Saturday, July 29, 2017

The curious case of the handsome Jesus

I recently finished watching A.D. Kingdom and Empire. It’s a fascinating, fast-paced mini-series on the events that occurred after the death and resurrection of Jesus. Over 12 episodes, the viewer is taken through the experiences of the disciples, the birth of the early Christian church, the spread of Christianity, and looms over the events that led to the eventual destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.

It depicts the escalating tensions between the early followers of Jesus and the religious system of the day, in a gripping style. It does take liberties to fill in gaps between the chapters of the Gospels, and in some instances, does not portray Biblical incidents in true context. That being said, it is eminently watchable and will rouse a desire to better understand the roots of the early Christian church.

The series is produced by Roma Downey and Mark Burnett, who also produced the Bible mini-series telecast on the History channel, and the movie ‘Son of God’.

As a kid, I enjoyed watching movies on the life of Jesus and have fond memories of viewing them with my family. Those were early years; I continued watching the newer movies made on Jesus and happily, never grew tired of them.

A strange trend emerged as Hollywood decided on a bigger say in the genre – the appearances of the men cast for the role of Jesus grew more and more striking. 

From the sculpted Jim Caviezel, to the traffic-stopping Diogo Morgado, 
to the blinding Juan Pablo di Pace.





As a child, I used to wonder why the Bible did not include a more detailed description of Jesus’ physical qualities. If the Bible described how tall he was, what the color of his eyes were, what his build was like, wouldn’t that put all speculation to rest? Now we have people molding Jesus per their own imaginations. Some claim he was white, some black, and some brown.

On the other hand, there’s also the most common picture of Jesus we’ve all seen. Almost universally, Jesus is shown as a light-skinned, lean man, with flowing robes, holding a lamb serenely and looking forlorn with a halo around his head. Where did that image come from? At some point, we created a sissified Jesus (as Voddie Baucham puts it), who looks like an ethereal supermodel, with silky smooth shampooed hair, manicured hands which haven’t seen a day’s work and feet softened from walking on roses.

Years later, in a moment of clarity, I realized why the Bible was silent about Jesus’ physical attributes. In stark contrast to His portrayals, the Bible leads us to believe that the historical Jesus was actually plain-looking and unremarkable, as stated by Isaiah – “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.” Yet, we think of Him as a pinnacle of male attractiveness in all our depictions and imaginations of Him.

Imagine how many mothers would have desired the perfect baby, how many men would have chased the ideal look, and how many women would have pursued the textbook man, in their quest to look like, or be with, a reflection of Jesus.  


That Jesus was “despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering’ is glossed over or completely forgotten. The Holy Spirit was intentional in allowing minimal details of Jesus’ appearance in the Bible, since He is never meant to be the standard of beauty, but instead the model for character and godliness, for life on earth. As the Bible makes abundantly clear, man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.

There are no accidents or oversights in the Bible – we ought to recognize and absorb the gravity of the simple truth behind the silence of Jesus’ appearance. It will also open our eyes to other realities – First, looking beyond people’s external appearance and valuing them as fellow beings made in the image of God, with intrinsic worth. And second, having a renewed understanding of beauty – by discarding the chase to look younger, lighter, or shinier, and instead cultivating the authentic beauty of character, virtue and a gentle spirit.


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