Roddenberry and the Biblical Allusions in TOS.

[Timewalker]

If Gene actually was an athiest, explain his Have Gun, Will Travel episode "The Hanging Cross."

Beliefs change. Writer's write. Gene Roddenberry was raised as a Southern Baptist but later rejected religion. Who knows what he really believed?

I'm unfamiliar with that episode, not to mention that entire show.

As mentioned previously, it is possible to be atheist and write about religious themes. People familiar with my views here and on a couple of other forums I've been part of for many years know I'm atheist and I don't budge. But I've also been working on a writing project in an alt-universe version of the 11th century in which I've basically thrown out real history so I don't have to shoehorn it into the computer game storyline I'm adapting to prose. This was also a way to avoid dealing with the religious aspects of life back then.

However, I do know that it would be unrealistic for people to not have some sort of religion in their lives in medieval times, so I created one. It's fairly benign as religions go - no instructions to kill or enslave "the other" and new knowledge is welcomed and used where practical.

The main characters in my story strive to better themselves, just as the main characters in Star Trek tend to want to become better people over the course of their lives, improving themselves in various ways.

I may not be able to write a serious Star Trek story to save my life, but it has influenced how I look at other things I write. Some things are just "the logical thing to do."

 

[Ssosmcin]

I found a recap of the episode: https://www.tvmaze.com/recaps/3654/have-gun-will-travel-the-hanging-cross-recap

It's a Christmas episode whose message is about choosing peace over violence, which certainly isn't something you need to be religious to believe in. It also seems like a bit of a riff on A Christmas Carol, a fairly routine formula of a protagonist teaching an antagonistic character the true meaning of Christmas and making their heart grow three sizes and whatnot. So it strikes me as a case of a young TV writer working to an established formula, nothing more.

The recap leaves out almost all of the religious symbolism, Paladin's speech to church goers and how his removal of the rope also included the removal of two supports so the hanging cross looks like the cross usually shown depicting the crucifixion. This episode is loaded with Christianity in the last half.

If you can find the episode, give it a look, because the "protagonist teaching an antagonistic character the true meaning of Christmas and making their heart grow three sizes and whatnot" example isn't really correct. The protagonist isn't moved by Paladin's words, his change of heart (refusal to slaughter a tribe) comes from getting his son back.

I watched this episode last week as part of my "Christmas Episodes" tradition and I didn't realize Roddenberry had written it until the end credits came up. I was surprised considering his later stance on religion. Unless he was assigned a "Christmas Episode" it's odd in retrospect that he came up with this one at all. Again, based on his later views.

 

[Shawnster]

I think a lot of people in the 50s and 60s changed their points of view and belief systems by the 70s and 80s

 

[Nerys Myk]

I've been an atheist most of my life, but I'm, pretty sure I could bang out a story heavy on Christianity and full of symbolism and allegory with ease for the Christmas season.

 

[Ssosmcin]

I've been an atheist most of my life, but I'm, pretty sure I could bang out a story heavy on Christianity and full of symbolism and allegory with ease for the Christmas season.

Sure but do you go around telling everyone what a devout atheist you are?

Just saying Roddenberry, in his later years, banged the drum pretty hard. So seeing a strongly Christian episode of a western with his name on it took me by surprise.

Hell, I could write a story about a vegan while enjoying my BLT. Writers write, as I said.

 

[Christopher]

The recap leaves out almost all of the religious symbolism, Paladin's speech to church goers and how his removal of the rope also included the removal of two supports so the hanging cross looks like the cross usually shown depicting the crucifixion. This episode is loaded with Christianity in the last half.

As we've been saying throughout this thread, that was just a basic part of the culture in the '60s. It's not a reflection of Roddenberry's personal belief, it's a reflection of the beliefs of the majority of the audience he was writing for, and of the executives and advertisers who decided whether he would continue to have a job writing for television. It was taken for granted that the target audience consisted of Christians and thus scripts had to be written to cater to their values and expectations. The kind of religious imagery you're talking about was the default, not the exception. It was just part of the landscape.

I think people today forget how restrictive the censorship was on TV in the '50s and '60s. The whole reason Rod Serling and Gene Roddenberry decided to go into doing science fiction shows is because the strict censorship imposed by execs and advertisers afraid to risk offending churchgoing Middle America prevented them from telling the issue-driven stories they wanted to tell, so they had to cloak them in allegory and pretend they were writing about aliens and fantasy worlds instead of commenting on war, racism, injustice, etc. in our own society. Sure, sometimes Westerns could be allegorical in the same way because they were set in the past instead of the present, but only up to a point.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

If Gene was not actually an atheist, then explain "The God Thing".

If he was an atheist all along--which is the packaged myth from certain fans and some behind certain Star Trek "history" books and documentaries, then explain the Scheimer account and the liberal Biblical references and characters stating belief in God on TOS, which was not the result of nonexistent NBC or sponsor mandates.

