Critics say Gibson film mimics a hateful book

[trumad]

Read this before you support crazy Mel....

Despite Mel Gibson's effort to disavow any anti-Jewish influence in his film about Jesus' death, his critics are firing back with fresh evidence that the movie closely follows an anti-Jewish book by a 19th-Century German nun.

<snip>
"Here's one example. There's this whole brutal scene in the movie in which Jesus' captors hang him over a bridge by chains and then yank him back up again," Rudin said. "That's nowhere in the New Testament. Where did it come from?"

<snip>
Gibson's co-screenwriter, Benedict Fitzgerald, sparked some of this new criticism by claiming in recent interviews that he believes the Pharisees played a major role in Jesus' death.

Emmerich's book, which was based on visions she claimed to have had, largely blames the Pharisees. But the Bible does not.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/7984487.htm

[regnaD kciN]

1. Oh, wonderful! From the same article...

However, John Dominic Crossan, a Catholic Bible scholar and author based in Florida, said Wednesday that he has made a fresh analysis of the film, which he has seen, in light of Emmerich's book and plans to be one of the leading voices criticizing "The Passion of the Christ."

For those who don't know him, Crossan is a radical "modernist" Biblical scholar who has spent most of the past two decades writing books that deny Jesus's divinity and suggest the "resurrection" occured only in the minds of his followers. Just the sort of opponent Gibson would love to hold up as an example of those criticizing his film.

:eyes:

[bhunt70]

7. Crossan is one of the leading scholars on the life of Jesus.

Let Mel bring it on then, although I plan on seeing the film.

[priller]

2. Uh, according to the NT, the Pharisees did play a major role

Emmerich's book, which was based on visions she claimed to have had, largely blames the Pharisees. But the Bible does not.

"The only role the Bible says the Pharisees have in the passion of Jesus is, in one case they try to warn him that there's a plot against his life," said Eugene Fisher, the spokesman on interfaith relations for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C.

Sorry, but this guy is completely wrong.

Matthew 12:14-15 -- But the Pharisees went out and conspired against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.  But Jesus, aware of this, withdrew from there.

John 11:47-53 -- Therefore the chief priests and the Pharisees convened a council, and were saying, "What are we doing? For this man is performing many signs.  "If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation."  But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, "You know nothing at all, nor do you take into account that it is expedient for you that one man die for the people, and that the whole nation not perish."...So from that day on they planned together to kill Him.

[no_hypocrisy]

3. Even Oberammergau has changed the script for The Passion Play which

is performed every 10 years since the mid 17th century. (Gibson's movie seems to be a knock-off of the original.) The script used to be extremely antisemitic to the point where Hitler employed it as a reference and a justification for his policies.

More info on the following link:
http://www.freep.com/features/travel/play2_20000702.htm

[blondeatlast]

4. Interesting to note this aforementioned book is headed for a reprint

with an impressive print run of 50,000. (Baker and Taylor's Title Source II; a trade database)

"he Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ"

The cover blurb says that it is indeed the inspiration for "The Passion."

ISBN: 0974909807 (your bookseller or librarian will thank you dearly if you use this)


Edit: removed Amazon link with personal info.

[libragirl73]

5. Well....

....Mel DID say that the Holy Ghost came inside him
and told him the "correct" version of
what went down 2000 years ago.
I don't know about you,
but I don't think I believe him.

[Bridget Burke]

6. So Gibson's lying....

When he says that anybody who has a problem with his movie has a problem with the Gospels.

He's free to make his movie using whatever source he likes, but his new Fundy friends need to realize that he's gone beyond the Gospels. With all the martyrdom he's been complaining about, I wouldn't be surprised if he follows her example & begins exhibiting the stigmata.

[blondeatlast]

8. He needs to make it crystal clear that the movie is a work of FICTION.

As a librarian, I go by the Dewey Decimal and Library of Congress classifications, both of which agree that both the Bible and "Dolorous Passion" are non-fiction.

But this isn't the first, nor will it be the last, time that a work of non-fiction is dramatized to the point that it is fiction.

OTOH, people ought to realize the same for themselves. But I'm smarter than that, and I know they won't.

FWIW, I believe in God and in the philosophies of Jesus Christ.

