Frank Rich: 'Passion' and the U.S. culture war

IHT ^ | 03/05/04 | Frank Rich

[Pikamax]

Frank Rich: 'Passion' and the U.S. culture war Frank Rich NYT Friday, March 5, 2004

NEW YORK Thank God - I think. Mel Gibson has granted me absolution for my sins. As "The Passion of the Christ" approached the $100 million mark, the star appeared on "The Tonight Show,'" where Jay Leno asked if he would forgive me. "Absolutely," he responded, adding that his dispute with me was "not personal." Then he waxed philosophical: "You try to perform an act of love even for those who persecute you, and I think that's the message of the film."

Thus we see the gospel according to Mel. If you criticize his film and the Jew-baiting by which he promoted it, you are persecuting him - all the way to the bank. If he says that he wants you killed, he wants your intestines "on a stick" and he wants to kill your dog - such was his fatwa against me in September - not only is there nothing personal about it but it's an act of love. And that is indeed the message of his film. "The Passion" is far more in love with putting Jesus' intestines on a stick than with dramatizing his godly teachings, which are relegated to a few brief, cryptic flashbacks.

With its laborious build-up to its orgasmic spurtings of blood and other bodily fluids, the film is constructed like nothing so much as a porn movie, replete with slo-mo climaxes and pounding music. Of all the "Passion" critics, no one has nailed its artistic vision more precisely than the journalist Christopher Hitchens, who called it a homoerotic "exercise in lurid sadomasochism" for those who "like seeing handsome young men stripped and flayed alive over a long period of time."

If "The Passion" is a joy ride for sadomasochists, conveniently cloaked in the plain-brown wrapping of religiosity, does that make it bad for the Jews? Not necessarily. As a director, Gibson is no Leni Riefenstahl. His movie is just too ponderous to spark a pogrom on its own - in America anyway. The one ugly incident reported on Ash Wednesday, in which the Lovingway United Pentecostal Church posted a marquee reading "Jews Killed the Lord Jesus," occurred in Denver, where the local archbishop, Charles Chaput, had thrown kindling on the fire by promoting the movie for months. Whether "The Passion" will prove quite as benign in Europe and the Arab world is a story yet to be told.

But speaking as someone who has never experienced serious bigotry, I must confess that, whatever happens abroad, the fracas over "The Passion" has made me feel less secure as a Jew in America than ever before. My quarrel is not with most of the millions of Christian believers who are moved to tears by "The Passion." They bring their own deep feelings to the theater with them, and when Gibson pushes their buttons, however crudely, they generously do his work for him, supplying from their hearts the authentic spirituality that is missing in his jamboree of bloody beefcake. Jews, after all, can overcompensate for mediocre filmmaking in exactly the same way; even the schlockiest movies about the Holocaust (Robin Williams as "Jakob the Liar," anyone?) will move some audiences to tears by simply evoking the story's bare bones in Hollywood kitsch.

What concerns me much more are those with leadership positions in the secular world - including those in the media - who have given Gibson, "The Passion" and its most incendiary hucksters a free pass for behavior that is unambiguously contrived to vilify Jews.

Start with the movie itself. There is no question that it rewrites history by making Caiaphas and the other high priests the prime instigators of Jesus' death while softening Pontius Pilate, an infamous Roman thug, into a reluctant and somewhat conscience-stricken executioner. "The more benign Pilate appears in the movie, the more malignant the Jews are," is how Elaine Pagels describes Gibson's modus operandi in The New Yorker this week. As if that weren't enough, the Jewish high priests are also depicted as grim sadists with bad noses and teeth - Shylocks and Fagins from 19th-century stock. Yet in those early screenings that Gibson famously threw for conservative politicos in Washington last summer and autumn, not a person in attendance, from Robert Novak to Peggy Noonan, seems to have recognized these obvious stereotypes, let alone spoken up about them in their profuse encomiums to the film.

