Religious panel reviews “˜Passion’

Religious scholars from throughout the UCLA community widely
agreed Thursday that the violence portrayed in the hugely
successful “The Passion of the Christ” was
over-exaggerated and furthered misdirected anti-Semitic
behavior.

It is a movie about controversy that has awoken many people from
their moral sleep.

UCLA’s Office of Residential Life presented “Why
“˜The Passion?'” a panel discussion on the
film’s impact on our culture Thursday night.

The panelists, John Book, director of Campus Crusade for Christ,
Professor Scott Bartchy, director of UCLA’s Center for the
Study of Religion, Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller, director of UCLA
Hillel and Hisham Mahmoud, a graduate student in Arabic and Islamic
studies, spoke to an audience of almost 200 people.

The panelists discussed their response to the film, particularly
of Jesus’s crucifixion scene, and the film’s impact on
our culture.

“The fundamental question here is not who killed Jesus,
but what killed Jesus,” Bartchy said. “It was a
military dictatorship and brutality (that killed Jesus). We cannot
blame a certain group of people.”

The panel discussed the controversy over the film’s
potential anti-Semitic ideas. All the panelists agreed that Jews
were not to blame, though they believed that was the intent of
director Mel Gibson.

“There is a presence of a new world where I am in it and
where I can go into a mosque and come out with my religion intact,
and that is a great world,” Seidler-Feller said.

“But Mel Gibson is against this new world. There is a new
world that we need to move forward, but Gibson has taken us
back,” he said.

Seidler-Feller saw the film as a fundamentalist work that did
not speak the whole truth in its text. He believed that the
violence in the film was not historical and did not follow the New
Testament in the Bible.

Bartchy further said that it was Gibson’s intent to
portray Jesus as greatly beaten and that the extreme violence was
typical of Gibson’s past in films such as
“Braveheart” and “Lethal Weapon.”

“There is nothing in the New Testament that shows Jesus
being beaten. What we see here, in the end, is that Jesus is
Braveheart,” he said.

Though Mahmoud agreed with Bartchy that the violence in
“The Passion” was overexaggerated, he believes that
there are some positives in the film’s impact.

“It has brought religion to the forefront and I am for
that. Though it is a historical inaccuracy, it brought the
discussion of religion to people’s attention,” he
said.

“The Passion” is consistent with the gospel accounts
with some additives that were not found in the New Testament, but
watching the film was a “deeply moving and spiritual
experience,” Book said.

At the second half of the panel discussion, there was a
question-and-answer session. Questions surrounded the concept of
Jesus’s crucifixion and resurrection, the question of whether
he is considered a God, and how the film’s depiction of these
concepts was adequate.

But this half of the discussion also brought more controversy
than UCLA’s security staff anticipated.

There were two outbursts from two members of the audience. The
first declared that Jesus was not crucified because he had a
look-alike person on the cross while Jesus stood in the back,
laughing.

Moderator Professor Robert Maniquis quelled this outburst by
drawing attention away from the person to another audience member
who actually had a question for the panel.

Bartchy later addressed these beliefs as incorrect because
though it may be plausible, the study of history looked to what
could have happen based on facts and records found.

The second outburst came from a person who accused the panelists
of causing genocide to the Native Americans and the Muslims, as
well as forcing their teachings in Asia.

The second audience member was escorted out to be arrested. But
Seidler-Feller said the arrest was not necessary. He followed this
with a reading from the Bible that talked about people of all
religions walking together.