Joshua Noel contends that Bishop Myriel’s singular act of mercy—bestowing the silver and the candlesticks and fabricating a lie to spare Jean Valjean incarceration—serves as the pivotal mechanism through which Victor Hugo demonstrates that compassion effects profound transformation more potently than grandiose political revolt. Joshua Noel approaching the tale as a Daoist Christian, elucidates how Hugo stages the bishop’s wu-wei-like restraint to reorient moral perception and to catalyze Valjean’s radical reinvention.

Joshua interrogates the protean nature of names and identity—prisoner 24601, Jean Valjean, Monsieur Madeleine—and parallels these permutations with the renamings in the Book of Daniel, thereby exposing how nomenclature, memory, and social context delimit and enable the self. Noel balances erudition with a playful cadence—occasionally yielding to a pun or a sly allusion to Kingdom Hearts’ letter-play—while insisting that quotidian acts of mercy propagate love in ways that revolution cannot fully accomplish. He notes how names change under power. Joshua points out that Daniel keeps his Hebrew name while others receive Aramaic names tied to foreign gods.

Joshua Noel places Jean Valjean’s many names next to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and asks why names matter for identity. He asks listeners to think of how social systems shape who people may become and how small acts can break those chains. Joshua brings play into heavy thought, mentioning Kingdom Hearts and the way names and hearts shape persons. He uses that game as a simple mirror for deep questions. Joshua closes by inviting reflection rather than answers. He leaves the listener with an open, clean question about what defines a life: label, deed, or mercy.

Takeaways:

• Joshua Noel explains how Bishop Muriel's quiet mercy transforms Jean Valjean and changes many lives.
• Noel contrasts small acts of kindness with large revolutions and finds mercy more lasting and powerful.
• Joshua ties identity and names together using Jean Valjean and the Book of Daniel as clear examples.
• Joshua asks listeners to consider how names, past actions, and sacrifice shape who they become over time.
• Joshua Noel reflects on privilege, culture, and the limits of judgment, urging listeners to let mercy guide public action rather than mere critique or anger.

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Lao Tzu once said, when I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.

When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need.

Jesus once said, unless you turn and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

This is Be Living Water, a show that seeks to find a way to imitate Christ that benefits all and is in conflict with none in our modern times.

I am Joshua Null, and I'm a Daoist Christian who seeks to be true to himself and true to Christ.

To the best of my abilities, I may not always be the smartest in the room.

I'm committed to try to be honest about who I am and look to both Taoist and Christian traditions for wisdom.

Sages, pastors and theologians who have paved the way before me.

Instead of speaking about Bishop Muriel, which I keep telling you guys, I was going to do, I'm just not going to do that episode.

And I apologize.

Instead of doing that for a full episode that I've teased so many times, I actually want to discuss why I think he matters so much and show how his inaction allowed for Jean Valjean to change so radically in the story.

Again, this is a Christian book, Catholic book, so he would not say Wu Wei, but I would say Bishop Muriel practiced Wu Wei in a profound way by not acting right.

In Zhao Bonjan's story, Bishop Muriel not acting changes everything so much, so deeply.

And as a Christian and as a Taoist, I think that's just the kind of man I want to be.

I want to talk about how Victor Hugo actually does this.

It's an incredible thing he does, right?

He builds up Bishop Muriel almost like the opposite of what we see in most media, right?

Like, usually the antagonist is built up, built up, built up.

So when he's done wrong, we're like, yeah, he does deserved it.

This is like the opposite thing.

Like, Bishop Mignon gets built up for a big chunk of the novel of Les Miserables.

Not anywhere near as much in the play and movie, which is why I like the novel better, obviously.

But it gets built up so much that when Jean Valjean goes to steal from them, you kind of don't like Jean Valjean in that moment.

You can have this little like.

Like, ooh.

That he deserves what's come to him.

So when Bishop Muriel shows him grace, you're like the God who shows me grace, who shows me that same mercy and love is so incredible.

And you feel that when you're reading the novel and you see how, like, Bishop Muriel is given this status in the church.

And he immediately gives up his home so the sick can live there and that he can live among the poor and be Christ to the poor.

