These are some of the discrepancies pointed out by Rabbi Wolpe.
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On opening day, I went to see the movie. The violence is mind
numbing,
and, in a certain way, purposeless. For if Jesus\' suffering was greater
than any human being has ever
endured, since he took upon himself the sins
of the world, that cannot be represented on screen. Have others, in
life,
suffered as much and more as the scourged, battered and crucified man on
the screen? Absolutely. No
Hollywood representation, alas, can outdo what
human beings have done to one another in the world. If so, why
the
horrific violence?
While the violence itself may be a basis for finding the film distasteful,
that does not
make it anti-Semitic. Several particulars combine to make
Jews uneasy:
\" THE DEVIL
The devil moved almost
exclusively among the Jews (once behind the Roman
soldiers). Considering that the devil is not mentioned in the
passion
narratives at all, that is enough to give one pause. Indeed the priests
are witnesses at Jesus\'
scourging, a detail not recounted in the New
Testament, and the devil hovers among them, so Gibson created a
special
scene to enable the devil to be identified with the Jewish priests.
\" THE HIGH PRIEST
The High Priest
throws stones at Mary Magdalene, not recounted in the New
Testament, and is also shown at Golgotha in the last
minutes, which is not
in the New Testament. Nor could it be, since the High Priest is not
permitted in a place
where there are dead bodies. Some clearly sympathetic
scenes including religious Jewish characters, such as the
Rabbi Nicodemus,
are omitted from the movie.
JESUS\' CONVERSATION WITH PILATE
Jesus tells Pilate that the
greater guilt goes to the one who handed him
over (John 19:11). The Oxford New English Bible glosses the statement
as
referring to \"either the High Priest, or perhaps Judas.\" Since Judas
represents tortured guilt that comes
to believe in Jesus and the High
Priest represents the Jews, which choice do you suppose Gibson made? To
whom will
his camera, by flashing right back to the culprit, assign \"the
greater guilt?\"
PHYSICAL ASSAULTS BY
JEWS
There are choices that are made for the sake of suffering, but do nothing
to mitigate the concern: the Jewish
guards beat Jesus (not in the original
story), and he is physically assaulted by Jews in prayer shawls
when
encountering the council of priests.
MATTHEW 27:25
More powerful is the line that Gibson said he had cut,
because his brother
told him that the Jews would \"kill him,\" a story, by the way, which Gibson
recounted, and
a story of which decency would demand that he be ashamed.
It is the line from Matthew 27:25: \"His blood be upon
us and upon our
children.\" We must be clear about the implications. The charges of
\"Christ-killer\" that have
followed the Jews through centuries, that caused
Popes to warn Jews to stay in their homes on Good Friday because
bands of
Christians would seek them out to injure and/or kill them, all the savage
accusations, the slaughter, the
degradation--these things have many and
complex causes, but if we sought one above all, it would be that line.
\"It
was said\" Gibson has commented. Such a blithe declaration--as though
history has leapt from 31 AD to 2004
with nothing in between. No blood
libel, no crusade, no inquisition, no pogroms. He assures us \"It
was
said.\"
But of course history cannot be wished away. So we must be grateful that
the line was removed.
Except it wasn\'t. It merely was not subtitled. I,
and others with whom I attended the screening, all understood
it quite
clearly in Aramaic. Even if it will not be understood by the vast majority
of those who attend the film,
as the lawyers on TV are wont to say, \"it
goes to state of mind, your Honor.\" It does indeed. I hope the
director\'s
cut will not restore subtitles to that line. Who will control the
subtitles in foreign languages?
Will the French read it? Russians? Poles?
Austrians? Italians? Ukrainians? In the Middle East, where the
favored
reading these days is \"The Protocols of the Elders of Zion?\"
THE WEAKNESS OF PILATE
The most
commented on and most obvious choices in this film are the
weakness of Pilate (known historically to be
extraordinarily cruel) and
the powerful, evil and manipulative High Priest of the Jews. Would that
the film had
taken seriously the earliest two extra Gospel sources,
Josephus and Tacitus, both of whom say Jesus was killed by
Pilate. Or the
Nicene Creed, which mentions only Pilate as causing Jesus\' death. Or of
Father Pawlikowski of
Catholic Theological Union in Chicago: \"But from
biblical and historical scholarship we know that Pilate was a
powerful
tyrant who fully controlled the political situation. No way could the Jews
of Palestine have blackmailed
him.\"
There are tender moments in the movie, and powerful moments. When Jesus
teaches, in the regrettably brief
instances of teaching between savage
torments, the movie lifts itself and its audience. But it will not be
long
before the gleeful Roman sadists and the leering, vengeful Jews will
return to wield the whip and pull the
strings, respectively.
