Who Killed Jesus? -Mel Gibson's powerful but troubling new movie

[Sana]

Originally posted by Oh Jerusalem
Maybe you should stop taking stupid pills.

You've been rebutted on virtually every point you've tried to argue here. Unimpressive.

~If I am so unimpressive then why are you replying? ~

~Jesus when confronted by violence, he chose peace. when he was confronted by hate, he gave love. when he was confronted by sin, he seeked forgiveness for all mankind—a powerful example for us all, whoever our gods may be~

~This movie will not make anyone hate Jews because they are Jews or to hate anyone, in fact, for Jesus command his followers to love their neighbor as themselves. When they come to arrest Jesus he says lay down your swords to his followers and tells them to love thy neighbor. I feel anti-Semitism is a form of illogical and self-defeating self-loathing.~

~The truth is that Jesus had to die for the Christian story to unfold, and the proper Christian posture toward the Jewish people should be one of respect, for the man Christians choose to see as their savior came from the ancient tribe of Judah, the very name from which "Jew" is derived. As children of Abraham, Christians, & Jews are branches of the same tree, linked together in the mystery of God. ~

[Oh Jerusalem]

A little Jewish legal law point. It is forbidden for one Jew to hand over another to a non-Jewish legal system, even more so when the penalty to the arrested is death. "Mo'sehr" is a grievious crime, according to Jewish law.

How does Christian historical chronicals explain this?

[Sana]

Originally posted by Mira
Hey Sana!

Did you know that “Barabbas” in Aramaic means "son of the father." Since Mel did the movie in Aramaic, how do you suppose he decided to handle that one?

~Mira I guess we will have to see the movie and see how he handled it~

[Sana]

Originally posted by Oh Jerusalem
A little Jewish legal law point. It is forbidden for one Jew to hand over another to a non-Jewish legal system, even more so when the penalty to the arrested is death. "Mo'sehr" is a grievious crime, according to Jewish law.

How does Christian historical chronicals explain this?

~Are you saying Jesus was not Jewish with this question?
Was this law "Mo'sehr" a law back in the day of Jesus of Nazareth?~

[Oh Jerusalem]

Originally posted by Sana
If I am so unimpressive then why are you replying?

To refute simple thoughts.

Jesus when confronted by violence, he chose peace. when he was confronted by hate, he gave love. when he was confronted by sin, he seeked forgiveness for all mankind—a powerful example for us all, whoever our gods may be

From Was Jesus merciful?:

[i]Now let's examine some of the things that the Christian bible records Jesus as saying. We will find that Jesus was cruel, very unforgiving, and full of a great deal of unrelenting anger.

Since there are so many examples in the Christian bible of cruel things in the name of Jesus, I will restrict the following quotes to the book of Matthew, the book that is placed at the beginning of the Christian bible, and therefore the first encounter anyone would have of Jesus in the Christian bible. So all quotes not otherwise accredited are from Matthew.

Jesus is quoted as having said: "But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." (8:13) Why doesn't he just forgive them, and allow them into Heaven? Where is the forgiveness? Where is the mercy?

Jesus is also quoted as saying, "But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven." (10:33) So those who do not believe in Jesus will not go to Heaven. How is that more merciful?

"And you, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell." (11:23) It is not explained why Capernaum was exalted to Heaven, (meaning that many miracles supposedly took place there), will be brought down to hell. In any case, since they Jesus considered it worse than Sodom, they would be destroyed and sent to hell. Again, where is the mercy in this?

"...but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men." (12:30) Notice that not only is this considered a sin, it won't even be forgiven! This is reiterated again (in verse 32), "whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come."

And here's a beauty; "but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath." (13:12) Of course, that one doesn't even make sense. How can you take away something from someone who has nothing? But what does that matter in the face of strong blind faith? Christians are taught to have blind faith, The actual words written in the Christian bible are not as important as having faith.

It made sense, by the way, in the original Talmudic version that Jesus distorted it from, which was, "Whoever tries to take what does not belong to him, what he seeks he will not get, and what he has shall be taken away from him" (Babylonian Talmud, Sotah 9a).

