Nah, not really worth the energy. But since hypocrisy is ignorance’s protective friend, thought I’d point out the obvious.
No, Vito is my protective friend, and he’s got a short fuse.
Well, probably that can be a problem in the USA where religious nutcases seem to pop up and flourish like mushrooms.
I don’t see how it can be a problem in EU nations though.
I also don’t see Mel Gibson" perceived as " cultural icon" overthere. (Childish adoration for actors is in my opinion something for teenagers).
People there tend to be a lot more realistic and moderated then that.
Besides: Those I know and that happen to be Christians don’t need a movie at all to get informed about the life of Jesus.
They know the lifestory of Jesus as they believe it happened.
They know he was a Jew and that he lived as Jew among Jews in a Jewish nation. So they know that those who were -according the story- demanding the death of Jesus hardly could have been something else then Jews themselves.
So no, I don’t see any “danger” in bringing this same story on a movie screen. Why should it be.
Salaam. A
It’s not personal, Sonny. It’s strictly business.
Because while the West has taken huge steps to confront and get over its anti-semitism to the degree that goofy swarthiness in its Jewish bad guys is not going to inflame anyone’s passions, anti-semitism is still all over in the ME, and in many places publically accepted.
If you can’t see how a film which portrays dastardly Jews scheming to protect their worldly and theological power from good guy upstarts could play a little dicey in the ME, then truly, sir, I tip my hat. I tip my hat.
What does that have to do with anything? The point is that Jesus is seen as a legitimate prophet, and the film has a cabal of Jews bringing him down.
I didn’t say that they were held solely responsible, but they were part of a whole host of Jewish figures brought low by the traumatic disaster, failures like the rest, their hopes dashed. To many people, this demanded some theological explaination, something that I think early Christians latched onto.
There is some doubt as to whether Paul had truly become a Pharisee: his writing certainly seem suspiciously devoid of the sort of literary style that such training would instill, and his take on various OT stories and theologies wouldn’t have passed a laugh test for most Pharisees. I remember reading some theory about how he likely wanted to become a Pharisee to impress a girl’s father, failed, became the vindictive hound dog of the high priest.
The Gospel of John is regularly attacked for anti-semitism, but John 11 gives Caiaphas and the Sadducees a motive for betraying Jesus that’s tragically understandable. John 11 indicates that they saw Jesus, a self-proclaimed Messiah, not as a blasphemer or evildoer, but as a danger to his own people. They knew that the Romans didn’t stand for sedition, and that if Jesus became the leader of a mass movement, the Romans were sure to come down on all of Israel without mercy.
Caiaphas doesn’t say “Jesus is a heretic, let’s kill him.” He says, “Do you not see that it is better for this one man to die than for the whole nation to perish?”
The Romans were the ones with the power, and they were the ones who regularly crucified dissidents. Caiaphas and his colleagues seem to have made a terrible decision on purely pragmatic grounds. They reasoned that it was probably better to help the Romans squash Jesus’ mission in its infancy, rather than wait until he was so popular that the Romans felt compelled to come down on ISrael like a ton of bricks.
Apos, I am sorry but you are mistaken. Perhaps you confuse being a Pharisee with being a Rabbi. It is unclear if he ever completed his training for the Rabbinate. Paul was a Pharisee.
Columbia Encyclopedia
http://www.bartleby.com/65/ph/Pharisee.html
Encyclopedia Britannica
http://www.britannica.com/ebc/article?eu=400019
“Brought low”?
A bit more than “brought low”. My source claims that more than 1,000,000 Jews were killed in the Great Revolt, 600,000 more during the Bar Kokhba Rebellion. Most of the survivors were enslaved.
Certainly theologians tried to make sense of the catastrophe, just as recent theologians have struggled with understanding how God could allow HaShoah. It did set Jews up for believing that there must be some sinfulness for which they had been punished, improper rituals, or a pattern of human failings from Adam on … not a far stretch to go to accepting Paul’s concepts of original sin. Matthew blamed the destruction of the Temple on Jews rejection of Jesus as the embodiment of Torah.
And to be fair, Paul wasn’t given a warm reception by many other Jews, much better at winning over non-Jews. He had reason to be frustrated with those who believed that the Law was still valid. But I think that Paul had already been executed by the Romans by the time of the Great Revolt.
Alde … My Grandmother had extended family stilll in Europe at the time. None survived. My Dad was one of the first American soldiers at the gates of Dachau. You do not have the right to tell me who has the right to remember HaShoah and how. What you distort, not out of ignorance (which would perhaps be excusable), but apparently out of malice, is the the basis for Jewish concern of antisemitism. You pervert this realistic fear (based not on one horrific modern event but on patterns of mass murders and systematic oppressions repeated for nearly two thousand years) into a claim for “PR”. Vomit all you like. Choke on it for all I care.