When you see that he travels, it's a dangerous journey to visit a revolutionary.

When the church is aligned with the state and you're like, why would you risk so much for someone against you?

When you see all these little things that he did, why I wanted to do that episode when Javon Jean shows up, you're kind of like man, for at least a second there, you're hoping he does get taken in, thrown in jail, imprisoned.

That's how we're introduced to our main protagonist, by first having built up Bishop Muriel, whom he then does wrong, and then seeing what mercy can do to one man's life.

What a story.

Jean Valjean is imprisoned at a younger age for stealing bread to help feed him, his family, him and his sister, whatever.

Right after getting out.

We don't know the full context at that point in the novel, right?

He is trying to find work, he's trying to find a place to stay.

And people go, oh, you were a criminal.

You can't stay here.

You can't work here.

You can't have our food.

You can't have this because you were once a criminal.

You cannot live.

You are not.

You don't have the right to anything because you weren't.

You were a criminal.

And he's begging for help.

He's trying to find work.

He's trying to do something.

He's going place to place.

Then he shows up at the church where Bishop Muriel is.

And of course the bishop's I want to help you.

We'll give you feud.

Stay here the night.

And even after giving everything else, what does John Bojon do?

He goes to steal the two candlesticks and he gets caught.

He's gonna get arrested again.

But Bishop Muriel goes, oh, no.

Ice City could have those he didn't.

The bishop lied as an act of grace and mercy.

And he said, in fact, I wanted you to have these two.

And he gives them the silver.

And then he turns him, he says, I today bought you away.

Sell all of this, change your life.

Bishop Muriel pleads with this man who's his only encounter with was the man trying to steal from him after he tried to help him.

And what's he do?

He immediately says, sell this stuff and get a new life for yourself.

I did this for you so that you could turn a new leaf, so that you can have a change in your life.

And how much does that reflect God's love for each of us.

Where we've sinned, we have done so wrong.

When God is good, embodied God is love.

And yet we hate love.

The Bible says that there was light and the darkness knew it.

Not that we hated it, that we turned from it.

We didn't understand it.

I can't speak for any of you, but I can see that that was me.

So much of my life, I was like.

I didn't really understand God.

I think he was this thing that wanted us to judge other people.

And he was judging.

And if we all lived just right enough, maybe we wouldn't go to hell and could go see him in heaven or something.

I don't know.

I didn't get it.

And when I did, I realized, oh, God is love.

He's constantly showing mercy, even to me, who's passing judgment on my fellow man, God.

While I'm passing that judgment, it just wants to love me and show me mercy and wants me to show others mercy.

Even though I don't believe in that image of Jesus on the cross who, you know, took our sins and he died.

And that's how we get to have salvation, because he.

No, what I believe is that he died, rose again, defeating hell in the grave so that none of us have to.

I believe in a different model.

Like salvation wasn't achieved on the cross, but rather on Easter Day when he rose, when I think salvation was.

And still I think he did take my sins with him on that cross.

Still I think he did make that sacrifice.

Why?

Because I.

You.

We did not understand the light.

We didn't understand love.

And when we went and tried to take from God and do our own thing and spit on the earth that he gave us, spit on the religion that he gave us, the love that he wants us to show to our fellow man, we turned our back on it.

What God says is, I'm still going to show you mercy.

I'm going to buy your ability to change in a system that doesn't want you to change.

That's going to hold your past against you forever.

God says, let me show you mercy.

And, yeah, that doesn't happen in every circumstance.

There are circumstances where people are in bad systems and are still done wrong.

But Bishop Muriel is just such a good image of the kind of love that God is and that we are called to be in God.

If we are the people of God, the body of Christ, that means that we are being like Bishop Muriel.

And when someone steals from us, he says, no, I meant for him to have that.

Here's some extra stuff, too.

Please go change.

Have a better life.

That's who we're called to be as the Church.

Sorry.

I knew I couldn't talk about Bishop Muriel and not get a little preachy and I'm sorry.

The context of how much he helped, becoming the bishop of Digni and donating his palace to the hospital, moving into a small home.

He says to Valjean, when all this is done, once he was done wrong, this man that we were built to love was done wrong.

