I think Gibson is trying to have it both ways. He does not want the anti-defamation league attacking so he is downplaying aspects of his movie. Gibson certainly fabricated scenes for this movies (stuff not in the Gospels). He could have added scenes where eveyday Jews were shown to be sympathetic to Jesus. English subtitles? A bit pretentious, methinks. BTW, the author of the article questioned the historical accuracy of the Gospels!!! Blasphemy!!! His "real" history of the times is also lacking, as he uses historical sources that are not considered "transcription" errors made by Christian monks.
I actually can't wait to see this movie...I plan to go see it after work and I'll still have my Ash on my forehead from lunch... When the movie comes out, the BBS will be a religous thread fest, which is ok if they're good ones, not just mindless re-hashing of untrue statements, kinda like what the Democratic Liberals post in this forum...
Would have been easy to do since the first Christians were Jewish. Guess we ... or some of us ... will see.
As a recent critic who viewed the film put it: "Jews didn't kill Jesus and Romans didn't kill Jesus; my sin killed Jesus." Jesus has and always will be controversial.
his disciples were all Jewish...no need to add that in. Jesus himself is from the Jewish tradition. btw...the gospels and josephus are the most reliable sources we have on the person of Jesus. what was said of him at his death was the same in texts written years before the books comprising the gospels. even compared to the other gospels, the ones that didn't "make the cut", the person of jesus remains the same. and yes..i've read the gospel of thomas... what books do you believe are more accurate representations of the life of jesus?
I'll see the movie, though I think I can wait longer than Ash Wednesday (depending on the wife, of course). I'm not concerned about the alleged anti-semitism. I don't really see how the movie could be more condemnatory of the Jewish elite than the Gospels themselves. Rimbaud, as some have already mentioned, the historical stuff is not relevant. This is a movie-form telling of the Gospels; if you departed from the Bible to account for historical scholarship, it would defeat the purpose of the movie. I do seem to have a different feeling towards the supposed anti-semitism though. I feel that the Jews were justified in a way in the crucifixion, so I don't reproach them for it (we are in D&D here, right?). In a Christian context, obviously, it isn't a good thing to reject and slay your savior and likely demonstrates a lack of salvation. Then again, the crux of the religion falls apart without it, so you can't be too sorry it happened anyway. But (and I'm getting to the important part), according to Jewish Law, Jesus (assuming here he's not the Messiah) deserved death. He was committing the worst of blasphemies which is very very bad in the Law. I'm glad they had some backbone and did as they ought to have done despite even the occupation and the general lack of obedience (a recurring theme throughout the Old Testament). They may have guessed wrong (if Jesus was the Christ), but at least they weren't lukewarm about it. And, of course, from an athiest perspective, none of this would really amount to anything -- it was all a long time ago.
Actually I still haven't seen The Last Temptation of Christ which some call Scorcese's best film, so I would see that first. I have trouble believing it's better than Goodfellas or Raging Bull or even Casino. re: ok..like who? - how about the Gnostic Gospels? Treating the Bible as literal fact is a bit silly. Do we use it for metaphorical history and not literal history? Do we ignore the science in it? Why?
JV -- interesting points....sounds like C.S. Lewis' point that you simply can't accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, because no moral teacher would call himself God if came out of the Jewish tradition. moral teachers point to a truth or philosophy outside themselves...Jesus pointed to himself, even going so far as to say "If you've seen me, you've seen the Father." also...it fulfilled prophecy...the cornerstone the builders rejected...the psalm description that mirrors death on a cross..and the fact that jesus himself talked about it well before the time he was led to death. woofer -- i've read the gnostic gospels...the gospel of thomas is king among those. there is some commentary on those in paul's letters...the same paul who was then called saul and present at jesus' trial before the sanhedrin. the same paul who watched phillip be stoned to death and who persecuted christians like crazy. ultimately, these guys and many others saw something that made them give up their lives and go across the world telling people about it. i agree the bible is full of parables...and it's not a science book..but the accounts of the gospels are by eyewitnesses, save Luke, who writes what many consider to be the greatest historical book ever. oh, and the last temptation of christ is excellent...rent it.
This was my obtuse point. As we have discussed before, there is no historically sound record of Jesus of Nazareth. The nonbiblical historians that mentioned him do so many years after the "fact". This history (if not transritpion errors) is at the very best very old second information. The lack of historically sound evidence does not mean Jesus did not walk the earth and live his life as described by the Gospels.
fair point...i misunderstood you. i just don't think they're secondhand...particularly the gospels of matthew and mark. i could certainly see how you'd say that of luke. one interesting thing about luke is how it's clearly the story as he understands it with his own filters...he recounts the story of the man being lowered through the roof to be healed by Jesus and he describes a tiled roof...chances are, Jesus wasn't preaching under a tile roof in that town...but luke was well-to-do and in recounting that story he just says, "they moved aside the tiles." to me that adds so much credibility to his account...it's so human to do that. and the story itself is not changed...the miracle is still there...but the roof is just made of different materials. interesting.
thanks! but why?? i think jesus absolutely dealt with the same temptations you and i face everday...he just handled them far differently! i'm trying, though.
Mark was a student of Peter? Mark's account in theory would then be Peter's account, i.e. a second handed account. I am probably missing something here?
i think mark was a student of peter...many scholars believe the gospel of mark is the fuller version of the gospel of peter, himself. mark appears to be directing this to an audience that is not jewish, as he explains jewish customs a lot. i suppose it is a second hand account...but i think mark may have been a scribe...and i guess i give it a lot of credibility because of his closeness to peter, given peter's closeness to jesus. ultimately, more than 80% of the text of Mark is used in the gospels of matthew and luke... what i don't understand is why people say the gnostic gospels are more reliable. they were all written in the 2nd century as i understand it, but they're supposed to be more accurate accounts of what really happened?? i just don't get that.
Are you talking about extant copies? The 4 cannonized Gospels do not have any first century (1 AD - 100AD) extant copies. The extant copies of the Gnostic Gospels are dated ~250 AD (found buried in Egypt???)
no..i guess i mean the dating...like when the documents are believed to have been created given reliance in other documents on them. i mean, we are pretty sure mark was the first gospel written because of the reliance on it by other texts. so there are ways of approximately dating documents without having the original text.
