Paul Craig Roberts: "The Passion's Message

Mel Gibson’s film of Jesus’ last hours is an intense experience. One sits for two hours watching Jesus be sadistically treated by his fellow men. Race and ethnicity are immaterial to Gibson’s purpose. The overpowering message of the film is that Christ really suffered for man’s sins. A second powerful message is man’s inhumanity to man, a message identical to that of Holocaust museums.

One gasps at the sight of Jesus brutalized by the thugs sent by the priests to seize him. As shocking as these scenes are, they leave the viewer unprepared for the extreme cruelty of the Roman soldiers.

Jesus, in the manner of Galileo or anyone who dissents from orthodox opinion, is perceived as a threat to the hegemony of those who represent religious authority. The priests want the Roman governor to condemn Jesus to death.

The governor tries to solve the problem with a compromise. He has Jesus scourged instead of crucified.

The Roman soldiers are delighted to get their hands on a person whom they can sadistically torture, and they put their utmost effort into beating Jesus to death. The whipping scene is so horrific and lengthy that the viewer cannot escape confrontation with man’s inhumanity to man.

Jesus emerges a bloody pulp. The viewer has a short respite while the governor washes his hands of the affair. Then the beatings resume every step of the way as Jesus carries the cross to the crucifixion site. It is a drawn out journey, and long before it is over many in the audience are sobbing uncontrollably.

With each act of cruelty, the Roman soldiers become more gleeful. Brutality ratchets higher with the driving in of the nails and the crucifixion. By the film’s end, the viewer is exhausted, drained.

Never has a film portrayed such suffering. Gibson confronts believers with their unworthiness. “God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son.” The film transforms the words, “Christ died for our sins,” from doctrine into searing personal emotional experience.

Controversy may make Gibson’s film a “happening” and draw a general audience to the most talked about movie of our time. People who are not attuned to the film’s religious message are likely to receive a message different from that which Gibson had in mind. They may see a story of a dissenter who paid for his dissent with his life.

The unjust mistreatment of Jesus will bring home the cost of nonconformity and daring to speak truth to power. Many may emerge from the film with their courage weakened and with second thoughts about the wisdom of questioning authority.

For libertarians, the film confirms what they already know about power: Those who have it will abuse it, put their own interests first, and take no risks for the sake of justice.

Paul Craig Roberts is chairman of the Institute for Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy during 1981-82.

>>Faith alone in Christ alone.

No, scripture doesn't say we are saved by faith alone. Scripture says we are saved by Grace!

Consider Romans 3:28:

"Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law." (Romans 3:28)

The "law" referenced in the passage was the law of Judiasm. The verse contrasts works of the Law and faith, not faith and works [of love].

Martin Luther, in his German translation of Scripture, added the word "alone" to this passage. Luther's translation would read:

"Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith ALONE without the deeds of the law." (Romans 3:28)

Luther added the word alone because he wanted to inject his man made doctrine of salvation by faith alone into scripture. Though Protestant translations don't use the word "alone", the man made doctrine survives today, in clear contradiction of the following scripture passages:

"Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone." (James 2:17)

"Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only" (James 2:24)

In fact, the James 2:14 - 26 details how faith "ALONE" is dead.

However, Luther did get around this problem. Luther wanted to remove the last four books of the New Testament, Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelations. He didn't consider them to be inspired.

He actually removed them from his [early] translation of scripture and put them into an unnumbered appendix. This treatment of these books illustrates how he considered them unequal to other New Testament writings.

This lessening of the importance of the book of James allowed for Luther to emphasize scripture passages about faith while de-emphasizing passages about the role of works.

The same holds trough to this very day. James is de-emphasize and twisted to fit within the "Faith alone" doctrine.

We are saved by Grace, through faith and works, both, of which are gifts of God. It's up to us to accept them. Works without the Grace of God are meaningless. Faith without works is dead, and works without faith are equally dead.

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