Deicide and The Passion

By Jeff Snyder
web posted September 22, 2003

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and various religious
scholars have expressed grave concern that Mel Gibson's new
film, The Passion, a portrayal of the final 12 hours of Christ's life
 based on the Gospels will, if released in its present form,
increase anti-Semitism throughout the world because of the
manner in which it portrays Jews. The controversy has generated
lots of news coverage and articles, despite the fact that almost no
one who is criticizing the film has actually seen it. When
fundamentalist Christian groups criticized The Last Temptation of
Christ years ago without having seen the film, this was taken as a
sign of their intolerance, narrow-mindedness and overall
nuttiness. So far, however, the news reports of criticisms of Mr.
Gibson's film by people who have not seen the movie are
reported, and seemingly supposed to be taken, with utmost
seriousness.


The Charges Against the Film 

Criticisms of Mr. Gibson's film gained momentum when one of
the members of an ad hoc group of religious scholars that had
obtained a stolen copy of an early version of the film's script (that
does not correspond to the final film) expressed some of the
group's concerns in a news report that ran in the April 22 Los
Angeles Times. That article quoted Rabbi Eugene Korn, director
of the ADL's Interfaith Affairs, essentially warning Gibson that if
Gibson did pay attention to the scholars group, the controversy
would heat up.

The group prepared a report containing extensive criticisms of
the film, and submitted it (unsolicited) to Gibson's production
company in May. A copy of the report found its way to The
Jewish Week in June, which then reported that the group,
consisting of "nine prominent Catholic and Jewish scholars at
major universities across the country" had concluded that "[v]
iewers without extensive knowledge of Catholic teaching about
interpreting the New Testament will surely leave the theater with
the overriding impression that the bloodthirsty, vengeful and
money-hungry Jews simply had an implacable hatred of Jesus."
This fueled numerous other news reports.
 
On August 10, Rabbi Korn attended a private screening of Mr.
Gibson's film in Houston. The next day the ADL issued a press
release voicing concerns that, in its present form, the movie "‘will
fuel hatred, bigotry and anti-Semitism,' by enforcing the notion of
collective Jewish guilt for the death of Jesus." The press release
states that the film contains a number of "troubling themes and
images, all raising the specter of ‘deicide,' or Jewish complicity in
the death of Jesus," and expresses hope that Mr. Gibson and his
production company will consider modifying the movie so that it
is "historically accurate, theologically sound and free of any anti-
Semitic message." On the following day, although containing no
indication that anyone in the organization had seen the film, the
Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a press release urging Mr.
Gibson to make the changes to his film suggested by the Ad Hoc
Scholars Group.
 
According to at least one news report, the Ad Hoc Scholars
Group's central complaint seemed to be that merely making a
graphic presentation of the crucifixion could "reawaken" anti-
Semitic attitudes. Since letting people see and understand exactly
what Christ suffered seems to be a key, if not the central, point
of Mr. Gibson's film, if that is the basis of the group's criticism,
there is little short of gutting the film and Mr. Gibson's artistic and
religious purpose that could satisfy the group.

In fact, a wholesale revision of the film and revision of the gospel
story seems precisely what the group seeks. In an extensive
article on the controversy over The Passion appearing in the
September 15 edition of The New Yorker, Peter J. Boyer sheds
light on the history of the group and its actions. The group was
formed when, after reading a March 9 New York Times article
about the church Mr. Gibson was building which raised the
specter that Mr. Gibson's film might provide a vehicle for the
propagation of paleo-conservative, pre-Vatican II views, Dr.
Eugene Fisher, a leading Catholic ecumenist, spoke about his
concerns with his friend Abraham Foxman, head of the ADL.
Together, they agreed to convene a small ad-hoc group of
colleagues with the purpose of offering Mr. Gibson their help in
making his film in a manner that would conform with
contemporary understandings of the trial and crucifixion of Christ
and post-Vatican II standards for the production of dramatic
depictions of the Passion. After making efforts to contact Icon
Productions (Mr. Gibson's production company) in March, one
of the members of the group arrived home one day to find a
copy of the film's script in an unmarked manila envelope, which
he distributed to the other members. The group read this script
and prepared a report, finding numerous problems "embedded
throughout the script" and concluding that "the steps need to
correct these difficulties will require major revisions" to the film.

