Dale K. Robinson
"The Lost Tomb of Jesus," a James Cameron film seen recently on the Discovery Channel assails the very tenets of Christianity. Writer and producer Simcha Jacobovici claims in the film to have found the tomb of Jesus Christ. Using statistics, he can make a reasonable case that one of the bone boxes or "ossuaries" found in the tomb held the remains of Jesus. The filmmakers also claim that another bone box likely held the remains of Mary Magdalene and that a third is likely the son Jesus and Mary Magdalene.
If this is true, then the very foundation of Christianity has cracked. Christians believe that Jesus was the Son of God, God Himself, come to Earth in human form. They believe that Jesus was killed on the cross to atone for man's sin; that He rose from the dead on the third day, walked the Earth for forty days, and then ascended into heaven.
If Cameron and Jacobovici are correct, then Jesus was just a human who died and was buried in a tomb in Jerusalem. At best then, by their studies, Christ was only a great teacher; at worst, he was a fraud and a charlatan.
Without arguing the merits of the film versus the teachings of Christianity, what I find most interesting about the entire controversy, however is this: neither Jerry Falwell, nor Pat Robertson, not even Pope Benedict XVI, have called for the deaths of Cameron or Jacobovici. Christians have not marched by the hundreds of thousands to hurl stones or burn the Discovery Channel headquarters in Silver Springs, MD.
Contrast that to the violence following the publications of cartoons depicting Mohammed in a Danish newspaper: the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Syria were set afire, as was the Danish Embassy in Beirut. Around the world, at least 139 people died in the protests. Many of the cartoonists went into hiding due to death threats. Haji Yaqoob Qureishi, a minister in the Indian Uttar Pradesh state government announced a cash reward of $11 million to the person who beheads the Danish cartoonist who caricatured the Prophet Mohammad.
Some Christians have certainly committed violence in the name of God; they are wrong.
In the Gospel of Luke, when the high priest's soldiers came to arrest Jesus, one of the disciples defended Christ with a sword. When the disciple's sword sliced off a soldier's ear, Jesus himself called for an end to the fighting and healed the soldier. In the Gospel of Matthew, Peter asks Jesus how many times he should forgive one who harms him. Jesus responds "not seven times, but seven times seventy." Also in the Gospel of Luke, Jesus exhorts us to do unto others as we would have them do unto us, to love our enemies, to be merciful, to neither judge nor condemn others.
So Christians, no matter how insulted by challenges that try to prove their faith is a lie, differ from their Muslim counterparts. While Christians turn the other cheek, Muslims react to challenges to their faith with violence.
Columnist James A. David recently wrote a column asking why there are no Christian suicide bombers. Do Muslims love Allah more than Christians love their God, he wondered. Are they more obedient than Christians? After all, they are willing to sacrifice themselves for their God. But Christians have a God who suffered and died for them out of His great love for mankind, for "Greater love has no one than this that someone lays down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)
David summed it up like this: "The difference between [the Muslim] Allah, who demands obedience, and [the Christian] God, who gives love, is stark. To some Muslims, Allah demands the sacrifice of their sons. To Christians, God gave His Son as a sacrifice for us. That's a world of difference."