Book Review: “Theophilos” by Michael O’Brien

Another work of art by Michael D. O’Brien. Yes, Theophilos, by Canadian author and painter Michael O’Brien is a multi-layered, erudite, yet very human story reaching back to the First Century. It is a literary exploration of the oral traditions – and of the Tradition – that gave rise to the Gospel According to St. Luke in particular and the New Testament in general.

Theophilos is different from O’Brien’s standard fare. He has written a lot about Christianity at the end times, but this book is about the very beginning of the Church.

In this Gospel “according to Theophilos,” O’Brien presents to us a wide panorama extending from Crete, into Greece, and then into Judea, to Nazareth and Jerusalem, of an investigation into the person and character of a certain “Yeshua,” acclaimed as “Mashiach” or “Christos “by some, and ridiculed and rejected by others. But no one was left unaffected by Him.

In this story, “Theophilos”– to whom St. Luke dedicated his Gospel and Acts of the Apostles – is “Loukas’” uncle, stepfather, and the one who taught the medicinal arts to the evangelist. Theophilos engages in his own exploration of the Nazarene, conducts interviews, and in the process we get to know him, as well as his life, family, friends, dreams and aspirations. We get an insight into Theophilos’ highly rational intellect, not unlike that of modern man and yet, placed in the context of his age without anachronisms. We also get a sweet profile of Loukas, the physician-evangelist who described Yeshua at the most humane.

We also find a Church that was Catholic, and very charismatic, and I mean charismatic in the sense of Pentecostal, filled with the Holy Spirit, brimming with charismata, liturgical, centered on the Eucharist, and proto-Marian. It was also a Church with dissenters, gossips, people who meant evil, and people who meant well but did or said silly things. In many ways, pretty much like today’s Church.

It was also a Jewish-Church, but one already opened to the gentiles in equality of membership. You see, like I like to say, Yeshua had torn down everything that separated men from the God of Israel. He had erased the boundaries. The election was Israel’s became now the heritage of every man who believed in Yeshua as God, Savior, and Messiah.

The novel is also a tour-de-force into classical studies in the context of the First Century Roman Empire. Several Greek myths are explored as well as the art of ancient medicine. Dark magical arts are also explored, but more in the context of the psyches that gave them birth, not the arts themselves. Also, Theophilos/O’Brien gives us a report on the state of mathematics, astronomy, navigation, weather prediction, wardrobes, and even cuisine in the First Century Levant. Types of cursive handwriting are also mentioned and, did you know there were seven qualities of papyri for sale in ancient stationery stores? I didn’t until I read this novel.

I highly recommend Theophilos. I don’t know any other way to say it! Like all his works, it’s full of light, wisdom, and peace. Read it, and become Theophilos yourself as He who is the Way, the Truth, and Life, comes to your encounter.