Top 10 Reasons Why Mel's Passion Isn't "As It Was"

[Bolo Boffin]

I know, I know, the movie hasn't been released. I haven't even seen it yet, so how can I judge the merits of this film?

Enough information is out already to tell that Mel Gibson's account of the death of Jesus is nowhere close to historically accurate. In fact, there's so much wrong that I can give you a top ten list. I'll try to do one a night from here on out. Then after all ten are out, I'll publish them all together in one post, okay? Okay.

Please don't misunderstand me. As a movie and as a spiritual exercise for Christians, The Passion of the Christ is shaping up to be a stunner. But Mr. Gibson is specifically marketing this movie as a historical account. He's claiming that the Holy Ghost moved him in the making of this film - an incredible grasp for the mantle of infallibility. Many people will be attending this film thinking that they are seeing the facts of that day in Judea almost two thousand years ago.

They won't be, and here's the top ten reasons why currently available to us:


10. Nails in the wrist, not in the hands.

9. Mary the mother of Jesus had other sons.

8. Koine Greek, the most common language of the day, is not used in the film.

7. Roman soldiers were present when Jesus was arrested.

6. The cross is wrong.

Interlude - Crucifixion Porn

5. The Jews who spoke with Jesus were trying to intercede on his behalf, not railroad him.

4. It was not blasphemy to identify yourself as the Messiah or the Son of Man.

3. Pilate was not the sensitive, thoughtful ruler portrayed in the film.

2. Pilate was the instigator of the death of Jesus, not Caiaphas.

And the number one reason why Mel's Passion isn't as it was...
The resurrection of Jesus is not historical.

On edit: Added the intro.

[Robin Hood]

1. Whom ever said that reasoning was part of religious thought.

You're confusing facts with their fantasy.

[Bolo Boffin]

36. Very Humian of you.

Hope you checked out my paraphrase of "On Miracles". I'd appreciate some feedback on it.

[Dr Fate]

2. It follows Classic literature rather than history.

Censoring and altering classic literature is just as facistic as altering history itself.

As an atheist and a Liberal, I stand behind "Crazy Mels" right to make his version of the King James Text.

[Bolo Boffin]

9. Well, he gets a lot of the Bible stuff wrong too!

If he were just making a movie based on his faith, I'd be right behind him too. But he's making truth claims like "It's how it actually happened," and "The Holy Spirit guided me while making this movie." He's using supposed quote from the Pope that "it is as it was."

Well, as Christian doctrine and as a movie story, it may be just fine, but as history, it stinks. And people have a right to know that, too.

[molly]

3. I think Mel's father had a lot of influence

the New Testament was rewritten because Constantine wanted it rewritten. I refuse to ever see another Mel Gibson film.

[Dr Fate]

5. Did you see this one?

I did not see it yet. How was it?

[Bolo Boffin]

7. This is all from what's already out there

Articles from people who've seen the film, production stills, etc.

I'm going to the movie tomorrow twice! Once to take it in as a spectator, and the second time with a notebook.

[JasonDeter]

4. Reading his and Newsweeks account reminds me of O'Neal's phrase:

A blind man in a room of deaf people. BUT they have a right to their opinions, even if they're wrong. Its just as easy to discount their interpretations as absolute falacy as it is for non believers to claim infalibility in their beliefs. The bottom line is God requires 'Faith' for one to be right in His eyes based on Faith in/with/by the Sacrifice of His Son on the Cross. Non believers may be right, but God help you if your wrong because there will be hell to pay. And God says that debt is an eternal debt. selah.

[Bolo Boffin]

11. They have every right to their personal faith

It's claiming faith to be history that the problem begins.

[SerpentX]

12. "God help you if your wrong because there will be hell to pay"

What does that say about "God"? If there is a supreme being, I'd hope it could do better than the sadistic monster some x-ians imagine.

[Bridget Burke]

24. Speaking of "The Supreme Being"....

I picked up a DVD of "Time Bandits" at Target yesterday--only 9.99!

There's definitely a Supreme Being in that film--a fairly ineffectual one, played by Sir Ralph Richardson.

[reprobate]

32. All have the right to their beliefs. The problems arise when......

the problems arise when the believers on one particular cult portray the believers of another cult as evil. Hatred quickly arises, and violence is not far behind. Christianity, among other religions, has done this from it's inception. Who was it that said "More people have died in the name of god than for all other reasons"?

