Posted by Isis at d4172.dialup.cornell.edu on April 03, 2000 at 14:33:01:
In Reply to: Wasn't Bethany the "stand in" christ, and then she posted by Darth Dobbin on April 03, 2000 at 13:58:15:
While I can't follow all of it, I still like your reasoning.
: became a Mary figure when the Metatron touched her belly and gave her the "real deal" 2nd coming bun in the oven?
Now, this is really fascinating. Because I was going to add that I didn't think there was a Mary character in "Dogma" either, really, but Bethany does seem to combine the two. Earthly sinful person touched by the divine and all that.
: My whole take on it was that being "the christ" is a role that gets passed from "owner" to "owner," in more or less degrees. In DOGMA'S cosmology, it seemed that JC was the 1st "full blown" messiah, but his scions have been keeping the flame, and in part, the super-powers, up until Bethany and her progeny.
I like that theory, as it fits better with the original idea of a messiah as a spiritual leader rather than a universal savior.
: Dunno. There was also a big angle on the whole "observer created reality" aspect that made any one "definition" or aspect of faith only accurate according to the relative position of its proponent. Which is to say that the golf club was "holy" because of the brute power of all that ambient faith, which according to its edicts, granted the power of belssing to the clergy.
: Wasn't that the whole point of the Plenary Indulgances being central to the plot? That "dogma," although man-created, becomes concrete and a "fact," and leaves "artifacts" of past paradigms, or paradoxical "rulesets" that must be obeyed because of the reflexive nature of faith? (What you hold true on earth, etc?)
Whoa. That's very interesting, and it's something I completely did not get about "Dogma". So if belief is strong enough in translates into reality? If there is enough invested faith in something it becomes holy?
I think I missed the point of this movie altogether, I'm just not getting it. Is dogma true, false, or true in the believer's mind? How can an eternal realm (heaven) be bound by a temporary one (earth)?
And isn't the idea that dogma is concrete disproved when God shows up? Bartleby passes through the gate, taking advantage of the indulgence, but God stops him. I thought the purpose of that was to illustrate that God is above being bound by dogma.
-- Isis
Pass the wine & reel in the line, JC...this is getting too deep for me.