Fact is that “The Passion Play” was used as kindling to stoke fires of violence against Jews for many centuries. Concern that its revivial could incite the same yet again is hardly “a cheap PR tactic”.
And by the way, I think that Arabs do get stereotyped in the media and have for years. And yes, I support the efforts of Arab Americans who lobby objecting to those stereotypes: http://www.adc.org/index.php?id=283
No need for you to start the lobby. Be serious.
Re Trial of Jesus-
Josephus may have mentioned it, Tacitus did, the Talmud references the Jewish aspect of it (info repeated by Maimonides).
There was no reason to reference Barabbas as he did not inspire a historically lasting movement. He was just another criminal who happened to be there.
No other prisoners of Pilate are mentioned in history. Is that a reason to question that he had any?
Neither Josephus nor Tacitus mention a trial by Jewish authorities. All they say is that Jesus was executed by Pilate.
It is highly debatable whether the Talmud makes any mention of Jesus. Some of the cited passages speak of “Balaam” not Jesus. There are those who claim that Balaam is code for Jesus but there is no real support for this argument and Rabbinic scholarship doesn’t recognize them as such.
There is also mention in the 4th century Babylonian Talmud which speaks of a Yeshu who was “hanged on the eve of the Passover” for sorcery but many believe that this was a different Yeshu, a magician who lived a century before Jesus. In any case it’s hardly a matter of settled fact that Talmud mentions Jesus or his trial. It definitely makes no mention of Pilate.
London, you’re probably smart enough to know that the same words can mean different things in the mouths of different people. Some people go way overboard and say (for example) that people who criticize Israel are ipso facto anti-Semites. That doesn’t mean that more reasonable people can’t ask if something else, like a movie, might have anti-Semitic themes.
- I don’t “tell” you anything.
- “remebering” of the suffering of relatives and friends by people involved is quite something different then making abuse of said sufferings by people and organisations for their political goals = They abuse the suffering of millions of people as a PR stunt because it is such a cheap and easy tool that almost beggs to be abused.
- You are the one who seems to do all you can to pervert my posts.
- No one is discussing the historical reality of persecution and ethnic cleansing. Not in case of the Jewish people, not in cases of other people throughout history.
Yet it is a fact that these days a certain section of Jewish people became extremely skilled in abusing these historical events purely for their political goals.
I call that ** shameless abuse of the suffering of others** for PR goals. They know all too well how easy it is to scream “anti semitism” with a hint to the horrors of the holocaust, when you want to play on the feelings of shame and horror of the non Jewish masses in Western countries.
The fact alone that people start screaming “anti semitism” about a movie long before said movie is released and on top of that manage to be taken serious about that “claim”, underscores already the case I try to make here.
By the way: I don’t vomit that easily. In fact: it only happens occasionally when I’m up in the air and once again get airsick in no time. But upto this day I always managed to survive. Sorry.
Fact is that Christians these days are all too well aware of what certain Christian leaders and certain Christians have done towards the Jews in the past.
Further: There is no “revival of the Passion play” involved at all in releasing a movie about the life and death of Jesus because
- Such “Passion Plays” are organized yearly in Christian communities. Some people, especially in countries like Spain where Catholicism prevails, even go as far as letting themselves be nailed on a cross.
- Furthermore there are all over the Western/Christian world performances of the Passions of Bach and of the Messiah of Händel. Every year again, all over the place.
Especially these musical performances in which the drama is underscored by the geniality of the composer’s music can make in my opinion a much larger impact on Christians and others attending them, then any stupid movie will ever be able to do.
So what do you intend to do. Start screaming “anti semitism” every time a church or organisation organizes a Passion Play performance and start lobbying for a complete bann on the Passions of Bach because of their “anti semitism”?
I know about such groups but I’m sorry, they hardly are able to represent me. Not only because they are US’ers - and as such aren’t related to my approach of such problems - but first of all because I’m not able to get interested in people who make it one of their goals to accuse a production house like Disney of “bias”.
Whomever is able to take such a movie “serious” as in: representing reality, is in my opinion ready for professional guidance in the use of his brain. (That is only to give one example of their “activities”).
Stay seriouss and don’t link me to such people if you don’t mind. Thank you.
Salaam. A
This belabors the obvious, given your posting history.