Historicly the Jesus story is only the last in a series of more than a dozen 'christ' myths, and all the rest had just as big a following in their day. This one, like all the rest, will fade one day and be replaced with a myth that more fits the life of the time it is formulated.

The wisest man that I have learned from, Joseph Campbell, put it quite well when he said that the mistake we make in the west is to mistake the spiritual myth for the concrete reality.

Peace and long life.

[Bolo Boffin]

34. Mistaking the spiritual myth for the concrete reality

Precisely. Thanks, reprobate.

[izzie]

6. It is also interesting where our 'picture' of this time comes from

Much or our 'pictures' of this time come from the artist of Italy city states. The Florence school etc. Much of early Christians were fitted in with the Roman(Greek) Gods. Even early churches were often from these people.Dates also. The church of the day also ruled in how things would be told to the people. It is not that things did not happen but it was colored by the time and how it was to be seen by people. What was done to JC was par for the times.Rome ruled and the locals often went along.Usually I should say.

[Shadowen]

8. Slight problem with the interlude.

The Interlude, quoting a USAToday article, refers to the whip as a "cat o'nine tails". This is inaccurate. The whip, according to detailed reviews I've read, had hooks on the end of each thong. A cat o'nine tails is a whip with nine thongs; a whip with nine thongs that end in hooks or barbs is a scourge, as in, "The flesh was scourged from Jesus's back."

[Bolo Boffin]

10. On the whip

I knew something was up with the whip, but I already had my top ten!

I'd read somewhere that hooks <i>weren't</i> on the traditional scourging whip, that it had small metal balls that pounded and bruised the flesh until it finally...

Well, you get the picture. I don't doubt what you're saying, though. I've haven't looked into it enough to know.

[Bucky]

14. Ewww! Yuck!

Sure, okay, Jesus suffered. But why should I worry my beautiful mind over this level of detail? You called it right; Bolo, it's porn.

[Bolo Boffin]

15. Ooh, not me! Jesse at Pandagon said it first.

"Crucifixion Porn" is his phrase, which I fully agree with.

[leftchick]

13. What About Jesus' Last Words?!?

I heard a scholar on NPR last week discussing this subject. He said Mel kept out Jesus' last words on the cross before dying about forgiveness....

"Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."
Luke 23:34

It will be interesting to see if this is true.

[Bolo Boffin]

16. Oh, I hadn't heard that.

That would be a terrible shame if that were true. I'll be on the lookout for that tomorrow.

[SerpentX]

17. Which tradition is it based on, Synoptic or Johnanine?

Or does he try to synthesize the two accounts?

[Bolo Boffin]

18. Oh, he pulls from everywhere.

All four gospels, plus the Stations of the Cross (Veronica makes her appearance) and supposedly elements from the writings of Anne Catherine Emmerich.

I like the editorial you posted. Gibson found contradictions among scholars, so he decided for himself...brilliant!

[trumad]

20. I heard in the movie they chained him and threw him over a bridge

Where's that in the New Testamant?

[Bolo Boffin]

21. They do...saw in the coffee-table book

Where's that anywhere? I've not read the Emmerich book, maybe that's one of her hallucinations.

[Bridget Burke]

22. That part came from Anna Katerina Emmerick

...a German nun of the 19th century who expanded upon the Gospel versions of the Passion. She bore the stigmata--when will poor, martyred Mel emulate her? Besides her meditations on the Passion, she wrote these Prophecies:

"The Church of Rome shall be abandoned without leadership. Rome shall be occupied by aggressors. Clergy and faithful shall be persecuted.

"Muslims and Orthodox shall promote an ecumenical church by electing a modernistic pope who will abandon Catholic Teaching and Tradition, rule by compromising and committee."

http://nostradamus.freehomepages.com/emmerick.htm

Mary of Agreda's "City of God" is another source for Mel. She is well known in Texas--as the Lady in Blue, she appeared to Indians throughout the Southwest at the beginning of the mission period. Saints preserve us, she never left Spain!

Mel keeps saying that if you're against his film, you're against the Gospels. However, he is using these other sources. I wonder if all his new Fundamentalist Protestant friends will begin studying the mystical writings of these two nuns? Wouldn't that be "ecumenical"?

[Bolo Boffin]

23. Thanks for that confirmation

That's going to seem loopy to a lot of people.

