I was scanning the electronic pages of the NY Times this morning and found a gem. If I were of a mind, I might take offense at the scrap of Papyrus that quotes Jesus as mentioning his wife.

The Times was all over it: “This Sept. 5, 2012 photo released by Harvard University shows a fourth century fragment of papyrus that divinity professor Karen L. King says is the only existing ancient text that quotes Jesus explicitly referring to having a wife. King, an expert in the history of Christianity, says the text contains a dialogue in which Jesus refers to “my wife,” whom he identified as Mary. King says the fragment of Coptic script is a copy of a gospel, probably written in Greek in the second century. (AP Photo/Harvard University, Karen L. King)”

This contradicts what they told me back in Bible School in the middle of the last century, and I took instant offense at this insult to my religion. I looked carefully at the media to see if someone had committed the heresy of drawing a cartoon about it.

I did not find one, though the idea that someone might do so caused me to immediately round up a bunch of like-minded friends, drive to New York and torch the paper’s editorial offices.

Then we would hound the author of the story, and possibly ensure that she is asphyxiated in the blaze before driving around with her body for more than four hours before dropping it at LaGuardia and driving on to Boston to attack the Harvard Divinity School.

No one has a right to yell fire in a crowded theater, as I have heard often lately, and thus I feel fully justified in burning the theater myself.

I think. You can see what folly passes in this world as justification for brutish behavior. My attention to this ancient context has risen and fallen. I was more bemused than anything else about the discovery a couple years ago of the alleged ossuaries of the brothers of Jesus. I must have missed that back in Bible School, too.

As a consequence of the doctrine of perpetual virginity which stipulates that the Virgin Mary had no children after Jesus, scholars have considered the term “brother” of the Lord should be read “cousin,” and conclude that James “the brother of the Lord,” (Gal.1:19) is therefore the James of the Twelve Apostles.

Other Christian denominations consider the Matthew 1:25 statement that Joseph “knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son” to mean that Joseph and Mary did have normal marital relations after Jesus’ birth, and that James, Joses, Jude and Simon were the biological sons of Mary and Joseph, and thus, at least half brothers of the Savior.

Or, just his brothers.

That challenges the whole doctrine of Christian divinity, and thus I think I am fully justified in going to set fire to some libraries.

Honestly, would you have thought that the parallel madness to this little tale would actually be true in the Year of Our Lord 2012?

(Saint James the Just, one of the Savior’s “cousins.”)

Copyright 2012 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com