Against Lore

Sometime around AD 150, a reader of the Christian Gospels became frustrated with a number of unanswered questions. What was Jesus like as a child? How was Mary treated as an unmarried pregnant woman? What role did Joseph play in Jesus’ boyhood? This early Bible reader decided to take matters into his own hands, filling in the gaps himself. The result is a wacky piece of Jesus fan fiction called “The Protoevangelion of James,” a book in which Mary gives birth in a cave, the fetal Jesus skips the birth canal altogether and magically appears in Mary’s arms, and a midwife who doubts Mary’s continued virginity and loses her hand to leprosy as punishment. The story became so popular that lots of copies were made, and some of them survive today. It’s one of the non-canonical gospels that scholars frequently mention, narratives about Jesus’ life that seem to be composed to satisfy the curiosities of Jesus’ expanding fanbase.

That same impulse, to assert ownership of a story to answer questions it didn’t intend to answer, is alive and well today. The self-proclaimed nerdy and geeky corners of the internet call it “lore,” the background stories behind our pop-culture artifacts that drive the engagement of fans with their franchises.

At best, lore keeps a good thing going for people who love a certain world or worldview. Our minds might think of Star Trek and Star Wars fans gathering at conventions, reading fan magazines, and devouring licensed-but-not-canon extended universe books, but we could argue that great works of literature also function as works of lore. Homer’s Odyssey continues the mythos of the Trojan War, Dante’s Inferno expands on the Bible’s understanding of hell, and Milton’s Paradise Lost plumbs the mind of Satan himself. Sequels, prequels, and spinoffs aren’t just a modern phenomenon, nor are they always of such high caliber. (There’s a reason why many sequels were sold direct-to-video and skipped theatrical release in the pre-streaming era. A Goofy Movie 2 is not worth your time.)

If it were simply about expanding a beloved universe of stories, lore would be fine, I would think. That’s not exactly the case. The Inferno is filled with images of Dante’s political enemies suffering eternally in the depths of hell. The Odyssey contains reflections on the Greek pantheon of Gods that showcases a growing Greek resentment for their flippancy. The Satan of Paradise Lost is a sort of sympathetic antihero that romanticizes opposition to God. The desire for lore is rarely rooted in a desire to know more but rather a desire to control the narrative.

The most prominent example of lore and control might be this recent final season of the Netflix show Stranger Things. The show has been panned for ditching its ’80s sci-fi horror premise for “fan service,” trading thoughtful storytelling art in favor of plot and character development that fans want to see. The finale granted them their requests — even though it made for an uninteresting and drama-free conclusion to the show. The desire for more and more lore  insisted upon by legions of superfans turned the franchise into a show that is only for the superfans, alienating casual viewers and critics alike. Fan service has been criticized for the decline in Marvel movie popularity, the struggle of the Star Trek franchise to reboot into relevance, the growing banality of anime, and the collapse of Disney’s management of the Star Wars franchise.

The quest for lore exists in more places than we care to admit. What else is sports media but a constant search for stories behind games, lore about athletes or teams that raises the stakes of any particular match? What is celebrity gossip but an attempt to expand the lore behind a pop star or movie actor? It is not enough to know if the athlete is excellent or the singer is talented, we must know if they are like us, on our team, and worth our attention and admiration. Eventually, we expect them to also take our direction as well.

One of the hardest truths about the Christian gospel is that it resists, perhaps even extinguishes, the quest for lore. There’s something resolutely final about Jesus breathing his exhausted “It is finished” as he dies upon the cross. His accompanying declarations of forgiveness and mercy are resolute, water under the bridge, never to be rehashed or resorted. The last words of the canonical Bible are “Don’t add any words to this book, and don’t take any away,” words written in Revelation that apply to the whole thing. No sequels, no prequels, no special editions: take the story as it is or move on.

That hasn’t stopped many from within the Christian tradition from trying to expand upon the story or make it their own. Hence: the non-canonical gospels. But more than this, the assertion that there are gaps to be filled in the story of God or the need to hear God’s word tailored explicitly to our times has fueled all sorts of prophecy and declaration. That’s not to criticize anyone’s active and imminent experience of the Holy Spirit in their lives but to instead cast skepticism on projects that suggest we need something more than Jesus’ death and resurrection, his promise to return to judge the world, and his word of forgiveness. As an old hymn asks, “What more can he say than to you he has said, to you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?”

One of the great joys of life is receiving the gift of a story that is unexpectedly enthralling. There is nothing like picking up a book or watching a movie recommendation and finding yourself completely charmed and captivated. In 2025, I had this experience with the second season of Andor and Knives Out: Wake Up Dead Man. Both arrived unbidden and without some sort of lore or fan expectation, and both brought me to tears, uplifting beauty and truth and goodness as only a good work of fiction can accomplish. Andor, of course, takes place in the Star Wars universe, and one of the worst aspects of the otherwise excellent show is that the fanbase immediately began to craft and speculate on the lore of the series. Who needs lore? Can’t we just enjoy the show for what it is? (Remind me to skip the online forums next time I fall in love with a new series.)

There is the world we want to exist and the world that exists. There are the things that we wish we knew, the things that we can know, and the things we won’t know. The human spirit is to believe that we can control the outcomes of a story that we are not in charge of telling, a drive that existed in antiquity as much as it does today. As the Big Book of AA describes it, many of life’s problems come from being an actor that is bucking against the instruction of a director, insisting that the story is ours to tell when we’ve only been asked to play a part.

Practically, the quest for lore manifests as grouchy fans, resentful at the invisible machinations of the entertainment industry, cursing authors of incomplete sequels and hastily composing fan fiction outlining the way things should have been. Spiritually, it cuts us off from the impromptu work of God, who often circumvents our expectations to deliver us goodness and mercy through surprise. Lore is the opposite of joy, and if you’ve spent any time with a rabid fan, you’ll know exactly what I am talking about.

Life is much better when we put down the quill and pick up the script. Grace is a director guiding you along for the part you were meant to play. And the joy of it all is that when the ending comes, it will be as satisfying as any we could hope or imagine. No lore necessary.