Hey JC, won’t you smile for me?

Come on, we don’t choose our parents. I am sure Jesus would not have minded all that much if David Beckham and Posh Spice delineated the roles of Joseph and Mary in mute wax works nor would the good lord have objected to Kylie Minogue fluttering around as the angel, though why anyone would have Bush, Blair and Prince Philip (the fools on the hill) as the three Wise Men beats me.

But Madame Tussaud’s got into trouble for this nativity scene, the tableau was destroyed and the Church leaders got very upset, mainly because they felt that celebrities were detrimental to the depiction of the “coming of god”. As one of them said, “It seems to me to be not just disrespectful to Christians, it is also disrespectful to the heritage of Britain and also does damage to the culture of this country.”

I find this strange. Films and theatrical productions have been staged with famous people portraying religious characters, Italian masters gained a great deal of celebrity for artistically interpreting Christian iconography. In India, we have had TV stars who have played Rama, Sita, Draupadi, Krishna, and it was a known fact that since this was their temporary moment of glory, they made a killing of it by charging exorbitant sums of money to inaugurate shops. This seems to be okay for our culture, but for a society that markets its gods as ‘human’, they create a hue and cry when they are flashed on certain commodities. Remember the time someone in the US had manufactured toilet seats with such images and people in Mumbai were burning image-less WCs in the street to express their anger?

Not particularly enamoured by the idea of such consumer baiting to begin with, for different reasons, I had written then, “Not only do I consider it in bad taste, I would think it an insult to the user’s intelligence. Can you imagine any true-blue defecator in search of gut-nirvana being able to relieve themselves in peace with someone breathing down their...well, whatever?

The American manufacturers are bad marketing people, for sure. Who did they have in mind as target consumers for their ‘Sacred Throne’ series? Certainly not the Hindus, who would naturally feel offended, not the Muslims, who would have nothing to do with idols, not even the Christians, who have their own take on such things. So who would buy stuff like that? The punks, kinky folk who have done the rounds of ‘Eendia’ and discovered the virtues of smoking marijuana in the midst of cow dung, and just ornery people who think that adding colour to their loos will make bowel evacuation an easy job…it is like reading comics while you are at it.

Frankly, this group is hardly likely to buy those precious commodes to offend anyone. They are a harmless bunch of people with nothing better to do in life, but indulge in such paltry measures of entertainment.”

I had reacted in the same manner when the Muslim world made a noise about model Claudia Schiffer walking down the ramp with some calligraphy embroidered on her blouse. How does this demean Islam in any way? Most Muslim households have some Quranic verses scrawled somewhere. Are the people in those homes living up to whatever it is that it written there? Are they above-board individuals?

Again, when former cricketer Mohammed Azharuddin, who endorsed Nike, was asked to sign a pair of shoes as part of the marketing strategy, there were objections. Because he shares the name with the prophet. There may be thousands of Mohammeds who are indulging in immoral activities. When parents choose the name of their child from the holy book, I do not think they are even for a moment assuming that their offspring will turn out to be paragons of virtue. They want the child to do well in life and make money. Which is what Azhar was doing.

To return to the current controversy, if the people featured in the tableau are suspect because of what they stand for, then is there a way to vouch for the integrity of the ordinary people who enact the Crucifixion during Easter in many parts of the world?

What is it about religious icons that makes us want to relate to them as real people even as we set out to deify them? How does that then make us different from a pop version of Herod who baits Christ to “walk across my swimming pool”? Would a human ‘divinity’ by its very accessibility cease to rise above our pettiness?

What about the Mary Magdalenes waiting in the wings, the Judases who, despite their treachery or perhaps because of it, become heroic enough for taking on the messiahs, or even the Christ who cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

This brings me to the person of Christ and the questions it raises.

In a brilliant book ‘Jesus The Man’ by Barbara Thiering, a theologian and biblical scholar, one gets to discover that “the divinity (of Jesus may have) to be sacrificed to the humanity”. But it is also reiterated that it does not mean that “because an illusory ideal of a perfect human life fails, the Church has no more resources for moral teaching”.

Are we ready for radical thought? Are we ready to believe that Jesus was the leader of a faction of Essence priests, that he was not of virgin birth, that he did not die on the Cross? This may seem blasphemous but Thiering manages to make Christianity come so very alive. Christ could have been a Sufi, rising above his fallibilities, and as the New Testament has said about him, “For because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.”

