The Wonderland of Knowledge deals with all topics, whether they be large (World War II) or small (hummingbirds (and I’m assuming here, because the person who threw out the seven volumes that I have either threw it out earlier or kept Volume 7 for some reason).

With this in mind, and because it’s just plain apropo for December 24th, I present to you this encyclopedia’s take on what I would call a large topic: “Jesus Christ.”

The first image you are greeted with in this entry is one that I would consider “cheery,” especially when one considers the many gruesome choices that come to mind first.

“The wary travelers enter Bethlehem, their “home town,” to be counted in the census, after a 90-mile journey from Nazareth. Here, Jesus was born.”

Okay. The “home town” here is a bit odd. Are the quotes included because the phrase “home town” didn’t exist at 8 B.C. or does The Wonderland of Knowledge suspect that Mary and Joseph were lying? 

“Yeah, they made this Jesus guy, but I don’t think they’re on the up and up. I don’t even know if that there Bethlehem was even their home town.” (That was me, writing as if I was a guy writing for the encyclopedia. It’s called character work. Read that with a “tough guy” accent in your mind.)

And then, as is par for the course with this encyclopedia, the rest of the entry is handled with it’s usual tact and grace.

Just kidding, it’s incredibly dismissive of any beliefs that don’t jive with those of the editorial staff.

First, at any point in the entry for Jesus in which the pronouns “he,” “him,” or “his,” appear they are capitalized, which is fine in a Bible. But it just seems weird in an encyclopedia that really shouldn’t have any stake as to who the one true god is. Also, it just looks weird grammatically.

Secondly, the entry gives a summary of Jesus’ life based only on the Bible, which makes perfect sense. It’s the most solid document of his experiences since he only updated his Blogger once after creating it and forgetting about it. However, The Wonderland of Knowledge never acknowledges that these things are from the Bible and simply reports them as if they were from The Nazarean Observer-Picayune (the newspaper of record in Jesus’ time (I have to get my print media jokes in now before it dies next year.)).

Overall, the entry on Jesus seems rather biased and doesn’t leave a lot space for interpretation. But then again, the sentence “Jesus began to be feared and hated by other Jews,” just goes to show that there’s room for everyone in The Wonderland of Knowledge’s Big Tent.

“Happy holidays!” from The Wonderland of Knowledge (but really, “Merry Christmas”)!