What Jesus did there is to take part of the words and apply them to something else. What he applies them to shows yet more of his cruelty. The disciples ask him why he speaks in parables. He answers that it is to prevent the masses from understanding him. For the masses have nothing, that is, they do not know the 'mysteries of Heaven." Since they do not know those secrets, they have nothing, and therefore they shall be given nothing, and all their merits -- although they have none -- will be taken away from them.

Well, they have no merits, he says. And you know what, Jesus says that he will not even give them the chance to get any merits at all!

Jesus said that he spoke in parables so that the masses would not understand and perhaps gain heaven, because they had closed their own eyes and it was their fault anyway. "Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive: For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them." (13:13-15)

In other words, if they would understand the parables, they might repent, and be converted, and he would heal them from their sins. And he does not wish that to happen for them. He cruelly denies them the possibility of repentance and conversion! (Not that he could really have granted it to them anyway, but the Christian belief is that he could have. In that case, he is cruel for refusing to do so!)

He and John the Baptist did a similar thing with the Pharisees. According to Matthew (3:7), the Pharisees came to John the Baptist when he was baptizing people, but he rejected them and refused to baptize them. " But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"

Later, Jesus said that the Pharisees were to blame for not going to John the Baptist! "For John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and ye believed him not; but the publicans and the harlots believed him: and ye, when ye had seen it, repented not afterward, that ye might believe him." (21:32) John never even gave them a chance, and Jesus still blames them! This is merciful?

[Oh Jerusalem]

What will happen in the future, asks Matthew? "The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." (13:41-42)

He repeats this again: "So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." (13:49-50)

No forgiveness, no mercy, for those he considers evil. But wait! It gets worse!

Who does he consider evil? Get a load of this! "Whosoever shall say, You fool, shall be in danger of hell fire." (5:22) In other words, just for calling someone else a fool, you will go to hell forever. This is being merciful?

"But if you forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." (6:14) While this seems somewhat logical and fair, it is not particularly merciful. In what way is Jesus merciful?

"That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." (5:21) In other words, if you are not very righteous, says Jesus, you will not go to Heaven. No mercy, no exceptions.

But it gets worse! Look what Jesus says about the average person:

And Jesus spoke to them again with parables, and said, The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who made a wedding for his son, And sent out his servants to call the guests to the wedding: but they would not come. Again, he sent our other servants, saying, Tell the guests, Look, I have prepared a large dinner: I have killed my best animals for the meal, and everything is ready: so please come to the wedding. But they didn't take it seriously, and continued whatever they had been doing before: one went back to his farm, another went back to selling his merchandise: And the rest of them took the king's servants, and treated them spitefully, or killed them. When the king heard about this, he was very angry, and he sent out his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. Then he said to his servants, The wedding is ready, but the people who were originally invited were not worthy. Therefore, Go to the highways, and invite to the wedding everyone you find there.

So those servants went to the highways, and gathered together everyone they found, both bad and good people: and the wedding had a lot of guests. And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man who was not wearing a wedding garment: And he said to him, Friend, how can you come her without wearing a wedding garment? And the man was speechless. So the king said to the servants, Tie him up very tightly, and take him away, and throw him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.

This is from Matthew, Chapter 2, verses 1-14

In other words, a simple man from the street, who did not expect to be called to the wedding, was suddenly brought to the wedding. Yet because he was not already wearing wedding clothes, he was punished! Many are called, Jesus says, but this man was NOT called. It is hardly his fault that he was not ready!

This parable reveals the horror of Jesus' teachings. The people in the street had not been invited to the wedding, and they never expected to be there. They had no command, indeed, they had no reason, to be wearing wedding clothes or to get ready for the wedding in any way. Yet they were pulled in suddenly, unexpectedly. And for not being prepared for something they had no reason to attend, this man is punished!

And the meaning of this parable is that when the time comes, and someone is not ready for G-d, he will be punished even though he did not expect to be called! This is cruel in the extreme.

Jesus was not merciful. Jesus condemns everyone who does not believe in him.

"Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said, Verily I say unto you, I know you not. Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh." (25:11-13) Where is the mercy here? The statement here is that they did not deserve to go to Heaven. If only those who fully deserve it go to Heaven, how is that being merciful?

And then there is Jesus' beliefs about marriage and divorce. How cruel it is to force a man and woman who are incompatible with each other to stay married to each other and not remarry (5:31-32). Moreover, he said that it is better not to marry (19:10-12). But if a man marries, and discovers that it was better not to marry, he must still suffer all his life in the marriage!!! This is kind? No, this is cruel!

Think about it. Jesus said that it is better not to marry. Yet nevertheless, he forbade divorce to everyone, even though not everyone can take it! It is hard to know which is crueler, to force men to stay single, or to force an incompatible couple to stay married. And if the woman leaves the husband, she may not even remarry, because Jesus says that this is adultery (5:32)! Jesus commits numerous cruelties with this ruling.

The very fact that such words were attributed to him by the very people who adopted him as god-messiah and brought him to the rest of the world as god-messiah, means to me that I don't want or need to know anything more about him. His own believers and followers reported him as being cruel, and no amount of whitewashing by later Christians can change that.

By their account, Jesus was cruel, which in itself shows that he was not on Hashem's side. According to his words, it is very difficult to attain Heaven. For he demanded that his followers love him more than their parents and children (Matthew 10:37); that they give up their entire lives and travel with him (ibid, 38-39); that they give away all their possessions and all they call their own (19:21); and that they never get divorced (5:32). His demands were utterly impossible, often abusive, and indeed, few Christians have ever fulfilled them.

As if those are not sufficiently difficult, he also insisted that you allow people to rob you, and even help them hurt you (5:38-41). Of course Christians don't keep that! All of society would collapse if those rules were kept! In point of fact, Christians have been the biggest source of hurt throughout history.

The Christian bible insists that Christians sell everything they own, and give it all to the poor. Is this more merciful than Judaism? Judaism (i.e., the Law of Moses, the Hebrew Bible, Jewish Law, the Torah) in most cases prohibits giving away all your assets, because that would make you destitute and dependant upon charity yourself, forcing others to support you when you are capable of supporting yourself. Therefore, the Law of Moses commands you to give only a tithe, one tenth of your assets. At most you may give one fifth, except in case of certain emergencies. Jesus demands that you give everything away. Giving away everything you own is much harder than giving away only a tenth. Yet Paul claims that the Law of Moses is more difficult to keep than the Laws of Jesus. Not true, obviously. Jesus' laws are cruel, unreasonable and wrong. Of course, very few (if any) Christians keep them, because they know those laws are impossible to keep.[/i]

This movie will not make anyone hate Jews because they are Jews or to hate anyone, in fact, for Jesus command his followers to love their neighbor as themselves.

A well proven historical fact, no doubt.

When they come to arrest Jesus he says lay down your swords to his followers and tells them to love thy neighbor. I feel anti-Semitism is a form of illogical and self-defeating self-loathing.

Do you think that everyone in the world is as lovey-dovey as you?

The truth is that Jesus had to die for the Christian story to unfold,

Indeed. You might all be pagans still today - or Moslems.

and the proper Christian posture toward the Jewish people should be one of respect

Prior to the Vatican II, over a 2 thousand year period, how often was this put in practice in General in the Christian world?

As children of Abraham, Christians, & Jews are branches of the same tree, linked together in the mystery of God.

Blah-blah.

And the vast majority of Christians throughout most of the religion's history are not descendents of Abraham.

[Oh Jerusalem]

Originally posted by Sana
Are you saying Jesus was not Jewish with this question?

No. On the contrary! I'm asking how it can be that the Sanhedrin, no less, could violate the Torah so blatantly.

Was this law "Mo'sehr" a law back in the day of Jesus of Nazareth?

It is an elementary Torah law - not a Rabbinical decree, which would nevertheless be just as obligatory in practice.

