A book report about the novel Joshua by Joseph F. Girzone. Joshua is quite like Jesus, and must work through a very similar but modern-like experience of Jesus' troubles.

Joshua

A Parable for Today

By Joseph F. Girzone

- How does Joshua prove the difficulty in living a true Christian life in the present?

At first, I would like to point out that it is quite obvious that Joshua is in fact the 20th century version of Jesus Christ. It is most obvious from early on, when he first introduces himself as a carpenter. Next, he heals that little girl, and then walks through town with that large log on his shoulder, which I guess could be symbolic of the cross Jesus carried. Then there was the man who came to help Joshua, but could not for it was too heavy. That seems awfully symbolic of Simon trying to help Jesus carry the cross.

Then, later in the novel, the miracles began to pile up. Joshua healed a blind girl and enabled her to see, as Jesus did. Joshua also revived the dead boy, Michael, after he had taken a deadly fall down a flight of stairs on the ship Joshua was on. Not only that, but Joshua also de-paralyzed the Cardinal after he had a stroke during Joshua's "trial" in Vatican City in Rome, Italy. I must say, the symbolisms were clear and strong.

Getting down to business, it was quite clear that the simplicity of Joshua's lifestyle, and not the complexity of others', was the factor that confused many in the small town of Auburn. We as people of modern times consider simplicity to be much better than bigger, and more complex, problems, lifestyles, etc., but in this case, it ends up hurting Joshua. Because Joshua does not have a nice fancy house, expensive cars and furniture, a television, or electricity for that matter...because Joshua does not posses all of these modern luxuries, he is automatically crowned a "weirdo" and "strange" by many--but not all (modern day apostles?). The clergyman of the Catholic Church and its divisions (i.e. the Protestant church) become automatically suspicious of the way Joshua thinks. It seems awfully symbolic of the Romans suspicions of Jesus, as the Son of God.

Just like how Jesus got into trouble for speaking his mind, Joshua also gets in trouble in the same, exact way. People ask for his advice about things, and he gives his answer, passionately. He tells them that he thinks the church as an organization and an institution is in fact scaring its followers, instead of nurturing them. In the end, Joshua is "tried" for his outrageous beliefs by Cardinal Riccardo and the Pope at the Vatican in Rome. Although the Cardinal defends him, all of the other cardinals, as well as the Pope, do not. This seems to be a reoccurring theme throughout the novel--few in a large group of disbelievers and skeptics change sides.

All of the facts I have presented above bring me down to my last statement: It is virtually impossible to live following Jesus' words without running into constant and powerful opposition. Joshua lives Jesus' words to the fullest extent and still is not considered a normal man. The same thing happens to Jesus. Hopefully through my analysis of the novel and its extremely familiar plot, you can see what I saw in Joshua and in the novel as a whole.

In conclusion, I think Girzone is trying to teach us that extremely religious people, such as Joshua (and Jesus, too), are not exactly strangely different, but are merely misunderstood in their own time.