The Chosen: The False Gospel According to Dallas Jenkins - Part II

Here is Part I of the The Chosen: The False Gospel According to Dallas Jenkins

Part I of this series of posts was certainly the most views and comments ever received on a post here to date. There were several comments from people upset that there were criticisms of The Chosen which followed along a couple of general lines:

1. The Chosen isn’t perfect, but so what? - My general response to this type of comment is that it is not the imperfection that should upset everyone, since no movie or tv series is perfect. What should upset everyone is the heresy.

2. The Chosen is using storytelling to bring the gospels to life and so what if it contains some events, actions and people who aren’t contained in Sacred Scripture nor Sacred Tradition? - Creating possible fictional stories about events not contained in Sacred Scripture or Sacred Tradition would be fine as long as those fictional stories were:

   1. Blatantly labeled as such so that there is no possibility for people to confuse them with actual events and information from Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture

   2. The stories contained no heresy or blasphemy. The Chosen violates both of these conditions.

3. The Chosen has inspired many people to turn to Jesus and to start following Him. That’s a good thing. - It is only a good thing when you bring people to the actual Jesus instead of a false version of Jesus. The Chosen presents a false Christ.

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With all that said, here are some of the other issues with The Chosen and the False Gospel According to Dallas Jenkins:

ST. PETER KEEPS GETTING TAUGHT BY EVERYONE ELSE

In Part I we noted that Dallas Jenkins creates a bevy of sins that he claims St Peter was guilty of, and we discussed the issues with that. Another problem that is present in The Chosen is how everyone else in the story is constantly instructing, correcting and rebuking St Peter. This isn’t a coincidence or an accident. St. Andrew, Peter’s wife, St. John, St. James, St. Matthew, St. Phillip, several other characters and even the Romans are shown to be correcting St. Peter. In fact, it’s tough to remember even one moment where St. Peter was doing any of this to the other characters. It’s a one-way street.

This, as mentioned, is not an accident. Protestants reject the authority of the Church Jesus built, so they are always looking to lower others down to the level of themselves (or even lower), in an attempt to undermine the belief that there is an authority structure in the Church Jesus built. The entire Protestant Revolt was about the rejection of that authority that Christ instituted.

So it is intentional when The Chosen shows St. Peter as someone who needs to be taught, corrected and rebuked by virtually everyone he meets. The biblical truth is that St. Peter is the leader of the Apostles. He gives the very first sermon on Pentecost. He is always listed first in every listing of the Apostles. Jesus prayed for Peter individually that Peter’s faith may never fail. Jesus performed the miracle of the fish and two coins to pay the tax for Himself and Peter. St. Peter declared that Judas Iscariot’s bishopric/office should be filled. St. Peter issued the first death sentences. St. Peter was the first one to preach to the Gentiles. St. Peter declared at the Council of Jerusalem that circumcision would not be required, and all fell silent after this. St. Peter walked on water as well. He was not just a regular, everyday Christian and he was certainly not the lowliest Apostle as The Chosen portrays him.

If this was not intentional, then why is it all directed at St. Peter and not spread out evenly among all the Apostles?

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BAPTISM IS ABSENT

We have John the Baptist in several scenes. We have Jesus performing miracles and Him being called the Messiah. We see the scene with Jesus and Nicodemus discussing baptism and being born again. But what do we not see? We don’t see any baptisms.

We don’t have any scenes showing John the Baptist out in the wilderness performing his baptism of repentance on many. We don’t see the Baptism of Christ which is a major event in beginning His public ministry and journey to the Cross. We don’t see Jesus and the Apostles going out and baptizing immediately after Jesus discusses with Nicodemus about being born again and baptism.

This complete ignoring of baptism by The Chosen is also intentional. In Protestantism, most Protestants claim that baptism is only a symbol and does not save us (which is weird because Scripture says it does). The Chosen intentionally avoids the entire topic because if people could see visually the Baptism of the Lord with the appearance of the Trinity, many would realize that baptism is more than a symbol. If they visually saw Jesus and the Apostles immediately going out baptizing directly after the conversation with Nicodemus about being born again, they would realize that Jesus is talking about baptism when He discusses being born again.

This has to be carefully avoided because The Chosen doesn’t want to upset the many fans who would become angry if their personal opinion about baptism being a symbol was challenged so effectively.

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SOLA SCRIPTURA PREMISE

One of the storylines is that Mary Magdalene and another woman want to learn the Scriptures and the entire storyline is infected by the premise of the Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura. The women lament that they can’t know the Scriptures without the ability to read and write, which is absolutely silly. They also lament that they didn’t go to school with the boys so they weren’t instructed in the Scriptures like they were. These are simply and laughably stupid claims that are complete fiction and contrary to the truth.

