Scholars: Crucifixion Portrayal Inaccurate

JERUSALEM (AP) - The dearth of information about Jesus' crucifixion makes it impossible to describe the event in accurate detail, as Mel Gibson attempts to do in his new film, "The Passion of Christ," Bible scholars and anthropologists say.

The crucifixion is the centerpiece of the movie, set to open in U.S. theaters Feb. 25, Ash Wednesday on the Roman Catholic calendar.

People who have seen the movie say it adopts standard Christian imagery in excruciating detail: Jesus being pinioned to a Latin cross - a T-shaped device with a short upper extension - with one nail driven through both feet and one through each palm.

In a December e-mail sent to The Associated Press, Gibson said he did "an immense amount of reading" to supplement the Bible's relatively unadorned account of the crucifixion in the four Gospels.

"I consulted a huge number of theologians, scholars, priests, spiritual writers," Gibson wrote. "The film is faithful to the Gospels but I had to fill in a lot of details - like the way Jesus would have carried His cross, or whether the nails went through the palms of His hands or his wrists ... Since the experts canceled each other out, I was thrown back on my own resources to weigh the different arguments and decide for myself."

Some scholars say even the most widely recognized features of the crucifixion, such as the shape of the cross and the use of nails, are open to debate.

James F. Strange, professor of religious studies at the University of South Florida in Tampa, said 1st century historian Josephus provided only general information, probably because crucifixion was so common that details seemed superfluous.

Crucifixion was first used in the 5th century B.C., and was a widely used form of execution in Asia, Europe and Africa for the ensuing eight centuries, said Israeli anthropologist Joe Zias. Depending on technique, death could be swift or take days.

"If you suspended people by their hands and left their feet free you would kill them within an hour," Zias said. "If you suspended them in a way they couldn't exhale they'd be dead within minutes."

Zias said the question of whether Jesus was nailed to the cross or simply tied to it remains a mystery. "There is no evidence whatsoever he was nailed," he said. "The Gospels say he was crucified and leave it at that."

Zias criticized "The Passion of Christ" for accepting the standard version of three nails being used. He said experiments on cadavers carried out by the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages have shown that people hanging with nails through their hands will fall to the ground within a relatively short time, pulled by gravity.

"All this is Crucifixion 101," Zias said. "People who study these things understand them. But Gibson ignored them in his film."

John Dominic Crossan, emeritus professor of religious studies at DePaul University in Chicago, agrees with Zias that little is known about Jesus' execution.

"Early Christians believed that Jesus was nailed to the cross," he said. "But there is absolutely no proof of this. The only skeleton of a crucified person ever recovered indicated that the two arms were tied to a crossbar, and two nails were used in either shinbone. There was no standard procedure in any of this. The only common feature in the different types of crucifixion is intense sadism."

The type of cross in Jesus' execution is also in question, Crossan said. First century Romans are known to have used both a T-shaped device, without an upper extension, and the Latin cross that is standard in Christian iconography.

Each of the four Gospels says an inscription mocking Jesus as the "king of the Jews" was affixed to the cross. Crossan said this would have made sense "because the whole point of crucifixion was to warn people through alluding to a specific crime."

Two of the Gospels say the inscription was mounted above Jesus. This presumably would strengthen the argument for a Latin cross, which would have provided space for writing about the condemned man's head.

However, the other two Gospels don't give a locator. "It (the written warning) could just as easily have hung around his neck," Crossan said.

Crossan is also uncertain whether the cross on which Jesus was crucified was carried to the execution grounds - either by Simon of Cyrene, as three of the Gospels report, or by Jesus himself, according to John's account.

It is possible that the vertical part of the cross was kept at Golgotha, the place of Jesus' death, and that the condemned person carried the crossbar, Crossan said.

"The point is we simply don't know," he said, "not in general cases and not in the case of Jesus either."

Its important to keep in mind that this movie represents Mel Gibson's interpretation of what happened. Not necessarily what actually occurred.

As anyone who saw "The Patriot" or "Braveheart" knows, Gibson makes films which are riveting and entertaining, but not necessarily historically accurate.

Having seen the outtakes, I noticed a number of historical inaccuracies and improbablities.

Christ probably didn't carry the entire cross. It would take a Charles Atlas - several of them - to lug an entire cross to Golgotha. The Upright portions were always there -like a gallows. The man to be executed carried just the cross-piece - a heavy enough timber, but one well within the realm of possibility.

The nails used to hold a person's arms on the structure were driven through the wrists, NOT through the palms as the film apparently portrays.

Pilate was a Roman Magistrate - a Civilian Official. He probably didn't wear armour, as he wasn't a military man.

The actors apparently are speaking Latin with an Italian accent, as Pilate says "Ecce Homo" and its pronounced by him as "Echay Homo" A Roman of the period would have pronounced it as though it was "Ekkay Homo" The "ch" sound was not found in classical Latin. It crept into the pronounciation of Ecclesiatical or Church Latin in the Middle Ages.

The soldiers portrayed escorting Christ in the film are carrying pila. The Pilum was a throwing weapon designed for field combat, not guard duty. The head of the pilum was made of hardened metal and the metal shaft below it, joining it to the main wooden portion, was NOT hardened. The purpose of this was to cause the pilum shaft to bend upon striking an enemy shield, armour, or the ground, so it couldn't be thrown back at the Roman forces. Thus it made a poor thrusting weapon, which was what a soldier on guard duty needed. More probably Roman guards or sentries used a lancea or hasta - a more typical spear or lance-like weapon designed for stabbing, not throwing.

When you see the film, notiuce if the "v" in Latin was pronounced like our "v". If so, that's another error. "V" in classical Latin was pronounced like our "w".

Finally, note if the soldiers on guard duty have a scutum - the characteristic rectangular shield used by the Romans. If they do, tht's probably another inaccuracy. Roman soldiers were not allowed to used scuta on guard duty. They had a habit of using them to prop themselves up and then fall asleep.

Finally, I can't recall reading about a snake in the Gospels, that was back in Genesis.

Gibson, as he admits, is not a historian, but there are enough Roman History buffs and Classical scholars out there he could have consulted, unless, as with the red-coated Tarletons' legions in the Patriot instead of the correct green coated troops, he was using artistic license, although I can't understand why here.

Finally, from what I saw of the film, it appeared to be REALLY violent and brutal and bloody, not that the event was not, but the degree of detail seemed to me to be excessively brutal.

He was crushed under the load of our sin. As some of the earlier posters pointed out, crucifixion meant a slow, agonizing death by exposure, dehydration, blood loss, and suffocation. Jesus died in about 6 hours. One poster states that his quick death was a result of the flogging. It's possible, I guess. My opinion is that if you assume sin is a corrupting and destroying influence, the load of every person's sin hastened the death of Jesus who was both True God and True Man. The sin hastened his demise, and threfore removed the need for breaking his legs, which would move the death along. His legs weren't broken which is also prophesied, in Isaiah, I think. It mentions that "not one of His bones will be broken." I think this corresponds to the Jewish traditions and laws surrounding Passover. The Passover lamb's bones were not to be broken or cut for the marrow.

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