Well, last week I watched the 4th movie, skimmed books 5 and 6 and at midnight Friday I bought book 7. I finished reading it this morning (3:00 Am). And it was good.
I won’t say much as to not give anything away. But it is a great read, if you are a fan I doubt you’ll be disappointed.
I have thoughts in my head around the ideas of a messiah in contemporary media. And, more to the point, how those compare to the biblical notion of Jesus the Messiah. We’ve got very interesting evolutions in the messiah motif in film and text…. Harry Potter, Neo, Frodo/Aragorn, Superman, Spiderman, etc….
I’ll save a further reflection to another time, but I’ll atleast pose a question or two… what are the qualities a “messiah” must possess to be considered a legit messiah? How has messiah-ship changed in literature/film especially in the last 100/50 years? (and the kicker) How are the contemporary ideas of messiah similar/different than the biblical view of Jesus?
The major difference between the modern Messiah and the Biblical version, in my opinion, is that all of these contemporary ideals of the Messiah are all shown as being human, if that makes sense. While these modern day Messiahs all experience a sort of resurrection, they all show human faults that the Biblical version of the Christ did not. It isn’t possible for there to be a real modern day Messiah if you compare it to the Biblical version.
I would certainly consider these modern literary heroes as leaders and saviors, but not Messiah’s. A human cannot grant redemption to another human. Of course it is a common trend, to make heroes seen as more on our level, they struggle with the same basic human faults we do. And while we can certainly strive to have some of the great characteristics that they have, that doesn’t mean to accept these faults.
Sorry, went on a bit of a rant there.