postmill inventor in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

But in general we don't have characters who are that far removed from our own theology. In my upcoming series "The League of Superheroes," I do have a couple Catholic characters and an Episcopalian who are all amill, but eschatology doesn't really come into the stories much. The theological differences are somewhat important--the Catholics see things in a way that most Protestants wouldn't, for example, and a Baptist character is likewise fairly typical for that group except that he gets on well with the Catholics and doesn't serously try to convert them.

But having characters from other denominations and doctrinal positions is one thing; do we actually represent another view as fact, at least within a story world? I did so in my short story "One Taken, the Other Left" in the anthology Light at the Edge of Darkness, where I posit an odd twist to the usual pre-trib Rapture scenario. (One reviewer accused me of putting "bad theology" in the Lord's mouth, but he couldn't be bothered to explain what was bad about it. From my knowledge of the reviewer in question, I would put my knowledge of theology and the Bible up against his any time. And for the record, the points attributed to the Lord in the story are actually quite standard theology; I just applied them where most others would for some reason make an exception.)

But the question remains: do our settings have to reflect our doctrinal positions? I don't see that they must, so long as the views are either standard doctrine (as postmillennialism is in some circles) or minor tweaks on them. This is speculative fiction, after all, and weirder matters arise. (It's worth noting that Chris Walley's The Shadow and Night doesn't have any alien races, which at least eliminates that problem.)

Baptist, Pentecostal, Charismatic

The Wikipedia article on Biblical Speculative Fiction mentions two stages in its history (at least in the evangelical Protestant sphere): the early phase in which a salvation message is spotlighted, though it is technically not necessary to the plot proper, and a later, more miraculous, phase in which divine intervention is fundamental to the plot. (The example given for the latter is Frank Peretti's work.)

I would suggest a three-part scheme--Baptist, Pentecostal, Charismatic--not relating to the theological distinctives of those groups but to their style. Thus,

Baptist--emphasis on a formalistic, scripture-intensive presentation. God answers prayer, but he acts in ways that appear mostly coincidental. No miracles, thank you! The spiritual dimension mostly explains character motivation, so the story could technically be re-written as a moral, secular piece.

Pentecostal--more emphasis on the individual's experience of God, though doctrinal issues are still important. God answers prayer, even if it involves direct, miraculous intervention. Demonic forces are also more vividly portrayed. The spiritual dimension is crucial to the story.

Charismatic--less emphasis on the specific teaching of a specific denomination, more openness to other views, especially Catholic. Unity of the Body of Christ is often a theme. Again, the spiritual aspect is fundamental to the story.

As an example of this most recent phase, in the anthology Light at the Edge of Darkness, not only is one of the writers (Steve Doyle) Catholic, other writers, such as Adam and Andrea Graham and Stephen Rice (yeah, that's me), offer positive portrayals of Catholics that probably wouldn't have occurred in earlier Protestant fiction.

Another example is the increased cooperation across denominational lines in promotional efforts. Thus, Karina L. Fabian, one of the editors of the Catholic sci-fi anthology Infinite Space, Infinite God, has helped promote various Christian authors, especially through her chatroom interviews on FabChat. A quick Google of her anthology will show how many other groups have returned the favor. Would that have happened even ten years ago? I think not.

The question is, will this truly prove to be a new phase, or will we return to the more insular writing of the past? That question remains unanswered, but in Biblical Speculative Fiction, there is always hope--Light at the Edge of Darkness.