And then he turns around and gives him more than he was going to steal from him, lies so that he doesn't have to go to prison.

What's he say to Jean Valjean?

He says, forget not, never forget that you have promised me to use the silver to become an honest man.

I withdraw it, your soul, from dark thoughts and from the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God.

Jean Lajean is so conflicted.

He's going out and he's given chance and chance, and he's like, he was raised where he just has to do whatever to survive so that his family can survive.

And he's just never had the freedom that came with a little bit of money to actually choose to be better.

He didn't have the freedom to make that choice.

And now he does.

He struggles for a while, but eventually he becomes the mayor of Montjul sur Mer.

I might be saying that incorrectly, but he becomes the mayor of a small town, and so much actually relies on Jean Valjean from here and the change of heart that he had and that one act of mercy that Bishop Muriel showed him.

It's incredible, incredible storytelling given the context that we talk about with Victor Hugo and the current ruler of France at this time.

And you're like, oh, mercy.

Thinking about our own context as Americans and how we, like, we want to fight against the system and, like, how wrong ICE is doing, what President Trump is doing across the world and how much harm is being done and how we want to fight back, and then realizing that the message when this happened in France that Victor Hugo wrote all those years ago was actually, remember the power of love and mercy.

That's a hard message.

I want to hear the message of, let's fight.

Let's stand up against the man.

Like, that's the message I want to hear.

And I don't think those things are necessarily wrong, but I think what we see throughout the book of Les Miserable is the revolution doesn't accomplish anywhere near as much as this one bishop who just showed some Mercy to a thief.

And I think it is those little acts of kindness that really make a change in the world.

I came really close to quoting Gandalf, but I won't go there today.

That's when we do Lord of the Rings, which will probably happen eventually.

Jean Valjean does recreate himself.

He sells the silver, but he keeps the candlesticks as a constant reminder of the mercy he will show.

And once he becomes mayor, you find out the stuff about him breaking parole, how he created a new identity for himself.

He's now Monsieur Madeleine.

He revolutionizes the local manufacturing industry.

All these people work for him now.

He brings prosperity to this town.

He's eventually again he's appointed mayor.

Like I said, he dedicates himself to philanthropy and aiding the poor.

He becomes a self made man, a success.

And he always keeps those candlesticks to remind him he's only here because the mercy of that one bishop showed him.

And that he is prepared to continue to show others.

He will pass on that grace, that love.

Love is contagious.

That's the story of Jean Paul Jean, how he got started, how he became mayor later on, very soon.

The next time we talk about Les Miserables, we'll talk about that song who Am I?

And how Hugh Jackson did a great job at that song.

Right?

But that song's not yet before he even gets to like the choices that he has to make to show who he is.

Now we are already shown how much his identity can change simply by having an act of mercy.

Bishop Muriel saw him as a thief named Jean Valjean, who was loved in the image of God.

He made himself into this mayor, this Madeleine, whatever, gives himself a new identity.

Sorry, Montreal Sor Mercury, I think, is the correct one.

Again, I'm not good at French and I apologize.

I shouldn't be trying to even say these words.

Just gives himself a new name.

So is he Jean Valjean?

Is he now, since he's made anew, is he actually Montreux Olmert, that this person he made up for himself?

Or is he still Jean Valjean?

Who is he?

This is the context when we go to the rest of the book.

And he's struggling with who he is now and what he's supposed to be, Is he still accountable for his past, all that things?

What he's struggling with starts here, where he was born.

And we're meant to ask, who is he now?

Is he the mayor?

Is he still that thief on the street?

Is he the prisoner who escaped?

What makes you you?

We're going to get a lot more of that as we continue to read Victor Hugo's Les Mesura.

But I think it's important to just sit on that question for a minute, to not have.

To have the answer, to not see how the book ends just yet.

It's a long novel for a reason.

You're meant to marinate on these things.

That's why the movie doesn't quite do it justice.

The play can't do it justice because you have to pause sometimes and marinate on what just happened.

Now we are talking about Les Miserable in conjunction with the Book of Daniel.

We've been going back and forth a little bit because I'm a crazy person and I have adhd.

Why these episodes don't get released in a way that really makes a lot of sense.

