What could have been Jesus Christ’s natural state of mind? Was it jovial or was it generally sad? Wouldn’t it have been likely that the oppression and suffering of his people he witnessed had cast a spell of gloom upon him? And also, perhaps more potently, his foreseeing of his impending trial, torture and condemnation! Didn’t he infact cry upon the Cross “My God, my God, for what have you forsaken me?” At the same time, couldn’t it have been more natural of him to exude the joy of his mystic union with God his father – that spiritual glow of realisation of the ultimate truth? Haven’t enlightened mystics been known to display a childlike joy?It seems that the former view has been more popular when it comes to artistic representations of Jesus. I haven’t seen a single painting with a perceptibly smiling Jesus. With the emphasis that the Church has historically laid on the Original Sin and repentance it’s understandable that artists have towed the line of the official Christian discourse that conceived Christ as serious and sad. The extreme pathos and horror of his final moments are too strong enough to make an everlasting impression of Christ’s suffering countenance. Regarding this school I have been recently touched by a film that presents this characterization of Jesus – The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965) directed by George Stevens. Here we have one of the saddest and gloomiest Christs ever portrayed, played by the actor Max von Sydow – he is famous for his performances in Ingmer Bergman’s films, especially for his role of the mediaeval knight who plays chess with death in The Seventh Seal. In the biblical film mentioned above there’s a devastating scene in which Sydow’s (Jesus’) face grows dark and intense with sadness and his eyes well up and overflow when Lazarus’ sister Mary tugs at his robe lamenting the death of her brother. Shortly after this I also chanced upon another biblical film, a recent one, Son of God (2014) directed by Christopher Spencer. It was a pleasant surprise that the Jesus here (played by Diego Morgado), for the larger part of the film, excluding the last scenes, is one that is overwhelmingly joyful, youthfully light-hearted, sensitive and charmingly friendly. He’s also more human because of his unrepressed expression of the fear of the imminent suffering towards the end. One of the most wonderful novels I have ever read, Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, is anchored on this question – did Christ laugh in his life? The mediaeval church did certainly repress a positive answer to this question, Eco’s novel suggests. To reveal more would be doing an injustice to those who are yet to read it.It should be assumed that each one creates her/his own Jesus as per the situations that govern their emotions – joy or misery.
Did Jesus Christ laugh?
04 Thursday Apr 2024
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