'Cross' shows Jesus as being a black man

Yahoo News ^ | October 25, 2006 | SANDY COHEN,

[Nachum]

LOS ANGELES - It's a familiar image for millions of Christians: Jesus Christ, with a crown of thorns, hanging from the cross. What color is he? In a controversial new film opening Friday, he is black.

"Color of the Cross" tells a traditional story, focusing on the last 48 hours of his life as told in the Gospels. In this version, though, race contributes to his persecution.

It is the first representation in the history of American cinema of Jesus as a black man.

"It's very important because (the film) is going to provide an image of Jesus for African-Americans that is no longer under the control of whites," says Stephenson Humphries-Brooks, an associate professor of religious studies at New York's Hamilton College and author of "Cinematic Savior: Hollywood's Making of the American Christ."

What Jesus looked like has long been debated by theologians around the world. Different cultures have imagined him in different ways, says Stephen Prothero, chairman of the religion department at Boston University. In Japan, Jesus looks Japanese. In Africa, he is black. But in America he is almost always white, like the fair-haired savior painted by Leonardo Da Vinci in "The Last Supper" in 1495.

While some black churches have images of a black Jesus behind the altar and others have claimed Christ was black, Prothero says "none of those arguments or images have filtered much into the mainstream."

Filmmaker Jean Claude LaMarre set out to change that with "Color of the Cross." LaMarre, who plays Jesus, wrote, directed and financed the film. It will open in 30 theaters in predominantly black neighborhoods.

"Black people in this country are the only race of people who worship a god outside their own image," says LaMarre, 38, adding that showing Christ as a black man is "the most poignant way to deal with the issue of race in this country because it goes to the heart of how we look at the world."

It also provides a positive image of blacks, something that's been scant in the U.S., says the Rev. Cecil "Chip" Murray, longtime leader of L.A.'s First African Methodist Episcopal Church and a producer of the film.

"It could be revolutionary because, for four centuries in our nation, blacks have been at the lowest end of the stratum," he says. "I think it will traumatize the United States more than it will foreign nations who, to some extent, don't have a centuries-old concept of equating black with negativity."

Humphries-Brooks agrees. Other countries are likely to view the film "in a more detached manner," he says, "because of the way (they) see our race-relations problem."

Why does race matter in the story of Christ?

"Jesus isn't in the hands of historians," Prothero says. "What we have now is our own debate and, in that debate, race has to be a factor because race is a big predicament in American life."

Film is a powerful place to have the discussion, says Humphries-Brooks, who calls the medium "one of the last places that is quasi-public for the formation of values in America."

"Artistic and aesthetic views are as important in developing religious values as the words we speak. Everybody goes to the movies. Not everybody goes to the same church."

Filmmaker LaMarre thinks the film can only have a positive effect.

"The message is that color, a colored Jesus Christ, doesn't matter," he says. "That's why the movie is important. When you have one prevailing image out there, it suggests color does matter."

[A CA Guy]

He would look the same dark color as the Jews in Israel today, he would not look like a Zulu IMO.

That said, makes no difference what color he was.

[antceecee]

I agree...
Jesus is timeless, not of any one race, culture or country... Jesus was here for all mankind (and for those who need to hear it... womankind as well).
The point of Jesus' sacrifice is truly lost on those who would rather be consumed by debating the color of his skin.

[ReignOfError]

Here is a painting done by a artist back in the 1930s who got his inspiration and image from the Shroud of Turin.

The shroud itself is far from authoritative. If it was fabricated -- or even embellished or interpreted -- solely by Europeans, there's an innate bias there. That said, that portrait looks as much Arab as European to me.

Jesus was a Jew... not African, nor Anglo, but, Jewish.

There's a lot of variation there. There are, in fact, African Jews, Anglo Jews and all manner of others.

Ethiopia had one of the oldest documented Jewish communities on Earth; most of them emigrated to Israel a few years back. Just in the last week or two, a colony of Jews in India was allowed to emigrate to Israel. They, also, have a long and documented history. The "lost tribes" aren't a new idea, and who are we to say where they'd turn up?

[ReignOfError]

He would look the same dark color as the Jews in Israel today, he would not look like a Zulu IMO.

Why on Earth would you think that? The Jewish population in Israel today is an admixture of every population the Jews blended into in the centuries when they lacked a homeland. You have Sephardic Jews who mingled with the Spanish and Portuguese, Ashkenazic Jews who were in Central Europe, and prominent figures like Natan Sharansky, whose first name as Anatoly before he escaped the USSR.

That said, makes no difference what color he was.

True. So if it wasn't a distortion to make him look like Ted Nugent, it's also not a distortion to make him look like Bob Marley.

[A CA Guy]

Christ was a Jewish Rabbi, so he would have looked like them.
No matter where the various Jews came from today, they started in Israel and a lot more area like most of Egypt that used to be theirs as well.

The Middle Eastern Jews would be tan, not light skinned or black.

