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This Won’t Be Controversial: Jesus As the Product of Rape
By Kyle | April 23, 2008
Speaking of Fox News, they’re running a story that “Basic Instinct” director Paul Verhoeven is about to publish a book in which he’ll claim that Jesus Christ was the result of a rape of Mary committed by a Roman soldier. The story seems a bit iffy on sourcing, with no quotations from the book or Verhoeven, though bait-takin’ Bill Donahue has already chimed in with some outrage. (Wouldn’t dignified silence be the best response?)
Topics: Books, Politics, Religion |
April 23rd, 2008 at 7:30 pm
If this book really exists, it sounds like he’s desperate to stir up some publicity. Even Bill Donahue’s comments read more as derision than anger.
April 24th, 2008 at 2:38 am
Clearly he’s just jealous of James Cameron’s little “Jesus Family Tomb” thing and decided to do one himself.
This just vindicates something that I’ve already known for a long time. Due to his revisionist version of “Starship Troopers” Verhoeven will spend an eternity in hell getting corporal punishment from Robert Heinlein.
April 24th, 2008 at 9:20 am
I’ve only caught a few minutes of “Starship Troopers” here and there on TV and I’ve never read the book. But on a thread about this same subject at Ace of Spades, someone noted that Verhoeven threw away Heinleins book because he wanted to make an homage to the old Foreign Legion films.
Maybe this is common knowledge but I didn’t pick up on it. Thinking back to the way the movie looked it makes perfect sense.
April 24th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
“Jesus As the Product of Rape”
Well, even accepting the traditional version, it was clearly an unequal power relationship in which Mary wasn’t truly free to consent. He is God, after all.
April 24th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
… from the brilliant director who brought you “Showgirls”!!
April 24th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
someone noted that Verhoeven threw away Heinleins book because he wanted to make an homage to the old Foreign Legion films.
No. Verhoeven purposely changed the story theme from a representation of Heinlein’s personal form of small government libertarianism to a fascist caricature. So besides cutting out the best special effects from the book (the powered armor suits) he inverted the politics to turn it into a Eurosocialist satire of the orginal story.
April 25th, 2008 at 3:52 am
“…from the brilliant director who brought you “Showgirls”!!”
Don’t forget “Robocop”.
*Tagline: Part man. Part machine. All cop. The future of law enforcement.
According to the “Hollywood Reporter” article: “Paul Verhoeven takes on Jesus”, Verhoeven has already completed the book and it will be published by Meulenhoff. It will come out in September 2008. The book has been co-written by biographer Rob van Scheers.
The book is not being published in English, and Verhoeven has no future plans for a film version.
According to imdb, Verhoeven is currently working on two projects: “The Thomas Crown Affair 2″ followed by “Azazel”.
April 25th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
It’s fairly clear to me that Verhoeven’s thesis is the progeny of John Shelby Spong’s speculation in “Born of a Woman” that Mary may have been a hooker.
The ex-Anglican bishop of Newark argued that Mary’s unmarried status as the mother of Jesus essentially forced early church leaders to invent the Virgin Birth, since potential converts would have found it impossible to believe that the Son of God could’ve been born under such shameful circumstances.
From there, Spong writes that it would not be unreasonable to assume Mary was a prostitute; the job certainly ups the chances of unwed motherhood, birth control being what it was at the time.
Verhoeven just takes this thinking one step further.
April 25th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Attempting dignified silence in response to Kyle Smith’s inane onslaughts……it seems to be working……………………………thanks for the advice Kyle! Hey Donahue…just pretend they never said it.
April 25th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
“Attempting dignified silence in response to Kyle Smith’s inane onslaughts……it seems to be working…”
It’s not “dignified silence” if you tell everybody you’re doing it…
April 28th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
jic….you’re a smart one aren’t you!