Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Epilogue

This is an epilogue to The Passion of the Christ according to Wuching posts. I was actually debating with myself on whether to write this post and now I've finally decided to write it.

The Passion play was held at Ruffey Lake Park in Doncaster and will be played again on Good Friday at 10 am should anyone in Melbourne is interested to watch. You can find out more from their website here. It is free but they do require that you do not take any photos or videos of the event which I just cannot understand. They have good intention of doing this free play for all to see but prefer not to let people take photographic memories of it which I think is a bit odd.

I like the Passion play, I think it's a great thing what the organisers did for families and Easter but there is one thing that I found quite troubling. At the play they had a man dressed up like a Jewish rabbi in the usual black rabbi outfit and hat. He even had a fake beard, mustache and the familiar curly hairs down the sides of his face typical of a Jewish rabbi.

The thing is this rabbi look-a-like had no part in the Passion play at all. He was just supposed to be some greedy money lender walking the ground and talking to people about why so many people had come that day to follow Jesus and how this affected his business for the day.

At one point when Jesus was arrested he even said to the audience that Jesus deserved what happened to him, well not the exact words but along those lines. Now I do know that ever since Jesus died 2000 years ago a lot of Christians blame the Jews for Jesus' demise and thus the Jews have been the scapegoats of everything that's gone wrong in the world.

I'm not a Christian nor am I into Judaism but from what I saw that day at the Passion play seems like a cheap shot at the Jewish people. Maybe it was meant as a joke but I wasn't laughing and I'm sure many of the audience there didn't find it funny either. In fact it could send a wrong message to the young people that the Jews are greedy, money grabbers and are indeed to be blamed for the death of Jesus and that it is OK to portray them as such on a family outing like that day.

So what do you think? Am I over-reacting to this harmless joke or do you agree with me that what they've done with the Jewish rabbi look-a-like money lender is indeed a stupid act that should never have happened. Just my 2 cent worth.

7 comments:

Dabido said...

Yeah, there are some people that blame the Jews for what happened to Jesus, but the actual standard Christian response is that everyone is to blame. [And I won't go into too much of the theology behind that].

At the end of the day, both Jesus and his disciples were Jews, so blaming 'All Jews' is blaming Jesus and the first Christians.

Anonymous said...

I used to not understand why some movies portray Jewish as bad people. Then slowly I realised why. TV also like that liao!

Jonzz said...

Bad taste. And it distracts people from watching the play.

ah nel said...

zorro or undertaker???

*men in black*

Anonymous said...

Promoting Christianity, yet at the same time condemning others? What a very un-Christian thing to do. And this is supposed to be the month of Lent too!

clement said...

the jewish rabbi look more like armish than jewish. jewish's headpiece not like tat 1

Wuching said...

dabido: yes, jesus was a jew so i never understand how ppl blame the jews for his death..must be just an excuse for anti-semitism.

SA: yeah..why God favour the jews to the rest of the human race? this i dun understand either!

che-cheh: i was like u before i left malaysia since i've never met any jewish ppl in malaysia till i went to melbourne, but then i didn't even know who the jews were!

jonzz: agree with u i do, the rabbi was done in bad taste but the play was good tho..

ah nel: hahahaha..he does look like an undertaker tho not so much zorro coz he didn't have a mask.

c4stp: not all christians are gerenti a spot in heaven hor!

clement: trust me, he is portrayed as a jewish rabbi, my photo not too good or clear & his beard is all fake one!