[leftchick]

19. This is also interesting...

<Snip>The film begins not when Jesus enters Jerusalem to the exuberant welcome of thousands of Jews but rather at night in a garden on the eve of the crucifixion when he is arrested by the Romans after being betrayed by Judas.

"Why did they need a traitor? Why did they need the night? Why didn't they grab him in the daytime?" Crossan asked.

"Because they did not want a riot," he said, explaining that Jesus was immensely popular among his fellow Jews, which is why the high priests and Romans felt threatened by him.

Those details, Crossan said, were absent in the film.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=638&ncid=762&e=1&u=/nm/20040224/en_nm/life_jesus_film_dc

[asthmaticeog]

28. Wait - what?

"Jesus was immensely popular among his fellow Jews, which is why the high priests and Romans felt threatened by him. "

I get it - I guess THAT'S why we're always blamed for killing him - because he was so popular with us we'd have rioted at the news of his arrest. Must be nice not to have to worry about consistency.

[Bolo Boffin]

30. hehehehe

I'm advocating that only Pilate felt threatened by Jesus, and early Christian leaders resented the Jewish leaders' inability to do anything to stop him.

PS: The Bush picture is FANTASTIC! That's exactly where Bush belongs: a permanent guest at the Overlook. That movie gets creepier every time I see it...

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

25. Not to mention

that Jesus probably looked more like Omar Sharif than a WASP as portrayed in the clips I've seen......

[Bolo Boffin]

26. So many Christians have gotten that one wrong for so many years...

I'd post the picture I've seen around DU lately, of the very ethnic Jesus, but I don't have a link. If that guy shows up in the clouds on Judgment Day, there's going to be a lot of uncomfortable Christians sailing up into the sky...

[TrogL]

27. That's it - you're on my daily list

of things to read.

Excellent blog.

[Bolo Boffin]

31. Damn. Now I have to blog every day...

Hehehe...thanks, TrogL.

[JohnOneillsMemory]

29. Surprise. There is no way to corroborate any of the Bible either. Fables.

This movie is unbelievably bloody. A reviewer said he was still stunned days after the preview showing. Seeing blood is traumatic. That's why we aren't allowed to see the blood of the Iraqis that Bush* slaughters.

But the blood of Jesus will charge up the troops of the culture wars to go out and elect Bush* the Destroyer again. Karl Rove could hire Mel Gibson to do propaganda the way Hitler hired Leni Riefenstahl who made the ultimate Nazi advertisement, 'Triumph of the Will.'

(Now, Christians, don't take this as an insult. I was raised by a Baptist-turned-Episcopalian mother who is a Medieval historian college professor and we both revere the 'Jesus model' of compassion in human values.)

But the Bible is the first Television, ever present tales of wonder designed to hit your emotional buttons and make you do things. While we hope it would mean do nice Jesus-kinda-things, too often it is used to get people to do bad Wrathful-Smiting-kinda-things.

For centuries the Bible has been touted as 'the way things are' just like Fox News. Any one who denied or questioned the Church was stoned, burned at the stake, exiled, starved, shunned. Bill O'Reilly is today's Grand Inquisitor-"Shut up! shut up! shut up!" I wonder how he would interview Galileo?

Sound familar?
"You're either with us or against us" is an old motto that still works.

http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_5160.shtml
(This is the best article on how a Hitlerian Theocracy is intentionally being nurtured in American culture. BELIEVE IT.)

[UTUSN]

33. Thanks for the Fascinating History

Couldn't get #6 link, and some of the links carry two or so topics. Love this kind of info.

[Bolo Boffin]

35. The perils of Blogger archives

Blogger archives a weeks worth of posts on one page, and accesses them in that form only. So you're bouncing around on the same page or two. Sorry about that.

The only thing I can do about it is change to Movable Type. If you see a blog built on MT, you'll see that each individual post gets its own page, with the comments and trackbacks all underneath. That's a better system, but I don't have the cash to put on that right now. And since Haloscan's got trackback capabilities now, I kinda like the old blog...

[megatherium]

37. explanations of the resurrection?

There are three takes on the resurrection: It didn't happen (it was a hoax or legend or something); or it happened pretty much as the scriptures described (bodily resurrection); or it was a "spiritual resurrection" (Jesus' followers strongly believed to have seen him after his death, but his body was still in the tomb somewhere).