Roddenberry was not the Atheist Superman all along (nor was TOS--yes, the original vision of what Star Trek was intended to be) some con themselves into believing. The accounts of his beliefs during certain periods are posted/quoted in this thread, which flush the "Gene was an atheist all his life!!!" propaganda.

 

[Bea Jonas]

When it comes to God and the Enterprise, I've always loved this Harlan Ellison story from the ST:TMP era:

Paramount was looking for ideas for a mission that would be big enough to fly the Starship Enterprise from the TV screen to the Siver Screen. Big was the operative word.

A parade of revered science-fiction writers passed through the studio gates, but all their ideas were considered "not big enough".

Even Harlan Ellison's original pitch was deemed to lack the proper spectacle, so in a fit of pique, he made another proposal:

"The Enterprise," Ellison said, "goes through an interstellar warp, the great granddaddy of all interstellar warps. It's transported over a googol of light-years in the space of seconds and comes out at a huge gray wall. The wall marks the edge of the entire universe. Scotty rigs the phasers for a blast which will breach the wall so they can see what's beyond the edge of everything. Peering through at them, bathed in an incredible white light, is the face of God Himself."

A brief period of silence followed, after which the Paramount exec said, "It's not big enough. Didn't I just tell you guys to think really BIG?"

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

As for high schools and elementary schools, religion should be taught by the parents, not by a state-controlled school.

Agreed.

And I say this as a Christian.

 

[Joanna McCoy-Kirk]

What portions were taught as poetry?

IIRC, portions of the books of Ruth and Song of Solomon.

 

[Tuskin38]

My high school World Religion class was taught by an atheist.

He used a lot of neutral language when discussing them. wish I could give examples but I don't really remember any.

Also liked showing religious themed episodes of the Simpsons and other shows on Fridays, but mostly Simpsons.

 

[fireproof78]

My high school World Religion class was taught by an atheist.

He used a lot of neutral language when discussing them. wish I could give examples but I don't really remember any.

My college World Religions class was taught by a Buddhist. It was very fun, informational and I gained a lot from it. I still have copies of the Kabbalah, I'Ching, and some other scriptures, as well as the Bible I regularly study. He took the approach of the tale of the 6 blind men describing an elephant.

IIRC, portions of the books of Ruth and Song of Solomon.

I am also fortunate to have a Jewish uncle who provided me examples of Hebrew poetry and how translating such writings as the Psalms, Song of Songs/Song of Solomon in to English loses much of the poetry structure.

 

[Christopher]

My high school World Religion class was taught by an atheist.

Some of the most insightful writings I've seen about religion have come from atheists. Objectivity helps.

 

[Timewalker]

Some of the most insightful writings I've seen about religion have come from atheists. Objectivity helps.

There's someone on one of my gaming forums who started an "Ask a Theologian" thread. He's written multiple books about theology.

He's atheist, and very good at explaining things in a neutral, unbiased way.

 

[Noname Given]

If Gene was not actually an atheist, then explain "The God Thing".

And don't fporget TOS S2 Bread And Circuses <-- Which GR wrote himself.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

And don't fporget TOS S2 Bread And Circuses <-- Which GR wrote himself.

Not entirely. Gene Coon wrote part of it.

 

[Noname Given]

Not entirely. Gene Coon wrote part of it.

Yeah, I'm sure Gene Coon rewrote the ENTIRE premise...not.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Yeah, I'm sure Gene Coon rewrote the ENTIRE premise...not.

Coon could have written the parts that actually mentioned Jesus. Which is only like a couple of lines.

 

[Christopher]

Coon could have written the parts that actually mentioned Jesus. Which is only like a couple of lines.

That makes no sense. No matter who writes the shooting draft of a script, the showrunner still has final approval of its content and supervises every stage of its production. It's not like the other staffers could sneak things past him without him knowing. If it's in there, Roddenberry decided it should be in there. Not just once, but repeatedly throughout the writing, filming, and editing process, since it could've been cut at any of those stages. (Well, unless the network censors insisted on keeping it in. As I mentioned before, censorship in the '60s was very strict.)

In the case of "Bread and Circuses," it could simply be that Roddenberry was approaching Christianity not in terms of its religious meaning, but its historical influence. He accepted the conventional wisdom of Western history that Christianity transformed the Roman Empire and led to its fall, hence his alternate world where Rome never fell because Christianity didn't arise until 2000 years later. He didn't have to believe in God to believe that Christendom was morally superior to Ancient Roman paganism; he merely had to be ethnocentric enough to consider his own cultural tradition better than the alternatives.

Or maybe he just wrote his characters as having beliefs that the audience would agree with, whether or not he personally agreed with them. He may have slipped commentary under the censors' radar where he could, but he still knew what audience he was writing for and what they would accept.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

I can't source this, but I vaguely recall an anecdote in which "Bread and Circuses" was worked up or possibly even filmed while GR was away on a vacation or something, and when he got back to the office he wasn't thrilled with the Christ reference, but it was too late to undo it.

That might be a "corrupted file" stuck in my memory, or there might be something to it. I don't know.