Nor do some of these pundits seem to recognize Holocaust denial when it is staring them in the face. In an interview in the current Reader's Digest, Noonan asks Gibson: "The Holocaust happened, right?" After saying that some of his best friends "have numbers on their arms," he responds: "Yes, of course. Atrocities happened. War is horrible. The Second World War killed tens of millions of people. Some of them were Jews in concentration camps." Yes, mistakes happened, atrocities happened, war happened, some of the victims were Jews. This is the classic language of contemporary Holocaust deniers, from David Irving to Gibson's own father, Hutton Gibson, a prominent anti-Semitic author and activist. Their rhetorical strategy is to diminish Hitler's extermination of Jews by folding those deaths into the war's overall casualty figures, as if the Holocaust were an idle byproduct of battle instead of a Third Reich master plan for genocide. Rather than challenge Gibson on this, Noonan merely reinforces his junk history. "So the point is that life is tragic and it is full of fighting and violence, mischief and malice," she replies.

No, that is not the point of the history of the Holocaust. Of course, if a Jew points out such callousness, he is not practicing journalism or trying to clarify the historical record. He is instead "rabidly anti-Christian," as James Dobson of Focus on the Family is fond of describing Jews who raise questions about Gibson. The message is clear: Jews who criticize a poor, defenseless multimillionaire movie star and his film are behaving much as Caiaphas and his cronies do in "The Passion" itself. There's a consistency of animus here.

There is also a mighty strange inversion of reality. America is 82 percent Christian, and 60 percent of the population believes the Bible is historical fact. (The Jewish population is 2 percent.) The president of the United States has endorsed Jesus as his favorite philosopher, and Gibson's movie had almost as large an opening week as "The Lord of the Rings." The star has won his battle. He's hotter than ever in Hollywood, a town whose first commandment is that you never argue with a hit. ("If Hitler did a movie with these numbers, we'd give him his next deal," one Jewish mogul told me in a phone conversation this week.) So by what stretch of the imagination is Gibson so aggrieved that he can go on "The Tonight Show," purport to be a victim and not be laughed at by Leno or anyone else? For all his talk of "suffering" for his art, it's hard to see exactly how Gibson has suffered.

The vilification of Jews by Gibson, his film and some of his allies, unchallenged by his media enablers, is not happening in a vacuum. We are in the midst of an escalating election-year culture war in which those of "faith" are demonizing so-called secularists - any Jews critical of Gibson and their fellow travelers, liberals.

Politicians, we are learning, seem increasingly eager to wrap themselves in "The Passion of the Christ" as a handy signal to indicate they are opposed to all those "secularists" whose conspiracy is undermining all that right-thinking Americans hold near and dear. Predictably enough, both the president and Mrs. Bush have publicly indicated their desire to see Gibson's film. But when even Connecticut's John Rowland, a scandal-ridden governor facing impeachment, starts to rave about "The Passion" in public ("unbelievable!" "breathtaking!"), as he did last weekend, it's clear that we're witnessing the birth of a phenomenon. You come away from this whole sorry story feeling that Jesus died in "The Passion of the Christ" so cynics, whether seeking bucks or votes, could inherit the earth.

[h.a. cherev]

having one's faith viciously defamed (even when it's a faith that mandates turning the other cheek) creates a real temptation to respond with bitterness, and a lot of us have given into that temptation.

I'm probably misunderstanding you. Are you saying that it's part of your faith that the Jews were screaming in condemnation of Jesus and urging his death by crucifixion? It's part of your faith that the Sanhedrin recommended crucifixion as capital punishment? It's part of your faith that Pontius Pilate was passive rather than the cruel leader he was? Somehow, I find that hard to believe.

But the hatred directed toward christianity in so many of these anti-Mel columns IS truly breathtaking.

Is it really hatred towards Christianity? Or towards Mel's interpretation of the crucifixion?

[h.a. cherev]

Frank Rich again? Is he afraid that if he doesn't condemn Gibson often enough, he will lose his position on today's Sanhedrin of Jewish journalists?

I find it interesting that no one, to date, has commented in response to this statement. Polybius; walden - what do you think of it?

[walden]

"Frank Rich again? Is he afraid that if he doesn't condemn Gibson often enough, he will lose his position on today's Sanhedrin of Jewish journalists?"

I don't like the analogy because "Jewish" is both a religion and an ethnicity, and to lump religious Jews with secular Jews is unfair. I guess Rich is of Jewish ancestry (which, to me, is about as relevant, when applied to an American, as Scottish, or Mexican, or Lower Slobovian), but I have no idea whether he's religious or not. However, I think Rush Limbaugh hit it on the head when he said in reference to Andy Roony that he had to say what he did in order to be allowed to stay in the club of sophisticated liberal elite opinion-makers (or, so THEY think ;) .) Same idea, but better expressed.

