Crucifixion debate revived in new film 'The Passion'

"The Passion," a movie about Jesus' crucifixion that's funded, produced, directed and co-written by actor Mel Gibson, is getting plenty of publicity months ahead of release.

The reason: Christians and Jews who have attended advance screenings or have read a script of the film, which is expected to reach theaters some time during Lent next year, are debating the perennial question of who was responsible for Jesus' death.

Christian theology provides only one answer: Jesus Christ's death takes away the sins of the world and each person must recognize that his or her sins were responsible for the sacrifice on the cross.

As the Apostle Paul taught, "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us," reconciling us with God and bringing salvation (Romans 5:8-11).

But throughout the centuries, many Christians have attempted to ignore that belief -- and their own guilt -- by trying to transfer blame collectively onto the Jewish people.

The film's Jewish previewers say Gibson's graphic, gory portrayal puts too much weight on the Jewish role, whereas the Romans who ruled Judea carried out Christ's execution.

While Christians and Jews debate that, another developing dispute pits Christians against Christians. Conservative Protestants and Catholics who have seen the film lavishly praise it as totally faithful to the New Testament Gospels.

But four Roman Catholic scholars, all advisers to the U.S. bishops' committee that handles Catholic-Jewish relations, say the script they reviewed did not obey the church's modern approach to the Bible.

"Catholic teaching makes clear that the Gospels are not simply historical transcripts," the four explain, and "simply conforming to the New Testament" does not remove the danger of anti-Semitism.

Jewish critics also say Gibson mingled New Testament materials with the visions of an anti-Semitic 19th-century nun, which defenders of the movie deny.

No consensus on such matters is possible until "The Passion" is completed and released.

But concerning who bears historical (as opposed to spiritual or theological) responsibility for the Crucifixion, Christians and Jews might ponder the conclusions of a leading Catholic expert on these Gospel passages.

The Rev. Raymond E. Brown issued his definitive 1,608-page treatment, "The Death of the Messiah" (Doubleday), in 1994. (He died four years later.)

Brown, who taught at New York's Union Theological Seminary, a liberal Protestant school, was no fundamentalist. He did not accept the literal truth of all the specifics in the Gospels and sought to weigh historical evidence with an open mind.

So it's significant that he concluded that the Gospels were correct that the Jewish leaders and certain other Jews played a part in seeking Jesus' death, largely because of religious conflicts, although Rome decided on the execution and carried it out.

Some critics have claimed the trial of Jesus before the Jewish leaders never occurred, partly because details recorded in the Gospels violated rabbinical rules. But Brown says those rules came at least a century later. Of course, it's also possible that such rules, if they existed, could have been violated.

To Brown, it was important to distinguish between the participation or "responsibility" of the Jews who were involved, and "guilt," which he considered an inappropriate term for people who presumably believed they were following God's will.

The bishops at Catholicism's Second Vatican Council defined the church's authoritative teaching on this in 1965.

The bishops said it's true that the first-century Jewish authorities "and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ," but the execution "cannot be blamed upon all the Jews then living, without distinction, nor upon the Jews of today."

Jews should not be presented as repudiated by God "as if such views followed from the holy Scriptures," the bishops added.

In that vein, Brown reminded readers that only a tiny portion of first-century Jews would have even heard of Jesus, and few among those would have been on hand demanding crucifixion. Others, in fact virtually all those who believed in Jesus during his ministry, were fellow Jews.