Chester Brown adapted Gospel of Mark and part of the Gospel of Matthew to comics; installments appeared in his comic books Yummy Fur and Underwater . Brown ran the first installment of the Gospel of Mark in Yummy Fur #4 in 1987, and left Matthew unfinished after cancelling Underwater in 1997. Brown had planned to do all four of the canonical gospels, [1] but in 2011 stated that it is unlikely he will finish even Matthew. [2]
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Brown was brought up in a strictly Christian Baptist [1] household. [3] Over his career, he has gone back and forth between belief and non-belief in Christianity. [4] [5]
Brown took on his retelling of the Gospels to try to figure out what he really believed. [6]
| Issue | Date | Passages [7] |
|---|---|---|
| Yummy Fur # 4 | April 1987 | Mark 1:01-39 |
| Yummy Fur # 5 | June 1987 | Mark 1:40–3:12 |
| Yummy Fur # 6 | August 1987 | Mark 3:13–4:14 |
| Yummy Fur # 7 | 1987 [8] | Mark 5:1–6:6 |
| Yummy Fur # 8 | November 1987 | Mark 6:6–7:23 |
| Yummy Fur # 9 | March 1988 | Mark 7:24–8:21 |
| Yummy Fur #10 | May 1988 | Mark 8:22–9:13 |
| Yummy Fur #11 | July 1988 | Mark 9:14–10:34 |
| Yummy Fur #12 | September 1988 | Mark 10:35–12:27 |
| Yummy Fur #13 | November 1988 | Mark 12:28–14:52 |
| Yummy Fur #14 | January 1989 | Mark 14:53–16:20 |
Brown began his adaptation of the Gospel of Mark in issue #4 of Yummy Fur in 1987. It ran alongside his surreal, taboo-breaking Ed the Happy Clown serial, which led readers to expect a similar treat of the Gospel; [9] instead, he provided a straight adaptation, [9] [10] running to issue #14 of Yummy Fur. Brown lays out the story at six equal panels per page, each panel illustrating one verse of the Gospel of Mark. [9] On the final page of the final installment, Brown stops illustrating the story after Mark 16:8 , where the myrrhbearers flee Jesus's empty tomb. The final four panels are of an unnamed old man reciting the final verses against a black background. [11] These four panels are of what scholars believe is an extended ending to Mark's Gospel. [12]
The adaptation became more idiosyncratic as it developed: On pages 55 and 56 Brown wove into the story a passage from the Secret Gospel of Mark, a highly contentious and disputed document said to have been written by Clement of Alexandria that Professor Morton Smith claimed to have discovered in 1958.
Brown stated he had a large number of sources for his adaptation of Mark. The books he referred to most frequently were: [13]
The Gospel of Matthew started in issue #15 of Yummy Fur in 1989 and continued through to the premature end of Underwater in 1997. As of 2011, it has yet to be finished.
Brown's gospels gained a reputation for being "ingeniously blasphemous" mainly from his Matthew retellings. In contrast to Mark's Jesus, who is "serene and always in control," in Matthew he is a scowling, balding figure, and "there is a more radicalized disbelief and a greater focus on the fleshy and earthly aspects of the story." [14] Brown's depiction of the Matthew's version of the Saviour is "a Jesus that shouts. He's a Jesus that screams", his face "haggard and worn, his dark hair matted and stringy". [3]
The disciples are depicted as awkward, fearful and full of doubt, who are "barely able to reconcile the greatness of God with the miseries of their existence". [3]
As Brown has pointed out, starting with the full-issue installment of Matthew in Yummy Fur #32, he deliberately changed Jesus's third-person references to himself to first-person references in the dialogue. [15]
Amongst the books Brown cited for his Matthew adaptation are:
Matthew has been on hiatus since 1997, with the story left with Jesus about to enter Jerusalem. Brown had long said he planned on coming back to the story, but in an interview at The Comics Journal in 2011, he said he would not likely finish it, as his heart was no longer in it. [2] He stated they were "poorly done". [11]
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The Gospel adaptations have generally been well-accepted by fans and critics. John Bell calls them Brown's most important uncollected work. [17]
To Francis Hwang of City Pages , "the paradox of faith is brilliantly, heartbreakingly depicted" in the Gospel of Matthew. [3]
Religious and biblical elements have found their way into almost all of Brown's work:
The Gospel of Mark is the second of the four canonical gospels and of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells of the ministry of Jesus from his baptism by John the Baptist to his death, burial, and the discovery of his empty tomb. There is no miraculous birth or doctrine of divine pre-existence, nor, in the original ending, any post-resurrection appearances of Jesus. It portrays Jesus as a teacher, an exorcist, a healer, and a miracle worker. He refers to himself as the Son of Man. He is called the Son of God, but keeps his messianic nature secret; even his disciples fail to understand him. All this is in keeping with Christian interpretation of prophecy, which is believed to foretell the fate of the messiah as suffering servant. The gospel ends, in its original version, with the discovery of the empty tomb, a promise to meet again in Galilee, and an unheeded instruction to spread the good news of the Resurrection of Jesus.
The Gospel of Matthew is the first book of the New Testament of the Bible and one of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells how Israel's Messiah, Jesus, comes to his people but is rejected by them and how, after his resurrection, he sends the disciples to the gentiles instead. Matthew wishes to emphasize that the Jewish tradition should not be lost in a church that was increasingly becoming gentile. The gospel reflects the struggles and conflicts between the evangelist's community and the other Jews, particularly with its sharp criticism of the scribes and Pharisees with the position that through their rejection of Christ, the Kingdom of God has been taken away from them and given instead to the church.