Thinking about all of the criticism of the "Passion", though, I did realize that secularists and religious Jews DO share one thing-- because none of them believe in the divinity of Christ, they all also disbelieve in all of the miracles Christ performed in the Gospels. (For the record, lots of liberal Christians also disbelieve in the miracles.) That casts the behavior of Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin in an altogether different light-- if Jesus hadn't really performed miracles, then these men were just ruthlessly power-hungry and intolerant. Despicable. But, when I look at them in the context of my firm Christian belief in Christ's miracles, and realize that they also knew that the miracles were real, that changes everything. From the perspective of the Sanhedrin, it wasn't a question of whether Christ was God or merely a man, it was a question of whether he was God or the Devil. Their fear is understandable. No doubt they thought that, if he was truly the Son of God, as the high priests, God would have let them know that he was on the way. Ergo, he had to be the Devil. This is not to say that I completely absolve them of their jealous desire to retain position, power, and control over the people, but it does make them much more understandable, more human.

I had a discussion afterwards with the two Christians I saw the movie with about how we identified with the various characters. My feeling then, and now, was that I hope if I had been there that I would have been one of the good guys, but what are the odds? I have seen parts of Pilate and Caiaphas in myself, even parts of the mob shouting for Christ's death. Or, I could have just been one of the crowd that turned away, indifferent to His fate and just wanting to avoid trouble. At best, I could have been Peter, who denied Christ three times out of fear. The only comfort I take is that no way could I have been a Roman soldier.

It's been a week now since I saw it, and I have finally managed to distill what the film left me with-- an overpowering realization of my own unworthiness, and a huge feeling of gratitude for the incredible gift of God's love.

[Polybius]

Their religious education was obscenely warped by the Hitler Youth but they truly believed they were saving Christianity and Germany by acting like savages towards the Jews, the Slavs and the other untermenchen.

Could you clarify this for me, please. It seems you are saying that the feelings for the Jews in Christian Europe was only warped by the Hitler Youth. I probably am misreading you.

I will clarify.

No, I am not referring to the mere "feelings" but the intensity of the feelings and, most importantly, how the feelings were translated into action.

Was Europe anti-Semitic? It sure was.

America was anti-Semitic too back then.

Many parts of Europe are anti-Semitic right now.

However, there is a vast difference between the "I don't like Jews" anti-Semitism and rounding up 6 million human beings for extermination.

Was Germany during World War One anti-Semitic? Yes, it was. During World War One, being Catholic in the United States would not win you much favor either.

However, in Germany during World War One, Germany was tolerant enough to lionize it's Jewish war heroes.

Lt. Wilhelm Frankl, was awarded the Pour le Merite (The "Blue Max"), Germany's equivalent to the Congressional Medal of Honor.

His portrait was sold as a "Sanke Card" which were photos of German war heroes (mostly the glamorous aviators) that were the military version of baeball hero cards in World War one Germany. Frankl's Sake Card, when it was issued, bore the inscription: "Our most successful flyer, Lieutenant Frankl."

Another German World War One Jewish war hero was Fritz Beckhardt who was awarded the Iron Cross (First Class), the House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords, the Hessian Medal of Bravery and the Hessian Order of Ernst Ludwig.

Fritz Beckhardt, in one of war's greatest ironies, decorated his World War One German aircraft with a swastika. Of course, back during World War One, the swastika had no political meaning and was merely a universally recognized good luck charm. Raul Luftberry, of the Lafayette Escadrille, also decorated his SPAD with a "good Luck" swastika.

Fritz Beckhardt's love and loyalty for Germany was so great that, after the Armistice was signed, Beckhardt refused to deliver his plane over to the Allied enemy and instead flew it to Switzerland.

And how was Beckhardt's loyalty to Germany repaid during the Nazi era? Beckhardt ended up in a concentration camp. Fortunately, Hermann Goering (a World War One aviator himself), at the pleading of another World War One German Jewish aviator, Berthold Guthmann, secured Beckhardt's release and Beckhardt escaped from Germany.