The latter theory seems parsimonious to me in that even in modern times it is not unusual for people to strongly believe they've seen or been in contact with the dead. Evangelicals dislike this theory because it sounds like Jesus is just a ghost, and it appears that the writers of the Gospels took the trouble to exclude this possibility.

In any event, it appears from history that the disciples were convinced of the reality of Christ's appearances to them. The first letter of Paul to the Corinthians was written in the early 50s, and contains a clear statement of the reality of the resurrection (chapter 15). (Paul died about 66 of the common era.) This of course doesn't prove anything, but it does imply that the belief in the resurrection was early, not a later legend that grew to mythology (as many skeptics suppose).

[HornBuckler]

38. Crock Of Crap

I'm Going To See This Film, And I Can't Wait. I Am No Christian - But I'll Put HEAVY Money That This Film Is Brilliant. I Don't Give A Rat's ASS As To The Facts (Pope Said It Was The Real Deal) But I Don't Give A Rat's Ass About The Pope Either - I DO Give A Rat's Ass About Mel Gibson And Think His Work Is Friggin' Great. I Liked Mad Max I'll Like The Passion. (Especially If It's Gory And Bloody As Hell)

Spoken Like A True American, I Know
Blame It On God

[UTUSN]

39. Kick for Great Info n/t

[MidwestMomma]

40. I have a question

Where in the gospels does the devil show up in the garden that night and tempt Jesus? This is bugging me because it seems like a glaring inconsistency to me. I know none of it is historical fact but there is a basic story and the way I remember it, Jesus faces his self doubts in the garden, not the devil. The devil temptation was in the desert before entering Jerusalem. Is the 40 days/nights thing in the movie?

Any scripture readers out there that can help me out? I'd appreciate knowing if I'm remembering my Gospels right or wrong. Thanks.

[UTUSN]

43. From O'REILLY Clips Tonight (not the Gospels, for sure)

The movie covers the last 12 hours of the story, not the 40 days/nights. And satan is portrayed as a woman. The clip showed the woman standing, and from out of the long skirt a snake slithered out, and there was a huge maggot peeking out of "her" nose. There's another thread somewhere here commenting on the misogyny. On O'REILLY, he and GIBSON commented that the movie introduces both the Jesus and satan characters TOGETHER in the garden, which ain't scriptural either. O'REILLY also sez (from his great learning - cough) that the Jewish character who was forced to help carry the cross had his role expanded in the movie to portray him as a heroic Jew.

[MidwestMomma]

44. Thanks

I thought Mel was making that part up. It doesn't really matter. He can write his movie anyway he wants. It's just doesn't follow the story to me and also takes away from Jesus' self struggle in the garden.

I liked your (great learning-cough) part...I wish I had seen Oreilly talking about this movie. Was he all in a religious fervor?

[UTUSN]

45. Oh, That "Misogyny" Thread Was Yours!

No, on tonight's show (the part with GIBSON was taped), O'REILLY was in his QUIET/INTENSE mode. He was also spinning throughout the whole show, the live parts on other topics, but that's another topic. With GIBSON his spin was that this was "a CABLE exclusive," since he can't claim a flat-out Exclusive because SAWYER already got that real one.

Last week he did his radio show about the movie, which he had just seen. His profound assessment was that the movie, with those couple of deviations, was just taken literally from the gospel accounts, therefore there was NOTHING NEW in it except for the incredible violence. He said that to people LIKE HIM, who had umpteen years of Catholic school and indoctrination, he already knew what was in the movie, that somebody LIKE HIM WOULD NOT BE CHANGED by the movie. Shucks, O'REILLY won't change! Tonight he told GIBSON that the violence soon ended up NUMBING him and lost its impact on him.

I didn't see the Diane SAWYER interview with GIBSON except for clips on other shows with him making strange expressions. He did it in the O'REILLY thing, too.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

41. Boloboffin must be pretty old to have actually been there at...

...the Crucifixion.

How else could he or she know all of those details that he mentions ad nauseum?

Amazing!

[BurtWorm]

42. The Number One Reason: Jesus is a Mythological Figure

totally lost to history, if based (not likely) on a real person. More likely, Jesus is based on Pagan godman heroes like Osiris, Dionysus and Mithra--he's sort of a blend between those heroes and the Jewish messiah myth. Therefore, any attempt to protray this mythological story "as it really happened" is blasphemy, totally missing the point of the original myth.