Although Mr. Gibson has from the beginning insisted that he is
endeavoring to make a movie that is faithful to the Gospels, Mr.
Boyer's New Yorker article makes it clear that that is precisely
what the group finds troubling. He quotes a group of Catholic
ecumenical scholars as stating that "One cannot assume that by
simply conforming to the New Testament, that antisemitism will
not be promoted. . . . After all, for centuries sermons and
passion plays based on the New Testament have incited
Christian animosity and violence toward Jews." This is actually a
horrifying statement. One would hope that Catholics and all
Christians would be shocked by the suggestion that anti-
Semitism springs forth as a near automatic and somehow
"natural" response from a literal reading and telling of the
Gospels. Mr. Boyer also cites an example of one of the
recommended changes ? that the two thieves crucified with
Christ be referred to as "insurgents," despite the fact that the
original Greek does not support that interpretation. Evidently
such efforts are thought necessary to subtly direct people's minds
away from thoughts about Jewish culpability to Roman political
concerns over a potential revolt in the province. However, at
bottom such revisionism betrays a profound lack of trust in the
Gospels and a cynical, distressing lack of faith in the ability of the
Church to bring Christ's message to its members.

Mr. Gibson has for the most part kept himself out of the fray but
early on responded generally to the fears about his film by
pointing out that "Jesus himself was a Jew, his mother was a Jew,
and so were his 12 apostles." As noted by Rev. Michael Reilly in
an article discussing Gibson's movie for Newsmax.com, "some
of the villains and all of the heroes in the movie are Jews." In Mr.
Boyer's New Yorker article, Mr. Gibson states that his critics
are looking at the movie with only one eye, blind to the
sympathetic Jews in the film and seeing only what they want to
see ? for example, not seeing that a Jew helps takes Christ's
body down from the Cross. He notes that he will be leaving
subtitles in, because it's necessary in order to point out all of the
sympathetic characters. He also resents the revisionism he finds
in the ad hoc scholars group's efforts to sanitize his movie. "It
was like they were more or less saying I have no right to
interpret the Gospels myself because I don't have a bunch of
letter after my name. . . . Just get an academic on board if you
want to pervert something!"

 
Censorship The Wrong Approach

Now it is certainly possible that a film can employ words and
imagery to stigmatize an entire people and inflame passions. One
need only consider D. W. Griffiths' Birth of a Nation, and its
manipulative use of vicious African-American stereotypes, to
know that films can, indeed, convey such ideas. However, no
one appears to be suggesting that the rough cut that Mr. Gibson
is now privately screening bears any resemblance to films of this
sort, or even leveling the charge that the movie is anti-Semitic.
Indeed, it would be impossible at this point to do so, since nearly
everyone who is criticizing the film has not seen it. And in fact,
according to Mr. Boyer's New Yorker article, ADL head
Abraham Foxman denies that the film is per se anti-Semitic. The
brouhaha thus seems to center almost entirely on "concerns" that
the film might provide "fuel" for anti-Semitism because it contains
"troubling themes and images," or that the movie might
"reawaken" anti-Semitism by its very graphic depiction of the
crucifixion, following its portrayal of certain Jews who played a
role in the trial of the man Christians call their Lord and Savior.

Unfortunately for everyone on both sides of this debate, people
who hate will never be found wanting in religious or moral
justifications for it. The methodology proposed in criticisms of
Mr. Gibson's movie ? idea and image sanitization ? is a
dangerous and ultimately futile approach to the problem of hate.i
People who have an agenda need only the slimmest of pretexts
and flimsiest of "factual support" as a basis and justification. No
detail is too miniscule or insignificant, no information of too
dubious reliability, to provide all the support they need. See, for
example, the quality of the evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass
destruction that purportedly posed an imminent danger to the
United States used as justification to commence the current war
on Iraq. In fact, it may be fairly argued that any form the movie
takes ? no matter how vetted by committees of religious scholars
? will be sufficient to goad anti-Semites. This is evident from the
Simon Wiesenthal Center's own press release urging Mr. Gibson
to change his film in accordance with suggestions of the Ad Hoc
Scholars Group report. Although the Center apparently did not
realize it, the Center seriously compromised the case for claiming
that image sanitization will control anti-Semitic passions when it
reported, in the same press release, that the Center had already
received "an unprecedented wave of hate mail" solely in
response to the controversy over the movie, i.e., from people,
obviously, who could not have not seen the movie. Clearly, these
people don't need a reason, they just need a pretext. Insuring a
fair presentation of facts and images ? or even one biased to lead
their minds in the opposite direction ? is not going to stop them
or curb their hate.ii

To the extent that Mr. Gibson's movie does not actually employ
stereotypes, imagery or falsehoods to create a malign group
characterization or anti-Semitic theme, and people are merely
"concerned" that others will seize upon it as "fuel" for hatred
because "troubling images" might lead some to conclude the
existence of "collective guilt," or spur anti-Semites on with
rekindled zeal, calls for changing the movie are no more than
censorship, a demand that the artist censor himself because of
fears that his work will be dangerously misunderstood,iii or
misused by persons seeking justification, elevation and
respectability for their vile passions.

