Enter the Adversary

If you're going to talk to a group of children about Lent, I think you have to talk about the Temptations of Jesus because that's the whole point of Lent; and if you're going to talk about the Temptations you have to grapple with the fact that the narrative has the Devil in it. I note that the Lion Storyteller's Bible, which they use at the Infant School in Swanvale Halt, doesn't go anywhere near Jesus in the Wilderness, probably quite sensibly. Once having done Dante for six-year-olds, I, however, scorn such reasonable caution, and sail towards the rocks of controversy. 

You could retell the story and miss the Devil out completely but that seems a bit of a cop-out. It's not only unfaithful to Scripture, it poses certain dramatic problems. It's a bit like the Doctor Who story The Deadly Assassin which featured Tom Baker on his own without the usual companions to whom he could explain the plot, a situation which Baker quite liked but which forced the scriptwriter, the great Robert Holmes, to pen lots of scenes with the Doctor commenting on what was going on in a strangely absent-minded way. Take out the Devil and Jesus has to talk to himself a lot, and that's no less weird. But you don't want to give the Adversary an unwonted prominence, either.

The story of the Temptations tends to throw Christians into polarisation. Conservative believers like the Devil: they enjoy the sense of drama and challenge to modern modes of thought that the Enemy brings, and so they want to defend the idea that he was really, absolutely there in the Judaean wilderness, whispering in the Saviour's ear. Liberal Christians want to say, Well, that's how they understood things at that time, and now we know better. They want to interpret the story in internal, psychological terms, and recast the Devil not as the Tempter, but as the symbol of temptation. 

I made my peace with this when I realised that the Gospel writers themselves see Jesus's Temptations as a visionary experience. This is very clear from the way the story ends, either with Jesus on top of a mountain (Matthew) or even more dramatically the parapet of the Temple (Luke), whither the Devil has 'taken him', but from which he is not returned once the Devil disappears. It's as though, perhaps, Jesus shakes his head and the experience is over. It's not unreal - that is, it's more than just an internal debate in Jesus's own mind - but nor is it something which takes place in ordinary, physical reality. It's a vision, the kind of thing induced, and in many religious traditions deliberately induced, by long fasting and sensory deprivation. And there is no mountain from which you can see all the kingdoms of the world laid out, is there?

I sat with my folder of stories and told everyone how Jesus was weak and hungry and not sure what was happening to him, because I'm sure this is all true. He would have known the stories of the Devil and wondered whether this was who was talking to him. He rejects the ideas the Devil proposes to him, rebukes him, and finally goes to begin his work. I was happy with that solution to the problem. What the children made of it is another matter, of course.