Jesus film slammed by minister

4:17pm Tuesday 4th December 2007

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PLANS for a 2009 Hollywood film showing Jesus travelling across India and living in Buddhist monasteries have been criticised by the minister of Bromley Baptist Church.

Film producers are spending $20million on creating a movie based around the unrecognised Aquarian gospel, focusing on Jesus's life between the ages of 13 and 30.

The film is set to be a fantasy adventure movie of Jesus's life with the three wise men as his mentors, and he is also rumoured to have a love interest with an Indian princess.

Minister Simon Jones said: "As to the historical validity of this, I'd say there is none.

"It's not that people didn't travel from Israel to the east in Jesus's day, they did. It's that there is nothing in any of the contemporary documents, by which I mean the gospels, the letters and Acts plus a whole load of other documents from the first and second centuries, that give any suggestion of an eastern connection to Jesus."

Scholars' work which the film is based on claims that Jesus's connections with Buddhism strongly influenced his 'love thy neighbour' teachings.

Film producer William Sees Keenan said: "We think that Indian religions and Buddhism, especially with the idea of meditation, played a big part in Christ's thinking. In the film we are looking beyond the canonised gospels to the 'lost' gospels."

This is something Mr Jones disagrees with: "Beyond vague generalities, there is certainly nothing that suggests any influence from Buddhist or Hindu thinking - something that would be inexplicable if Jesus had lived his formative years in India.

"I think it is part of a contemporary way of thinking that has no discernment when it comes to doing history.

"We treat any text as true and accurate and decide on its truth and accuracy on the basis of our preference.

"This means we are increasingly unable in some quarters to make sensible statements about the past."

By Dan Coombs