Not having seen Mr. Gibson's movie or final script, I am in no
position to extol, defend or excoriate any of its features. This is a
debate that will simply go on until full public release provides the
opportunity for everyone to judge the movie's merits by
reference to specific content, ending the current fervid
speculation about hypothetical or possible reactions to unseen
images and content.

However, the interim is not being used well. On the one hand we
have calls for censorship and revision ? implicitly revisionism of
the Gospels themselves ? and pleas that the film reflect the ideas
or theology of this or that group, rather than those of the artist.
On the other hand, the various preemptive defenses against
possible anti-Semitic reactions to The Passion that have thus far
been advanced do not really get to the heart of the controversy:

- 	guilt is an ethical/moral concept that applies only to
individuals, pertaining as it does only to individual choice (that
alone which an individual has some control over, his own action),
not to entire peoples or races;

- 	looking at a people as a whole, there are both good and
bad;

-	Pilate was a Roman, crucifixion was a Roman method of
execution and it was Romans who actually put Christ to death.iv

Instead of wringing hands over the possibility that Mr. Gibson's
movie will inflame anti-Semitic passions and issuing calls for its
revision, a far more productive approach would be to confront
the feared problem directly. Instead of running as fast as we can
from the question of deicide and responsibility for Christ's death,
why not use the time to actually discuss it. If worries abound that
Mr. Gibson's theology is not completely spot on, then discuss
theology ? now. If certain men claim to be Christians while hating
others, then the controversy is an opportunity to remind them of
the example and commandment of the one they nominally call
Lord, but do not follow. Each of these approaches has the very
great merit of fixing attention where it belongs ? on oneself.
 
Although raised in the Lutheran Church and converting later in
life to Orthodox Christianity, God knows I'm no Christian. Nor
am I a religious scholar, let alone one offering consulting services
to artists to assist them in shaping their visions so that their works
do not produce or exacerbate bad mental states. However, I
know something of what others who have spent a lifetime
thinking about the Gospels ? in their unrevised and unsanitized
form ? have said. The notion that anti-Semitism springs forth
from a "natural" or "literal" reading of this story is so outrageous
that it deserves to be addressed and countered in the strongest
possible terms. The notion that deicide is a subject so fraught
with danger that we must subtly redirect men's minds away from
it lest they be consumed with hate is equally cowardly. These
charges, implicit in greater or less degree in the criticisms of Mr.
Gibson's film, cry out to be addressed. Let us look at the work
of one man who spent a good deal of time contemplating the
significance of why men killed the "son of Man."


The Gospels As a Mirror in which to See Yourself 

Kierkegaard argued that, if it is supposed that Christ is God or,
at least, a man who lived his life in complete accordance with
God's will, then it cannot be the case that the Gospels are simply
an historical account of what happened at a particular time and
place, but must be presumed (because it is a kind of
communication from God) to be a disclosure of universal truth
about men and God ? true for all times and places. God,
appearing among men, reveals, by the contrast of his example,
exactly who men are, not just at the particular time and place,
but reveals essentially who they are.

In other words, to be blunt, were Christ to appear in America
today, matters would go absolutely no differently: gentile
Americans and devout Christians would have him put to death.
You do not understand the significance of the Gospels, until you
can see that what it is showing you is that, not only is this the way
your society would behave, now, today, but by far the
overwhelming likelihood is that this is also precisely the way that
you and people you know would behave, that you, seeing,
judging and acting always with worldly eyes, could easily be
among those calling for Christ's death as an imposter and
blasphemer, or pronouncing good riddance. You do not see the
significance of the Gospels until you realize that, as David
Horowitz recently said of The Passion, each of us kills Christ,
and does so every day.

To even begin to see this, you have to imaginatively insert
yourself into the story. If you are a Christian, you can't begin by
standing outside the story in the superior, privileged position of
knowing that the man on trial for his life is the son of God, just
because the Church has been teaching that for the last 2000
years and because you have heard it since you were a child, so
that you cannot even imagine what it would be like to have to
decide on your own looking at the "evidence" as if for the first
time. No, if you already know, it's too easy to read the story as
just a morality tale between good and evil, congratulating
yourself for being on the side of God. To learn something, you
must put yourself in the story, be there when it happened, and
then honestly ask yourself, how would I have acted?

