Ben Witherington on the Bible and Culture

George Clooney loves political satire, and here we have yet another film of that ilk. The movie is less than two hours long, but it seems slower as there are stretches in the film that drag.  The cast on the other hand is not a drag-- Clooney, Bridges, Spacey, and McGregor and all four men play their parts well. Clooney may well get an Oscar nomination for this role. The story is somewhat loosely based on real events, specifically in the 80s, where the Army at good ole Fort Bragg in my home state, decided to try and create psychic warriors, or as they are called in the movie Jedi warriors. You must remember how very popular the Lucas films were in that time period.   The basic premise is that soldiers could be trained to fight with their minds, perhaps with the aid of psycho-tropic drugs. If you can drop a goat at 20 paces just by concentrating your psychic energies on it and staring, then clearly, many things might be possible.

There are humorous moments in this film, and the sheer stupidity of some of the things attempted by the Army in the service of trying to get a military advantage over the Russians, or whoever, else may seem fantastic, until you sadly learn that some of it was true.  This does not inspire confidence in some of the brains behind the military machine during that period of time. There is of course a fine line between satire done with respect and ridicule, and sometimes one gets the feeling in this film that the line has been crossed. 

The story is told from the perspective of a reporter, played by McGregor  from Ann Arbor Michigan who eventually tells the story of the psychic warriors, only to be basically ignored.  This is equally disturbing. The reporter goes to Iraq only to run into one of the old psychic warriors who knew one of the men the reporter had interviewed in Ann Arbor who had been in the same unit.  Perhaps even more perturbing is the little that is revealed about the so-called independent contractors in Iraq supposedly serving our cause for profit (think Haliburton) while vying with one another for turf.

This movie will not likely be nominated for best picture of the year, quite rightly, and it earns its R rating for language and a hot tub scene. Its most funny moments are basically viewable in the trailers, so you need not go if your main purpose in going is to have a laugh. But if you are like the child who pulls up the front door mat because you like to see the creepy little disturbing things crawling around outside your normal view, then this is a movie for you. Be prepared to laugh occasionally, and be disturbed more frequently when it dawns on you--- some of this true, not merely modern polemics by an old school liberal like Kentucky's own George Clooney.  

    

This post is not about me, as much as this book has been influencing my thinking.  It is about Greg Mortensen's remarkable story of founding schools for girls and boys in the heart of Taliban country in Pakistan and Afghanistan, in part as an answer to the oppression of women by the Taliban.  There are now some 80 schools Greg and his Central Asian Institute have started in that rugged mountainous region since the mid-90s.  It is an amazing testimony about the power of hard work and culture-making and how it can change lives, and even cultural prejudices and assumptions. I will make a bold statement-- it appears to me that Greg Mortensen has done more to undermine the fundamental appeal of the Taliban in that region than all the war efforts we have undertaken in that war-torn region over the last twenty years, and with far less expenditure of money and lives.  

The Bible says "We were all created in Christ Jesus for good-works."    Greg Mortensen, the son of two Lutheran missionaries (though himself not a practicing Christian) has shown what a difference good works, culture making works, can make. More Christians need to get involved in these sort of good will educational efforts.  As an educator I feel strongly about this. Here is a picture of Greg with some of the children of Pakistan and Afghanistan who have benefited from his hard work building schools in this region.



'Three Cups of Tea'  is a remarkable story of one man's journey to find his life calling,and to make a difference for good in this world. You read his story and you realize that all our cynicism about 'good works'  and whether one person can make a difference, and whether Americans could ever befriend Muslims in Afghanistan and Pakistan is probably not at all a godly or Christian response to the problems in that troubled part of the world.  

There are in addition remarkable lessons about indigenization to be learned from reading Greg's book.  Greg, without giving up his mission to overcome ignorance and intolerance in that region, especially when it comes to the education of girls, learned how to adopt and adapt to their culture and show it respect and understanding, even when he did not necessarily agree with what they did and believed.   But along the way, he learned that he had much to learn from them about: 1) what is really important in life; 2) patience and how important things like culture-making take time and a lot of goodwill and a lot of hard work; and 3) about raising money for worthy causes. Though 'Three Cups of Tea' is an award winning book, it is surprising to me that Greg Mortensen has not won the Nobel Peace Prize in the last decade. He certainly should have done so before our President, but that is a story for another day.

