The Passion of the Christ Controversy

The purpose of this paper is to take an in-depth look at Mel Gibson's movie, "The Passion of Christ," about the crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth. The paper focuses on the debate that has accompanied the movie. This debate involves whether Gibson's movie was a work of art that made the spiritual message of the crucifixion of Christ come alive for viewers or whether it was an overly violent movie that promoted anti-Semitism. The debate is examined from several angles. These include examining reviews of the movie as well as discussing it in relation to religious studies, history, philosophy, art, and violence in film.

Movie critics Roger Ebert (2004:1), Daniel Edelstein (2004:1), and Lutheran Minister Robert Benne (2004:1-2) all reviewed Mel Gibson's "The Passion of Christ." Edelstein's review portrayed Mel Gibson as a man obsessed with the cinemagraphic portrayal of violence throughout his long career.

Given this obsession, it was no surprise to Edelstein that Gibson spent time "wallowing is his [Jesus'] torture and death." Edelstein (2004:1) briefly acknowledges the centrality of Jesus' death on the cross to Christianity but feels that to focus on the last 12 hours of Jesus' life is to necessarily focus on the part of the Gospel that most reflects historical and current 'tension' between Christians and Jews and is, therefore, sure to cause a stirring of anti-Semitic urges and impulses.

On the other hand, while Roger Ebert (

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ave been biblically accurate but was most likely not historically accurate. Further, the panel stated that while Gibson had the nails driven through the hands, historically, they were driven through the wrists in order to hold up the body. They point out that this inaccurate image suggests that Mel relied more on artistic portrayals of the crucifixion than on historical detail. The portrayal of Mary Magdalene was also not accurate and the panel felt that Pilot was 'whitewashed' based on cherry-picking passages from the bible. As to the overall historical accuracy, based on panel responses Howard (2005:1) gave the film a B+. In other words, it was substantially more accurate than it was inaccurate. Philosophy: The Soundness and Validity of Both Sides of the Argument The essence of the debate about "The Passion of Christ" involves whether the movie was an accurate and meaningful as well as artistic portrayal of the last 12 hours of Jesus' life or whether it was it an overwhelmingly and excessively gory film that promoted anti-Semitic sentiments. The idea that it was inaccurate is an assertion and it is an assertion that, historically and biblically, has been shown to contain some small truths but to be mostly invalid

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