That Time of Year Again

If you watch enough History Channel, Science Channel, National Geographic and or History International around the holidays (mainly Christmas and Easter) you're likely to stumble across at least a couple of shows aimed at examining the possible historical facts around Biblical events. These always struck me as interesting, not so much for their content, but for the idea of them. In a very real way, knowledge obviates faith to the degree that you don't need to believe in things unseen once you can actually see them. Now, it's unlikely that the History Channel will ever manage to score an exclusive interview with God, or get an Angel on film. So the big aspects of faith are safe from the media machine.

But I have always been fascinated by the work (and the contortions) that people are willing to put into searching for concrete evidence of the truth of human legends and stories. I'm a bit disappointed that myths and legends outside of Judeo-Christian canon are generally unexplored, however, unless the Ancient Aliens crowd is involved, or they're taken as corroborating evidence of something in the Bible.