Much has been said about Mel Gibson’s as-of-yet-unreleased-film The Passion, about the last hours of Jesus’ life. Here’s a short list of some of the complaints from various groups:

1. The film is anti-Semitic.
2. The film doesn’t hold to the Biblical narrative.
3. The film holds too closely to the Biblical narrative.
4. The film uses texts by Catholic mystics.
5. The film is anti-Semitic.

There are two reasons for the opinion that the film is anti-Semitic. First, it was a group of Jews (the religious leaders at the time) who were at least partially responsible for putting Jesus to death. That much is in the history books. But nowhere do the gospel accounts claim that every Jewish person was responsible for Jesus’ cruxifiction. Second, Gibson holds to the beliefs of a Catholic sect which does not recognize the changes in the Catholic Church that were inacted after Vatican II. One bone of contention: during Vatican II, the pope declared that the Catholic Church had no business blaming the Jews for the death of Jesus (the history of the Catholic Church is rife with anti-Semitism).

Salon has an interesting article about the movie and the reactions for and against potential anti-Semitism. What I found most interesting was what many Christians said about the anti-Semitism — it all comes down to politics. “We support Israel” is a common theme. And therefore, how can Christians be anti-Semitic? Personally, I think Christians (and the U.S. government) should stay out of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as its roots are religious in nature and not easily solved simply with “dialogue.” Now, I don’t know much about Dispensationalism, but I don’t think that God is going to rely simply on the Jews controlling Jerusalem for His will to be done (but I could be wrong).

Posted on 21 August 2003