If you put yourself in the story, then what you can really see and
know is that here is a man who was born a bastard child of
unknown father,v who associates with the lowest of the low in
your society, a rabble rouser who attracts large mobs eager for
miracles and dangerous elements hopeful that he is the promised
messiah who will liberate your occupied country from the
tyrannical rule of Rome and make it the most blessed land on
earth. Zealots stand ready at his proclamation that he is The One
to begin a horrendous bloody battle with the greatest power on
earth. He, a complete uncertificated and unauthorized nobody,
constantly rebukes the most respectable, learned and religious
men in your society ? some of whom you personally believe to
be truly holy men ? charging that they are hypocrites, worse than
the sinners the holy men reflexively condemn. He challenges your
burning desire to see that justice is done by telling you that the
blessed turn the other cheek, and suggesting that yes, you may
carry out the sentence, only let he who is without sin cast the first
stone ? as if in seeking justice you were not really carrying out
God's will! Although he will not directly and simply say that he is
the son of God, he often states that has been sent by his father
above to do his father's work, and that he is in the father and the
father is in him. Although he is reputed to have performed
amazing wonders, it is hard not to think that this is either
blasphemy, something dangerously close to it, or the ravings of a
madman. He continuously violates or ignores the most
fundamental laws and sacraments of your religion, rituals you
scrupulously adhere to and consider to be of the very essence of
who you are, based on some arrogant belief that he is above all
that because he serves some higher purpose ("The son of Man is
Lord of the Sabbath"). And he certainly does not match what
you have been taught about The One who will come and save
you and your country, who was prophesied to defeat your
enemies and make your land a glorious kingdom. He does not
hail from the proper city or region, and he steadfastly refuses to
assume any mantle of power, and does not even found any
organizations or programs to bring about necessary change and
reform. In sum, a very dangerous, deluded trouble-maker and
complete nobody who is challenging the established order of
things and who could easily bring down the wrath of Rome on
your head.

Only now, in the position of having to decide on your own
whether the "son of Man" be charlatan, madman, prophet, false
or real messiah, without the illusory benefit of dogma or "history"
as support, can you begin in honesty to consider how you would
think, feel and act. You must make a decision, and if you are for
him, it will be without benefit of any unequivocal objective
support that you can point to that will vindicate you. The
authorities, the people at large (especially the better sort!) and
most likely your family and friends are not on his side, outward
circumstances are not dispositive and certainly not favorable, and
even the man you are trying to decide whether to cast your lot
with will not tell you directly that he is The One, but leaves you
entirely to yourself to make your own judgment. He evidently
wants disciples, not worshipers; he wants people burning to
follow his example, not people who will sing his glories day in
day out because of Who He Is, or who are eager for the benefits
that will flow from siding with divinity (eternal life!) and fool
enough to take someone's word for it. In short, your decision
can only be founded in faith.

In order to uncover the meaning of faith in a society in which
everyone was automatically a Christian as a matter of course
simply by being born in a Christian country, being baptized as an
infant and occasionally worshiping Christ in church services,
Kierkegaard labored to tear down the supports of a false piety
that rested certain in the belief that Christ was God, certain of its
own salvation by reason of believing this, and smug in its belief
that Christianity was completely integrable with its conception of
the Good Life and the values according to which it judged of one
another in everyday life. Kierkegaard argued that, not only is it
impossible to prove that God exists,vi God is not "directly
recognizable." You can't tell just by looking or hearing. Thus, the
very first problem is a rather serious one: if God appears, just
how are you going to know it's Him?

Nothing that Christ did or said indicates, unequivocally, that he
was God or the son of God. The miracles, even if it is assumed
that they actually occurred, would not be definitive proof of
divinity or omnipotence, only of an extraordinary or superhuman
power. Although in the Gospel of John Christ speaks continually
of having been sent and authorized by his father above to do his
father's will, His habitual way of referring to himself was as the
"son of Man," a phrase that certainly does not immediately
convey the concept of divinity, and one which could even have
been chosen for its ability to deny divinity. When during his trial
he at last admits publicly that he is, indeed, the "King of the
Jews," knowing that this will be understood as a messianic claim
and will in all likelihood seal his doom (and, indeed, it is taken by
the crowd as blasphemy), it is at a time when he is held in
complete subjection to religious and civil authorities who are
considering his execution, and he is at the greatest possible
remove from being anything remotely "king-like," in the human
sense of the word, so that it would seem he must be a madman,
who indeed lives in some fancied other world inside his head.

In various philosophical works, Kierkegaard endeavored to
show that faith existed only so long as there was uncertainty, that
it was a "restless thing" and a "daring venture" in which one
"ventured everything," as if out on the ocean alone at "20,000
leagues."vii However, he also often combated false piety by
simply recounting and analyzing the Gospels by placing the
reader in the original position of one who was confronting the
situation as it, not only appeared, but was, at the time, and
having to make his own decision.

