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Who Killed Jesus?

Continued Pages 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
Page 2 of 4

Newsweek

As moving as many moments in the film are, though, two
NEWSWEEK screenings of a rough cut of the movie raise important historical
issues about how Gibson chose to portray the Jewish people and the Romans. To
take the film's account of the Passion literally will give most audiences a
misleading picture of what probably happened in those epochal hours so long ago.
The Jewish priests and their followers are the villains, demanding the death of
Jesus again and again; Pilate is a malleable governor forced into handing down
the death sentence.

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In fact, in the age
of Roman domination, only Rome crucified. The crime was sedition, not
blasphemy—a civil crime, not a religious one. The two men who were killed along
with Jesus are identified in some translations as "thieves," but the word can
also mean "insurgents," supporting the idea that crucifixion was a political
weapon used to send a message to those still living: beware of revolution or
riot, or Rome will do this to you, too. The two earliest and most reliable
extra-Biblical references to Jesus—those of the historians Josephus and
Tacitus—say Jesus was executed by Pilate. The Roman prefect was Caiaphas'
political superior and even controlled when the Jewish priests could wear their
vestments and thus conduct Jewish rites in the Temple. Pilate was not the humane
figure Gibson depicts. According to Philo of Alexandria, the prefect was of
"inflexible, stubborn, and cruel disposition," and known to execute
troublemakers without trial.

Mel Gibson's 'The Passion of the
Christ'

•
Who Killed
Jesus?

•
Interview: 'You
Want Me To Play
Jesus?'

So
why was the Gospel story—the story Gibson has drawn on—told in a way that makes
"the Jews" look worse than the Romans? The Bible did not descend from heaven
fully formed and edged in gilt. The writers of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
shaped their narratives several decades af-ter Jesus' death to attract converts
and make their young religion—understood by many Christians to be a faction of
Judaism—attractive to as broad an audience as possible.

The historical problem of dealing with the various
players in the Passion narratives is complicated by the exact meaning of the
Greek words usually translated "the Jews." The phrase does not include the
entire Jewish population of Jesus' day—to the writers, Jesus and his followers
were certainly not included—and seems to refer mostly to the Temple elite. The
Jewish people were divided into numerous sects and parties, each believing
itself to be the true or authentic representative of the ancestral faith and
each generally hostile to the others.

Newmarket
Releasing / Courtesy Everett Collection

Claudia Gerini (right) plays the wife of Hristo Shopov
(left)'s Pilate

Given these rivalries, we can begin to understand the
origins of the unflattering Gospel image of the Temple establishment: the elite
looked down on Jesus' followers, so the New Testament authors portrayed the
priests in a negative light. We can also see why the writers downplayed the role
of the ruling Romans in Jesus' death. The advocates of Christianity—then a new,
struggling faith—understandably chose to placate, not antagonize, the powers
that were. Why remind the world that the earthly empire which still ran the
Mediterranean had executed your hero as a revolutionary?

The film opens with a haunting image of Jesus praying in
Gethsemane. A satanic figure—Gibson's most innovative dramatic device—tempts
him: no one man, the devil says, can carry the whole burden of sin. As in the
New Testament, the implication is that the world is in the grip of evil, and
Jesus has come to deliver us from the powers of darkness through his death and
resurrection—an upheaval of the very order of things. Though in such anguish
that his sweat turns to blood, Jesus accepts his fate.

In an ensuing scene, Mary Magdalene calls for help from
Roman soldiers as Jesus is taken indoors to be interrogated by the priests.
"They've arrested him," she cries. A Temple policeman intervenes, tells the
Romans "she's crazy" and assures them that Jesus "broke the Temple laws, that's
all." When word of the trouble reaches Pilate, he is told, "There is trouble
within the walls. Caiaphas had some prophet arrested." It is true that the
Temple leaders had no use for Jesus, but these lines of dialogue—which, taken
together, suggest Jewish control over the situation—are not found in the
Gospels.

The idea of a nighttime trial as depicted in Gibson's
movie is also problematic. The Gospels do not agree on what happened between
Jesus' arrest and his appearance before Pilate save for one detail: Jesus was
brought before the high priest in some setting. In the movie, Jesus is
interrogated before a great gathering of Jewish officials, possibly the
Sanhedrin, and witnesses come forth to accuse him of working magic with the
Devil, of claiming to be able to destroy the Temple and raise it up again in
three days, and of calling himself "the Son of God." Another cries: "He's said
if we don't eat his flesh and drink his blood, we won't inherit eternal life."
Gibson does indicate that Jesus has supporters; one man calls the proceeding "a
travesty," and another asks, "Where are the other members of the council?"—a
suggestion that Caiaphas and his own circle are taking action that not everyone
would agree with. The climax comes when Caiaphas asks Jesus: "Are you the
Messiah?" and Jesus says, "I am..." and alludes to himself as "the Son of Man."
There is a gasp; the high priest rends his garments and declares Jesus a
blasphemer.

NEWSWEEK RADIO |
2/8/04

Religion:
Gibson, Jesus, and the Jews

Jim Caviezel, Star of Mel
Gibsons’, The Passion of the Christ, Abraham
Foxman, Director, The Anti-Defamation League and
John Meacham, Newsweek Managing Editor

•
Listen
to the audio

•
Listen
to the complete On Air show

There
is much here to give the thinking believer pause. "Son of God" and "Son of Man"
were fairly common appellations for religious figures in the first century. The
accusation about eating Jesus' flesh and blood—obviously a Christian image of
the eucharist—does not appear in any Gospel trial scene. And it was not
"blasphemy" to think of yourself as the "Messiah," which more than a few Jewish
figures had claimed to be without meeting Jesus' fate, except possibly at the
hands of the Romans. The definition of blasphemy was a source of fierce Jewish
argument, but it turned on taking God's name in vain—and nothing in the Gospel
trial scenes supports the idea that Jesus crossed that line.

The best historical reconstruction of what really
happened is that Jesus had a fairly large or at least vocal following at a time
of anxiety in the capital, and the Jewish authorities wanted to get rid of him
before overexcited pilgrims rallied around him, drawing down Pilate's wrath. "It
is expedient for you," Caiaphas says to his fellow priests in John, "that one
man should die for the people" so that "the whole nation should not perish."

Continued Pages 1 | 2 | 3 | 4

© 2004 Newsweek,
Inc.

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