[A CA Guy]

Hey wait, Christ was Filipino.

[Drango]

What next? A female Jesus so women will have someone to identify with? There is no black or white, male or female with Jesus. He is God.

[adam_smith_76]

In related news, Touchstone Pictures announced a new film about the life of Mohamed starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Although most of the world knows the image of the Prophet as a serious man with a bomb for a turban, immortalized in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, DiCaprio hopes to put a lighter, more feminine touch to the founder of the world's scariest religion. As for Touchstone, they just hope that the Prophet means Profit.

[loboinok]

The greatest problem with the Social Club Churches is not about the ethnicity of Jesus, but their denial of the fact that he came as the sacrificial lamb, to once and for all be the final sacrifice.

No Israel, no Jesus... no Jesus , no Savior.
The Bible is absolutly full of race and ethnicity.

Hollyweird knows racism divides this country and always has. It's not about race, it's about racism. Hollyweird doesn't care about the Christ or religion. It cares about money, and if they can stir the religious pot at the same time, all the better.

Those chapters of lineage were intended to map the route from the promise of a Messiah, to his actual arrival. [and He is who He said He is, and the one you were foretold of, and waiting for]

The only lineage that matters one iota, is the lineage of Jesus to his Father, God Almighty.

I actually believe that every single thing in the Bible, from the first word to the last, God placed there for a very good reason.

Best regards, Lobo

[ReignOfError]

Christ was a Jewish Rabbi, so he would have looked like them.

Maybe. Assuming that there was a narrow range of "like them" and that you or I have any clue what "like them" means. I find no support for either belief.

No matter where the various Jews came from today, they started in Israel and a lot more area like most of Egypt that used to be theirs as well.

Which is a broad range of phenotypes. Even within that range, did Jesus look more like Bibi Netanyahu or like Hosni Mubarak? I can't say. Neither can you.

The Middle Eastern Jews would be tan, not light skinned or black.

Only if you tweak your terms to match your beliefs. A whole lot of Israelis are darker-skinned than Colin Powell and Barack Obama, who are black, and lighter-skinned than George Hamilton, who is white. There is more genetic and phenotypic variation within each "race" than there is between them.

[wai-ming]

Jesus was Jewish because his mother was Jewish. That only accounts for 50% of his DNA. What about his Dad?

[dayglored]

> ...half of Jesus' genes came directly from God the Father, so there's no reason to believe he was the exact same hue as Mary.

Wow. I've never thought about the implications of God having DNA (genes, chromosomes) that would inter-operate correctly with human ones. Always sort of assumed that there was a more overall miracle there that didn't need to worry about such details.

God's DNA. That's gonna be my thought-problem for a little while tonight. Thanks!

[wai-ming]

Here's some more food for thought:

Jesus was not a clone of Mary. He had a Y chromosome.
Where did that come from?

Was Mary impregnated with God's DNA?

That would answer some questions, but raise even more.

[dayglored]

>Here's some more food for thought: Jesus was not a clone of Mary. He had a Y chromosome. Where did that come from? Was Mary impregnated with God's DNA? That would answer some questions, but raise even more.

Do we know for sure Jesus had a Y chromosome? Human male, yes, but also Divine; no male offspring to prove he carried a Y. Of course my assumption is the same as yours, that He did.

Meanwhile, until tonight, I'd never had a mental image of the Holy Ghost overshadowing Mary during the Incarnation, with a vial and an A.I. glove. Icck. Was there an egg? If so, was there a sperm? Which one, of millions, half of which carry God's -other- chromosome, an X? Would Christ have been female, 50/50 chance? Would God have been happy with that? How about the Twelve -- would they have followed a woman around, in those times?

But having only one sperm, a known Y, is kinda chancey too. What if the Holy Ghost dropped it. I'm not being smart-ass -- I've just never considered these things before.

I think I'll stick with my previous assumptions, that the miraculous conception of Christ was done without regard to details like sperm, and DNA, and genes. No offense, but it complicates theology until my head hurts. But thanks for the exercise anyway!

[napscoordinator]

I say, who cares?


Me too!!!

[wai-ming]

God is infinitely more knowledgeable than we are. I think He could find a way to get a specific sperm cell to unite with an egg and implant it in Mary's uterus (without all the mess) in order to produce the divine embryo that would become Jesus.

Some people say Jesus is the literally begotten Son of God in the flesh. Others consider that very idea blasphemous.

I have no problem with the notion that Jesus got half of his DNA from God. Any speculation as to how it was done remains a mystery for now.

[Swordmaker]

A thread on the appearance and race of Jesus ... some Shroud references.

PING

If you want on or off the Shroud of Turin Ping List, Freepmail me.

[mkjessup]

Jesus is the color of Love

A-hunka, hunka, burnin' love, at that!

[offensive image left at #111]

Fortunately for you, Christians do not react as Muslims do to such gratuitous attacks upon their faith and beliefs.

But your handle was well chosen!