American Jesus: How the Son of God became a National Icon
- Tim Berroth
- Dec 1, 2004
- Series: Books
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"Forget what you have heard about the cross or the tomb. Jesus is alive and well and living in America. And everyone is bearing witness to his glory." So writes author Stephen Prothero in his book American Jesus : How the Son of God Became a National Icon.
Prothero is the chair of the Department of Religion at Boston University and his book, subtitled "How the Son of God Became A National Icon," is a fascinating study of how the identity of Jesus has morphed through American history. As a scholar and historian, Protheros' painstaking research paints an often hilarious, sometimes painfully convicting picture of how our nation has sliced, diced, molded and re-shaped God the Son into everything but the savior of sinful man.
The book begins with a scathing chapter on Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence and architect of the First Amendment. Any casual reading of Jefferson and his writings reveal that he was not a Christian but a deist. He viewed Jesus as "the first of human Sages" and labels the writers of the four gospels as "the most unlettered and ignorant of men." Jefferson took it upon himself to discover the true historical Jesus. It was his mission to wade through the tenets of the faith that had been corrupted, in his mind, by "the metaphysical abstractions of Athanasius and the maniac ravings of Calvin" to discover the true teachings of Jesus. He did this by taking a razor to the King James Version of the New Testament eliminating anything that he thought reeked of corruption. The result of his hatchet job was a Jesus who was a great moral teacher and example but definitely not God. Many of the founding fathers apparently shared his opinion of Jesus being less than deity. In today's political climate of culture wars, family values, republicans vs. democrats, red states and blue states one has to wonder if all the current talk of "re-claiming America for Christ" and the view that "America was founded a Christian nation" is a reality or a foolish pipe dream. Could it possibly be that many who identify with what is today labeled the religious right are longing for an era that never existed? Regardless of your presuppositions or conclusions, this chapter is a compelling read.
What follows in Prothero's book is a systematic analysis of how Jesus has become a modern day version of the Greek god Proteus, conveniently morphing and changing into whatever image is created for him. The Great Awakening and the influence of revivalist preachers like John Wesley re-scripted Jesus as more of a "friend" and less "the crucified and risen Lord." The God-fearing Calvinist Puritans, obsessed (in Prothero's words) with being God-fearing rather than Jesus-loving, were replaced by Arminian pietists who viewed Christ as more loving than wrathful and angry. Through this time, religion became more individualistic and less corporate. Theologically strong hymns like "Before Jehovah's Awful Throne" (1719) were replaced by more tender hymns like "What A Friend We Have in Jesus" (1855).
The natural response to this softer effeminate Jesus was a push for a more masculine Jesus. Christianity was viewed, for the most part, as a religion for women. In the late 19th-century, church membership was only 28 percent male. By 1910, U.S. churches were only one-third male. In The Virility of Christ , published in 1915, author Warren Conant protested against artists who "subjoin a silky, curly beard to a woman's face and hair and label it 'The Christ'" Instead he offered a vision of a "Fighting Christ" with "big lung capacity" and the "free swinging stride of the mountaineer." Men of the industrial age would "demand a strenuous Christ." Prothero's examination of this battle for the male/female Christ is fascinating in light of the church's continuing struggle and failure to proclaim the distinctly masculine God revealed in the scriptures. In the wake of the radical feminism of the 1960's and 70's the church is still scrambling to figure out how to define roles of the sexes and how to faithfully proclaim God as a male.
Prothero also examines the rise of Jesus Christ as "superstar" in the late 1960's. In 1965, Time magazine asked on its April 8 cover "Is God Dead?" In 1969, after a period of national spiritual re-awakening, Time was forced to ask "Is God Coming Back to Life?" The rise of "Jesus Freaks" and "Jesus people" in the 1960's again led to a re-creation of Jesus as "The Real Revolutionist." In a time of great social and political unrest, the Jesus people followed the biblical command of Paul to "become all things to all men" (1 Cor 9:22) by making Jesus a hippie among the hippies. Instead of dropping acid, Jesus people instead were encouraged to "drop Matthew, Mark, Luke and John" and to groove on "Jesus the everlasting high." It was this movement that birthed many of the trends that we still see in Christendom today: "High on Jesus" t-shirts and "Honk If You Love Jesus" bumper stickers were the pre-cursors to the plethora of Jesus junk that litters our Christian sub-culture. Contemporary rock hits like the Doobie Brothers "Jesus is Just Alright" and James Taylor's "Fire and Rain" (which asked Jesus to help him face death and addiction) capitalized on this new-found Jesus awareness. With the help of these mainstream hits and rock operas like Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell , Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) was birthed. Many of the contemporary hymns and choruses that emerged from this movement, from labels like Maranatha Music and the Vineyard, are still sung at many churches today.