For example, in one of his discourses, Kierkegaard recounts the
reaction to the beginning of Christ's mission. Shortly after
appearing on the scene, Christ has become a colossal power ?
all is astonishment at him. He seems to hold all possibilities in his
hand. But what is it he wants to do with this power, what is it
that he wants to become? Many expect him to announce that he
is the Promised One. Yet he never takes that step. He has but to
say the word and his supporters will enthusiastically embrace him
and follow him. But it drives one mad, while many are waiting
for, expecting him to take the step, he does not use his fame, his
power to advance his position in the world, to take control, to
proclaim that he is The One and become King of the Jews or
lead the revolt against Rome, but steadfastly remains a nothing in
this world, ever continuing the same ministry. Eventually, this is
perceived as obtuseness, a burden, a madness; his obstinacy will
come to frustrate us and, at last, become an intolerable affront to
us:

It is the same with human approval as with erotic love, friendship
and the like; it is self-love. Where there is direct recognizability,
where the presence someone exceptional is known by worldly
power, honor, status, by gold and goods ? there human approval
is also on hand. It is ? even if the individual is not always
conscious of it in this way but it is in him more as a natural
cunning of selfishness ? a simple arithmetical process: by
approving at this point, I gain the advantage of sharing with the
powerful, of being along in taking sides with the powerful, and so
I am also an amiable person whose soul is not pettily shrunken
but is enlarged in disinterested enthusiasm. But where the more
direct recognizability is lacking or denied, to approve is devoid
of profit, is an effort, is making a sacrifice; there approval is
absent, . . . If God in heaven were to clothe himself in the form of
a humble servant, if he, divinely squanderous, if I dare put it this
way, were to scatter around checks drawn upon heaven, human
approval could not associate with greatness of that kind. A
human mediocrity, which as we all know is in vogue ?- that is
something for the speculative mentality of human approval. If
there is in a family a child who is exceptional, and this is directly
known by worldly honor and esteem, a European reputation, by
medals and ribbons ? well, that is splendid, the family is sheer ?
disinterested! ? enthusiasm. If he were exceptional but without
direct recognizability, well, then the family would soon feel him to
be a burden, a nuisance, and would rather have him be an utterly
insignificant person. So it is with human approval ? and he who
serves only one master, he unconditionally wants to be: nothing.
viii

In another place, Kierkegaard explains why Christ, who keeps
offending the Pharisees with his challenges that their
righteousness is mere outward formalism and empty ritual, will
eventually be charged as a blasphemer:

Matthew 15: 1 - 12. Then scribes and Pharisees came to Jesus
from Jerusalem and said: (2) Why do your disciples transgress
the tradition of the elders? They do not wash their hands when
they eat. (3) But he answered and said to them: And why do you
transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your
tradition? (4) For God has commanded, saying: Honor your
father and mother, and whosoever curses father or mother shall
surely die. (5) But you say,: Whosoever says to his father or
mother: That whereby I could have helped you is a gift, does not
need to honor his father or his mother. (6) Thus, for the sake of
your tradition you have annihilated the command of God. (7)
You hypocrites! Justly did Isaiah prophesy of you when he said:
(8) This people keeps close to me with their mouths and honors
me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. (9) But in vain
do they worship me, when they teach such doctrines that are the
commands of men. (10) And he called the people to him and
said to them: Listen and understand! (11) Not that which goes
into the mouth makes a person unclean, but that which comes
out the mouth, this makes a person unclean. (12) Then the
disciples came up and said to him: Do you know that the
Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?

. . . This is the collision, a collision that appears again and again
in Christendom; to put it briefly, it is the collision of pietism with
the established order. The Pharisees and scribes are, namely,
representatives of the established order, which precisely because
of their quibbling and shrewdness has become an empty, indeed,
an ungodly externality.

The established order, however, at that time insisted and always
insists on being the objective, higher than each and every
individual, than subjectivity. The moment when an individual is
unwilling to subordinate himself to this established order or
indeed even questions its being true, yes, charges it with being
untruth . . . then there is the collision. Quite properly the
established order poses the question: Who does this individual
think he is? Does he perhaps think that he is God or that he has
an immediate relation to God, or at least that he is more than a
human being? . . . .

We need but little acquaintance with the human race to know
that this is so and but very little with the most recent philosophy
to know that this will happen in our day also. Why has Hegel
made conscience and the state of conscience in the single
individual "a form of evil" (see Rechts-Philosophie)? Why?
Because he deified the established order. But the more one
deifies the established order, the more natural is the conclusion:
ergo, the one who disapproves of or rebels against this divinity,
the established order ? ergo, he must be rather close to imagining
that he is God.ix

So he is tried as a blasphemer. In recounting Christ's trial,
Kierkegaard describes why anyone, at any time, would find that
Christ merited the death penalty: he robs us of that which to us is
the most valuable, that in which we have our lives:

The people have the right to choose, the choice between the
release of a robber and of this accused. They choose the robber.

