THE HOFFMAN WIRE

Feb. 10, 2004

Who Killed Christ?Newsweek says we can't rely on the New Testament for the answer

http://www.RevisionistHistory.org/wire6.html
by Michael A. Hoffman II

Copyright 2004 revisionisthistory.org

The following excerpts from the Feb. 16, 2004 Newsweek magazine cover story, "Who Killed Christ?" were chosen to reveal the core of Newsweek's prevarication and mendacity. To read the window-dressing intended to make the lies palatable examine the article in its entirety at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4212741/

Note that Newsweek does not deal with David Klinghoffer's assertions in the Los Angeles Times (Jan. 1, 2004) that the Talmud itself upholds the accuracy of Gibson's film.

Newsweek proclaims that the New Testament is not always "a faithful record of historical events." In that case, what is? Why not debate the relative merits of the various sources, both Biblical and non-Biblical, rather than merely derogating the Christian account, while upholding the supposed omniscience of a "history" that is never adequately sourced, except for vague references to skimpy citations by Tacitus and Philo and allusions to Josephus that do not bear scrutiny? Newsweek claims veracity for any pro-Pharisee version of history and shoots holes in ancient Christian accounts because the Newsweek article is an exercize in public relations for Judaism, not objective scholarship.

Newsweek mocks the Evangelist Matthew's depiction of a vengeful Jewish mob: "...consider the source of the dialogue: a partisan Gospel writer." In the eyes of Newsweek, anything in the Gospel that points to the complicity of the religious leadership of the Jews in the death of Christ is suspect, "partisan."

In instances where Newsweek imagines the New Testament can be used to blunt criticism of Judaism, however, the New Testament account is upheld and we are cautioned against "misreading it." But in those instances where the New Testament is unambiguous in assigning guilt for Christ's death to the majority of the Jews of His day, then Newsweek advises us to discount the New Testament. What hypocrisy!

Newsweek deviously pretends that when Christ said, "Father forgive them for they know not what they do," He was referring to the Pharisees. Actually the Church has always taught that the cosmic crime of the Pharisees is that they knew precisely who Jesus was and demanded his execution in spite of that knowledge. Christ was begging forgiveness for the Roman soldiers, who surely had no idea who the "King of the Jews" was.

Newsweek insists on the absolute villainy and culpability of the Romans. This is a fixed dogma with Newsweek. This fallacy has been a mainstay of Judaic propaganda about the crucifixion and Newsweek is careful to toe the party line. And yet what does Newsweek have to say about the fact that the Roman army acted as God's avenging troops when it destroyed the Temple in AD 70 and smashed the corrupt rule of the Pharisees over Jerusalem? What of the Roman centurion, about whom Jesus said he could not find greater faith in all of Israel?

Even the rabbis' Talmud affirms that Christ was given a trial (rather than being summarily executed by the Pharisees themselves), only because he had found favor with the (Roman) authorities. This important corroborative datum is excluded from the Newsweek article.

At the conclusion of the Newsweek essay, the pedantic author explains with painstaking didactism how Gibson might have "avoided this firestorm." Newsweek advises that Mel should have simply made a bland, politically-correct, toadying film in accordance with guidelines issued by the modern Catholic Church, which "suggest dropping scenes of large, chanting Jewish crowds and avoiding the device of a Sanhedrin trial." In other words, Mel should have engaged in self-censorship in order to appease commissars like Abe Foxman and gain favorable notice in rags like Newsweek.

Newsweek sees nothing ironic in counseling an artist to avoid controversy by submitting his work to history-by-committee-of-Philistines. Even though Newsweek in the past has consistently defended the most outrageously blasphemous and pornographic books, films and other anti-Establishment "works of art" on the lofty basis of the "prerogative of the artist," all of that radical defiance is suspended when the artist is Mel Gibson and the Establishment being defied is Jewish. Newsweek's message to Gibson is that he would be wise to domesticate his vision and dumb down his movie until it constitutes pabulum. That was not Newsweek's message to Martin Scorcese when the latter deeply offended Christians with his film, "The Last Temptation of Christ."

Perhaps the true significance of the Newsweek cover story is in the degree to which Gibson's movie has frightened the Establishment, hence the massive media damage-control that runs the risk of overkill and blowback -- winning sympathy for the besieged Gibson and generating millions of dollars worth of free publicity for his film, which debuts Feb. 25.

