Spotlight on Fandoms: Lamb

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Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Written in 2002 by Christopher Moore, Lamb was a book I picked up entirely based on the title and have read at least three times a year ever since. Distilled to its essence the book can be described as "take the New Testament, add crack, stir."


The Canon:

You think you know how this story is going to end, but you don't. Trust me, I was there. I know.

Written in 2002 by Christopher Moore, Lamb was a book I picked up entirely based on the title and have read at least three times a year ever since. Distilled to its essence the book can be described as "take the New Testament, add crack, stir."

Inspired by the coming of the new millennia, Jesus and the Guys Upstairs decided that they needed to set some of the New Testament straight, and the best way to do that was to resurrect Jesus's (whose real name, Biff tells you up front, is Joshua. Jesus is Greek) best friend Biff, dead for 2000 years, stick him in the Hyatt Regency Hotel in St. Louis and get him to write how the whole Messiah thing really went down in colloquial English. (Biff has been given the gift of tongues, you see, though he'd say that he'd always had them. Ask any girl he's ever known. *rimshot*)

The book tries, in a pretty hysterical way, to fill in the missing 15 years of Jesus's life between his arguing in the temple in Jerusalem at 13 and being announced as the Messiah by John the Baptist at 30. In this version, he and Biff go off searching for the three wise men (who live in Afghanistan, China, and India, respectively) so that Josh can learn how to be a Messiah and explain it to others. In the beginning, there was the Word, and Josh had to learn how to explain the idea that there was something sacred inside everyone.

Biff learns how to blow things up, the Kama Sutra, and to do kung fu. They're on slightly different life paths.

The ending of the story is still the same—crucifixion and death—and Biff doesn't stick around for the resurrection (in this version, because he kills himself after hanging Judas), and so he's been left out of the New Testament because the rest of the apostles thought he was an asshole. He gradually figures out that his buddy Josh is pretty famous when he discovers the New Testament in the Gideon Bible in his hotel room and starts reading the evangelists' accounts of his times. And don’t think he's not a little miffed to be skipped over.


The Cast of Characters:

If you know the New Testament at all, you know our cast. Everyone from Mary and Joseph to Herod and Pontius Pilate makes an appearance, but to make it easier for you, I'll stick to the main folks.

Joshua bar Jehovah:
The first time I saw the man who would save the world he was sitting near the central well in Nazareth with a lizard hanging out of his mouth.

Josh is the Messiah, the Chosen One of God Hisownself. The only problem that for a while, he's not sure he is the Messiah (Azriel, the stupidest angel, showing up ten years late helps to clear that up a bit) and then he definitely doesn't know how to be one. So after consulting with the Holy of Holies in Jerusalem and getting nowhere, his mother suggests finding the three magi who showed up at his birth and seeing what they know. He takes Biff along on his adventures when Biff points out that Josh's tendency to tell the truth at all times is going to get him robbed and killed on the side of a road.

Levi bar Alphaeus who is called Biff:
You go with Joshua. He needs a friend to teach him to be human. Then I can teach him to be a man.

Inventor of sarcasm, lover of many (many, many) women, some in an effort to explain lust to Josh, who was told by the angel that he shall not know woman (bummer for Josh), Biff took Joseph's advice to show Josh how to be human very seriously. He was the voice of reason (…ish) when Josh tried to love all people, even the creepy ones, explaining why that doesn't always work. The book is told from Biff's perspective as he tries to square what he's learning in the 21st Century with what he lived through with his friends. Oh, and Biff has a huge, huge crush on Mary Magdelene. She bumped Mary (Josh's mom, yes) out of first place in his choice for wife, so you know that's love.

Mary of Magdala. Call her Maggie:
Those laughing eyes, even as the Romans passed by only an arm's length away. God, I miss her.

Her family moved to Nazareth from Magdala when she was still young, so she was with Josh and Biff from the very beginning. She loved Josh, Biff loved her, Josh ignored both parts. It makes for a very interesting love triangle. She eventually gets married off to a future Pharisee—Jakan—who Biff will hate like he hates no one else on earth (half because he married Maggie, half because he began led the trial that led to Joshua's execution). She'll get divorced and become one of the greatest disciples for Josh's cause. And at no point is she a harlot.

Balthasar:
"Biff, I realize you may not think so, but from my way of thinking, sodomizing the Son of God is really, really bad."

The first of the Magi that Biff and Josh meet, Balthasar believes that Josh has come to bring immortality, but in a much more literal way than Josh's eventual teaching of "there's something immortal inside of everyone." Balthasar has a vested interest in this, since he's bound his soul to a demon named Catch in order to live forever and that's, you know, bad. Balthasar also had eight Chinese concubines, a fact that made much more of an impression on Biff than on Josh.

