According to G. K. Chesterton, only serious matters like marriage or death are worthy of jokes! That is, if we take these subjects seriously. That being the case, if we take our faith seriously, then the subject of Christianity should provide ample materials for good jokes and a hearty laugh. Otherwise, there is nothing in our faith or religion that we can joke about. Or should joke about.

However, most people do not take the Christian faith or religion seriously. At least not for themselves anyway. For example, Hollywood and the mass media often portray Christianity as narrow, conservative, and fundamental and they lampoon religious characters. But neither really takes religion seriously.

Humor happens in the tension between the sublime and the ridiculous, the serious and the profane. It becomes meaningful when we share common assumptions and beliefs about the subject matter. It is the shared assumption and the sense of community that provide the context for the joke or satire to be understood and appreciated. Otherwise, we may feel offended and discriminated against.

We laugh at the same thing because we share not only the same assumptions but the same feelings about the world. Laughing together both expresses and satisfies our longing for intimacy. Many a times, when I tell a joke in my talk, it backfires because my listeners and I do not share similar assumptions or experiences. Rather than establishing a connection, I could have actually alienated myself from my audience as they found the joke silly or even in bad taste. If not for the fact that most audiences are quite forgiving and really do desire the speaker to succeed!

Here is an illustration of how a joke can connect with the listeners when we share a similar point of view. How many Presbyterians does it take to change a light bulb? Ten. One to change it, and nine to say how much better the old one was. This joke can be told among Presbyterians as a way of acknowledging a shared experience. Of course, it works just as well with Baptists, Lutherans or virtually any group — organizational resistance to change being universal.

Here is how the same joke can be even more effective. How many Presbyterians does it take to change a light bulb? Ten. Eight to form the light bulb committee and two to count the votes.

This joke is more effective as it identifies something more peculiar to the Presbyterian ethos: it relies on a more specific kind of shared knowledge. In any case, when people laugh together at something absurd in their own group, it can be a way of affirming that they belong to it.

Did Jesus then joke and laugh with His community of disciples? If Jesus was fully human as well as fully God, then surely He must have joked and laughed. He could not have been a totally staid and serious guy for all the people to like hanging around and hanging out with Him. Even some Pharisees gravitated toward Jesus’ company.

It has been observed that Jewish jokes seem to address incongruities and absurdities of life like evil and suffering – the most terrifying absurdities of life. Jewish jokes have a way of embracing all the world’s pain as well as all the world’s wisdom. They exhibit despair, joy of living, unspeakable misfortune of being, and also, the pride of being Jewish. But what incongruities or absurdities in life would the Son of God find to laugh at or joke about? Would He have joked about the religious establishment with His disciples who were very earthy Galileans? Would Jesus have laughed at the customs of the Roman overlords? Well, what kind of laughing and joking is worthy of the Messiah? Perhaps, Jesus Christ was fully capable of laughing, but he did not do so. Often the typical portrait of Jesus is that of the Man of Sorrows.

What we know about God in a verse like Psalm 2:4, “He who sits in the heavens shall laugh,” is that God laughs but His is derisive laughter at human pretensions. A profound characteristic of Jewish jokes is their solidarity with human failures and absurdities. Perhaps Jesus could have met the absurdities of life not only with prayers and tears, faith and obedience, but with a joke – one filled with all the world’s pain and all the world’s wisdom. Jesus could have had the last laugh when He defeated Satan with His own death in what appeared to be Satan’s trump card. The idea may verge on blasphemy, but the doctrine of the incarnation prevents us from ruling it out.

Jesus certainly had a sense of humor as we have seen in His parables and sayings. Furthermore, Jesus was quick on His feet as we would say today and His creativity and wit enabled Him to respond to fans and critics in unorthodox and often unsettling ways. His sense of hyperbole was remarkable if not original (see Mt 19:24; 23:24). He was great at using biting irony (see Mk 7:9) and witty repartee (see Lk 12:13-14). In fact, Jesus used humor freely and relevantly, allowing His humanity to prevail over tragedy.

Jesus was never flippant. He did not come to be a stand-up comedian. He did not joke at the expense of another nor did He find it necessary to laugh at Himself in the way that we do as a sort of defense mechanism. But He was not devoid of humor.

Clever humor can be subversive when it highlights the folly of the proud and mighty. It can also remind us of our human frailty and fragility and as many Jewish jokes are prone to do, help us understand pain and suffering. Did Jesus joke and laugh? There was an argument between two monks in Umberto Eco’s mystery novel The Name of the Rose:

“John Chrysostom said that Christ never laughed.”

“Nothing in human nature forebade it,” William remarked, “because laughter, as the theologians teach, is proper to man.”

“The Son of Man could laugh, but it is not written that He did so,” Jorge said.

Well, we know He did so because there will be laughter in Heaven. As C. S. Lewis once said, “Joy is the serious business of Heaven.”

Michael Tan is the Executive Vice-President of Eagles Communications. He likes to preach, write, play the guitar, and manage his staff!