The truth about Passion
The Passion of the Christ is labelled a religious revolution, Christian propaganda and anti-Semitic nonsense. To top it, it's riddled with inaccuracies.
Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ is in essence not much more than a reading of how the co-writer and producer of the film personally understands Jesus and the last twelve hours of Christ's life. And as with everything in life, different people see things in different ways.
To even try to understand Gibson’s presentation of the crucifixion, you have to understand Mel. He's a staunch Catholic with strong traditional Christian beliefs. Gary Younge explains Gibson’s traditionalism in The Guardian; “He is pro capital punishment, anti-abortion, anti-feminism and anti-gay”.
The Passion of the Christ offers a fundamentally Catholic interpretation of Christian religion. Mother Mary is a central character in the film - even the disciples call her ‘Mother’, something which isn't true to scripture. There is also a focus on communion, showing it to be an important part of the story.
Although the film is very close to the Biblical truth, some elements of fiction and symbolism have been incorporated to strengthen Gibson’s message. There is, for instance, the white dove, and the black-robed Satan carrying an evil-looking child with and aged face and a hairy back. The 40-year old baby apparently represents the Anti-Christ and the dove the Holy Spirit.
Like most film adaptations based on literature, Passion deviates from the scripture and contains historical inaccuracies. To complicate things more, you can't judge the film according to historical fact because so little of what the Bible says has been scientifically proven. The changes Gibson introduces can either be seen as artistic license or as conflicting with the truth - depending on your view. Here are a couple of the most obvious 'inaccuracies':
In Jesus’ time people of different ethnic groups communicated in Greek and not Latin, as the film portrays. Apparently, it's because Gibson feels there is something magical about saying Mass in Latin and he wanted to bring the feeling across in the film.
In the film Mary Magdalene is shown to be the woman of the well-known Bible story “let he who has no sin throw the first stone”. But there's no support for this in the Bible. In John Chapter Eight they don't identify the woman caught in the act of adultery.
Jesus has to carry his whole cross in The Passion. According to historical fact it's more likely that he only carried the crossbar - as did the other two criminals in the film. Gibson obviously wanted to increase the suffering.
According to historical facts the Romans crucified people with nails through their wrists and not through the palms of their hands.
Probably the most obvious factual mistake is the portrayal of Pontius Pilate. Many sources within the Bible (as well as other historical accounts) sketch him as a bully and a coward. According to Peter Feldman's article on artslink.co.za, Pilate is famous in Roman history for his cruelty and for executing thousands of people without trial. Gibson preferred a much more traditional interpretation, where Pilate is portrayed as a man troubled by moral scruples.
Gibson embroidered on the characters of the Roman soldiers by adding bickering and joking scenes between them.
He also integrated Pilate’s wife Claudia into the story. We see her begging for Jesus’ safety and showing sympathy towards Mary and Magdalene.
As if the different interpretations we find in Mark and John are not enough to confuse us as to what really happened, Gibson allegedly included another text; Anne Emirich’s The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Emmerich was an Augustinian nun in the 18th century who had visions about the suffering of Christ.
In the end Gibson remains a director with the freedom to produce a film in any way he finds pleasing. Especially since he's paying for it himself. We don't have to take The Passion of the Christ literally, but can interpret it figuratively according to its message. It is only his interpretation. And perhaps it's best we view it as a representation of what happened and not as ‘what really happened’.
Image: Mary (Maia Morgenstern), left, and Mary Magdalene (Monica Bellucci) in a scene from The Passion Of The Christ, copyright Icon Distribution Inc. All rights reserved.
- Women24