"Not peace but a sword" (Safire slams The Passion)

New York Times ^ | Mar 1 04 | William Safire

[churchillbuff]

By WILLIAM SAFIRE

Published: March 1, 2004

Columnist Page: William Safire

WASHINGTON — ...Mel Gibson's movie about the torture and agony of the final hours of Jesus is the bloodiest, most brutal example of sustained sadism ever presented on the screen.

...[snip] — the bar against film violence has been radically lowered. Movie mayhem, long resisted by parents, has found its loophole; others in Hollywood will now find ways to top Gibson's blockbuster, to cater to voyeurs of violence and thereby to make bloodshed banal.

What are the dramatic purposes of this depiction of cruelty and pain? First, shock; the audience I sat in gasped at the first tearing of flesh. Next, pity at the sight of prolonged suffering. And finally, outrage: who was responsible for this cruel humiliation? What villain deserves to be punished?

Not Pontius Pilate, the Roman in charge; he and his kindly wife are sympathetic characters. Nor is King Herod shown to be at fault.

The villains at whom the audience's outrage is directed are the actors playing bloodthirsty rabbis and their rabid Jewish followers. This is the essence of the medieval "passion play," preserved in pre-Hitler Germany at Oberammergau, a source of the hatred of all Jews as "Christ killers."

Much of the hatred is based on a line in the Gospel of St. Matthew, after the Roman governor washes his hands of responsibility for ordering the death of Jesus, when the crowd cries, "His blood be on us, and on our children."

Though unreported in the Gospels of Mark, Luke or John, that line in Matthew — embraced with furious glee by anti-Semites through the ages — is right there in the New Testament. Gibson and his screenwriter didn't make it up, nor did they misrepresent the apostle's account of the Roman governor's queasiness at the injustice.

But biblical times are not these times. This inflammatory line in Matthew — and the millenniums of persecution, scapegoating and ultimately mass murder that flowed partly from its malign repetition — was finally addressed by the Catholic Church in the decades after the defeat of Naziism.

In 1965's historic Second Vatican Council, during the papacy of Paul VI, the church decided that while some Jewish leaders and their followers had pressed for the death of Jesus, "still, what happened in his passion cannot be charged against all Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today."

That was a sea change in the doctrinal interpretation of the Gospels, and the beginning of major interfaith progress.

However, a group of Catholics rejects that and other holdings of Vatican II. Mr. Gibson is reportedly aligned with that reactionary clique. (So is his father, an outspoken Holocaust-denier, but the son warns interviewers not to go there. I agree; the latest generation should not be held responsible for the sins of the fathers.)

In the skillful publicity run-up to the release of the movie, Gibson's agents said he agreed to remove that ancient self-curse from the screenplay. It's not in the subtitles I saw the other night, though it may still be in the Aramaic audio, in which case it will surely be translated in the versions overseas.

And there's the rub. At a moment when a wave of anti-Semitic violence is sweeping Europe and the Middle East, is religion well served by updating the Jew-baiting passion plays of Oberammergau on DVD? Is art served by presenting the ancient divisiveness in blood-streaming media to the widest audiences in the history of drama?

Matthew in 10:34 quotes Jesus uncharacteristically telling his apostles: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword." You don't see that on Christmas cards and it's not in this film, but those words can be reinterpreted — read today to mean that inner peace comes only after moral struggle.

The richness of Scripture is in its openness to interpretation answering humanity's current spiritual needs. That's where Gibson's medieval version of the suffering of Jesus, reveling in savagery to provoke outrage and cast blame, fails Christian and Jew today.

[Just mythoughts]

Take note about the "METHOD OF OPERATION" being used upon Christians today.

Accuse, lie, deny. Keeps Christians on the DEFENSE and off topic of Christ.

[hellinahandcart]

Good one! Yes, English has got to be easier to translate.

[Askel5]

Thanks for the flag. Let's keep Safire and his ilk in our prayers.



=== He has seen what he wanted to see

This brings up my only serious problem with your review the other day: the title.

While the body of the piece made clear Gibson's was a profoundly meaningful work of art in the tradition of any human work which not only further informs those who know the story but communicates to those who don't, I was discomfited I guess by the sounding of the gramscian "art for art's sake" slogan.

