The Passion of the Christ

Moriel’s response to new Mel Gibson film

We carefully watched the Mel Gibson interview by ABC’s Dianne Sawyer with preview clips of the film in advance of its release on the Roman Catholic feast of Ash Wednesday.

What nearly jumped out most clearly was Mel Gibson’s plain and unequivocal statement: “Someone does not even have to believe in Jesus Christ to enter The Kingdom of God”. Jesus Himself on the contrary teaches in The Word of God that “Unless A Man Is Born Again” (through a saving faith in Jesus) he/she cannot possibly enter The Kingdom of God. Gibson’s position reflects the ecumenical/inter faith revision in The Roman Catholic catechism 847 (which contradicts 846 in the same catechism which says salvation is available only in The Roman Catholic Church).

It is sad, if not perverse, that Evangelicals and Evangelical pastors are using a film beset by biblical and historical inaccuracy, as an “evangelistic tool” made by someone who in open televised rejection of the biblical gospel and in direct opposition to the very words of Jesus does not even believe that faith in Jesus is necessary for salvation.

Mel Gibson is a traditional Roman Catholic complete with wanting the pagan ritual of the Mass in Latin. The film is partially inspired by visions of two nuns into the “˜stigmata’, the appearance of nail wounds on the palms of the hands read by Mel Gibson. The trailer for the film shows the Roman nails being driven into the palms. This predictably is absolute rubbish inspired by Roman Catholic superstition. Forensic pathology and forensic archaeology both establish that in Roman crucifixion the nails were hammered into the radius above the wrist and not into the metacarpals on the palm as the film portrays in support of the Roman Catholic stigmata superstition.

Admittedly, as a matter of personal taste I do not find Mel Gibson a very talented figure, but even if I did, the film would still be incongruous with how Roman crucifixion was actually carried out. Before he died in Los Angeles 1929, the American gunslinger Wyatt Earp gave the true account of the gunfight at OK corral after Hollywood made its first films about it. What actually transpired at OK corral in Tombstone, Arizona and what transpired on the silver screen in Hollywood, California were two different things. The problem with films like this one about The Passion of Christ was demonstrated in Oliver Stone’s epic “JFK’ where poetic license misrepresented essential ballistic facts surrounding the Kennedy assassination. It just didn’t happen the way Kevin Costner explained it in the movie. But because of a well made movie most people do not know that and wind up with a distorted perception of the most important death in 20th century American history. So too, Mel Gibson has seen to it that because of a well made movie, viewers wind up with a distorted perception of the most important death in human history. As was portrayed in the film “Wagging the Dog” the power of Hollywood to subtly mislead should never be downplayed. Harry Potter films make evil look good. In Israel, I worked on a film, starring actor Lou Gosset, (a talented man) about jet fighter pilots filmed on location at an Israeli air base using real Israeli air force pilots as extras. I saw how the Hollywood director was able to change slight things that really took place in a military environment to give the film a different flavor than what actually went on in a military situation. In New York, I once worked for the same company as author Mario Puso, before the Godfather films made him so successful. Hollywood cannot only make gangsters look like heroes, but also make desperados appear to be reluctant killers instead of the calculated operators they actually are. This film is like that.

The independent historical record of Flavius Josephus and other sources shows that Pontus Pilot was far from the benign personality type the film wrongly portrays him as being. Pilot mingled Jewish blood with the blood of temple animal sacrifices. The Sanhedrin were indeed by and large a nasty assortment of characters with some good men in it such as Nicodemus. But to show the Sanhedrin as villains but Pilot as benign is not the biblical description of Pilot nor the historical one and paints a biased picture”¦ It puts the blame mainly on the Sanhedrin while in The New Testament the Apostle Peter rather states that the Romans were co-equally responsible (Acts 2:23, Acts 4:27-28). As Jews For Jesus stated in The New York Times, “How Can You Blame Anyone For The Death Of Someone Who Is Alive”? The Roman Catholic depiction of the cross however is not the biblical one but rather a crucifix; an idolatrous graven image condemned by God in His Word that places a risen Christ back on the cross, which is needed to facilitate the pagan abomination of the Mass which rejects the repeated teachings of 1 Peter and The Epistle to the Hebrews that Jesus died once and for all in a perfect sacrifice sanctifying for all time those who are redeemed. The Mass however is claimed to be the same sacrifice repeated and continued in fundamental rejection of the biblical gospel.

In our view the film is not anti Semitic, but its biblical and historical misrepresentation of Pilot implies a vindication of Pilot and Rome, which contradicts Peter’s sermon, and can give fuel to those who are anti Semitic as the Roman Catholic Obberamagau Passion Play was employed as anti Jewish political/religious propaganda by Hitler and Goebbels.

This film, Roman Catholic inspired film (supposedly endorsed by the anti Christ pope) is historically inaccurate, biased, and like anything else tainted with the cancer of Roman Catholicism, is not something we would recommend or endorse. We are however pleased to continue to sanction the “˜Jesus’ film made by Evangelicals which has been used successfully in the evangelization of groups from Russian Jews to Moslems. We do not need a historically and biblically inaccurate and biased secular film produced by Hollywood under the influences of Roman Catholic superstition to present the gospel to anyone. Much less do we need a secular film made by someone who wrongly believes in a false gospel, which states salvation is by sacraments instead of New Birth, and that we atone for our own sin in an invention called purgatory ““ while the Bible teaches, “the blood of Christ cleanses from all sin”. St Paul says that those with a different gospel are accursed in Galatians chapter 1.

The actor who portrayed Christ in the film is a Roman Catholic who said he could not perform in front of the camera unless he had Jesus in him, a feat accomplished not by being Born Again but by taking the cannibalistic Roman Catholic Eucharist which directly contravenes the plain and unambiguous teachings of the Apostles in The New Testament in Acts 15 condemning ritual cannibalism and the consumption of blood.

The stupid spectacle of saved Christians extolling a film whose maker on an internationally broadcasted TV interview denies that faith in Jesus Christ is even necessary to enter The Kingdom of God however defies the imagination. Some “Christian” bookshops are selling Mel Gibson approved memorabilia nails that are replicas of those used in the film.

This film will likely do more to advance the satanic ecumenical deception among undiscerning Evangelicals than it will to advance The Kingdom of God. It is just another step in misleading biblically ignorant Christians into an experiential faith based on emotional response instead of a scriptural one based on a genuinely spiritual response. If for His own glory God uses this film to see a soul saved, Praise God. I was saved through a cult called “The Children of God’ and a friend of mine received the gospel through a ouiji board. God can use anything. But, I certainly wouldn’t recommend ouiji board evangelism or joining a cult, and on behalf of Moriel I personally wouldn’t recommend Hollywood evangelism either.

In Jesus,
Jacob Prasch

Contributions By
David Lister