The life of an Israelite at that time was steeped in Scripture, even though most could not read and write. Children, both boys and girls, were educated in the Scriptures and taught them thoroughly. The Psalms were sung daily while people worked. The Scriptures were read each Sabbath at the synagogue. The people, especially anyone who wished to know the Scriptures better, could learn them thoroughly no matter if they could read and write.

This storyline only exists because of the theological error of Sola Scriptura. It’s a modern phenomenon that Bibles are widely available to everyone, even the poorest among us. Books as we know them today did not even exist then. The Scriptures were a series of scrolls that were kept in each synagogue. They were not on paper but on animal skins or papyrus. They were extremely difficult to make and only the richest families could afford to have their own copy of the scrolls. People did not learn the Scriptures by reading them on their own. This is complete fiction.

People today might be surprised to learn that when you don’t possess any electronics which can consume vast hours of every day, it becomes quite easy to spend time listening to the stories of Scripture being recited quite often and regularly while eating with your family and getting ready for bedtime.

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THE WEDDING IN CANA IS A HOT MESS OF THREE MAIN ERRORS

1. The Chosen claims, falsely, that Mary was an unmarried woman at the Annunciation and conception of Jesus.

This pernicious blasphemy simply will not die in our modern culture for some reason. It comes from an ignorance of Jewish wedding culture and ceremonies at that time, but also a malicious desire to lower the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Incarnation of Christ. Couples were married in a two part process then which consisted of them being married but living separately for a short time. During this time the husband would prepare the home to be ready to receive his bride. The couple was married though. You can see this in Matthew 1, where Joseph is called her husband and Mary is called his wife BEFORE Joseph took Mary into his home. It also says that Joseph considered quietly divorcing Mary to not expose her to shame. To remind everyone, you cannot divorce someone you are not married to.

2. The Chosen edits out critical parts of the intercession that the Blessed Virgin Mary performs for the wedding couple.

When Mary tells Jesus that they have run out of wine, The Chosen has Jesus saying in response “Why are you telling Me this?”. This radically misses what He actually says to her. Jesus in response said “Woman, what to Me and thee?”. This idiom that Jesus uses means that the two of them are so closely united that their issues and concerns are one instead of two. That what affects her will affect Him and vice versa. It expresses a union that is perfectly aligned.

They also intentionally leave out the title that Jesus bestows upon Mary of Woman. This is the same title given in Genesis 3:15 when God says the seed of the Woman will crush the head of the serpent. This isn’t an accident or mistake that Jesus makes when calling Mary by this title. He’s specifically invoking it, and He’s reminding her that if He does this miracle for her, it will begin His journey towards the Cross on Calvary.

A small detail that many miss is that at the Presentation in the Temple (Luke 2), the holy man Simeon gave a prophesy about Mary as well. He said that a sword would pierce Mary’s soul and through it the hearts of many would be revealed. Jesus is reminding His mother of this prophesy and that if He performs the miracle, then it will mean that Mary’s soul would be stabbed with a sword. God never forced Mary to participate in the plan of salvation. It was always her free will to respond with a “yes” at every opportunity. Her response at this reminder from Jesus is to tell the servants to do whatever Jesus commanded them. She knew what would happen and freely chose to start His mission. The Chosen misses all of this.

3. The Chosen downplays and changes the miracle of the water into wine.

The wedding at Cana shows Jesus performing the 3-shell game to children, which is a sleight of hand trick. This is right before Jesus performs the miracle of turning water into wine. This can implicitly infer that it was not a miracle but instead some type of sleight of hand. The show then for some reason, during the miracle of changing the water into wine, has Jesus send everyone outside when He performs this miracle.

Why do they add this action by Jesus to the Scriptural story? The Scripture says that there were six stone jars which each holding between twenty or thirty gallons of water. Jesus commands the servants to fill the jars. Now this would have taken them a LOT of work. They would have had to go repeatedly to the well with bucket after bucket of water, letting each one down and drawing each one up and then carrying it to the jars and dumping the water into them. They would have had to do this hundreds and hundreds of times. This was grueling work to fill 120-150 gallons of water into these stone jars.

Then after all this work by the servants, Jesus then performs the miracle in the presence of all the servants. He’s not alone when He does this. His miracle is public and this is why it signals the start of His public ministry and begins His journey to the Cross. He cannot remain hidden any longer and His hour is now here.

The miracle of changing of the water to wine prefigures the Eucharist. His public ministry begins with Jesus turning water into wine, and ends with Him changing wine into His Blood. These miracles form the bookends to His ministry. The Chosen deciding to instead change this miracle into a hidden miracle with Jesus alone cannot be an accident. Just as Protestants deny that the wine at the Last Supper actually became the Blood of Christ, now they obfuscate and downplay the miracle of the water into wine, because the two are related. Denials or downplaying of the miracles of Jesus are an implicit attack on the Divinity of Christ because they imply or outright argue that Jesus could not have actually done these miracles. This implicit denial of the Divinity of Christ is not limited to this example either, as The Chosen repeatedly shows Jesus as lacking in omniscience and omnipotence.