It has not been by accident that for generations now we have been accustomed to the abstract, the ritual deconstruction of the human and the encouraging of an "to each his own" meaning where alleged works of art are concerned.

And -- just as the Gospels themselves have been politicized into social justice treatises ripe for a faithbased partnership with the state -- art has been dumbed down such that it's lost its transcendent, universal quality but instead is always now a vehicle for this or that "personal" value or "political" statement.

"Depends on your meaning of 'is' is."

This was one of the profound statements Clinton had or will ever make. It encapsulates the nut of the "art for art's sake" movement and reduces one of the most elegant and instantaneous mediums of human communication (art being second only to the math of music) to a Tower of Babel whose interior is but a hall of mirrors.

[Askel5]

Thanks for the flag. Let's keep Safire and his ilk in our prayers.



=== He has seen what he wanted to see

This brings up my only serious problem with your review the other day: the title.

While the body of the piece made clear Gibson's was a profoundly meaningful work of art in the tradition of any human work which not only further informs those who know the story but communicates to those who don't, I was discomfited I guess by the sounding of the gramscian "art for art's sake" slogan.

It has not been by accident that for generations now we have been accustomed to the abstract, the ritual deconstruction of the human and the encouraging of an "to each his own" meaning where alleged works of art are concerned.

And -- just as the Gospels themselves have been politicized into social justice treatises ripe for a faithbased partnership with the state -- art has been dumbed down such that it's lost its transcendent, universal quality but instead is always now a vehicle for this or that "personal" value or "political" statement.

"Depends on what your meaning of 'is' is."

This was one of the profound statements Clinton had or will ever make. It encapsulates the nut of the "art for art's sake" movement and reduces one of the most elegant and instantaneous mediums of human communication (art being second only to the math of music) to a Tower of Babel whose interior is but a hall of mirrors.

[AnnaZ]

And -- just as the Gospels themselves have been politicized into social justice treatises ripe for a faithbased partnership with the state -- art has been dumbed down such that it's lost its transcendent, universal quality but instead is always now a vehicle for this or that "personal" value or "political" statement.

This was the point of my review, and such relativistic types my target. All of a sudden art was no longer protected by the End All/Be All of Artistic Freedom. Hardly any reviews took in the film's artistic merits at all, it was a disagreement with the content, cries for changes, pleas for disclaimers, and audaciously insulting projections.

 

How many movies made on Buddha, or some Lama or other, are heralded as "transcendent" and "epic"? Moses never got such a raw deal. If Muslims paused fidgeting with switches long enough to focus on it, I'm probably not exaggerating when I say that a loving paean to Mohammed would be orgiastically lauded.

 

All religions are exclusionary -- they all have some path or set of rules one must follow. But Christianity, which indeed is offered freely to all solely on the basis of believing a miracle, is "divisive". I will probably write on this incongruity next... if I ever get a quiet moment in this place.

 

;^)

[Richard Kimball]

For 2000 years scripture as written has been suffcient to convey the passion of the Christ. Now all of a sudden scripture is not enough and everybody has to flock to a sensational movie. Makes no sense.

Congratulations. Let's see, it's too violent, it's anti-semitic, it's inaccurate, Mel Gibson's a whacko, Mel Gibson's father is mean, and now, why make a movie about it, anyway? Almost as much fun as Gibson's success is the nonsense being spouted by people who are trying to discredit the movie without admitting their real problem is that they just don't like Jesus or His message.

[1Old Pro]

Safire should go play shuffleboard with Andy Looney and Walter Cronkite in Florida. I saw the film. The thing that the anti-Gibson crowd fear the most is the re-awakening of Christians and Catholics who they have tried for years to "put down" and mock.