[Mira~]

Ok, I’m going to change my tune here a bit. For the record, I never advocated that Gibson should not be allowed to make this movie. I also think that the accusations hurled against Foxman and others are unfair. In the beginning, Foxman approached Gibson along with other prominent leaders of the Catholic Church to enter into a dialogue concerning the making of the movie. Gibson rebuffed all of them. Somehow, in the process of the whole thing being reported, the fact that Catholic leaders also objected to the portrayal of the Jewish mob in the film became lost. That’s the first bad sign in this whole affair.

That said, I don’t think the vast majority of Jews care one way or another about this film or how Jews 2000 years ago are portrayed. Most don’t know themselves what happened and don’t really care. You say that this film won’t result in an increase in the already increasing anti-semitism that exists today….we shall see. Either way, I won’t bother you about it anymore. It’s not because I believe that the passion narrative is an accurate historical account, because I do not, but I’m not the Shepard of your flock so I have neither the responsibility or authority to lead you through the historical record. If you were Jewish that would be another story. So I’m going to turn the other cheek.

[Mira~]

Originally posted by Sana
~Mira I guess we will have to see the movie and see how he handled it~

Just curious, how would you have handled it?

[Sana]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Oh Jerusalem
[B]To refute simple thoughts.


~Oh my gosh you are Anti-Christian!~

~Many religions have words in their holy books that can be down right scary to this day and time. But I will not go and point them out as you have.~

[Sana]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Mira
[B]Ok, I’m going to change my tune here a bit. For the record, I never advocated that Gibson should not be allowed to make this movie. I also think that the accusations hurled against Foxman and others are unfair.


~Foxman, you mean Abraham Foxman? There are a few things that should be hurled out against Foxman and his views that he loves to fight for...he is a disgrace! He really should step down off the GAY PLATFORM...Foxman sees linkage with homosexuals as an Anti-Defamation League mission??? A gay mission but he doesn't speak out against murdering cops in entertainment. He has no missions for Cops or battered women...but he speaks out a lot on Gay issues........Hmmm says a lot about this man! He has done more to destroy traditional family values and Orthodox Jewish beliefs than any anti-Semitic bigot!! Until he is ousted from the Anti-Defamation League, contributions to this once-respected organization should be withheld. That's my opinion on FOXMAN~

You say that this film won’t result in an increase in the already increasing anti-semitism that exists today…we shall see.

~ Yes we will see, and I am sure I am right. Most of the Anti-semitism today is in Europe and other countries...maybe the ADL would do better to try and find out why instead of pointing the finger so fast! Because the increase in anti-semetism started before the Mel Gibson movie was even thought of.~

[Sana]

Originally posted by Mira
Just curious, how would you have handled it?

~Well I wouldn't because I wouldn't make another movie on Jesus, Moses & Noah... How about a movie about Muhammad instead? And since you had the question why don't you tell me how you would have handled it?~

[Mira~]

Originally posted by Sana
~Well I wouldn't because I wouldn't make another movie on Jesus, Moses & Noah... How about a movie about Muhammad instead? And since you had the question why don't you tell me how you would have handled it?~

It's your book.

[Mira~]

Originally posted by Sana


~Foxman, you mean Abraham Foxman? There are a few things that should be hurled out against Foxman and his views that he loves to fight for...he is a disgrace! He really should step down off the GAY PLATFORM...Foxman sees linkage with homosexuals as an Anti-Defamation League mission??? A gay mission but he doesn't speak out against murdering cops in entertainment. He has no missions for Cops or battered women...but he speaks out a lot on Gay issues........Hmmm says a lot about this man! He has done more to destroy traditional family values and Orthodox Jewish beliefs than any anti-Semitic bigot!! Until he is ousted from the Anti-Defamation League, contributions to this once-respected organization should be withheld. That's my opinion on FOXMAN~

Jesus defended whores.

[Sana]

Originally posted by Oh Jerusalem
No. On the contrary! I'm asking how it can be that the Sanhedrin, no less, could violate the Torah so blatantly.


~Maybe out of Fear? How would we know, none of us lived back then?~

It is an elementary Torah law - not a Rabbinical decree, which would nevertheless be just as obligatory in practice.

~I don't know that much about the Torah laws, sorry I am not a Rabbi, nor am I Jewish. Just a Girl. ~