Gaspar:
"What do you know?" snapped Gaspar in a distinctly unenlightened way. "You'll be working off your karma for a thousand years as a dung beetle just to evolve to the point of being dense."

The second Magi that Josh and Biff meet, Gaspar is a Buddhist monk who teaches them kung fu, Jew-do (I know, siiiiiigh), and to commune with the abominable snowman (which makes sense in context, I swear). Gaspar introduces Josh to the concept of bodhisattvas: a person who reaches enlightenment but makes a decision not to evolve to nirvana until all sentient beings have proceeded him there.

Melchior:
"Look, a seagull!"

Melchior, Gaspar's brother, is the final Magi that Josh and Biff meet. While Biff is off learning the Kama Sutra, Josh is learning how to convert one grain of rice into many (that'll come in handy with loaves and fishes) and enough yoga to bend himself into a wine jug (that'll come in…less handy), and all about the Divine Spark, which he will eventually rename the Holy Ghost.

The Apostles:
"Those are the dumbest sons of bitches on earth."
"They've become like little children, as you told them to."
"Stupid little children," Joshua said.

The Twelve, plus Biff and Maggie, help Josh bring his news of the kingdom to Judea. As the quote mentions, they really aren't the brightest group you'll ever find, but they have amazing faith. Among the highlights: Bart, who gave up being the village idiot of Jerusalem to follow (along with a good dozen or so dogs, who he disturbingly refers to as 'his disciples'), John, who wouldn't know what to do with a woman if his mother ordered her to cleave unto him, and Thomas, whose name means twin, and his imaginary friend, Thomas 2.

Azriel, the stupidest angel:
I've learned that there's a tradition in this time of telling funny stories about the stupidity of people with yellow hair. Guess where that started.

Azriel, former angel of death who was demoted after he let people like Noah and Moses linger on Earth for hundreds of years by telling him they were backed up on paperwork, was sent groundside to reincarnate Biff and make sure that he wrote up his new book of the New Testament. Azriel was also supposed to bring the good news to the shepherds in Bethlehem, but missed it by getting involved in a card game for ten years instead. He's good with weather (he helped with the plagues of Egypt) and showed up once to help Biff and Josh out when their ride on a boat had tossed Biff into the Sea of Galilee when he couldn't swim.

Biff still loathes him.

There are a bunch of other folks running around: Joy the concubine, Gaius the Centurion, John the Baptist (psycho...), all of Josh and Biff's brothers and sisters, Vana the elephant...the book is full of brilliant characters.


More Quotes

What makes this book so, so great is the writing. It's the kind of book that will get you looks on public transportation as you sit there giggling to yourself.

Some more examples:

"Please. You can't hit anyone, you have to be at total peace with all creation so you can find Sparky the Wonder Spirt."
"The Divine Spark."
"Whatever, th--ouch. Oh great, what am I supposed to do, hit the Messiah back?"
"Turn the other cheek. Go ahead, turn it."

"You broke the Sabbath," said the Pharisee.
"I'm allowed," said Josh. "I'm the Son of God."
"Oh fuck," Philip said.
"Way to ease them into the idea, Josh," I said.

"You've been in God's presence, right, Raziel?"
"Of course."
"Do you think he sounds like James Earl Jones?"
"Who's that?"
"Darth Vader."
Raziel listened for a moment while Darth Vader threatened someone. "Sure, a little. He doesn't breathe that heavy, though."

"…here's the gist of almost every sermon I ever heard Joshua give:

You should be nice to people, even creeps.
And if you:
a) believed that Joshua was the Son of God (and)
b) he had come to save you from sin (and)
c) acknowledged the Holy Spirit within you (became as a little child, he would say) (and)
d) didn't blaspheme the Holy Ghost (see c)
then you would:
e) live forever
f) someplace nice
g) probably heaven.
However, if you:
h) sinned (and/or)
i) were a hypocrite (and/or)
j) valued things over people (and)
k) didn't do a, b, c, and d
then you were
l) fucked"


Where can I find this book?

Amazon.com's got both the original and the special edition with gold leaf around the edge and a red ribbon down the middle to mark your page (I have both). Buy one for you, and one to hand out to your friends when you decide that they all must read this book, too. It's also the gateway drug to more of Chris Moore's work. He writes fantastic, wonderful crack.

Questions, comments, incredibly fake positions of the Kama Sutra to share?