And I'm sorry.

The Book of Daniel we talked about Last time in Daniel 1, Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah were given new names, Aramaic names.

Why?

Because the Babylonians took over Israel and the four Hebrew children that the Book of Daniel largely about were taken into the palace.

They are now going to be the men of Nebuchadnezzar.

They're supposed to be his wise men.

And we kind of hear some of these stories.

And when they're taken up, they're given extra privilege for being smart, pretty young boys, basically.

So they're given new Aramaic names about the Aramaic gods.

I can't help but think about how they were given new names when I think about all the names of Jean Valjean.

Who knows how I'm pronouncing it?

What's in a name?

It's significant that in the rest of the Book of Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Israel are Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.

That's what we all know them as.

Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, then Jesus.

And then there's, like, some vegetables involved.

I think there's a cucumber, right?

Daniel we know is Daniel.

He was given nothing.

I think it's B' Shazar or something.

But, like, Daniel's given another name, an Aramaic name that has to do with Aramaic gods.

But in the rest of the book, he's still called Daniel.

So when we think of Daniel, we know him as Daniel.

Why?

Because that's the name people used for him.

Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.

Their names?

Yeah, that's still their names.

They were given new names.

And because that's what we hear them called in the story, that's who we think of them as.

We don't think of them as Hananiah, Mishael and Israel.

Do we think of Meshach, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.

Daniel we think of as Daniel because that's the name that they use for him.

How much does your name matter?

In a context of the story of Daniel, I think it's significant.

The Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego are known by their Aramaic names, not by the names they were born with, not by the names of their Hebrew God, but from the names of the Aramaic gods.

Daniel is still known by his Hebrew name associated with the Hebrew God.

I'm left to wonder how much of our own identity is tied to our name.

Right.

Someone named Josh.

Oh, the Josh is the Josh.

You know, whatever.

Like, it's such a common name.

A lot of my experience in life has to do with how common the name Josh is.

Oh, there's another Josh.

My name matters.

And there's a culture behind that.

Right.

Like Joshua, you probably can assume I'm Caucasian, maybe Hebrew, because there's Hebrew origins.

Joshua has the same Hebrew name as Jesus.

Yeshua.

It's to do with the Lord, Savior.

Lord saves all this stuff.

Like, how much of that impacts who I am, knowing my name.

What is behind that?

The culture I grew up in, there's power behind that.

How much power was I like?

You know, I have privilege.

As someone who was born white, I don't have all privilege.

I still struggle in ways.

Right.

But there's some privilege that I got from how I was born that other people maybe didn't have.

When you look at the story of Jean Valjean, he wasn't born with a whole lot of privilege.

He was born in a system where he was kind of destined for failure.

When you look at Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, they were born for success, really.

They were brought up to the king.

They could have just fell in line with the Aramaic God, been successful, had a lot of money, been fine.

What's in the privilege we're born with?

What's in the religion we're born under, right?

Jean Lejean was born under the church, and we see that the church as a whole didn't do great job.

But Bishop Muriel stood out amongst others in the religion who weren't doing what they were called to do by the Lord, but instead we're doing what the state wanted to do because the church and state were kind of working hand in hand.

That's why I believe in separation.

Church and state.

That's a whole other conversation.

But then we see there's a significance between Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

Their names having to do with the Aramaic gods.

Daniel still goes by his name that's associated with the Hebrew God.

There's something to that.

Are we defined by our actions?

What I do?

Am I known as a podcaster?

As a burrito roller at Chipotle?

Am I known from the times that I gave to my friends and love them?

Or am I known as the person who doesn't answer their phone when my friends call?

Our actions define us, but I think there's more than that, too.

It's really hard to pinpoint what creates your identity.

My favorite video game franchise of all time is Kingdom Hearts, and all the games are about that.

It shows that.

Okay, well, is it your whole, your heart, your soul, whatever?

Well, no, there's more than that.

Is your memories.

Well, you're still you without those, actually.

Like, you also recognize you.

You have a personality, art, something about, like, are you a sum of your part?

Well, like, what are you?

These questions of identity are important.

I don't think there's a clear answer.

And so I think it's important to stop.