[BigDaddyLove]

17. Absolutley...........

I don't understand the enormous flap this is creating.

It's a frickin movie for crying out loud....when did Gibson ever proclaim himself a biblical scholar? It's just his interpretation of events depicted in the Bible.

[blondeatlast]

9. I have yet to see it, but I have a problem with his interpretation

of the Gospels (from his own words, again stressing I haven't seen it).

Furthermore, I wish he'd stick a sock in his daddy's mouth for a while.

[chookie]

14. Arrogance

Gibson is free to make any film he wishes to.

Most people in the creative arts will take responsibility for their interpretation of a story. Gibson, however, is not -- arrogantly proclaiming that his film presents the absolutely true version of events, and that his interpretation is not to be questioned. To say that his critics can only "have problems with the 4 Gospels" is sheer arrogance.

Clearly, Gibson is on some sort of religious crusade. Even in setting up a shot in a film, a director is making a clear and definite choice regarding interpretation. Gibson, and his supporters, largely in the evangelistic crowd, are trying to convince us that Gibson's film is an infallible telling of the stories of the Gospels, based on his objective yet divinely inspired reading of the same. This simply is not the case, and this is increasingly evident as Gibson's true sources, such as the German vision material, is revealed.

I am guessing that the reason this film is so "correct" about Jesus is that it will frame it within RW politics, within the "End Times", as these people believe that we are currently living through.

[sendero]

10. Fiction....

... based on fiction and visions. For the life of me I cannot understand why anyone would bother.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

11. If he has added extra-NT scenes

then his whole claim of being accurate to the gospels is false.

[trumad]

12. Exactly... What...Is Gibson re-writing the Gospel

when he adds things like below?

<snip>
"Here's one example. There's this whole brutal scene in the movie in which Jesus' captors hang him over a bridge by chains and then yank him back up again," Rudin said. "That's nowhere in the New Testament. Where did it come from?"

It came from a guy who clearly wants to make Jews the bad guys.

I'd like folks to explain this one?

[brainwashed_youth]

13. what?

The Bible puts alot of blame on the Pharisees. And that scene your talking about is probably the scourging of Jesus. No, the Bible does no give much details about that other than it was extremely brutal.

[chookie]

15. The arrogance of our age

Gibson is free to make any film he wishes to.

Most people in the creative arts will take responsibility for their interpretation of a story. Gibson, however, is not -- arrogantly proclaiming that his film presents the absolutely true version of events, and that his interpretation is not to be questioned. To say that his critics can only "have problems with the 4 Gospels" is sheer arrogance.

Clearly, Gibson is on some sort of religious crusade. Even in setting up a shot in a film, a director is making a clear and definite choice regarding interpretation. Gibson, and his supporters, largely in the evangelistic crowd, are trying to convince us that Gibson's film is an infallible telling of the stories of the Gospels, based on his objective yet divinely inspired reading of the same. This simply is not the case, and this is increasingly evident as Gibson's true sources, such as the German vision material, is revealed.

I am guessing that the reason this film is so "correct" about Jesus is that it will frame it within RW politics, within the "End Times", as these people believe that we are currently living through.

[chookie]

16. The arrogance of our age

Gibson is free to make any film he wishes to.

Most people in the creative arts will take responsibility for their interpretation of a story. Gibson, however, is not -- arrogantly proclaiming that his film presents the absolutely true version of events, and that his interpretation is not to be questioned. To say that his critics can only "have problems with the 4 Gospels" is sheer arrogance.

Clearly, Gibson is on some sort of religious crusade. Even in setting up a shot in a film, a director is making a clear and definite choice regarding interpretation. Gibson, and his supporters, largely in the evangelistic crowd, are trying to convince us that Gibson's film is an infallible telling of the stories of the Gospels, based on his objective yet divinely inspired reading of the same. This simply is not the case, and this is increasingly evident as Gibson's true sources, such as the German vision material, is revealed.

I am guessing that the reason this film is so "correct" about Jesus is that it will frame it within RW politics, within the "End Times", as these people believe that we are currently living through.

What's next -- that if I don't think it's a good film, that I am simply incapable of understanding how sublime Mel is, and that I am going to hell?

People who live utter certainties, and who believe they are in absolute possession of absolute truth, ought to raise red flags....