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THE CHOSEN PORTRAYS JESUS AS NOT BEING OMNISCIENT NOR OMNIPOTENT

At the same Wedding in Cana, as one of the last things shown during the wedding, the show has Jesus saying “Some things even I can’t do”. Here Jesus is referring to dancing, and if this were by itself, would be concerning but could be excused as the show portraying Jesus as being humble or relating with His Apostles. It would not be enough to make a huge deal over, but that’s not the only example.

During the scene showing the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph finding Jesus in the Temple when He was twelve, they have St. Joseph saying to Jesus, “What are we going to do about this transgression?” while referring to the scare that Jesus gave to His mother. As Jesus is abundantly clear in His response to them, He was going about the work of His Father. They didn’t understand what Jesus meant at the time, but they did comprehend that something important just happened. Jesus didn’t commit a transgression by remaining in the Temple. In fact, He was preparing His mother for the three days that she would be without Him after the Cross, by having her and Joseph search for Him for three days in Jerusalem.

Again, some might want to excuse this as a minor thing, but things get much worse. At one point Jesus is talking about heading to Syria and St. Phillip says “if I didn’t know better, I’d say you had a death wish”, and to which Jesus replies “I wouldn’t really call it a wish.” St. Phillip then responds by asking what He means by that, and Jesus deflects this question and says “I’m still thinking through how to talk about it.” This is just blasphemy. Jesus did not need to hem and haw over how He was going to say something. He knew exactly what He was going to say at all times. This is a denial of the omniscience of Christ. But if you thought this example wasn’t enough, the preparation for the Sermon on the Mount is blatant.

The Chosen chooses to show that Jesus has to work on preparing His sermons and He is working on getting better at speaking. Jesus even says that He could mess up in His Sermon on the Mount. The Chosen actually has Jesus working with St. Matthew on the Sermon on the Mount! Jesus only has fragments in His mind and needs to work on them. He has to work with Matthew to fix the sermon and make it correct. St. Matthew actually FIXES His sermon by telling Jesus to start with salt of the earth! This folks is really just unspeakable blasphemy and a denial of the Divinity of Christ and there’s no other way to say it. Jesus didn’t learn from the Apostles or need anything from them. He didn’t need to learn anything or need help to get things correct. Jesus is God and showing Him this way is an explicit attack on His Divinity. There’s no getting around this.

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INDIFFERENCE IN THEOLOGY

Everything above feeds into this final point. Dallas Jenkins is not dogmatic in his theology for many areas, as we can see from the above examples. This would be why he happily partners with so many Mormons in the making of The Chosen. Dallas is an Evangelical Protestant, but happily works with a sect of Protestants who deny the Divinity of Christ. What exactly can you hope to produce when you are working with those who deny the VERY FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT truth about Christ!!!!

There are a few other instances where the LDS theology starts to show itself. In the first example, Jesus tells Nicodemus “what does your heart tell you?”. This is the “burning in the bosom” of the LDS. Jesus didn’t want people listening to the whims of their heart. He wanted people to make a free will choice from their intellect and will to decide if they were going to follow and obey Him. Another instance of this shows up when Jesus, in the speech to the Woman at the Well, says we will worship in Spirit and truth, but then the show adds to this by having Jesus saying “just the heart”.

The second big example is when Jesus proclaims in season 3 that He is the Law of Moses. I mean, The Chosen shows Jesus literally saying “I am the Law of Moses!”. This is just a theological mess and shows an influence of Mormon theology because this is found in the book of Mormon. But Jesus, while He fulfills the Law of Moses, is NOT actually the Law of Moses. Jesus is the Word of God and is God. The Law of Moses is a creation that was created by God at a specific time and place. The Law is not God.

All of this theological muddling in the show is a reflection of the indifference that Dallas Jenkins has towards doctrines and theology. He, like many today, believes that differences in doctrines just comes down to personal preferences instead of teaching actual truths about God and the New Covenant. Those who are indifferent to theology hold to a form of relativism that ultimately renders the entire Christian faith meaningless.

Either Jesus is God or He is not. Either Jesus has one will or two wills. Either baptism conveys salvific grace or it does not. These are mutually exclusive beliefs and one is true and the other false, or vice versa. But they both cannot be true. And this gets to the real heart of the problem with The Chosen. Jesus, as He Himself says, is the way, THE TRUTH, and the life. Jesus equates the truth itself with Him. So if you want to follow Christ and you want to worship Him and be saved by Him, you need to know the ACTUAL & TRUE CHRIST.

When a person is given a false Christ, then they are not worshipping the actual Second Person of the Trinity. They are worshipping a false and non-existence Christ. This is why error and heresy is so poisonous. It leads people away from worshipping the actual Trinity and worshipping in the way that He wants to be worshipped. It leads people into falsehood, error and possible damnation. It leads people away from God to a false version of Him. This is why The Chosen should be avoided.