Is the Gospel of John Ready for Its Close-up?

A film version of John's gospel emphasizes Jesus' arguments with the Jewish leadership over his poetry.

BY: Laura Sheahen

Whether they know the gospels verbatim or not, many Americans can cite one of the Gospel of John's most poetic phrases: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son." That's John 3:16, whose chapter and verse appears on T-shirts, billboards, and handheld signs on television. It's only one of the fourth gospel's many well-known and powerful verses: "In the beginning was the Word"; "I am the vine, you are the branches"; "Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains but a single grain."

Christians who read John in discrete chunks at church might wonder why scholars and interfaith advocates wring their hands over it. How could this beautiful and poetic text, this staple of the canon for nearly 2000 years, raise red flags?

The answer comes in watching "The Gospel of John," a three-hour, word-for-word screen dramatization of John's text from Visual Bible International. The film makes clear what a cursory reading doesn't: John's Jesus was at war with the Jewish leaders of his day. In the movie, Jesus repeatedly goes to the temple, condemns the Pharisees and high priests, and leaves, judging them more harshly with every visit. Each encounter ups the ante with the high priests, who eventually plot to arrest him.

John's Jesus comes off even slightly maniacal in the film version, if only for the number of times he reiterates that he was sent by God. Played by Henry Ian Cusick, this Jesus is forceful, believable, and not nearly as moony-eyed as other movie Messiahs. But it's completely understandable why this Jesus makes the Jewish leaders nervous, and finally angry: If today we heard an unkempt man in the streets yelling relentlessly that we must believe in him and love him, what would we think?

"The Gospel of John" is well-acted, with production values and realism most non-Hollywood movies only dream of: even the desert plants look authentic. For the most part, the actors don't sound ponderous--perhaps because the creators chose to use the conversational translation of the Good News Bible. The filmmakers even manage to make the long Last Supper monologues work via a judicious use of flashbacks.

But dramatizing the Gospel of John is a dangerous game. Because it pits Jesus against the Jewish leaders in the battle for people's souls, some Christians have taken the fourth gospel as justification for treating Jews badly. And it's not just the obvious lines, like "The Jews picked up stones again to stone [Jesus]," that make interfaith experts worry.

In the other three gospels, Jesus is primarily a man of action: a healer and a teacher of parables. John's Jesus, by contrast, is a mystic theologian, speaking in symbols and occasionally in abstractions. In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus rarely refers to his fellow Jews as "them." The author of John's gospel often has Jesus distinguish between himself and "the Jews."

Less grounded in history, scholars say, and more concerned with who Jesus was than with what he did, John's gospel is rooted in mythic truths. John's Jesus repeats over and over that he is God's son, and the only way to his father.

 

Continued on page 2: No amount of massaging makes John's gospel ultra-friendly to Jews... »