Great Story, Never Told

In 2000, ABC's Peter Jennings gave us "The Search for Jesus," a television special in which for the most part channeled the Jesus Seminar-that coven of iconoclastic New Testament scholars who contend that Jesus of Nazareth didn't say or do many of the things reported in the Gospels. Jenning's new "Jesus and Paul: The Word and the Witness," shows Jesus and Paul, but also a Jennings chastened perhaps by the criticism he got four years ago for leaning so heavily on skeptics: "Jesus and Paul" is far more balanced, and more respectful of traditional beliefs, about the man whom Christians call savior.

The Jesus Seminar cabal is back, of course. Its founder, Robert Funk, appears, as does his former co-chair, John Dominic Crossan, propagating his theory that Jesus' body was eaten by wild dogs. But Jennings has taken care to include many more conservative Christians among his scholarly commentators, including, most notably, the respected evangelical Ben Witherington and Luke Timothy Johnson, a Catholic, to complement N.T. Wright, the Anglican Bishop of Durham, who back in 2000 was practically the only traditionalist Christian in Jennings' lineup.

Jennings also tackles the matter of Jesus' resurrection reverently--although he can't resist flashing the images of Easter MTV-style across the screen to the accompaniment of rock music. This bow to fashion is pardonable in a show that consists mostly of cameos by New Testament scholars issuing soundbites. Those who can parse the allusions in "The Passion" will recognize these scholars as celebrities in the field (Elaine Pagels of the best-selling "Beyond Belief," "Passion" pooh-pooher Paula Fredriksen and Episcopalian Bishop John Shelby Spong, who disbelieves in the divinity of Christ) as well as some less known but no less impressive academics like Rodney Stark, Alan Segal and E.P. Sanders. But the rest of ABC's Monday night audience may need a stirring rock chorus or two to hang in there.

What most harms this documentary look is that Jennings can't seem to take the New Testament seriously as a historical or a theological source. Without the backbone of that widely shared conviction, "Jesus and Paul" serves up thin, superficial gruel. The long segments on Paul are downright boring, even though the Bible's version of Paul of Tarsus was one of the most colorful and best-documented of early Christian figures.

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