4-23-18<\/p>\n
I was a guest on a couple of podcasts this week, most of the questions having to do with one of my \u201cother lives\u201d \u2013 in the cartoon and comics fields. I drew political cartoons, edited notable strips like “Peanuts,” wrote for Disney and TV animation, and was Editor at Marvel Comics.<\/p>\n
Ancient history, but to many fans today superheros are a little like Holy Writ. The podcast interviewers sometimes asked questions about projects I had nearly forgotten! Previous to my time at Marvel (a different Marvel in those days) I had never been a big fan of superheros themselves. I explained that to Stan Lee, whom I admired (still do!) and had known previously.<\/p>\n
Part of Stan Lee\u2019s credo was that we were in the business of \u201csuspending disbelief\u201d \u2013 an aphorism credited to him but actually coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge about three centuries ago. Coleridge likened the concept to \u201cpoetic faith.\u201d<\/p>\n
I have come to regard the superhero ethos as rather unhealthy \u2013 the guys in the white hats (or white Spandex) always win? By power, force, and violence? \u201cMorals\u201d at the end of every story? Naw \u2013 any values divorced from biblical truth are counterfeit. Readers were being weaned on \u201cNew Gods\u201d whist the old God was ignored, dismissed, and, most tellingly, disbelieved.<\/p>\n
Disbelieved by fans and creators on this basis \u2013 get ready: I had many such debates, so this is accurate \u2013 \u201cthat stuff in the Bible can\u2019t be true\u2026 those supernatural events and miracles are all fables\u2026 Jesus couldn\u2019t have done all those things; get real, Rick.\u201d<\/p>\n
That reflects neither poetry nor faith.<\/p>\n
\u2018nuff said, true unbelievers. I suppose I am supposed to find comfort in the saying that believing nothing is better than believing the wrong thing. Save that for fortune cookies, not life principles. It is a Super-Lie. (Not to mention the pragmatic imperative — a society with no core beliefs CANNOT, by definition, operate on any positive standards or values.) <\/p>\n
In the parlance of today\u2019s comics culture, Jesus was the greatest superhero of them all. He was sent to earth; He knew the past of prehistory and could foretell the future; he read peoples\u2019 minds; He turned water into wine, fed a multitude by praying an increase over a basket of fish and bread; He walked on water and walked through walls; He raised people from the dead, and rose Himself despite agonizing torture and putrefaction in a tomb.<\/p>\n
His costume was a simple robe, except for the holy Blood that covered Him according to uncountable prophesies and predictions. The greatest of His superheroic acts, in my eyes, is that He did this all for us sinners, while we were yet in our sins. But more of that another time\u2026<\/p>\n
This view of Jesus \u2013 certainly proper and very biblical \u2013 was scoffed at when I had discussions back during my comic-book life. Strange, it seemed to me, and it still seems strange.<\/p>\n
However, Jesus was not a fictional character, but indisputably a historical figure. I knew Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, who invented Superman as teenagers in Cleveland. \u201cIt just seemed like a fun character, a fun story to think about.\u201d I asked Bob Kane how he came to create Batman. A similar story \u2013 at least no high-culture or pop-culture babble about cosmic forces of evil and revenge from him. \u201cA fun idea,\u201d not to mention, in each hero\u2019s heritage, some fictional antecedents.<\/p>\n
Motion pictures have reinforced a generation\u2019s tendency to think of superheros as plausible, and their powers as virtual. Art imitates life imitates art. Yet Christianity teaches not the opposite nor the corollary \u2013 but the truth that Jesus was God-with-us (\u201cEmmanuel\u201d); that He had super powers; and that He still does. His miracles were not virtual but real.<\/p>\n
Christianity is nothing if not about the supernatural. Welcome to Reality, not Fantasy! <\/p>\n
Jesus, as a historical truth, is not a mere character in a story. His acts and teachings are not merely symbolic. And He is a Man who lives today. And confronts us. He looked at you from the cross; He looks into your eyes as He leaves the tomb.<\/p>\n
More than a symbol, more than a character, more even than a superhero. You must confront Him in return; you cannot ignore Him. For, as C S Lewis said, this Man of history, after what He claimed and what was claimed of Him, was one of only three things: a deluded fool; a master charlatan; or\u2026 the Savior of humankind, lover of your soul.<\/p>\n
All hail the POWER of Jesus\u2019 name!<\/p>\n
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The podcast interview referred to above: cbh-podcast-episode-17-rick-marschall-interview-part-1-newspaper-strips-to-marvel-comics<\/a><\/p>\n PLEASE watch this moving performance of a classic hymn, performed in praise and worship, and discernible singing in tongues —<\/p>\n