And Mary Magdalene was not the culprit. History has sidelined her for obvious reasons, but to see her in an almost feministic light is an enlightenment. According to the Gospel of Philip, “And the companion of the (Saviour was) Mary Magdalene. He loved her more than all the disciples ... The rest of the disciples (were offended and) said to him, ‘Why do you love her more than all of us?’ The Saviour answered and said to them, ‘Why do I not love you like her? When a blind man and one who sees are both together in darkness, they are no different from one another. When the light comes, then he who sees will see the light and he who is blind will remain in darkness’.”

Mary - or Miriam - was not a name but a title, which meant that the woman was given a form of Ministry, that of prophetess. This is no trifling matter. She may have been referred to as one “from whom seven demons had gone out”, but certain researchers are convinced that Jesus held her in such high esteem that after a three year trial marriage as per the prevalent custom, he did wed Mary Magdalene when Jonathan was pope. It is said that he was “affirming his right to continue the dynasty”. A daughter and two sons are said to have been born.

Although a ‘fallen woman’ theory has been perpetuated for long, certain facts can be seen in a different light, because they give a refreshing view about the character of Jesus. If we go by the premises set forth by Thiering, he comes across as a radical, liberal person. Mary Magdalene who was not terribly young at 27 when she was with Jesus could have had an earlier marriage.

She also had definite political views. “Mary was a zealot with opposite views of those of Jesus”, she belonged to an Ecstatic order, the eastern nationalist party, whose believers were called “seekers-after-smooth-things”. Such was her commitment to her cause that she chose to separate from Jesus. This might come as a surprise if not outright travesty but even if no divorce was permitted between a Christian husband and wife, if one partner was a nonbeliever - as Mary was - the matter was deemed personal. In fact, it is implied that there was a second marriage too, so to Lydia “the Lord opened the heart”.

All this may sound controversial and the author knows it. “If the reading of it is a serious difficulty now, it is because the person of Jesus has been allowed to lose all humanity, contrary to the Church’s own desire to teach full humanity with divinity. It has rarely achieved such a balance for the natural reason that it is almost impossible to hold both concepts together.”

This probably explains why even Judas went against him. Judas has got the great lines, he is the brash upstart trying to show the Lord’s feet of clay. Besides the theological reason that he was “bitterly antagonistic to Jesus for his claim to the high priesthood and his opposition to ritual law”, there are psychological aspects too. He was jealous of the fame of a man who appeared so deceptively simple. He was possessive and could not accept Mary Magdalene’s role. His obsession was dangerous because it bordered on the manic (as opposed to Christ’s depressive). He did not drink, was not known to womanise; for him Jesus was a friend and hero and, as often happens in such situations, he wanted to be kingmaker and yet his self-esteem wanted him to rebel. The “thirty pieces of silver” were not to betray, but to seek out his own identity. That is why I find his crucifixion even more tragic. Because he was his own victim.

Jesus was far more polished and in some ways sharper. When he realised that there was a horde opposing him, he himself started making preparations for the last supper. It has even been implied that while initially he refused poison on the Cross to lessen his pain, later Christian sources claim that he relented and took the ‘vinegar’ - wine spoiled by poison. And it was then that he “gave up the spirit”.

The person of Christ has always been complicated by various streams of thought. Some say he was Black, others persist with the fair, blonde Scandinavian image. These only serve to make him more fascinating. As has been pointed out, “Jesus, and those close to him, were frail human beings, as we all are, caught in personal dilemmas which could be solved only in terms of the particular situation, not by conformity to ideal rules.”

That is how messiahs start out. Unfortunately, with time a halo appears to distance them. As we cannot accept what is ‘normal’, we need to sustain it by the ethereal. True sublimity lies in being true to oneself as a human being.

Which is perhaps what Jesus Christ was. As a healer, he must have tapped the wellsprings of his humanity; as a miracle-maker he would have trained in exercises of self-control; and as a prophet he probably was a lesson in humility.

As a woman, I find the idea of a male prophet who is vulnerable quite tantalising. Therefore, a Jesus who looks tired, frustrated and even angry becomes even more divine. He is my kind of man. Note, I haven’t said saint. Simply because I have touched him - a swarthy man robed in white, making me want to call out to him, “Hey JC, won’t you smile for me?”