Out of this Jesus movement of the 1960's and 70's emerged the influential movements of Calvary Chapel and the Vineyard. Prothero contends that it was this movement, founded in southern California, that has had the biggest impact on modern evangelicalism into the 21st century. On the positive side, it reversed the spiritual movement away from the newer eastern religions. Negatively, the movement still maintained a distrust of authoritarian groups, including those within the church. Individualism reigned supreme, many times to the extent of abandonment of the church altogether. At the heart of this rejection of "Churchianity" was a quest for distance from traditionalism. Even common symbols of the church were eliminated. Calvary Chapel, for example, rejects the symbol of the cross replacing it, curiously, with another symbol: a descending dove. Prothero writes "the elimination of the cross may free Jesus up to be everywhere rather than somewhere--to allow him to reside in each believer's heart, in keeping with each believer's needs."
In the latter part of the book, Prothero moves away from an examination of Jesus in traditional Christianity and focuses on how Christ is portrayed in other religions. The chapter entitled "Mormon Elder Brother" examines the doctrines and practice of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Prothero fairly analyzes the changes of doctrine through the history of the church and the differing roles Jesus has played its teaching. Any casual reading of this chapter reveals a number of inconsistencies and the ever-changing doctrines of Mormonism. The influence of Jesus in the early Mormon church was non-existent. Only after following the lead of traditional evangelicalism in the 20th-century has the church adopted a more central role of Jesus. A number of "new revelations" has caused the church to reject its early teachings of polygamy and racism while adopting a new emphasis on a need for "a personal relationship with Jesus Christ" and the view that "the message of the Mormon Church is the message of Christ."
In "Black Moses," Prothero looks at the social, political and religious motives for the rise of African-American churches and the Nation of Islam. Albert B. Cleage Jr. was a pioneer in the Black Christian Nationalist Movement and a close ally of Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam. He argued that Christianity, as expressed in America particularly, was a white man's religion. He also argues that Jesus was distinctly black. And if Jesus was black and God created "man in his own image" (Gen 1:27), then God is black. The implications of this for the African-American was liberation from a history of slavery and a nation that still harbored seeds of racism both overt and institutional.
Prothero concludes this excellent work with these words: "...most Americans have their eyes squarely on Jesus. Though the WWJD ("What Would Jesus Do?") craze of the 1990's has passed, Americans continue to read books such as What Would Jesus Eat? (2002)...The "Jesus balloon," a 110-foot-tall, 750-pound hot air balloon of the "King of Kings, Lord of Lords," continues to lift off each Easter over northern California, preaching the risen Christ to citizens below. What would Jesus make of all this? That is anyone's guess. Might he be leaning back and laughing?"
As the church continues to retreat into its own subculture, this book should be required reading to nudge it back to cultural engagement. Many of the false ideas presented in this book fall squarely back on the shoulders of the institutional church and its failure to proclaim Christ as reveled in the scriptures. The church as a whole and individual Christians should read this book to see the variations of Christ that have been proclaimed through history and continue daily in our culture. Perhaps then it will be forced to have to confront the errors with truth and the sad history of our savior in this nation will be a thing of the past. If the church refuses to leap head-first into the dialogue, then Jesus will continue to be fashioned into an idol and not the savior of mankind. It's a battle the church can not afford to ignore.
AMERICAN JESUS
Stephen Prothero
Farrar, Straus and Giboux, 2003.
364 pages, $14.00
Author: , is an elder at Crossroads Church and is part of the greater Kaleo Church family through the Acts 29 Network.
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