The 'Passion' Gap

Mel Gibson's

is reminding me more each day of the O.J. Simpson trial. Back then, white and black friends I deeply respected talked past each other, utterly unable to understand each other's viewpoints. The lenses through which most blacks and whites saw the trial were so very different that interracial conversations, even among friends, became difficult.

I fear something similar is happening with

. Most of my Jewish friends have had violently different reactions from many of my Christian friends. Many Jews profess no interest in seeing the film at all. And on the message boards of Beliefnet, I see a widespread sense that the other faith simply "doesn't get it."

Perhaps we can improve this dynamic if we take stock of the differing worldviews involved.

What Jews tend not to understand about the Christian response:

1) Christ's suffering is important

Many Jews (and some Christians) have criticized the movie on the grounds that the violence is gratuitous, unspiritual, and misses the point of Christianity. "He virtually ignores the entire life of Jesus, preferring instead to tell us that what made Jesus special was not that he lived righteously and meekly, but that he died bloodily," Rabbi Shmuley Boteach writes.

What Jews fail to realize is that for many Christians the death--and the suffering--is as important as the life of Christ. Christians believe that Jesus died so that sin wouldn't destine humanity to hell. As a Beliefnet member, "anointed prophetess," wrote:

"I walked out of the theater with a tear streaked face, a broken heart and a renewed purpose: to make sure that I do not let the blood that was shed for me be in vain."

The movie's violence brings many Christians into Jesus' world and helps show just how much he had to give up in order to give us the gift. In that sense, the violence is extremely spiritual.

2) Most of this really is in the Bible

Gibson certainly inflamed the situation by adding all sorts of new material, but the core elements of the movie--including the parts that have been used against Jews in the past--are, indeed, in the Bible. According to the Gospels: