This Wednesday, Ash Wednesday, our Christian friends will be leaving church with their foreheads marked by a symbolic cross of ash and making a beeline for the nearest triplex movie house to see the real thing. The day marks the debut of Mel Gibson's new Hollywood production depicting, in excruciating detail, his savior's crucifixion and the events that preceded it. Sight unseen, I give it four Jewish stars.
Make no mistake, The Passion of the Christ, which opens at 2,800 theaters, is going to be boffo at the box office. For starters, the Pope has already given it a thumbs up, reportedly proclaiming the film "is like it was." And he's old enough to know. The potential audience is huge, too, numbering in the billions. And the plot line is a proven winner. From Rome to Kiev to Warsaw it has thrilled the masses for millennia, often driving them into a frenzy of Christ-like love and forgiveness.
Merchandise tie-ins and licensing are also expected to add millions to the gross as fans grab up the "witness cards", T-shirts and mugs waiting for them in the lobby. One new item, a sure-fire winner, is the official Passion of the Christ crucifixion spike pendant engraved with a passage from our own prophet Isaiah that's often used to "prove" that the film's hero was indeed the one true and only Messiah. At this rate, Lenny Bruce's gag about a line of religious cocktail napkins with nifty sayings like, "another Martini for Mother Cabrini," may not seem so far-fetched.
But what makes Gibson's film a can't-miss project is the "buzz" that ensued after it earned the coveted "controversial" label. Hollywood publicists know that sort of free publicity is priceless and can overcome a multitude of sins. That's why they made certain the pre-production script found its way into the hands of the ADL and other groups charged with interfaith dialoguing and defending the well-being of the Jewish people. Once Abe Foxman & Co. got hold of it, the flacks knew the indignation would spread like wildfire. Now, everyone from Michael Jackson's rabbi, Shmuley Boteach, to Rabbi Marvin Hier, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, have weighed in, calling for changes in the "script" and warning of the damage this flick could do to Christian-Jewish relations. The media, in turn, has eaten it all up.
Of course, it's worse than folly for Jews to try and edit Christian scripture or recreate someone else's religion in our image. It betrays weakness and a lack of confidence in our G-d. Nevertheless, the instinct is understandable, since the effort helps us avoid confronting an unpleasant, immutable reality: Jews will always live as a tiny minority in a world in which irreconcilable theological differences, not to mention antagonisms, exist among Judaism, Christianity and Islam - and neither of the two spin-offs are interested in, or can withstand, Judaism's scrutiny.
Surely, this plain vanilla fact has cost us dearly in the past, distant and recent, but the point is, thank G-d it doesn't have to now or in the future. As long as we have Israel, I mean. Ironically, that's the missing link in all the Jewish arguments I've heard against Gibson's film.
I value the maturing Zionism of Christian Evangelicals (Gibson is Catholic), and I'd never write off the power of simple human goodwill, but I don't think it's cynical to say that most progress made between Christians and Jews in America, and the little made in Europe, has come about largely because we are the ones who have emerged miraculously from the ashes and are now simply less physically vulnerable as a Jewish nation. But as Mel Gibson reminds, while the old rationale to hate Jews is dormant in some quarters, it is constantly being resurrected and given new life in others. After all, it's gospel.
So, what else is new? Only Israel, the IDF and the public knowledge that the sacrificial lamb has unexpectedly acquired a mean set of horns and a willingness to use them. Heaven forbid, should we ever lose that, Jews could find Hollywood's make-believe blood and gore the least of our tsuris. Again.
If Jews want to protect our interests (and our tuches), we need to keep our eye on the ball and start worrying about what's happening in Jerusalem, not Tinsel Town. We, and any genuine gentile friends who wish to join us, need to be working hard for a big, strong Jewish state that no one dares to mess with. Then everything else will take care of itself. Chazak!
Make no mistake, The Passion of the Christ, which opens at 2,800 theaters, is going to be boffo at the box office. For starters, the Pope has already given it a thumbs up, reportedly proclaiming the film "is like it was." And he's old enough to know. The potential audience is huge, too, numbering in the billions. And the plot line is a proven winner. From Rome to Kiev to Warsaw it has thrilled the masses for millennia, often driving them into a frenzy of Christ-like love and forgiveness.
Merchandise tie-ins and licensing are also expected to add millions to the gross as fans grab up the "witness cards", T-shirts and mugs waiting for them in the lobby. One new item, a sure-fire winner, is the official Passion of the Christ crucifixion spike pendant engraved with a passage from our own prophet Isaiah that's often used to "prove" that the film's hero was indeed the one true and only Messiah. At this rate, Lenny Bruce's gag about a line of religious cocktail napkins with nifty sayings like, "another Martini for Mother Cabrini," may not seem so far-fetched.
But what makes Gibson's film a can't-miss project is the "buzz" that ensued after it earned the coveted "controversial" label. Hollywood publicists know that sort of free publicity is priceless and can overcome a multitude of sins. That's why they made certain the pre-production script found its way into the hands of the ADL and other groups charged with interfaith dialoguing and defending the well-being of the Jewish people. Once Abe Foxman & Co. got hold of it, the flacks knew the indignation would spread like wildfire. Now, everyone from Michael Jackson's rabbi, Shmuley Boteach, to Rabbi Marvin Hier, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, have weighed in, calling for changes in the "script" and warning of the damage this flick could do to Christian-Jewish relations. The media, in turn, has eaten it all up.
Of course, it's worse than folly for Jews to try and edit Christian scripture or recreate someone else's religion in our image. It betrays weakness and a lack of confidence in our G-d. Nevertheless, the instinct is understandable, since the effort helps us avoid confronting an unpleasant, immutable reality: Jews will always live as a tiny minority in a world in which irreconcilable theological differences, not to mention antagonisms, exist among Judaism, Christianity and Islam - and neither of the two spin-offs are interested in, or can withstand, Judaism's scrutiny.
Surely, this plain vanilla fact has cost us dearly in the past, distant and recent, but the point is, thank G-d it doesn't have to now or in the future. As long as we have Israel, I mean. Ironically, that's the missing link in all the Jewish arguments I've heard against Gibson's film.
I value the maturing Zionism of Christian Evangelicals (Gibson is Catholic), and I'd never write off the power of simple human goodwill, but I don't think it's cynical to say that most progress made between Christians and Jews in America, and the little made in Europe, has come about largely because we are the ones who have emerged miraculously from the ashes and are now simply less physically vulnerable as a Jewish nation. But as Mel Gibson reminds, while the old rationale to hate Jews is dormant in some quarters, it is constantly being resurrected and given new life in others. After all, it's gospel.
So, what else is new? Only Israel, the IDF and the public knowledge that the sacrificial lamb has unexpectedly acquired a mean set of horns and a willingness to use them. Heaven forbid, should we ever lose that, Jews could find Hollywood's make-believe blood and gore the least of our tsuris. Again.
If Jews want to protect our interests (and our tuches), we need to keep our eye on the ball and start worrying about what's happening in Jerusalem, not Tinsel Town. We, and any genuine gentile friends who wish to join us, need to be working hard for a big, strong Jewish state that no one dares to mess with. Then everything else will take care of itself. Chazak!