Wednesday, February 04, 2004

What did Jesus write in the ground?

In a recent review of The Gospel of John, S. T. Karnick comments that in Cecil B. De Mille's The King of Kings (1927) one can actually see what Jesus writes in the ground in the story of the woman taken in adultery in John 8. I asked whether anyone knew what Jesus wrote since I don't have a copy of the film. Correspondent Michael Stickland asked Sam Karnick, the author of the article, who responds
What happens in the DeMille film is that Jesus kneels down, and as each of the first few prominent persons approaches with a stone, he very casually writes in the sand a sin, such as "liar," "adulterer," "murderer," etc., and each Pharisee in turn drops the stone and leaves, as Jesus has exposed them as not being without sin and as hypocrites and deserving of being stoned themselves, by the [sic] own stated standards, the Law of Moses. (Of course, Jesus writes in Aramaic or Hebrew--I forget which--and intertitles translate for us.) It is a very powerful treatment, and for me a perfectly plausible understanding of the Biblical text."
I've now also had a look at Greatest Story Ever Told and Last Temptation of Christ but neither have Jesus writing in the ground.

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