I know it’s a pet whine of yours that one can’t criticize Israel without being called an anti-Semite. Except that your claim is nonsense.
You’re invited to provide an example (for instance, try citing any poster on this board) of someone having equated criticism of Ariel Sharon (or Israel) with anti-Semitism. And if you can’t do so, quit whining.
I have no opinion on the movie, not having seen it (and not planning to).
However, this should be noted: Aldebaran’s claim that the impact of a
major-distribution film is equivalent to that of a performance of the Messiah is ridiculous.
Oh well…it must be a cultural difference because where I live people kiss my hand for paying respect or gratitude.
Nevertheless I’m happy that I could inform you on the matter. Yet there is something missing in your understanding of the case.
First of all : For a film to be viewed by the public, it first must have been released.
Now I’m not informed about details in such transactions/permissions and in fact: I don’t attend public movie theaters at all so I don’t follow any of their programming anywhere.
Yet with this particular movie there are in my opinion a few minor problems to get it released onto the MENA public.
- Jesus = God is blasphemy of the first degree.
- A film about the Christian view on the life of jesus = proselytizing Christianity = advertizing blasphemy.
- In several - if not all, I’m not quite sure about this - of our dear MENA nations proselytizing is excluded from things foreigners are allowed do. (We don’t speak even about some of the really original punishments for blasphemy).
- In some of our dear MENA nations they do everything to convince people that even music,let be a “Western made” movie, is distracting a good Muslim from his religion. Which at all costs must be avoided. I see that attitude as an additional little problem for any movie to dwell freely towards the audience, let be a movie about “Jesus = God”.
- In addition: Picturing prophets is haram ** because** of the idea that when you picture a prophet, you can easily create a tendency to start worshipping that picture representing a prophet. (I don’t touch here even the still widely spread surperstitions linked to “picturing humans” within certain segments of the population)
- Little and great miracles are possible, so let’s take a case where some cinema announces this movie. I picture some unease/disturbance in the surrounding neighbourhood, yet I see at the same time also a very great indifference by the observing Muslim population towards paying money to go see a display of a few hours of what is considered to be pure blasphemy.
- In any case: Those who don’t see such a movie as a display of a few hours advertizing blasphemy, fall already outside your projection of “every Muslim is a Jew hater” even before they enter a theatre to see “the jews pictured as killing Jesus/God”.
To your question “what has Al Qur’an and what is written there to do with it” the answer is:
Everything possible. See above.
I don’t see an overwhelming amount of Muslims becoming all of a sudden severely interested in how Mel Gibson pictures the Christian record and view on the life of Jesus and if yes or no this film pictures Jews as killing Jesus/God.
For a Muslim this whole movie starts from a wrong angle and a distorted view on Jesus to begin with. Whatever it pictures is irrelevant for Muslim beliefs about the story.
Because according to Islam, Jesus was a prohpet and not God . In additon the prophet Jesus was not killed by the Jews as every Muslim who is just a little bit informed about Islam knows.
Muslims do realize that there was some process organized to put him to death and realize that since Jesus was a Jew living in a Jewish land, this trial had also to do with how his fellow jews looked at him at the time.
But in the 31 years of my life I most seldom became informed about someone making the case that this has any relation with the ongoing problems in the ME which makes many people dislike “Jews” or even hating them to death this very day.
The issue “Jesus” has nothing to do with that, while the issue “Jesus” has everything to do with how in the past (and even nowadays)Christians were led to form their opinion on Jews.
If you think Muslims are going to change their beliefs because Mel Gibson made a movie then I think you should reconsider that option.
Salaam. A
Well yes, in fact it is.
This movie shall come, possibly make some firework in certain circles and next it shall disappear.
Händel and Bach always remain and always come back.
Salaam. A
Maybe. Maybe not.
You surely cannot be ignorant of the potential for movies to shape bigoted attitudes for many years to come. This is probably the most outstanding example.
Having not seen you in months you suddenly pop up with your standard MO in the middle of a DD; same old zero respect for the forum and the board.
If you have a point to make, act like a man and make it - preferably in the right forum - because you still read like a snide, behind-the-hand bag of shit.
I imagine most will recognise that to be accurate description of your wholly negative contributions on this board but you should at least try not to live down to your reputation.
Why not try contributing substance tough guy or, please, save your causes the embarrassment of this drive-by smearing and slide away into a dark corner.
You bring nothing positive to the board, and to the best of my knowledge you never, ever have.
Please just go away.
Should read:
" . . . in the middle of a GD; "
Sorry everyone, carry on.
Never ever heard of the movie behind your link.
So sorry.
Salaam. A