Anybody watching "Revelation" on NBC?

[RevCheesehead]

I missed the first 20 minutes.

Just wondering how anyone else is feeling about this stuff on TV.

[Left Is Write]

1. I'd like to, but I won't be able to watch all of it anyway.

Better in that case not to get started.

[supernova]

2. How was it, RevChesehead?

I skipped it thinking it wouldn't really be up my alley. Was it better done than I maybe thought it was?

[RevCheesehead]

5. I had trouble following it.

Of course, I was posting on DU at the same time, so I wasn't paying close attention at all.

I don't believe in the Rapture. That's 18th/19th century theology, gone amok, and stands outside of orthodox teaching. But it doesn't hurt to see what "the others" are presenting as Christian doctrine.

[Maru Kitteh]

3. I watched it, not quite sure what to think of it yet

I have lots of different thoughts about it, but I don't think I've thought about it carefully enough yet to really have anything much to say about it just now.

[mrgorth]

4. It just didn't look like it could possibly be any good.

The Seventh Sign wasn't too bad.

[hvn_nbr_2]

6. A summary, anyone?

I'm so detached from TV that I don't even know if this was a one-show thing, a mini-series, or a new show. I guessed it was a mini-series. Is it all over now? Was it the standard Hal Lindsey type silliness (Put the book of Revelation through a paper shredder, put it back together the way they think it ought to be and pretend it says what they want it to.)?

I'll never understand how people can read the story of Armageddon and get what they get out of it. It says quite clearly that the armies of the nations of the earth all gather to battle against the Word of God. (Not against each other or against armies of nations on God's side. The only armies on God's side are in heaven.) The only weapon that the forces on God's side use is a double-edged sword coming out of the mouth of the Word of God. Isn't that a transparently obvious symbol for truth? So isn't the point of the story that God's truth overcomes all the armies of the earth, that God's truth is the one thing powerful enough to do that. I think the story of Armageddon advocates pacifism.

[mourningdove92]

7. I watched it. I have the rest of it set up on TIVO.

I will let ya'll know my overall opinion when it is all over. Right now it is looking kind of Omen'ish if you know what I mean. I will be watching with eyes looking for both religious political propaganda.

[realFedUp]

8. No, and here's a letter about the show

You have to register to read this in whole.

http://www.calendarlive.com/printedition/calendar/cl-et-counterpunch18apr18,2,6542589,print.story

NBC's 'Revelations' looking for 'true believers'
By Victoria E. Thompson
Victoria E. Thompson is an actress and writer. She lives in Los Angeles.

April 18, 2005

In his wry review of the new NBC series "Revelations," Paul Brownfield takes exception to its humorlessness and implausible details <"Sure, It's the End of the World, but Do They Have to Play It This Heavy?" April 13>. I couldn't agree more, but I think there is a more urgent reason to be critical of the show.

The series is based upon an interpretation of Revelation in the New Testament that has gained an astonishing following in the United States, largely due to the "Left Behind" series of books by Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye (a co-founder of the Moral Majority with Jerry Falwell). Having read the first in the series, I can report that the theory behind them is execrable.

snip

What the theory requires of its adherents is blind belief, unsullied by inquiry and thought. Scholars are by their nature suspect. In order to be saved, one must repudiate education as well as the intuitive instinct for solidarity with other human beings and cleave exclusively to those who know "the truth."

The TV series' writer, David Selzer, has added some flourishes, and he does not have the True Believers raptured into Heaven, at least not yet. But the series takes the End Time theory as its premise, and therein lies the problem. It is akin to taking the premise of the notorious anti-Semitic tract "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" and basing a series on it. Just think of the promo: "A scholar and a nun team up to keep the Jews from taking over the world."

It is irresponsible of NBC to give credence to these ideas. The show's characterization of doctors as ghouls and the bashing of scientists are panderings to the extreme Right to Life contingent whose bizarre notions have been weaseling their way into our collective consciousness. Selzer may think he is being creative, but End Time is not fiction to LaHaye and the millions of others who subscribe to the theory.

continued

[RevCheesehead]

9. That's a good letter (from what you wrote).

The rapture crap is only a few generations old. It is not aligned with mainstream orthodox theology.

I think people are confusing the Rapture with the Parousia - the "return of Christ." And that is a topic which deserves its own post!

[realFedUp]

10. yeah!

The more truth about the Bible and
how it came to be is necessary for
those who read the Bible literally
instead of finding the God in your
reading.