[Askel5]

Sooner than you know it, you'll wonder where everyone went. I laugh every time I see you fret ... what a joy. === But Christianity, which indeed is offered freely to all solely on the basis of believing a miracle, is "divisive". I will probably write on this incongruity next... if I ever get a quiet moment in this place. If you go that route, you may wish to review the Church's treatment of exactly this difference in Catholicism where -- for all its very real exclusivity -- trad-Caths like Gibson understand our being expressly prohibited from the condemnation of non-believers and enjoined to recognize and respect a man's being faithful to what truth he does know. (Though this does not prohibit us from recognizing and rightfully criticizing those "men [who] have become vain in their reasonings, and have exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and served the creature rather than the Creator" ... as we do on a regular basis those in our our communion who would call us "reactionaries" or a schism of Catholicism in the revolution's wake.) I'm differentiating between Catholicism and the other, sometimes eponymous, sects of Christianity because one critical difference between the faith of Mel Gibson and the faith of some self-styled Christians is that Gibson is expressly forbidden from condemning anyone -- or perceiving them as condemned -- simply for their failure to recognize the Christ or accept the mystery of redemption. Not all men are positioned -- in time, intellectually, emotionally, or otherwise -- to both receive and apprehend this truth. This concept not only is sounded in the movie -- "Forgive them Father, they know not what they do" -- but a critical part of Catholic teaching regarding the Church's relationship to other Christians, Jews, Muslims other believers and non-believers. The key virtue Christ exhibits in his sacrifice is the selfless humility which allows him to forego rationalization or sense of self and submit to his Father's will as effected by the authorities who serve as instruments or catalysts of a sort. (This is very different from the premeditation and rank rationalization of evil that is pragmatism ... where men purposefully choose evil in order to bring about good. This is an example of the fact only God can bring good from a man's choice for evil or from a natural evil ... such as fire, flood, famine or other suffering by which humans transcend themselves somehow and/or draw closer to Him.) Non-believers can share in this sacrifice simply by remaining obedient--in all humility--to those truths they've apprehended, honoring the natural and rightful authority of men over men (such as a father's over the family he has founded and for which he is ultimately responsible), and rendering each his due where circumstance has placed you under the authority of another ... whether giving to Caesar what is Caesar's or respecting the authority of the vineyard owner who pays the same full day's wages to those who worked all day and those who arrived late-afternoon. I wandered a bit there but have no time to scroll back at present. forgive the signature logorrhea. =)

[churchillbuff]

I applaud Safire for being willing to stand against the general sentiment

What are you talking about? Every columnist and editorial writer on the NY Times -- and in the mainstream media -- has condemned this movie. Safire is FLOWING WITH the "general sentiment." It took no balls at all to write this column for a readership, and management, who hate Gibson and Christianity.

If it's courage you admire, than you should be applauding Gibson for risking hoots from anti-christian Hollywood by refusing to adulterate the Gospels with PC spin.

[churchillbuff]

All religions are exclusionary

Actually, Christianity is uniquely so. That's why it's hated by hedonists in a way that nearly no other religion is.

[Askel5]

((OOOF ... sorry about that ... a clean-up version in the hopes you haven't pulled posts yet and will hit it first.))

Sooner than you know it, you'll wonder where everyone went. I laugh every time I see you fret ... what a joy.


=== But Christianity, which indeed is offered freely to all solely on the basis of believing a miracle, is "divisive". I will probably write on this incongruity next... if I ever get a quiet moment in this place.


If you go that route, you may wish to review the Church's treatment of exactly this difference in Catholicism where -- for all its very real exclusivity -- trad-Caths like Gibson understand our being expressly prohibited from the condemnation of non-believers and enjoined to recognize and respect a man's being faithful to what truth he does know.

(Though this does not prohibit us from recognizing and rightfully criticizing those "men [who] have become vain in their reasonings, and have exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and served the creature rather than the Creator" ... as we do on a regular basis those in our our communion who would call us "reactionaries" or a schism of Catholicism in the revolution's wake.) (see, Para. 884, I think, of the Catechism)

I'm differentiating between Catholicism and the other, sometimes eponymous, sects of Christianity because one critical difference between the faith of Mel Gibson and the faith of some self-styled Christians is that Gibson is expressly forbidden from condemning anyone -- or perceiving them as condemned -- simply for their failure to recognize the Christ or accept the mystery of redemption.

Not all men are positioned -- in time, intellectually, emotionally, or otherwise -- to both receive and apprehend this truth.