To me one of the most wonderful aspects of this book is a whole string of 'remarkable coincidences'  that happened in Greg's life to bring about the building of these schools. Of course 'remarkable coincidences' is only what a secular person would call them. Mr. Wesley would call them 'singular providences of God' and I am quite convinced that is what they were. Let's take an example.

Julia Bergman is the cousin of Jennifer Wilson who in turn was the wife of Jean Hoerni (a eclectic scientist who invented various things and made his fortune in the computer chip etc. revolution).  Now Jean Hoerni through a series of 'singular providences' became the patron of  Greg Mortensen and helped him not only build his first school in Korphe but establish the Centra Asian Institute with a million dollar endowment. 

Anyway, in October 1996 Ms. Bergman who like many others had been on many mountain climbing expeditions in the wake of Sir Edmund Hillary's conquest of Mt. Everest, was flying with friends over K-2 in a huge chartered Russian MI-17 helicopter out of the Pakistani town of Skardu hoping to get a good glimpse of K-2.  On the way back from the mountain viewing, the pilot asked if they would like to stop and see a typical remote mountain village. They all said yes, and the helicopter came down in Korphe, right where Greg built his very first school.  The local boys quickly figured out Ms. Bergman was American and proudly carted her off to see the new school they and the girls in town had, built by an American.  Ms. Bergman looked at the sign on the front of the school which said that the school had been built with money donated by her own cousin's husband! 

Now if you read this book you will realize how unlikely this 'coincidence' really is, because Korphe is about the most remote inaccessible mountain village you could imagine. Greg only ended up there in the first place by 'accident' when he got lost coming down off a failed mountain climbing expedition up K-2, and was basically rescued and rehabilitated by the town folk of Korphe.  Bergman says, even though she is a totally non-religious person "I felt I had been brought there for a reason and I couldn't stop crying."   Imagine Greg's surprise when after giving the eulogy at Jean Hoerni's funeral Ms. Bergman, whom he had never met, came up and gave him a bear hug, and told Greg "what can I do to help."  Greg replied..."Well I want to collect books and create a library for the Korphe school".  Bergman's mouth fell open and she said "There's a message here, this is meant to be.... I am a librarian".   She then was added to the board of directors for Greg's Institute.  There are a bunch of such stories in this remarkable book, and what it reminds us of is indeed the sovereignty of God and how he works all things together for good, even using the lives of non-Christians to accomplish his culture-making projects!!

I do not want to spoil the story of Greg Mortensen and his transformation into a cross-cultural school builder and spreader of light and love, and I will not regale you with the stories of when he was captured by the Taliban and imprisoned for a while, and threatened by various Mullah's along the way when they learned he wanted to build schools especially for girls, but suffice it to say that God's hand has been on his life in a mighty way in the last 15 years, and now 80 plus schools have been built and have begun paying dividends in winning good will for Americans in the region, among other by products.  When God paves the way, much can be accomplished even by one single life.  I hope you will put down other reading projects, and take the time to read this book right through. It may well inspire you to hear God's call to do something special, remarkable, serendipitous for others, even showing love for those some would see as our enemies..... and Jesus will be pleased.  As it turns out. swords have just enough metal in them to make a good plowshare that can cut up the ground and help plant needed crops, instead of cutting down people, and destroying their lives.   
 
  

I remember the 60s well.  One of the things that happened in the 60s was that a children's book got banned from a lot of libraries, perhaps especially in the South.  It was Maurice Sendak's  Where the Wild Things Are  which came out when I was barely ten. Of course it later won a national book award, but it was still considered too dark and scary for most young readers, especially if one was prone to read such a book under the covers with aid of flash light, late at night, like I was.a There are only some 300+ words in the whole book, and so it was always considered doubtful that a feature length movie could ever be made out of this book.  How long can you stretch 20 pages and 300+ words?   As it turns out, pretty far. Spike Jonze is a very creative film maker  (see Being John Malcovich), and he is in his element with this film.  Here is the synopsis of it provided by Warner Brothers.

