The artistic responses to the gospel accounts of the Passion of Jesus Christ, especially that in Matthew, include such works of transcendent genius as the poetic "Stabat Mater," Grnewald's painted "Crucifixion," Michelangelo's sculpted Pietà and Bach's choral masterpiece of tremendous power — BWV 244. Whether a recent aspirant in a newer medium, Mel Gibson, deserves admission to the Genius Club remains, in a double sense, to be seen; but that the buzz about an unviewed film could dominate even a recent faculty fellows' table at Wilson College suggests to me that it is not unworthy of a columnist's attention. In fact it will demand two columns addressing two cognate phenomena: historical anti-Semitism, and the anti-Christian bias at this and many other American universities. Today "God and Man at Princeton" must give its place to "Dead Jews Are News."
Jesus predicted the nature of his death, which he regarded as so absolutely necessary that he called Peter, who would pooh-pooh his presentiments, "Satan" in Matthew 16:23. Its necessity is a fundamental doctrine of Christian theology. The Nicene Creed states that it happened in fulfillment of the Scriptures. Nonetheless a vast historical opprobrium hovers over those involved in achieving it, especially Judas Iscariot, Annas, Caiaphas, Pontius Pilate and a fickle mob of what Matthew calls "the Jews." Now Jesus himself lived and died a Jew. He had come to Jerusalem to keep Passover. He was so thoroughly Jewish that he could call non-Jews "dogs" in Matthew 15:26. Mary was a "Jewish mother." All the disciples were Jews. I should describe the author of Matthew as a hyper-Jew whose narrative, written at a distance from Jesus' death, reflects a contested conception of its relation to Jewishness. Elementary literary intelligence will therefore suggest that his phrase "the Jews" cannot refer to a religion, let alone to an historical race. He is talking about a particular religious "hierarchy". "The Jews" killed Jesus in the same sense that "the Christians" or "the Church" killed Joan of Arc, Thomas More, or Thomas Cranmer — all victims of a particular political tyranny zealously sanctioned by particular religious bigotry.
But in Christians' reading of our Bible elementary literary intelligence has never been absolutely required and therefore not always deployed. Many contemporary Christians nourish the odd assumption that the word of God is more transparent, easier of access, than the word of Henry James. Yet difficult texts when removed in space and time from the clarification of context or "historical background" can and often do become a repertory of inkblots for a Rorschach Test. Christians need to know, if they don't already, that Matthew's Passion narrative, thus abused, has often provided the pretextual iconography of the disgraceful history of anti-Semitism in the Christian Church. Reviewing the long European history of Jew-slaughters, expulsions, pogroms and legislated civil injustice, what neutral observer would conclude that for Christians "love is the fulfilling of the Law" as Paul wrote in Romans 13:10? Even the hateful anti-Semitism endemic in the Muslim world today is in its specifics — hooked-nosed bloodsuckers plotting world domination — often of Christian origin.
The Holocaust of the last century was not an episode of Christian anti-Semitism. It was too horrible and vast to be an "episode" of anything. But the S.S. thugs, who in most regards showed scant evidence of the Christ-life, were fierce against the "Christ-killers." It is true that many individual Christians boldly confronted the Mystery of Iniquity, but important Christian leaders, including the heir of Peter at whose fonts Hitler and Himmler had been claimed as "Christ's own forever," stood by in politic silence or ineffectual dithering.
I shall of course hope soon to see Gibson's film, which I hear aspires to a new kind of visual "historical accuracy." Christians, who believe that God penetrated history in Jesus and redeemed history through him, must grasp our own history, nettles and all. Jesus said "the truth will make you free" in John 8:32 — the truth, not the convenient oblivion, not the carefully worded statement of the diocesan lawyers.
Gibson appropriately launched his film on Ash Wednesday. As a scholar of Franciscanism, which greatly advanced popular Christian devotion to the Passion, I can hardly doubt that viewing it might be for believers a useful Lenten exercise.
But as the medieval author of the great "Meditations on the Life of Christ" points out, the fruit of the penitential season cannot ripen in the past — only in the existential present, in the sincere recognition of past faults and the truthful resolution of "amendment of life."
John V. Fleming is the Louis W. Fairchild '24 professor of English. His column appears on Mondays.
Read More
Keep academic authority in human hands
Lily Halbert-AlexanderThe Trump administration’s attacks on research and higher education as well as a blind reliance on AI chatbots are reflective of a societal backslide: a commodification of knowledge that prioritizes “efficiency” over the messy process of getting to an answer, where nuances are flattened and the truth is fungible.
The Trump administration’s attacks on research and higher education as well as a blind reliance on AI chatbots are reflective of a societal backslide: a commodification of knowledge that prioritizes “efficiency” over the messy process of getting to an answer, where nuances are flattened and the truth is fungible.
What do we owe society for a Princeton education?
Jia Cheng ShenThe social and moral responsibility that comes with receiving a degree subsidized by both private generosity and public trust is significant.
The social and moral responsibility that comes with receiving a degree subsidized by both private generosity and public trust is significant.
Notes from a so-called enemy’s classroom
Jennifer JenningsIt wasn’t revolutionary. It was homework. But it was homework that asked: how do we build schools that work for all kids? Inclusion, after all, is the “I” in DEI. That’s what we’re thinking about together. And caring about each other’s experiences and opportunities, it turns out, isn’t something you can outlaw.
It wasn’t revolutionary. It was homework. But it was homework that asked: how do we build schools that work for all kids? Inclusion, after all, is the “I” in DEI. That’s what we’re thinking about together. And caring about each other’s experiences and opportunities, it turns out, isn’t something you can outlaw.