This concept not only is sounded in the movie -- "Forgive them Father, they know not what they do" -- but a critical part of Catholic teaching regarding the Church's relationship to other Christians, Jews, Muslims other believers and non-believers.

The key virtue Christ exhibits in his sacrifice is the selfless humility which allows him to forego rationalization or sense of self and submit to his Father's will as effected by the authorities who serve as instruments or catalysts of a sort.

(This is very different from the premeditation and rank rationalization of evil that is pragmatism ... where men purposefully choose evil in order to bring about good. This is an example of the fact only God can bring good from a man's choice for evil or from a natural evil ... such as fire, flood, famine or other suffering by which humans transcend themselves somehow and/or draw closer to Him.)

Non-believers can share in this sacrifice simply by remaining obedient--in all humility--to those truths they've apprehended, honoring the natural and rightful authority of men over men (such as a father's over the family he has founded and for which he is ultimately responsible), and rendering each his due where circumstance has placed you under the authority of another ... whether giving to Caesar what is Caesar's or respecting the authority of the vineyard owner who pays the same full day's wages to those who worked all day and those who arrived late-afternoon.


I wandered a bit there but have no time to scroll back at present. forgive the signature logorrhea . =)

And I'll never miss a "preview" again. sorry about that.

[gcruse]

Who is Safire calling a sadist?
Someone who pays money to watch someone else beaten?
I dunno...

[tet68]

Thank God, Jesus wasn't killed by Palestinians.
We'd never hear the end of it, and theaters would be blown
up across the country.

Think I'm wrong?

[DestroytheDemocrats]

"If a Caravaggio showing was in town would you refuse to see that, too?"

Would it be my Christian duty to go see it? Would it be my Christian duty to like it????

[DestroytheDemocrats]

"If a Caravaggio showing was in town would you refuse to see that, too?"

Sorry I have to repeat this because I sent your post to the wrong person. Is it my Christian duty to go see it? Is it my Christian duty to like it?

[DestroytheDemocrats]

"Almost as much fun as Gibson's success is the nonsense being spouted by people who are trying to discredit the movie without admitting their real problem is that they just don't like Jesus or His message."

If I don't like DaVinci's painting of the Last Supper, does that mean I don't like Jesus or his message? Is it my Christian duty to like that painting?

[DestroytheDemocrats]

"Have you ever read a book pertaining to Christianity?"

Of course and I have been to a passion play and it was not very good even though it followed the bible. It was not my Christian duty to go, it was not my Christian duty to like it. It was not my Christian duty to defend it when others were critical of it. It was not a sin to be critical of it.

[Richard Kimball]

If I don't like DaVinci's painting of the Last Supper, does that mean I don't like Jesus or his message? Is it my Christian duty to like that painting?

Nice dodge. BTW, you replied to me in post 134, and I think you meant to respond to someone else.

No, it's not your duty to like any particular piece of work. However, you objected to the fact Gibson had made the movie in your initial statement. If you objected to the existence of the Last Supper painting, and claimed that Da Vinci shouldn't have painted it, then yeah, I would suspect your problem is with the spreading of the Gospel, and not with the expertise of Da Vinci or the quality of his painting. BTW, do you know why the Last Supper is so famous, especially considering that there were thousands of Christian paintings done at that time.

Oh, and your statement about the Last Supper also proves your initial statement incorrect. You stated, For 2000 years scripture as written has been suffcient(sic) to convey the passion of the Christ. Now all of a sudden scripture is not enough and everybody has to flock to a sensational movie. Makes no sense. Paintings, writings (Pilgrims's Progress, the Chronicles of Narnia, Paradise Lost, Ben Hur, to name a few), poems, and movies have all been used to convey the Gospel message.

[af_vet_1981]

Sorry, Safire, we know you would like the words of Christ to mean something else, but taken in context they have nothing to do with moral struggle.

Do you then assert they are about a military struggle ?

Do you think the centuries of religious wars between those who called themselves Christians were the fulfillment of those words ?

[af_vet_1981]

For 2000 years scripture as written has been suffcient to convey the passion of the Christ. Now all of a sudden scripture is not enough and everybody has to flock to a sensational movie. Makes no sense.

Actually it makes a lot of sense.