The other one, of course was really a much more terrible robber.
What is assaulting a lone traveler on a highway perhaps a half-
dozen times compared with his assault upon the whole human
race and upon what it means to be a human being! A thief can
steal my money; in so doing we are in disagreement, but in
another sense we are completely in agreement, because the thief
really shares my opinion that money is a great good. A slanderer
can steal my honor and reputation, but the slanderer shares my
opinion that honor and reputation are a great good, and that is
why he robs me of mine. But in a much more cunning way one
can rob us, so to speak of all our money, honor, reputation, etc.,
steal from our human lives that in which we human beings have
our lives. That is indeed what he, the accused, did. He did not
steal the rich man's money ? no, but he took the idea away from
the possession of money. "O miserable mammon," that is what
his life expressed, "miserable mammon, with which a person
defiles himself by hoarding which he accumulates to his own
ruination . . ." . . . Neither was he a slanderer who diminished
anyone's honor and reputation ? no, but he took the idea away
from human honor and reputation. "O miserable fool's costume,"
his life expressed, "miserable fool's costume; the more it is put on
and the more it glitters and sparkles, the more miserable it is.
You are unaware of it; you are like that king who by mistake put
on the grave shroud instead of the coronation robe. . . ." But
what is the use, then, of my being permitted to keep the money,
the purple, the medals and ribbons, what good . . . that all fall on
their knees when I appear, what good is it to me if he has his
way, for then he has indeed taken the idea away from it, and if
he wins, I am instead the butt of ridicule ever time there is a gun
salute and every time they kneel to me. If it is perhaps too severe
to impose capital punishment for thievery and robbery, for the
kind of robbery he has committed against us all there is only one
punishment ? the death penalty.x

So Christ is carrying his cross to Golgotha. Kierkegaard warns
against a too easy assumption that one as good, as elevated and
brave as oneself would have had the courage to stand with
Christ in these circumstances, and along the way has something
to say about the impulse to sanitize images that perhaps
expresses one of the very reasons Mr. Gibson wished to make
his film:

The crowd spat upon him (Christ). You shudder, you would
perhaps prefer that such a thing be left unmentioned because it is
so horrible, because the fact that it happened shakes one out of
one's customary soft way of thinking. ? But now imagine yourself
contemporary with that event. Are you quite sure you would
have had the courage to side openly with Christ, to stand by a
man mocked by every glance, betrayed by all ? on whom the
crowd spat. But you were present! Perhaps you were moved to
compassion by the sight of the mistreatment of this man, but you
stood in the crowd. Far be it from you to participate in those
diabolical doings. But look, those standing near you noticed that
you did not shout along. Enraged in their wild passion, a couple
of them standing nearby grabbed hold of you ? your life was at
stake, more surely than if you had been attacked by a wild
animal ? and at the moment you had neither the courage nor the
resolution to risk your life, at least not for such a man, despised
and rejected by all ? and you went along with the crowd; you,
too, shouted insults at him, and you, too spat upon him.

Oh, we warn young people against going to dens of iniquity,
even out of curiosity, because no one knows what might happen.
Even more terrible is the danger of being along in the crowd if
you are not so unconditionally resolved within yourself
concerning what you want that you are willing to sacrifice your
life. Ah, but those who are so resolved seldom run with the
crowd. Ah, truth, there is no place, not even one most
disgustingly devoted to lust and vice, where a human being is so
easily corrupted ? as in the crowd.xi (Italics added)

To be sure, Kierkegaard was not addressing the question of
Jewish culpability for Christ's death. What was significant to him
was not the accidents of time, place, race and custom, but that
the Jews and Romans were men, and therefore in all essentials
like ourselves. Kierkegaard wanted the individual, at least he
who claimed to have some interest in being associated with
Christianity, to see himself in light of Christ's life and example and
in the mirror of God's word, to understand himself, who he was,
in light of God's absolute requirements, not by the normative
comparative standards that men always apply in judging of
themselves and their times, in which everyone was automatically
more or less a decent fellow, "nice guy," good parent, loving and
devoted husband or wife, hard worker, honest merchant,
respectable and esteemed businessman, brave soldier, etc..xii
Even pagans do the same.xiii How could men who did not
measure themselves against God's unconditional requirements,
Kierkegaard wondered, ever even honestly feel that they needed
a savior, when nothing in the conception they had of themselves,
judging especially by the way they lived their lives and not by
their announced beliefs, indicated that there was anything about
them they thought needed saving?

