FILM & FOREIGN POLICY
The Passion of the Christ:
The Sins of the Father

By Raff Ellis
YellowTimes.org
April 13, 2004

I was finally prompted to see Mel Gibson's film, The Passion of the Christ, because of an essay being passed around, one written by a Jewish psychiatrist. He had gone to the theater with thirty other Jews of various professions, and it was the group's unanimous opinion that the film was the most potentially disastrous development for Jewish public relations, outside of recent events in Israel.

The psychiatrist-reviewer felt that the Jewish leadership had put pressure on Pontius Pilate to not just crucify Jesus but to subject him to the horrible tortures that the film depicted in unrelenting detail. Many critics and columnists have also variously labeled the work, its director, actors and crew as anti-Semitic. Still others have defended it, people such as Morris H. Chapman, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee. On CNN on Feb. 6, he said the film is "not anti-Semitic because people who love Christ love the Jewish nation." Chapman deftly linked criticism of Israel with hatred for Jews, an oft-promoted canard of Zionist ideology.

The most vocal critic of the film has been the head of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), Abe Foxman. He reported that a committee of nine Jewish and Catholic scholars studied an early screenplay and unanimously found it to be historically inaccurate, unfaithful to the gospel narratives and to project a uniformly negative picture of Jews. "The film can fuel, trigger, stimulate, induce, rationalize, [and] legitimize anti-Semitism," he argued. He also alleges that anti-Zionism is but a politically correct form of anti-Semitism. The ADL wanted to consult with Gibson about how he should make his movie so that it didn't fan the flames of anti-Semitism. I think they call that chutzpah.

These comments reveal the hidden agenda of those strident critics -- the worry that the film will negatively affect support for Israeli policies among Christians in general and the Christian Right in particular.

In contradiction of that concern, a nationwide survey conducted for the Institute for Jewish and Community Research found that 83 percent of Americans familiar with the film say it's made them neither more nor less likely to blame today's Jews for Jesus' crucifixion.

Artistic efforts, as always, are subject to interpretation and that interpretation is conditioned by an individual's personal experiences, system of beliefs, and predilections prior to viewing the work. The psychiatrist-reviewer concluded his analysis with the statement that even the savviest moviegoer would walk away with "an extremely negative impression of Jews." Indeed, he himself walked out hating the Jews depicted therein. Perhaps, since fictitious films such as Exodus and its ensuing genre came out, it is unpalatable for him to see Jews being portrayed as anything but superheroic.

I must confess I cannot empathize with those feelings or conclusions. First, if someone leaves a theatrical production with universal hatred for the racial, ethnic or religious descendants of the antagonists, he has a serious mental problem. There have been dozens of movies where the bad guys were Germans and the victims were Jews. Are we expected to hew to the concept that the sins of the father are visited on their sons? Is it logical to assume that the antiquated and elitist notions of "blue blood" genetics or the principles of animal husbandry apply? I wouldn't think so.

For anyone to despise Jews after seeing this film, he would have to posit -- in addition to the notion of heredity of culpability -- that the majority of present-day Jews are descended from those early Middle Eastern Jews. That is hardly the case. The present day Italians, if they chose to assert it, have a much stronger claim to those cruel Roman soldiers as antecedents than would the preponderance of modern-day Jews have to those Oriental Jews. So, if you need to hate somebody from the film, hate the Italians!

Speaking of which, who did all the spitting, kicking, hitting, slapping, mocking and whipping of the Jewish protagonist, Jesus? It wasn't the Jews, it was the Romans! Who beat back the crowds of sympathetic Jews? It was the Romans. Who nailed Jesus to the cross? It was the Romans. I didn't see the "bad" Jews do anything but cajole Pilate into doing what their laws prohibited them from doing. Bad enough you say, but they didn't encourage His torture. That was Pilate's idea, thinking they would let Him go once they saw His wracked and bleeding body.

And what about the "good" Jews? Jesus, his mother, the apostles, and all of those sympathetic to Him were… Jews! If you are supposed to hate Jews, where do you draw the line? Remember, Jesus was a Jew and He preached love for his enemies. So, if you are a believer in Jesus, why should He forgive them and you can't? Do you know better than Jesus?

For the Pharisees’ part, they genuinely felt that Jesus had broken their law. Now the prescribed punishment may be draconian in today's context but back then it was a serious offense with serious consequences. Anyway, is it not a Christian tenet that the passion was foreordained and all of the actors in this play were just performing parts for this ecclesiastical drama? If they did not play out their roles, what would have happened? Had they let Jesus go after He predicted His suffering and death for the sins of the world, would there be a religion called Christianity today?

The brutality so vividly portrayed was common for the period and, although I thought the portrayal a bit gratuitous, it quickly became utterly sadistic. But, wherever armies go and wars are fought, wherever men gather with power over others, cruel and sadistic behavior surely follows. It happens in just about every prison around the world. It happened in Baghdad and happens in Guantanamo. It's a testament to the persistent, atavistic nature of man, something that the evolution of civilization should have bred out long ago.

No one I have discussed this movie with thus far has confessed to having ill feelings towards Jews as a result of the film. Therefore, I conclude that if you come out of the theater feeling hatred for Jews, you hated Jews prior to walking in. And if you truly did not harbor such thoughts and still came out feeling that way, I'd say you need time on that psychiatrist's couch. Your only defense would be by reason of mental defect.

Finally, let me say that it's just a movie, for Christ's sake! (Sorry, I couldn't help myself.)

Raff Ellis lives in the United States and is a retired former strategic planner and computer industry executive. He has had an abiding and active interest in the Middle East since early adulthood and has traveled to the region many times over the last 30 years.

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