It's important that Lehim Israel is a thick book, so you have to marinate.

It's important that I want to stop at the end of this podcast that we have to marinate.

What makes us us?

I don't know.

If we knew, there probably would be less Kingdom Hearts games, actually.

And I'd be sad because I love Kingdom Hearts.

Is that what makes me me, that I love Kingdom Hearts?

I don't know.

But the Hebrew children, before Hebrew children we're talking about, they were offered new identities.

They were offered more privilege to deny their identity as men of God and children of Israel.

That's what they were offered.

They all will deny that in the stories that we talk about as we go through the Book of Daniel.

Jean Valjean, he had a name.

His names show what people see him as.

Do they see him as a prisoner?

Do they see him as A man born under poor circumstances.

Do they see him as a mayor?

As someone who is privileged with money and power?

The name he goes by that people know him by, change how they view him.

They knew him as prison or whatever.

They don't respect him.

They know him as mayor.

That name, I can't say.

There's a lot of respect and stuff like that.

What happens when they know that he's Jean Valjean?

We'll see.

Next time on Sorry.

Getting on Myself but can make names.

They matter.

Our names that we choose for our children.

They matter.

The identity that we discover as we live our lives.

I discover more of who I am as I live.

Right this.

Like that famous.

I think it's Giergar quote of like, when I look back, I see who I am, but I don't know who I am till my life's at the end.

And that's the crazy thing.

None of us who know who we are until it's done.

Then someone can look back and say, that's who Josh was.

That's who Joshua Newell was.

This guy I don't know till my life's up.

I might be a psychopath one day.

I have no idea.

Brains are weird.

Anything can happen.

I might just be known as a podcaster.

I might be known as the guy who got hit by that really, really cool train.

I don't know till my life's up.

It's hard to say.

Jean Valjean's identity changes throughout the novel.

He becomes a man so moved by Bishop Muriel's kindness that he's willing to deny himself for others.

And that's who I know Jean Valjean as.

Not as the thief, not as the prisoner, but as that man who was so moved by Bishop Muriel's kindness that he constantly denied himself for others, Showing love in a world where there seemed to be no love.

These tiny little lights shone.

And that changes everything.

Not the revolution, not the war, not fighting the man standing up against tyranny.

What changed the world?

Mercy.

Love.

These little acts of kindness.

And all of us are capable of that and think at the end of our lives, that's how it will be defined, as those little acts of kindness.

Those moments that we turned the other way and acted like we didn't see what was happening in our country.

That's going to be what ultimately defines us one day.

Are we, like Jean Valjean, gradually sacrificing more and more of ourselves until we grow into a man known of love?

Are we people who continually turn the other way, get more cynical, hardened to the world and act like we don't care until we're just a grumpy old man.

And that's maybe that's who we are.

I think these little acts, what we choose to do in these interactions, micro interactions with others throughout our lives, ultimately will at least contribute largely to what defines us in the mart.

I mentioned it before.

My favorite video game franchise of all time, it's all about identity.

One of the interesting sub stories, I guess you could say in the game is there's this a lot of explaining I have to do.

Different villains are created from stuff, right?

If your heart is consumed from darkness, your heart becomes some kind of little monster called a heartless.

Your body, that leftover shell, becomes what's known as a nobody.

And certain nobodies still hold their human form.

And one of the some of those that hold their human form are called organization 13 because it's 13 of them.

And in organization 13, there's some interesting stuff.

They'll have these conversations throughout the game, like, do you remember your real name?

Do you remember who you are?

They don't have their memories, they don't have their heart.

But there's still something about them where it's like, I could tell there's something here still.

So do you remember your name and all when you get to the names that they're going by at this point that they're given from the Big Bad.

I'm just going to say Big Bad.

I don't want to do too many pronouns confuse you guys.

The Big Bad kind of gives them their names back, but incorrect.

So he tells them all, there is no heart in you.

There's nothing left of you.

You're just a nobody.

Thus the term nobodies, right?

And they'll just buy it like, okay, yeah, there's no heart.

We're just empty shells listening to this guy.

Turns out that's not actually true.

They are still.

They can still be their own person.