NEWSWEEK, "Who Killed Christ?" Feb. 16 cover story

"...the Bible can be a problematic source. Though countless believers take it as the immutable word of God, Scripture is not always a faithful record of historical events; the Bible is the product of human authors who were writing in particular times and places with particular points to make and visions to advance. And the roots of Christian anti-Semitism lie in overly literal readings which are, in fact, misreadings of many New Testament texts...

"...two NEWSWEEK screenings of a rough cut of the movie raise important historical issues about how Gibson chose to portray the Jewish people and the Romans. To take the film's account of the Passion literally will give most audiences a misleading picture of what probably happened in those epochal hours so long ago. The Jewish priests and their followers are the villains, demanding the death of Jesus again and again; Pilate is a malleable governor forced into handing down the death sentence...Pilate was not the humane figure Gibson depicts...

"So why was the Gospel story-- the story Gibson has drawn on --told in a way that makes 'the Jews' look worse than the Romans? The Bible did not descend from heaven fully formed and edged in gilt. The writers of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John shaped their narratives several decades after Jesus' death to attract converts and make their young religion understood by many Christians to be a faction of Judaism attractive to as broad an audience as possible.

"...we can begin to understand the origins of the unflattering Gospel image of the Temple establishment...the writers downplayed the role of the ruling Romans in Jesus' death. The advocates of Christianity -- then a new, struggling faith -- understandably chose to placate, not antagonize, the powers that were. Why remind the world that the earthly empire which still ran the Mediterranean had executed your hero as a revolutionary?

"...In the memorable if manufactured crowd scene in the version of the movie screened by NEWSWEEK, Gibson included a line that has had dire consequences for the Jewish people through the ages. The prefect is again improbably resisting the crowd, the picture of a just ruler. Frustrated, desperate, bloodthirsty, the mob says: 'His blood be on us and on our children!' Gibson ultimately cut the cry from the film, and he was right to do so. Again, consider the source of the dialogue: a partisan Gospel writer. The Gospels were composed to present Jesus in the best possible light to potential converts in the Roman Empire and to put the Temple leadership in the worst possible light.

"...A moment later in Gibson's movie, Pilate is questioning Jesus and, facing a silent prisoner, says, 'You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?' Jesus then replies: '... he who delivered me to you has the greater sin.' The 'he' in this case is Caiaphas. John's point in putting this line in Jesus' mouth is almost certainly to take a gibe at the Temple elite. But in the dramatic milieu of the movie, it can be taken to mean that the Jews, through Caiaphas, are more responsible for Jesus' death than the Romans arean implication unsupported by history...

"The Roman soldiers who torture Jesus and bully him toward Golgotha are portrayed as evil, taunting and vicious, and they almost certainly were. ..After Jesus, carrying his cross, sees the faces of the priests, he is shown saying: 'No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.' Is this intended to absolve the priests? Perhaps. From the cross, Jesus says: 'Forgive them, for they know not what they do.'

"...Are the gospels themselves anti-Semitic?...they are polemics, written by followers of a certain sect who disdained other factions... Without understanding the milieu in which the texts were composed, we can easily misinterpret them. The tragic history of the persecution of the Jewish people since the Passion clearly shows what can go wrong when the Gospels are not read with care...

"The justification for anti-Semitism was articulated by Pope Innocent III, who reigned in the early years of the 13th century: 'the blasphemers of the Christian name,' he said, should be 'forced into the servitude of which they made themselves deserving when they raised their sacrilegious hands against Him who had come to confer true liberty upon them, thus calling down His blood upon themselves and their children.' After the horror of Hitler's Final Solution, the Roman Church began to reassess its relationship with the Jewish people...

"Was there any way for him (Gibson) to have made a movie about the Passion and avoided this firestorm? There was. There are a number of existing Catholic pastoral instructions detailing the ways in which the faithful should dramatize or discuss the Passion. 'To attempt to utilize the four passion narratives literally by picking one passage from one gospel and the next from another gospel, and so forth,' reads one such instruction, 'is to risk violating the integrity of the texts themselves... it is not sufficient for the producers of passion dramatizations to respond to responsible criticism simply by appealing to the notion that 'it's in the Bible'.

"The church also urges 'the greatest caution' when 'it is a question of passages that seem to show the Jewish people as such in an unfavorable light.' The teachings suggest dropping scenes of large, chanting Jewish crowds and avoiding the device of a Sanhedrin trial. They also note that there is evidence Pilate was not a 'vacillating administrator'...The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, NEWSWEEK has learned, is publishing these teachings in book form to coincide with the release of Gibson's movie...

"...Bluntly put, 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..."

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