Innovative director Spike Jonze collaborates with celebrated author Maurice Sendak to bring one of the most beloved books of all time to the big screen in "Where the Wild Things Are," a classic... "Innovative director Spike Jonze collaborates with celebrated author Maurice Sendak to bring one of the most beloved books of all time to the big screen in "Where the Wild Things Are," a classic story about childhood and the places we go to figure out the world we live in. The film tells the story of Max, a rambunctious and sensitive boy who feels misunderstood at home and escapes to where the Wild Things are. Max lands on an island where he meets mysterious and strange creatures whose emotions are as wild and unpredictable as their actions. The Wild Things desperately long for a leader to guide them, just as Max longs for a kingdom to rule. When Max is crowned king, he promises to create a place where everyone will be happy. Max soon finds, though, that ruling his kingdom is not so easy and his relationships there prove to be more complicated than he originally thought."

Perhaps it is of some importance to note that Sendak collaborated on this adaptation for film, and was fully satisfied with the outcome. It is certainly one that is bound to win some awards for its creativity. Whether you ought to take small children to this film is another story. The beasties in this film are not 'wee beasties'  they are big beasties and they could be quite scary to small children.  And this film, while under two hours may well be too slow in places and too dark for many kids. The ones in front of me were constantly getting up and running to the concession stand and coming back. Since they didn't come back with any goodies I assumed they were escaping to daylight. At the end of the day I would say this is an excellent film for older children, at least as old as Max in the film, and for adults.  Certainly its message will be well over the heads of small children.  

So let's talk about Max.  Is he Mad Max, or King Max, or I Max?  The film, like the book, sees the world through the eyes of an eight or so year old boy. But Max is not your average  eight year old boy.  Not only does Max have a very vivid imagination, Max has no Father, and his only sibling Claire is doing her best to move on beyond childhood, leaving Max all alone with his fantasies and dreams. It will not be a surprise that a highly emotional boy in a less than perfect home who spends a lot of time being lonely and alone and afraid would have some pretty wild dreams.

Sometimes when life is difficult even adults retreat into their heads and live in a fantasy world. and certainly that is where our Max spends a lot of his time. His mother is trying to hold down a job, and date, and raise two children... and clearly there is not enough time or love for Max.

Children, especially those with vivid imaginations sometimes have a difficult time distinguishing what is real and what is fantasy, and Max is certainly a candidate for such confusion. And Max's imaginary world is emotion charged, unruly, and indeed at times wild and frightening.   Fear and love, and anger and self-loathing and hope and fun are all mixed in together. Sometimes psychologists say that children construct imaginary worlds where things go right and they are in control, especially when there is trauma and trouble in one's real world.  Max, it must be said, is no such child. His imaginary world and friends are about as unruly and scary as his real life companions.

The best part of this movie is Max's voyage of discovery to the island of Wild Things where he first postures and positions himself to be king over creatures much larger than himself,  which takes both some courage and some lies.  As the time away on the island goes on, Max not merely learns some things about himself (for instance that he has a destructive side he needs to control) and learns some coping skills that help in the real world, he begins to learn how to be honest with himself and others about who he is,and who he is not.  

The Bible has something to say about this subject--- "when I was a child I spoke as a child, I thought as a child, I reasoned like a child. But when I grew up, I put childish things behind me." (1 Cor. 13.11).  Max indeed sees life through a mirror darkly, and it is a dark and cracked mirror into which he gazes.  The good news is that he is not only beginning to grow up, and to want to grow up (for in the movie he knows he ought to go home and love and be loved by his mother), he learns you don't have to be a king to rule the monsters in your dreams and tame the fears in your mind.   You just need to become your best self--- to the max.

I highly recommend this film to parents (especially single parent moms or dads) who have children who are moody or struggle to come to grips with the real world, and live a good deal of the time in their imagination. Imagination is a wonderful thing.... except when you mistake it for reality.  But on the other hand it is out of our imaginations that we learn how to better construct or reconstruct and reconfigure our realities. 

Jim Henson's Muppet creators have once more done a spectacular job of creating creatures that look alive and lively and amazingly real, and all without the use of CG.This film and its imaginary island world should win all sorts of awards, and still some forty plus years after the book came out, its  stormy imaginary world can be said to be too disturbingly real for some.