A Comparison of Two Films;
The Son of God and The Last Temptation of Christ
At first when
watching The Son of God and The Last Temptation of Christ there
seems to be very little to compare with both films. However, a theme is present.
The Son of God, a 2014, John, the last surviving
disciple of Christ, is living in exile as he tells his story. Jesus was born to
a virgin, and three visiting wise men declare Him the future
King. Thirty-three years later, an adult Jesus travels to Galilee and
begins recruiting followers, from James, to his brother John, to Peter the
fisherman, to Matthew the tax collector. These men and women would
become His disciples. Through His teachings and numerous miracles, Jesus builds
a huge following, who begin to call Him the Messiah. He also draws the
attention of the Pharisees, the Jewish religious leaders. The Pharisees
claim Jesus is blaspheming God by forgiving sins, something only God can do.
Jesus responds by saying he is the Son of God.
Jesus tells the disciples they are to travel to Jerusalem for
the upcoming Passover holiday. He enters the city on the back of a
donkey and is met by a huge crowd of supporters, who lay palm leaves in His
path (this is celebrated today as Palm Sunday). Caiaphas, the head of
the Pharisees, is afraid Jesus' presence in the city will further agitate the
people, who are already in a near state of revolt against the oppressive
Romans, led by Pontius Pilate. Upon entering the temple, Jesus sees the
money changers and proceeds to upend their tables. This act draws cheers from
the people and scorn from the Pharisees. Later, Jesus tells a little girl that
every stone of the temple will soon fall. The Pharisees take this as a plan to
destroy the temple and decide Jesus must be stopped.
Judas, one of Jesus' disciples, approaches the Pharisees. He
also believes Jesus is going too far and wants to help. They give him 30
pieces of silver for his assistance. That night (the night before
Passover), Jesus tells the disciples this will be their last supper together
and says that one of them will betray Him. Later, in the Garden of
Gethsemane, Judas kisses Jesus' cheek, thereby identifying Jesus to the
Pharisees and revealing Judas; betrayal, and Jesus is then arrested for
blasphemy. The disciples then flee the garden to save themselves.
Caiaphas orders an immediate trial, even though it's late at
night and not in public, which are violations of Jewish law. He is afraid an
open trial on Passover will cause trouble, and Pilate will close the temple.
Caiaphas asks Jesus if He is the Son of God, and He answers "I am".
This is all the Pharisees need to hear, and they immediately find Him guilty of
blasphemy.
That morning, to a growing crowd, Caiaphas announces Jesus'
guilt and reveals the penalty for blasphemy is death. Judas, horrified by what
he has done, throws the silver at the Pharisees and runs off; he later hangs
himself. Caiaphas believes if the Pharisees killed Jesus on Passover, it would
start a riot, so he turns him over to the Romans for the punishment. Pilate
tells Caiaphas that Jesus didn't break any Roman laws, but orders him to be
lashed 40 times. Since it's Passover, Pilate says he will follow tradition and
free a prisoner of the people's choosing, and if they choose Jesus, He will be
set free. By this time, Jesus' mother Mary has arrived in Jerusalem
to see what is happening to her son.
Pilate orders the crowd to enter his courtyard to choose
whether to release Jesus or Barabbas, a convicted murderer. Since none of
Jesus' followers were allowed into the courtyard, Caiaphas easily sways the
vote so that Barabbas is set free. Pilate then asks what he should do with
Jesus, and again Caiaphas sways the crowd to have him executed by way of crucifixion.
Fearing a riot among the hostile people, Pilate orders the crucifixion, then
literally washes his hands of the situation. A battered and bloodied Jesus then
carries His cross to Golgotha and is nailed to it by the mocking
Roman guards, who earlier had placed a crown of thorns on His head.
Before the cross is put into place, Pilate orders a sign attached to it,
reading: "The King of the Jews", much to Caiaphas' dismay. With John,
Mary, and Mary Magdalene watching in horror, Jesus hangs from the cross
for several agonizing hours. After forgiving the Romans, asking why God has
forsaken Him, and declaring "It is finished", Jesus dies. He is then
lowered from the cross and placed into a tomb, which is sealed off with a large
rock.
Three days later, Mary Magdalene goes to visit the tomb, but
is shocked to see the rock broken into pieces and the tomb empty. She sees a
man by the tomb's entrance and realizes He is Jesus; Jesus has been
resurrected. Mary goes to the disciples' hiding place and tells them the good
news, but they don't believe her. Jesus then appears to them, and they all now
believe, except "Doubting" Thomas. Once Thomas touches Jesus,
then he believes. Forty days later, Jesus is speaking to His disciples and
tells them to travel the world to spread His message. He then ascends into
Heaven, and the disciples go their separate ways.