A few years later, Berthold Guthmann was sent to the concentration camps that he had saved Beckhardt from and he died there.

World War One Germany, despite all of it's anti-Semitic faults, was a nation that Jews were willing to fight for, to die for and to defy Allied orders for, as Beckhardt did to preserve the honor of his squadron.

Even monsters such as Hermann Goering retained a bit of the honor of Imperial Germany when he arranged the freedom of his old Jewish comrade, Fritz Beckhardt.

But Nazi Germany was a different creature.

The Jewish war heroes were expunged from the list of Por le Merite winners. German Jewish war heroes were sent off to extermination camps as if they were insects.

That quatum leap from Jewish Por le Merite recipients to Jewish untermenchen deserving of extermination was a Nazi ideological creation.

That extreme ideology had to be instilled in the tabula rosa that was German youth. The mechanism for that indoctrination was the Hitler Youth.

That is what I mean by my refernce to the Hitler Youth.

Mere anti-Semitism produces a Dreyfus Affair.

Nazi ideology, ingrained into the psyche of millions of youths by the Hitler Youth, produced 6 million dead Jews ten year down the road.

That is the difference.

[h.a. cherev]

"Frank Rich again? Is he afraid that if he doesn't condemn Gibson often enough, he will lose his position on today's Sanhedrin of Jewish journalists?" I don't like the analogy because "Jewish" is both a religion and an ethnicity, and to lump religious Jews with secular Jews is unfair.

LOL. And what P.O.ed me was his use of the term "Sanhedrin of Jewish journalists".

It's been a week now since I saw it, and I have finally managed to distill what the film left me with-- an overpowering realization of my own unworthiness..."

I hope you're mistaken. As children of G-D, we are all worthy of His love...even though we sin. Perhaps you meant something else?

[h.a. cherev]

Thank you. That clarifies your position.

[h.a. cherev]

Keep your mouth shut and just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Wow! For a Jew to feel secure in YOUR America, we should just shut up, sit back, and enjoy whatever ride you'd like to take us on.

Have a nice day.

[walden]

"I hope you're mistaken. As children of G-D, we are all worthy of His love...even though we sin. Perhaps you meant something else?"

Well, no, my feeling really IS unworthiness, at least right now. Although I was raised in the church, I fell away from my faith and only truly became a Christian a little over a year ago. So, since I have twenty-five years of sins to repent, I'm having a very busy Lent. ;) I am very much looking forward to Easter!

[walden]

"Are you saying that it's part of your faith that the Jews were screaming in condemnation of Jesus and urging his death by crucifixion? It's part of your faith that the Sanhedrin recommended crucifixion as capital punishment? It's part of your faith that Pontius Pilate was passive rather than the cruel leader he was?"

Have you read our Gospels? If not, I think you should. That's Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, starting at the Garden of Gesthemene in each. Gibson's interpretation is entirely in accordance with the scriptures. But the point that your phrasing misses is that Jesus was a Jew, as was Mary, Mary Magdalene, John, Peter, Veronica (the lady who tried to give Christ a drink of water), Simon of Cyrene (who carried His cross), Joseph of Arimathaea and the other Jewish high priest who defended him before Caiaphas, etc.. Other than the Romans, EVERYONE was Jewish. Like any group of people anywhere at any time, some were good, some were bad, and some were in the middle.

[h.a. cherev]

So, since I have twenty-five years of sins to repent

Well, best wishes for your success. You might want to take a page out of Judaism which urges us to "repent one day before your death."

[h.a. cherev]

Have you read our Gospels? If not, I think you should. That's Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, starting at the Garden of Gesthemene in each.

Yes, but it was over 30 years ago. I always say about getting older, "memory is the second thing to go."

Gibson's interpretation is entirely in accordance with the scriptures.

It seems that is one of the points of disagreement. While I appreciate your viewpoint, my Presbyterian Minister friend takes exception to the depiction of Pilate and Caiaphas. A Catholic priest questions the Sanhedrin meeting on Passover and putting the high priest in a position where he could get blood on himself. From my knowlege, Jewish "priests" aren't even allowed in cemetaries. These are evidently parts which don't make sense. If the gospels say they happened, perhaps that's one of the reasons Jews don't take them seriously.

