The subtle antisemitism in The Passion

[xray s]

I think the key antisemitic tilt of this movie centers around its portrayal of the Romans.

There is no doubt in the movie that Pilot and the Romans hate Jews. Pilot make reference to his disgust at being assigned to a desolate outpost populated by filthy people. Pilot also talks about having to put down a dozen insurrections and fearing he will lose his life if the Jewish population isn't subdued.

It is plain to me that the courtyard of torture where Jesus is brutally whipped to near death has seen many other Jews pass through its gates. Others Jews received the same treatment for their insolence and attempts to rebel from their foreign captors, some being scourged to death by the sadistic Roman soldiers.

And yet, Gibson chooses to portray the leader of these European invaders, the man who condones such brutal torture, in a sympathetic light.

And that in my opinion is the most dangerous message in the film. Some people come away from the movie thinking that the Romans were trying to keep law and order and civilize a rebellious population lead by corrupt priests and kings. It is only a short leap from seeing Pilot in a sympathetic light to accepting his frustration toward the Jewish population, and then rationalizing that the Roman treatment of Jews was justified.

And that idea chills me to the bone.

[rockymountaindem]

1. That's an interesting point of view

that hasn't been expressed before. I think when most people heard it was "anti-Semitic" (I'm not saying it is or it isn't, I haven't seen it) they were expecting racial slurs and Nazi-style stereotypes. Clearly that wouldn't be produced for mass consumption these days. I think your description is much more realistic and plauseable, from what I've heard.

[scottcsmith]

3. People who don't know what it is, are not going to see it

That's the problem with this film. Christians that see it will simply see a story that they've grown up with. I'd be surprised to find out how many of this film's defenders know anything about the sources Gibson used to write his screenplay or the historical context that is missing from the Christian bible. True believers accept the premise of the Christian bible as being a perfect instrument of God, and that the writers of the Gospels were first-hand witnesses to the events they describe. Biblical scholars know that the writers of the Gospels were not first-hand witnesses. It's generally accepted that the oldest of the Gospels, the book of Mark, was written around 70 CE, or about 40 years after the time Jesus was to have lived. The other gospels came later. And when one reads the Gospels in the actual order they were written, not in the order canonized, a different picture emerges. We begin to see that the authors of Matthew and Luke drew upon Mark as a source for their own material (there are features from Mark found in both Matthew and Luke). The book of John is a different matter altogether, drawing from different source material.

An understanding of Jewish history is important. How did Jews live in the first century? What was it like for a Jewish community to live under Roman rule?

Other questions are important to ask. What crime did Jesus commit? What violation of Jewish law was he guilty of? We get various answers in the Gospels, but the accepted "crime" was Jesus claiming to be the Messiah, thus guilty of blasphemy. But we know that it was not a violation of Jewish law to be a claimant to the title of Messiah.

The historian Josephus gives us some insight into the man Pilate was. His portrayal in the Christian bible is fiction. He was not a thoughtful man of indecision who would have such a difficult time in executing a Jew. He was a brutal ruler, and not particularly empathetic to Jewish traditions or customs. Josephus records an incident where Pilate stole money from the Jewish temple to build an aqueduct. Pilate was also known to display Roman battle standards in Jerusalem. Romans considered the standards to be minor deities, and to put them on display in a Jewish community would surely cause much grief among the Jews in that community, as gazing upon these standards would be in direct violation of the first commandment.

The Passion scenes of the Christian bible have a mob of Jews demanding Pilate execute Jesus. Pilate, as history has recorded, would not have allowed a crowd of Jews to gather at all; he most certainly would have sent troops to break up the group. In 36 CE, Pilate squashed an insurrection of Samaritans, and was so brutal that he was recalled to Rome for his actions.

No, the sympathetic portrayal of Pilate in the New Testament was more done out of necessity than out of historical accuracy. After all, the authors of the Gospels were still living under Roman rule and it would not have been very wise to portray Pilate in a negative manner.

One last point to consider: as Christianity evolved, Jesus' Jewish roots were de-emphasized, to the point that his Jewishness was essentially ignored. What emerged was a Jesus who created Christianity, when in fact the religion formed decades after Christ was to have died. Over time the Jews of the Passion were cast in the roll of antagonist, enemy to Christ, and rejected by God for the act of deicide. The idea that Jews killed Christ has fueled anti-Semitism for over two thousand years. That's why this film worries us. We Jews see a powerful, and popular, film like The Passion re-igniting those old beliefs. And it may not fuel them now. But over time, this film could be used as a tool of people that are anti-Jewish. The book "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" was written in 1897, and has long been exposed as a fraud, but to this day it is still used to fuel anti-Semitism, especially in the middle-east.

[rudeboy666]

2. Pilate

Actually, the Bible portrays Pilate in a sympathetic light.

Of course, the historical accuracy of the Bible is obviously questionable.