Graphic Novel Bible

My project- what do people think? I'd like reactions, critiques, biblical correction, prayer and helpful suggestions.

My name is Alex Morgan I’m at the Newfrontiers church in Bristol

I feel compelled to do an unabridged Graphic novel of the Bible, i have decided to start in the book of judges as it stories lend themselves well to comic style action.

The qualities of my project are thus…

aimed at adults, young adults and teens aged 15+
-very historically accurate
-not shying away from the more unsavoury events and issues
-representing the true ethnicity (i.e. no white Jesus)

Below I have posted the first completed page. I plan to add additional pages as i go, so everyone can comment and give critique.

As this is the first page I will also annotate the work so you can see how the sort of things involved with the project.

Panel 1 = Manoah milks a goat, because i wanted to show and everyday work activity and based on later verses about sacrificing a goat and Samson’s gift of a goat to his new bride I concluded they must have at least a couple of goat- the breed is Cretan wild, thought to be the type in the middle east at that time, it as a nanny goat so ‘relatively’ small horns. 

The bowl the goat is eating from and the jug he’s using for the milk are a shape consistent with the archeologically record of the period.

Manoah is dressed on a robe, typical of the period, as depicted in Egyptian reliefs of battle of Kadesh for the Hapiru (Hebrew) people. He and his wife have blue accessories, as each if the clans of Israel have a colour (and gem stone) that is linked to them- for tribe on Dan the colour is blue

Each clan also has an icon that represents them (i.e. the ‘lion’ of Judah) Dan’s icon is a Snake- thus Manoah has a gold snake bracelet. In my graphic novel I plan to run certain themes throughout the book. One is the appearance of the characters, I decided to make all men and woman in each clan to look like their patriarch, (Judah, Rueben, gad etc.) in this case, Danites (in my comic) have tall slim faces, tend towards baldness and the men have a small thin goatee beards.

The trees in the background of all these images are the type of trees that grow in Zorah today (so I guess they were there then too.)

Zorah is Hebrew for Hornet so I have a little hornet flying by as well as one might assume that if the place is called Hornets as there are Hornets in the area. The type of hornet is an oriental
hornet, with yellow stripe tail and dark orangey body

Panel 2 = Manoah’s wife possessing the same long thin face, wearing blue, and carrying a basket of ripe figs. Figs are harvested in Israel in the month of September, I am basing the events in September as the baby prophesied is Samson, Samson mean Sun, or Sunny. So a possibility that he was born in the Summer (maybe June) 9 months earlier is September - obviously this is all conjecture but the is no information to the contrary.

The little goat is there for fun, and also to foreshadow the kid scarified later in this chapter (a goat less than 1 yr old due to Levitical law)

Panel 3 = The Angel of the Lord is depicted as a human in a robe, his face is concealed, the depiction is a match for the image of the messenger/ Jesus in Rev 1 (white hair, gold sash…) , ascribing this appearance as a Christophony but in a slightly subtle way. The appearance is ‘mundane’ as Manoah doesn’t even realise the angel of the Lord is not a man. When he is transfigured at the end of the verse we will see his divine nature.

Speech is green in a green bubble as the green/teal colour represents things that are of the Spirit or in spirit form, for example in the Balaam’s donkey tail the angel who is invisible would be drawn in green/teal and slightly see through, but when the angel appears to Balaam it would be in full colour with black lines.

The woman drops the fruit is shock.

Panel 4 = The angel hovers up in a sort of manifested power, the wind blows, and the background world bends around him as his presence sort of warps reality (causing her to say later he was awesome, but not define why) Again he speaks in green.

The perspective has the angel pointing at the ‘camera’ this is intended to bring a more immediate action but also subconsciously put ‘you’ (the reader) in the place of the woman being prophesied over.

The narration leads us to a new scene

Panel 5 = The woman exclaims to Manoah what happened, as the text does not flow very well in English I split it into a string of small statement, to give the impression she’s in shock just blurting out exclamations. He looks confused and surprised possibly a little annoyed,.

He is decanting the milk inside, he is illuminated by an oil burning lantern (unseen) hence the orange light

Their home is depicted as a Bedouin tent for several reasons; the text refers to this area as the Camp of Dan. Also, in archaeology, bible sceptic state that there was no settlement of Israel in Canaan at this time as very little archaeological evidence can be found (i.e. buildings) but obviously as they were mostly tent dwellers of course there is no record.

Panel 6 = The ‘camera’ zooms in to get a more personal feel, The woman speaks intimately to Manoah, she tells him the prophesy, and he wells up with emotion and has a look of amazed astonishment.

Panel 7 = Manoah falls to his knees and prays, tears streaming (tears or happiness, relief, hope etc) his wife equally moved, cuddles into him and supports him as he prays. His prayer is a request so I’ve depicted him sort of pleading to God.

In the background you can see an urn and jug which is again linked archeologically to this period.

At the food of the panel i conclude the scene with the statement ‘God heard Manoah’. This is actually the start of the following verse but i use it to bookend this scene, and lead in the next scene which happens another day.