Biblical Themes in Science Fiction ed. by Nicole L. Tilford and Kelly J. Murphy (review)

Reviewed by: Biblical Themes in Science Fiction ed. by Nicole L. Tilford and Kelly J. Murphy John Anthony Dunne nicole l. tilford and kelly j. murphy (eds. ), Biblical Themes in Science Fiction (Bible and Its Reception 6; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2023). Pp. viii + 271. Paper 39. Biblical Themes in Science Fiction offers ten essays (plus an introduction and an afterword) on several biblical themes that recur throughout various media of science fiction (sci-fi), broadly conceived, including literature, comics, film, TV, and video games. In their introduction, the editors, Nicole L. Tilford and Kelly J. Murphy, provide a scholarly justification for the volume, accounting for some similarities between the Bible and sci-fi, before providing an overview of the volume's contents ("Introduction, " pp. 1–13). The main essays are centrally structured in a tripartite manner, with one exception (noted below). The structure entails, first, a summary of the theme as it appears in biblical literature (and/or as developed by later reading communities) ; second, an overview of that theme's reappearance across the history of sci-fi media; and, third, a closer look at the End Page 416 development of the chosen theme in one exemplar. Some essays offer more sustained focus on one of the three sections than on others, but the general method makes the volume's treatment overall feel fairly cohesive and comprehensive. Space prohibits extended discussion on each essay, and not least of all the sci-fi stories that the contributors select to attest to the genre's engagement of biblical themes, but I will highlight each essay's key sci-fi example. Krista N. Dalton ("Adam, Eve, and Lilith, " pp. 15–33) addresses how Lilith traditions disrupt ancient social boundaries prescribed in the creation accounts of Genesis 1–3, and also those of modern society, as seen with respect to race in Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis trilogy (New York: Grand Central, 1987–1989), or Lilith's Brood (New York: Warner Books, 1987–1989). In "The Tower of Babel" (pp. 35–56), Tom de Bruin shows that sci-fi examines the audacity associated with constructing the primeval tower and, more prominently, the curse of mixed languages, as seen particularly in Samuel Delany's novel Babel-17 (New York: Ace Books, 1966), which explores how language helps us reimagine a world with unity and diversity (p. 52). Tilford's essay, "Noah's Ark" (pp. 57–84), highlights how ark narratives from antiquity onward probe what aspects of humanity are worth saving in the face of utter destruction (p. 68), including several episodes of Doctor Who, with the most recent example ("The Beast Below, " 2010) displaying how compassion, rather than ingenuity, will ultimately save humanity (p. 80). Rhonda Burnette-Bletsch assesses patriarchal handmaids from Genesis in her essay, "The Handmaid" (pp. 85–101), contending that themes in the Sarah/Hagar narrative illuminate Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale (the 1985 novel and cinematic adaptations), even though the story overtly draws upon the example of Rachel and Bilhah. Steven J. Schweitzer, in his essay, "The Utopian City" (pp. 103–19), notes how the biblical traditions about Zion and Jerusalem are subverted in The Matrix trilogy (1999, 2003), since the utopian city is revealed to be a dystopia. Jackie Wyse-Rhodes's essay, "The Land" (pp. 121–43), investigates how sci-fi handles the notion of people contending for a land that already belongs to others and then losing that land (p. 129), delving in particular into Margaret Atwood's MaddAddam trilogy (Oryx and Crake; The Year of the Flood; MaddAddam, 2003, 2009, 2013), which exhibits how a sense of being in exile can persist even within one's homeland. In "Babylon" (pp. 145–66), Jason A. Staples traces biblical imagery about the archetypal enemy of God's people, and demonstrates how the 1927 film Metropolis employs that biblical symbolism to critique a corrupt futuristic city benefiting from labor abuse. Frank Bosman strays from the tripartite structure to offer a typology of "Messiah/Christ" figures in video games (pp. 167–86), which include Common Heroes, Self-Sacrificial Heroes, Messianic Heroes, and Christophoric Gamers (the latter being exclusive to the medium of video games through the involvement of the. . .