THE DECIL WITH JEWISH CHILDREN
Judas, who goes mad, sees small, sweet Jewish children turn
into devils,
an image that I wish would not be so close to an anti-Semites deepest
conviction. As the devil hovers
behind the Jewish children, I cannot help
but wonder, why those children? The only source for placing children
in
the scene I can find is in the visions of Sister Anne Emmerich, whose
writings were a source for the film. She
helpfully comments that Judas
hung himself in the valley where \"Jews used to sacrifice their children.\"
The
most tragic part of this entire debacle is that it has become a
Jewish-Christian contretemps. It should not be.
Many have spoken out in
tones of kindness and concern. Here in Los Angeles Cardinal Mahoney has
vividly expressed
his concern and his feelings for the Church and for
Jews. He is one of many voices for whom all, Jew and Christian
alike,
should be grateful. Jewish Christian relations have made strides
unthinkable in earlier ages. In each
community we have to struggle not to
lose a single step of progress. This is not about our faith; it is about
Mel
Gibson\'s movie.
What were Mr. Gibson\'s intentions? One cannot see inside another\'s heart.
The evidence of
the movie is predominantly that he sought to make a movie
that showed the suffering of Jesus to the world, and that
it was
sufficiently important to him to make it no matter the institutional
obstacles.
But a movie about the
death of Jesus is not a stone dropped into a clear
pool. There are thousands of years of history, of anguish, and
of hate.
The answer is not to boycott the movie or to anathematize Mel Gibson.
There is a better way.
When I
returned from the screening my wife said to me that if he really
wanted to combat hate, Mel Gibson should establish
a fund, the Passion
Fund, to aid all those who might come to be the Jewish victims of
violence surrounding the
showing of this film. If the fund is untouched,
so much the better. But when I see a Denver Church proudly parading
a sign
that says \"\'Jews Killed the Lord Jesus\' 1 Thess. 2:14, 15 Settled!\" I
begin to wonder if the
children of Denver, and other cities, might not be
in need of Passion fund. Or better, she suggested, perhaps the
Passion
fund might serve to educate people who might be moved to hate.
Mr. Gibson, use the proceeds from this
movie to heal and teach. Would that
not be what Jesus would have you do? Do you, along with millions and
millions
of Christians throughout the world, believe not only in his
death, but in the message of his life?
Following the
movie my friends and I spoke to a Christian woman who
solicited our reactions (which varied) as we solicited hers.
She said
\"well, it was clear. It was the Romans and the Jews.\" But, I pointed out,
there are no more Romans,
so doesn\'t that leave only the Jews? \"Oh, I read
that in a review,\" she said, as if trumping its truth by
its lack of
originality. Still I stood before her, a Jew, and wondered if her
conclusions touched her feelings
about me.
I believe that the intent of this movie is not to stir up hatred against
the Jewish people. But will
it give aid and comfort to anti-Semites? Will
it be something that those who hate the Jewish people can show
their
children with an easy conscience? I\'m afraid so. And we do not live in an
age when hatred should be given
nourishment.
When Heinrich Heine, the great German-Jewish lyric poet, sat down to write
his poem \"To Edom\"
(Edom being an old Rabbinic metaphor for Christianity)
he began with these lines:
A thousand years and more we
suffer
Each other for so long an age.
You--you tolerate my breathing
And I tolerate your rage.
For almost two
millennia that was the experience of the Jew. In recent
times, however, Jews and Christians have begun speaking to
each other,
reaching out, seeking to understand the other. Along with many other
Jewish Rabbis, scholars and
teachers, I was a signer of Dabru Emeth, a
statement of Jewish understanding and some shared aspirations with
the
Christian tradition. I have been invited to lecture and teach at Christian
colleges, and invited my Christian
colleagues to do the same. The
statements of the Church and of many Protestant leaders reflect a
tremendous change
from the terrors of earlier times.
Christianity is a great world tradition whose cradle is my faith.
The
greatest sin of this movie would be if the vision of a single Hollywood
star overrode, even for an instant,
the efforts of so many Rabbis,
Pastors, churchmen, Ministers and countless laypeople to understand each
other,
embrace each other, seek each other\'s heart. I hope that a movie
which, with a spurious literalism, veils the
remarkable message of love at
the heart of the Christian tradition, will paradoxically enhance that
love, and so
bring closer the time for which all pray, a time of peace.
Kein Y\'hi Ratzon. So may it be God\'s
will.
Rabbi Wolpe gave this sermon to his congregation February 28, 2004.
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