Gospel originally meant the Christian message, but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was reported. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words and deeds of Jesus, culminating in his trial and death and concluding with various reports of his post-resurrection appearances. Modern biblical scholars are cautious of relying on the gospels uncritically, but nevertheless, they provide a good idea of the public career of Jesus, and critical study can attempt to distinguish the original ideas of Jesus from those of the later Christian authors.
Chester William David Brown is a Canadian cartoonist.
Yummy Fur (1983–1994) was a comic book by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. It contained a number of different comics stories which dealt with a wide variety of subjects. Its often-controversial content led to one printer and one distributor refusing to handle it.
John 2 is the second chapter of the Gospel of John in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It contains the famous stories of the miracle of Jesus turning water into wine and Jesus expelling the money changers from the Temple. The author of the book containing this chapter is anonymous, but early Christian tradition uniformly affirmed that John composed this gospel.
Mark 2 is the second chapter of the Gospel of Mark in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. In this chapter, the first arguments between Jesus and other Jewish religious teachers appear. Jesus heals a paralyzed man and forgives his sins, meets with the disreputable Levi and his friends, and argues over the need to fast, and whether or not one can harvest food on Sabbath.
Mark 5 is the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Mark in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. Taken with the calming of the sea in Mark 4:35–41, there are "four striking works [which] follow each other without a break": an exorcism, a healing, and the raising of Jairus' daughter.
The Playboy is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown, serialized in 1990 in Brown's comic book Yummy Fur and collected in different revised book editions in 1992 and 2013. It deals with Brown's guilt and anxiety over his obsessive masturbation to Playboy Playmate models.
I Never Liked You is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. The story first ran between 1991 and 1993 under the title Fuck, in issues #26–30 of Brown's comic book Yummy Fur; published in book form by Drawn & Quarterly in 1994. It deals with the teenage Brown's introversion and difficulty talking to others, especially members of the opposite sex—including his mother. The story has minimal dialogue and is sparsely narrated. The artwork is amongst the simplest in Brown's body of work—some pages consist only of a single small panel.
Matthew 9 is the ninth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament and continues the narrative about Jesus' ministry in Galilee as he ministers to the public, working miracles, and going through all the cities and towns of the area, preaching the gospel, and healing every disease. This chapter opens with Jesus back in "his own town", i.e. Capernaum.
Luke 5 is the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament of the Christian Bible, traditionally attributed to Luke the Evangelist, a companion of Paul the Apostle on his missionary journeys. The chapter relates the recruitment of Jesus' first disciples and continues to describe Jesus' teaching and healing ministry. Early criticism from the Jewish religious authorities is encountered as the chapter progresses.
In the New Testament, the Sanhedrin trial of Jesus refers to the trial of Jesus before the Sanhedrin following his arrest in Jerusalem and prior to the trial before Pontius Pilate. It is an incident reported by all three Synoptic Gospels of the New Testament, while the Gospel of John refers to a preliminary inquiry before Annas. The gospel accounts vary on a number of details.
Ed the Happy Clown is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown. Its title character is a large-headed, childlike children's clown who undergoes one horrifying affliction after another. The story is a dark, humorous mix of genres and features scatological humour, sex, body horror, extreme graphic violence, and blasphemous religious imagery. Central to the plot are a man who cannot stop defecating; the head of a miniature, other-dimensional Ronald Reagan attached to the head of Ed's penis; and a female vampire who seeks revenge on her adulterous lover who had murdered her to escape his sins.
Vortex Comics is a Canadian independent comic book publisher that began operation in 1982. Under the supervision of president, publisher, and editor Bill Marks, Vortex was known for such titles as Dean Motter's Mister X, Howard Chaykin's Black Kiss, and Chester Brown's Yummy Fur, the last of which was a pioneer of alternative comics. Vortex also earned a reputation for publishing Canadian comic book creators such as Brown, Ty Templeton, Ken Steacy, and Jeffrey Morgan.
The historical reliability of the Gospels is the reliability and historic character of the four New Testament gospels as historical documents. While all four canonical gospels contain some sayings and events which may meet one or more of the five criteria for historical reliability used in biblical studies, the assessment and evaluation of these elements is a matter of ongoing debate. Virtually all scholars of antiquity agree that a human Jesus existed, but scholars differ on the historicity of specific episodes described in the biblical accounts of Jesus, and the only two events subject to "almost universal assent" are that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and was crucified by the order of the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate. Elements whose historical authenticity is disputed include the two accounts of the Nativity of Jesus, the miraculous events including the resurrection, and certain details about the crucifixion.
The Little Man: Short Strips 1980–1995 is a collection of short works by award-winning Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown, published by Drawn & Quarterly in 1998. It collects most of Brown's non-graphic novel short works up to that point, with the notable exception of his incomplete adaptations of the Gospels.
Underwater was an alternative comic book by award-winning Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown that was published from 1994 until 1997, when the ambitious project was abandoned unfinished by its creator.
Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown attracted the attention of critics and peers in the early 1990s alternative comics world when he began publishing autobiographical comics in his comic book Yummy Fur. During this period Brown produced a number of short strips and two graphic novels: The Playboy (1992) and I Never Liked You (1994). The personal and revealing deal with Brown's social awkwardness and introversion, and the artwork and page layouts are minimal and organic. In 2011 Brown returned to autobiography with Paying for It, an account of his experience with prostitutes.
Mary Wept Over the Feet of Jesus is a graphic novel by Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown, published in 2016. The book is subtitled Prostitution and Religious Obedience in the Bible, and is made up of adaptations of stories from the Bible that Brown believes promote pro-prostitution attitudes among early Christians.
Brown's Mark does not read like the work of someone who is challenging received wisdom but an exercise in illustration.
