Why BBC's Historical Revisionism "The Passion" is Worth Criticizing

Controversy has surrounded The Passion, a BBC mini series brought about with the intent to give you a new look on the crucifixion. The British have already scored remarkably high with their attempts at putting a face to Christ, with their world popular Jesus of Nazareth, considered by many to be the epitome of quality Jesus films that not only does justice to the stories, but adds to them such an air of believable historicity that they should be on any person's "much watch list", even if you are in the growing movement of Christian bashers.

Many Christians have taken something of an apathetic approach to the film - there are bigger battles to fight, and unfortunately to many of them, those take the shape of Dumbledore's preference to wizards over witches and whether or not the scholastically befuddled ramblings of Dan Brown constitute an attack on a Church that spends just as much time attacking its own scripture for the sake of Papal vanity. However, that is not to say everyone has been silent about The Passion, and truth be told, it is the historical purist who should be outraged, far more than the Christian.

Therefore it is from the avenue of an ardent Roman history enthusiast that the notion that Jesus was crucified in a fetal position - apparently mimicking the Jehova's Witness depiction of Christ nailed to what they call "death sticks", whereby a single pole is stood erect, and Jesus's hands are nailed above his head. Since I have not personally seen the series, I cannot remark overtly on the exact method they use, despite my constant attempts to find a copy of the film, or at the very least pictures, I can only go by the testimony provided by the BBC's official website.

Ultimately, it has been announced that their primary reason for showing this "new way" that Jesus died was the worst that they could come up with: "The makers wanted something that wasn't the typical image that would surprise the viewers. This is not an attempt to be iconoclastic, but to get people to look again at the events surrounding his death."