And the names that they go by throughout the game, it's their old name with letters rearranged and an X added in.

For example, Sora becomes Roxas.

Same letters with a random different order and an X added.

Because there's power in a name.

There's power in not knowing what your name was.

And it's important that we don't come up with definitive answers like, oh, we are definitely the little actions like Josh said.

Or, oh, no, we are our memories.

He's wrong.

Or we are.

We don't know, man.

Philosophers have been debating what it means to be you like what an identity is like forever.

We're not going to solve it.

I'm not that smart.

I'm trying not to call myself a dummy for Will's sake, but when it comes to this stuff, we're all kind of dummies.

Anyone who says, I know for sure what makes us us, what forms your identity, who you are, they're wrong.

Somebody else will come up with a different philosophy in a decade.

It'll make more sense and they'll be all like, if philosophers had an answer to this, they wouldn't have a job.

And they're still philosophers with jobs.

So there's not really a clear answer.

And that's okay.

But I think there is an importance to names, to recognizing what I go by matters.

If it's Josh, Joshua, Prisoner number Bishop Muriel, Fusion went by Muriel, that matters.

If it goes by Bishop Muriel, that means something.

If you go by Meir, that name I can't pronounce, that means something.

Are they Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego?

Or are they Ananiah, Mishael, and Azariah?

Do you still call them Daniel?

There's power in a name.

It matters.

The name you go by, the names that you choose as nicknames, they matter.

They say something about how you view yourself and they tell others how you want to be viewed.

Names matter.

Identity is important and confusing, and we're not going to solve it today.

As always, though, instead of giving you a takeaway action, I'm going to give you three takeaway questions and a point of meditation for the day.

A little bit of a shorter episode, but I think that's good because we need a.

We need a marinade on this one.

All right, our three takeaway questions.

Ask yourself, how would I define myself to others?

What names do I want to go by?

What do I want people to think of me as?

As the grumpy person at work, the one who always smiles when they walk in and cheers when the boss shows up because I'm just so excited all the time.

Is the one who's secretly showing kindness to others or the one who has to make it all about himself?

How do I want to define myself to others?

Question number one.

Question number two.

What impact does my name have on my life and my experience with others?

How might my life be different if I wasn't named Josh?

If we didn't have those jokes of how common Josh is, we're have a big battle of the Joshes or calling me the Josh I at theology beer camp because I'm part of, like all the other Joshes, right?

Like, how might my life be different if I didn't have my name?

How important is my name to my life and my experience with others?

This question too.

Question number three.

How can I give myself up for others?

What are some ways right now that I can make little sacrifices that might make life better for others?

Maybe I'm going to skip lunch for a month, take that money, donate to the national park, donate it to community service that's supporting the queer community around me right now or the Latina community around me, because there's some real challenges for those people groups right now.

But how can I give up myself for others?

That's why when I fast, I love to do what I call the Isaiah fast.

And it says what you fast, you then take and you give to someone else.

I think that's beautiful.

How can I give up myself for others?

That's question three.

So again, our three takeaway questions.

How would I define myself to others?

What impact does my name have on my life and experience with others?

And how can I give up myself for those around me?

Our point of meditation today, just to think about those times that you have chosen to sacrifice for others.

What are some times where you.

You gave up something so that someone else could have it?

Even if it's just like a little thing, like I gave my candy bar that I won for, you know, somebody, or my Easter candy, someone else, whatever.

What are some times that others maybe gave up something for you?

I know my dad skipped breakfast a lot of times so that we could do more when I was growing up.

What are some times that others sacrifice for you?

So just meditate on those things today and think about these takeaway questions.

I'm not going to give you any answers.

It's not what we do here.

But guys, I. I do hope that rather than providing you with any clear answers or instructions on what to do with your life or how to find wisdom, I hope this conversation has instead helped you struggle with and ponder how to best be true to yourself as a unique individual and be true to Christ as the source of all life.

I hope you will remember that we are to be water, beneficial to all, in conflict with none.

And we're called to be Christ, loving everyone, laying down our own lives for others.

Thank you all so much for joining me in my struggles to love others, to love myself, and to love God better.

And I hope this conversation has helped you to continue to be living water.