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Authentic Illusions?


I really love a good play on words.  When I see it, I often wonder if it’s intentional or accidental.

When it comes to advertising or marketing, I think the chances of it being intentional dramatically increase.  The other day I saw an electronic billboard that was advertising an upcoming performance of “The Authentic Illusionist”.  So tantalizing!

If you break it down, a common definition of authentic is that which is fully trustworthy as according with fact.

An illusion, on the other hand, is something that deceives or misleads or causes a misinterpretation of something’s actual nature.

So an illusionist would be a person who deceives or misleads by causing our perceptions to misinterpret that which is actually occurring.  In the entertainment word, it’s all fun and games.

But when it comes to how people sometimes behave, take a look at what Isaiah communicated on God’s behalf:  They say to the seers, “See no more visions!” and to the prophets, “Give us no more visions of what is right!  Tell us pleasant things, prophesy illusions. (Isa 30:10).

A New Testament corollary is this:  “For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.  They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”  (2 Tim 4:3-4)

Instead of truth and that which is right, we tend to want to be told illusions and myths that seem pleasant and simply suit our own desires. 

Oh, and just in case you didn’t quite catch the play on words (I think there are more than one!), it centers on authenticity.  Assuming the illusionist advertised is the one and only real illusionist (and all others are fake), how can an illusionist ever really be authentic when their function is to deceive?  In addition, pretty much every illusion they present to their audience is done to deliberately deceive or mislead and thus by definition cannot be fully trustworthy or according to fact!


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