Theologically speaking, then, the story of Christ's crucifixion is a
story about a story of how men are offended at God and by his
requirements, in which it is possible to see oneself. Jew, gentile
are irrelevant - it is you and me of whom it is speaking.


Christians Are Under a Commandment

I have taken this long approach to respond to the idea that
"deicide" is a taboo subject, too dangerous for unprepared,
untutored minds, and that thinking about why men put Christ to
death, and who is responsible for it, somehow leads "naturally"
to notions of collective Jewish guilt and grant of a divine license
to hate succeeding generations. In numerous works,
Kierkegaard demonstrated how what Christ said and did was an
offense to men. In doing so he makes plain how worldliness
perceives God, what it is to be mired in worldliness, and why
worldliness and the kings and powers of this world want nothing
so much as to put God out of the way.xiv

It is not necessary, however, to make such long investigations in
order to address the concerns of Mr. Gibson's critics. If a
renewed rise of anti-Semitism by people who call themselves
Christian is what we are worried about, then the emetic is readily
at hand in the form of Christ's own teaching. It does not take
long to administer. It is easily addressed within even a 350 word
limit for an op-ed article and well within the 15 minute limit for a
single church sermon. The one Christians call Lord gave a
commandment ? a standard of conduct that his followers are
required to adhere to at all times. In the context of this particular
controversy, this commandment, when followed, makes the
question whether the Jews were 1%, 50% or 99% responsible
for the death of Christ and metaphysical speculation whether
their role in his death subjected the entire Jewish race
forevermore to eternal damnation not only irrelevant, but far
worse, a flagrant evasion that exacerbates its disobedience by
passing off its hatred for others as a form of piety, that obscenely
employs the strength of its hatred as a measure of its piety for
God, and thinks that God smiles on and is fooled by this.

The words are simple, the concept is easily grasped; carrying out
the task is everything. This man who was crucified, who, while in
agony on the cross, asked God, "forgive them," this is what he
taught: you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Just as Christianity's joyful message is contained in the doctrine
of humanity's inherent kinship with God, so is Christianity's task
humanity's likeness to God. But God is Love, and therefore we
can be like God only in loving, just as we also, according to the
words of the apostle, can only be God's co-workers ? in love.
Insofar as you love the beloved, you are not like God, because
for God there is no preference, something you have reflected on
many times to your humiliation, but also many times to your
rehabilitation. Insofar as you love your friend, you are not like
God, because for God there is no distinction. But when you love
the neighbor, then you are like God.

Therefore, go and do likewise.xv Forsake the dissimilarities so
that you can love the neighbor. xvi

Jeff Snyder is an attorney who works in New York City. He is
author of Nation of Cowards ? Essays on the Ethics of Gun
Control. © Jeffrey R. Snyder, 2003

i For example, is the 1970s rock opera and Broadway hit, Jesus
Christ Superstar, to be censored because, during the trial before
Pilate the chorus shouts "Crucify him! Crucify him!," and it might
occur to the audience that the people shouting this would have
had to have been Jews, and from this further conclude that, in the
words of the ADL press release, there was "Jewish complicity in
the death of Jesus"? In fact, the logical extension of the concerns
expressed over Mr. Gibson's movie would be to question the
degree to which the New Testament itself should be sanitized to
avoid giving the wrong impressions. But then, why stop there?
The Old Testament itself freely reports that the Jews, at different
points in their history, were in revolt against God, and that they
often put prophets sent by God Himself to death because the prophets
had the temerity to point this out to them. Thus, if left unsanitized,
the Old Testament itself contains sufficient "evidence," for any
person bent on finding "religious" justification for his anti-
Semitism, that the Jews were, in the words of the ADL press
release, "enemies of God."

ii The assumption at work in requests that Mr. Gibson change his
movie seems to be that, by controlling some of the factual and
image content of people's minds, we can control their passions.
This is a thin reed to hang so much upon; one can only stand
amazed at the presumption that we are such masters of causality;
once can only be distressed at the presumption that people, or at
any rate certain people (not the ones controlling the images, to
be sure!) are essentially to be regarded as little more than
stimulus-response automatons. Instead, what needs to be
challenged is the leap that is made when a person concludes that
he has a license to hate from a historical fact or claim that some
Jews - at some level - were involved in the decision to put Christ
to death (e.g., that Judas Iscariot provided the means of arrest).
Merely making a well-rounded presentation of the event (as best
we can discern based on current historical research and
archaeological findings), while meritorious in its own right, is not
going to address this.