The movie concludes with an elderly John saying that all of
the disciples were eventually killed for their beliefs, except him. He has been
exiled to live alone on a deserted island until he dies. John then sees Jesus,
who tells him he will not die, but have everlasting life, and He will
return one day.
Like Nikos Kazantzakis’ novel, Martin
Scorsese’s film depicts the life of Jesus and his mortal like struggle with
innumerable forms of temptation.
These include; fear, doubt,
depression, reluctance and lust. The film portrays this by Jesus being tempted
by visualizing himself betrothed in sexual activities, marriage, and child
rearing. The movie fully makes note that
it departs from the typical Christian canonical portrayal of Jesus
and those stories from the Gospels.
The
plot covering more than just the last 12 hours of Jesus’ life is too much to
get to here in its entirety. The story opens with Jesus being tortured by
this calling he is receiving. It immediately shows a bond between Jesus
and Judas and that of friends. It then shows the two going to John the
Baptist to be baptized and then it is off to the wilderness. However the
reason is for different reasons it looks to suggest there were certain nomadic
peoples out there in which he needed to converse with about this calling he
feels. He then goes in to the wilderness alone for 40 days and nights
where he is tempted by Satan in the form of a snake.
After
these events he and Judas go to find his disciples. What is
different from the Gospel telling is that Judas knows the others formally, and
they are all depicted as members of the Jewish group the Zealots. I say
this because they all want a violent overthrow of the Government (Rome.)
We see Jesus perform his miracles, and even attempt to go through with an
insurrection event upon Roman troops. However, playing with the theme of
Jesus not knowing of one event to the next as if there is a cloud of vagueness
as if there is knowledge of what will happen next seconds before they play out.
He
then tells Judas what his mission is, and Judas is un-wanting of this
call. The last supper is held and Judas departs only to return with the
guards in the garden to detain Jesus. I must mention however the kiss
given to Jesus is one of sincere and love. The cautiousness to carry out
the mission is displayed. Jesus is then led away only to pick up with him
carrying the cross. He
is hung on the cross and it is at this moment Jesus feeling alone, has a
temptation that his mission is over. He
is shown what his life would be like if he came down; kids, a wife, and a
normal life. But in the end
the mission is more important.
However the difference being that for about
45 minutes we see a vision that Jesus has while on the cross of him living a normal,
fully human life. This of course being
the “last temptation” that Jesus is afflicted with. The other major difference is the depiction
of Judas.
After close examination, what both films do
have in common is the central saving act of the crucifixion and the choice
Jesus, the God-man, had. Both films play heavy on the saving act of the
crucifixion. While both seem to
highlight, in part at least, the choice Jesus made to stay on the cross. We see this very clearly in The Last Temptation and more eluded to
in The Son of God; the eluding act
being Jesus being seen as fully God yet staying on the cross to die. For both films the crucifixion was the
defining act for God and Jesus. The defining
act of God giving up Gods elf and allowing Gods elf to suffer and die a
embarrassing, godforsaken, loveless, and abandoned death.
In both
films Jesus knows, at least by the time the crucifixion comes, why it is he is
doing what he is doing. Although it
takes Jesus a bit longer to get there in The
Last Temptation, he does in fact get to the conclusion that he is the son
of God and this is God’s way of righting all of the wrongs.
If I had to
pick one film in which I think the humanity and of Jesus is portrayed the best,
it would have to be The Last Temptation
of Christ. For me this just seems to be more of a real approach
to how the life of Christ is portrayed and would have lived out. I think one can, like Kazantzakis did, make a great argument that Jesus did
not know all along that he was the God-man.
I think a strong argument can be made that Jesus did not fully
understand this until after the dessert experience.
In any
event, I felt that The Son of God
played more to the traditional and sometimes unrealistic life of Christ. I felt like it was another movie about the
perfect man that lived and downplayed all of the humanistic experiences that
Christ would have suffered and went through.
To me these depictions of Jesus, such as the one in The Son of God, are not ones that resonate with modern Christ
followers or hold true to what the life of Christ would have been like. To me it makes it seem that God suffered
nothing and is still somehow discounted with the humanistic experience, and for
me that is just not the point of the crucifixion.
In
closing, both movies were in some way following the gospel story; whether it be
the more traditional Jesus or one that some can read and see in the gospel
narratives. Jesus was fully human and we believe fully God and both films
depict that in their own way.
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