The Existentialist Jesus

1001 Movies To Watch Before Your Netflix Subscription Dies, Part 34
Martin Scorsese (director), The Last Temptation of Christ

In northern Galilee lives a carpenter who makes crosses for the occupying Roman forces. The man Jesus has dark dreams of making all things new, but these dreams all end in his violent death. Jewish rebels assign Jesus’ childhood friend, Judas, to kill the man they consider a race traitor, but as Judas rediscovers his friend’s torments, he begins to suspect something nobody expected: Jesus might be the long-expected Messiah.

Martin Scorsese was no stranger to controversy; classics like Taxi Driver and Raging Bull demonstrated his willingness to push limits and defy critics. But this, his eleventh directorial outing, really angered people willing to voice their feelings. His deviation, not only from the Gospels, but also Nikos Kazantzakis’ existentialist novel, enraged believers and doubters alike. Yet audiences willing to overlook the controversy, will find something deeper waiting herein.

For Jesus (Willem Dafoe), the call of God isn’t sweetness and light. He knows representing God will place him between Romans and Jews, unable forever to live peacefully. He makes his living as a Roman collaborationist, but isn’t particularly sympathetic to the occupiers; though he also has no commerce with the rebels. Life in occupied Galilee is permanent suffering, especially for a tradesman who simply wants to live quietly.

Judas Iscariot (Harvey Keitel) pulls Jesus from one extreme. His demands for violent rebellion against the occupiers have a certain appeal. The Jewish people are crushed, silenced by their status as lesser people, a status Judas doesn’t accept. He isn’t particularly eloquent, but his actions speak volumes. When he interprets Jesus’ dreams to mean Jesus might be the Anointed One of prophecy, he thinks maybe his rebellion isn’t vain.

From the other extreme, Jesus feels drawn to Mary Magdalene (Barbara Hershey). Like Judas, Jesus has known Mary all his life. Now working as a prostitute, Mary fucks Jew and Roman indiscriminately; her assimilation buys wealth unparalleled in rural Galilee, and a level of personal solitude Jesus envies. Mary attempts to seduce Jesus into the peaceful life of an acculturated sell-out, but Jesus finds this as dissatisfying as Judas’ rebellion.

Inspired by the half-naked visionary John the Baptist, Jesus flees into the wilderness to confront God directly. Instead, he meets Satan, who—but let’s pause there. Here’s where conservative Christians’ objections to this movie seriously begin. Scorsese, like Kazantzakis before him, presents a list of temptations differing from the Gospels. No more does Satan offer Jesus mere nourishment, glory, and power. Because Scorsese acknowledges, this isn’t really Jesus.

Willem Dafoe as Jesus of Nazareth, and Barbara Hershey as Mary Magdalene

Nikos Kazantzakis had a massively complicated relationship with Christianity. He denied Jesus’ consubstantiality with God, and believed humans could have the same Messianic relationship Jesus did. But he also resisted the Greek Orthodox patriarchate’s attempts to excommunicate him, wrote books on prayer and pilgrimage, and ordered a religious funeral. He simply didn’t believe the Christological message could be preserved in amber by embodying it in only one person.

Scorsese carries this hybrid religious existentialism into cinema. This Jesus isn’t Jesus Christ, the historical figure who lived, died, and was putatively resurrected in First-Century Galilee. This Jesus is the Christological impulse in all human spirits, the desire to become closer to God’s will, coupled with the dread of what happens when we achieve this desire. Because Scorsese’s Jesus knows, like all theologians, that God’s call leads to this-worldly death.

Returning from the wilderness, Jesus assumes his missionary role, carrying a message unto the people of God’s unconditional acceptance. But he successfully alienates both Roman occupiers and Jewish nationalists, because in Jesus’ telling, this world has no comfort for you. You must abandon the illusion that you’ll find peace and stability in the flesh. This message sways, but never quite converts, both Judas and Mary.

But as Jesus confronts the violent ends which this world reserves for all non-conformists, he discovers he never left Satan in the wilderness. Sure, he resisted the three temptations put before him, and began his mission. But Satan, king of this world, has saved one temptation in reserve: the invitation to relinquish one’s moral purity and become normal. That’s the Last Temptation of the title, which we all face.

The conservative controversy which enshrouded this movie’s 1988 release exists out of proportion to its actual message. Even if we don’t accept Kazantzakis’ (and Scorsese’s) moral that becoming Christ is an option available to humankind, we all nevertheless face the existential struggles this Jesus overcomes. We only survive by coming prepared. That’s the Gospel of this Jesus, that we have the tools to overcome.