iii Rousseau should not have written The Social Contract;
Goethe should not have written The Sorrows of Young Werther;
Nietzsche should never have written about the Superman;
Wagner should not have composed his pagan operas.

iv The purpose of this observation seems to be to point out not
only that both Jews and gentiles shared complicity in the death of
Christ, but also the irrationality of the "blood guilt" theory. If
there were some sort of "blood guilt" that taints an entire people
for all eternity resulting from complicity in Christ's death, then
gentiles would necessarily also be eternally tainted, unless, of
course we gratuitously assume that Jesus' plea on the cross to
God to "forgive them" (i.e., at a minimum, everyone involved in
his death) was selectively answered by God on the basis of race
and, further, is not binding, by way of Christ's example, on those
who proclaim themselves to be his followers.

v "But false piety has long since let it be forgotten that the family
was despised as long as it lived on earth; false piety makes a
show of the ‘holy family,' would like to fool itself and others into
thinking that this condition of abasement is glory, that heavenly
glory and earthly glory amount to the same thing. And false piety
is offended when abasement is portrayed ? it is embarrassing,
and in order to protect itself, it calls this blasphemy by us
freethinkers." Judge for Yourself!, by Soren Kierkegaard,
translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong, Princeton
University Press, 1990, at pp. 163-164.

vi A problem not unique, however, to God. Existence, in general,
cannot be proved. Kierkegaard explains this quite succinctly: "So
let us call this unknown something: the God. It is nothing more
than a name we assign to it. The idea of demonstrating that this
unknown something (the God) exists, could scarcely suggest
itself to the Reason. For if the God does not exist it would of
course be impossible to prove it; and if he does exist it would be
folly to attempt it. For at the very outset, in beginning my proof, I
would have presupposed it, not as doubtful but as certain (a
presupposition is never doubtful, for the very reason that it is a
presupposition), since otherwise I would not begin, readily
understanding that the whole would be impossible if he did not
exist. But if when I speak of proving the God's existence I mean
that I propose to prove that the Unknown, which exists, is the
God, then I express myself unfortunately. For in that case I do
not prove anything, least of all an existence, but merely develop
the content of a conception. Generally speaking it is a difficult
matter to prove that anything exists . . . [t]he entire
demonstration always turns into something very different and
becomes an additional development of the consequences that
flow from my having assumed that the object in question exists.
Thus I always reason from existence, not toward existence,
whether I move in the sphere of palpable sensible fact or in the
realm of thought. I do not, for example, prove that a stone exists,
but that some existing thing is a stone. The procedure in a court
of justice does not prove that a criminal exists, but that the
accused, whose existence is given, is a criminal. Whether we call
existence an accessorium or the eternal prius, it is never subject
to demonstration." Philosophical Fragments, by Soren
Kierkegaard, originally translated by David Swenson and revised
by Howard V. Hong, Princeton University Press, 1971, pp 49-
50.

vii See generally, Concluding Unscientific Postscript to
Philosophical Fragments, by Soren Kierkegaard, edited and
translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong, Princeton
University Press, 1992. "If that of which I am to gain possession
by venturing is certain, then I am not venturing, then I am
trading." Id., at Volume 1, at p.425.

viii Judge for Yourself!, at p. 172.

ix Practice in Christianity, by Soren Kierkegaard, edited and
translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong, Princeton
University Press, 1991, at pp. 85 - 87.

x Judge for Yourself!, at pp. 177-178.

xi See Kierkegaard's Journals and Papers, III 2926. This
fragment is contained in the Supplement to Works of Love, by
Soren Kierkegaard, edited and translated by Howard V. Hong
and Edna H. Hong, Princeton University Press, 1995, at pp.
470-471.

xii See "Good Men Make Good Rhinoceroses," by Jeff Snyder,
at http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/snyder4.html.

xiii Matthew 5: 43 - 48.
xiv See, for example, Practice in Christianity, which is an
extended reflection on this subject, especially Part II thereof,
which takes as its title Matthew 11:6: "Blessed is he who takes
no offense at me."

xv A reference to Luke 10: 37. Concerning the commandment to
love one's neighbor as oneself, a Pharisee has asked Christ, who
is my neighbor, in other words, which people (surely it is not all!)
qualify as a "neighbor" and are therefore worthy of receiving this
love? Christ responds with the parable of the good Samaritan,
and then prevents further legalistic wrangling over the concept,
"neighbor" (a wrangling the essential purpose of which is to
evade the obligation) by (as Kierkegaard notes) trapping the
questioner in a task: Go and do likewise.

xvi Works of Love, at pp. 62-63.

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