[Lancey Howard]

Frank Rich? Doesn't he write strictly for the Upper West Side snob litter?

[walden]

I would like to talk more on this, but I have a very busy day planned and won't be able to get back to this conversation until this evening.

The portions of the Gospels that relate to Gibson's film (excluding the flashbacks) are really VERY short. Here they are:

Matthew chapters 26-27, really starting at 26:36, but the earlier part of 26 is also helpful in setting the stage

Mark 14-15, really from 14:32, but same comment above

Luke 22-23, really from 22:40, ditto

John 18-19

Here is an easily readable full text of our bible online:
http://etext.virginia.edu/frames/bibleframe.html
The revised standard is more readable, but the King James version is more lyrical.

I have read that John 13-17 should ONLY be read by true believers, but if you can suspend disbelief for a moment, it might be helpful in understanding Christians. John is the most mystical and difficult of the Gospels, although it appears on the surface to be easy (John was the guy with Mary and Mary Magdalene throughout the movie.)

While I appreciate your viewpoint, my Presbyterian Minister friend takes exception to the depiction of Pilate and Caiaphas. A Catholic priest questions the Sanhedrin meeting on Passover and putting the high priest in a position where he could get blood on himself.

Over 2000 years of our history, Christians have repeatedly wrestled with this issue-- do we listen to the priests and ministers or do we read the bible ourselves? Pretty much everyone has concluded that we listen, but if we see any conflict, we trust the bible. It irritates the clergy to no end. ;)

[veronica]

BTTT.

[Aquinasfan]

With its laborious build-up to its orgasmic spurtings of blood and other bodily fluids, the film is constructed like nothing so much as a porn movie, replete with slo-mo climaxes and pounding music. Of all the "Passion" critics, no one has nailed its artistic vision more precisely than the journalist Christopher Hitchens, who called it a homoerotic "exercise in lurid sadomasochism" for those who "like seeing handsome young men stripped and flayed alive over a long period of time."

This man needs prayers, badly.

[Aquinasfan]

Gibson's picture, by contrast, is a work of personal inspiration. Its success at the box office may erode the hegemony of the depraved collective, especially as it provides far less leeway for rip-off imitation than other successful movies of originality and individuality.

This movie is going to do nothing less than change the direction of Hollywood.

Until now, the new mediums - moving pictures with sound, electronically transmitted - have for the most part resisted depiction of transcendent concepts.

Gibson may have drawn the first sketchy explorer's map. The Passion of the Christ is a true work of art, and enters the inner life.

Beautiful and true.

[Iowegian]

I have been on several Passion threads. You can just feel the love of the Passion supporters. \sarcasm.

I have read many myself and concluded that the film's detractors either don't understand it or, much worse, are just hateful. So which group do you fit into?

[Mr.Clark]

This is just sad, Rich is a joke.

[walden]

"You can just feel the love of the Passion supporters. \sarcasm."

I saw the other comment to this, and I just want to say that I have also seen the anger of some Christians on these threads. I'm praying for them, because they seem to be forgetting the most basic of Christ's commands to us-- to forgive our enemies, to love our enemies, to love one another as He loved us.

Christianity is a VERY tough faith, and the better one understands it, the tougher it becomes. In fact, I think one objection that liberal Christian clergymen have with the "Passion" is that it is NOT watered-down and comfortable-- it presents the demands of following Christ in all its uncompromising difficulty. They're afraid that it will drive people away from the church, but it's a needless fear.

[SauronOfMordor]

My local Jewish paper published two articles - one expressed the views of a number of Rabbis who'd seen the picture, the other were the views of several Christian clergy who'd seen the picture. None of the Rabbis had anything positive to say. Only one of the Christian clergy said the movie was anti-Semitic, but all of them expressed some level of concern about the negative images of Jews in the film.

One of the first things you learn in the newspaper game, is that the paper can express any opinion it wants to, by simply choosing who is invited to express his opinion in the stories.

At this point, it's a lost cause. Too many people have actually seen the movie, and formed their own opinion. A lot more are going to see it. All the charges of "Anti-Semite" are going to do is make Christians less interested in hearing the arguments the next time

Recall the story of the boy who cried "Wolf!"