It's gonna be a perfect day.

[chestnutcurls]

Welcome, March! I'm still going through Ezekiel, and this morning's reading was chapter 31. I wrote it down in my journal and thought, "Chapter 31 on 3-1. Hmm." Then I saw that it began, "In the eleventh year, in the third month on the first day..." I know their calendar wasn't the same as ours so it wasn't actually March, but still weird, no? I like March. It is a good month.

This weekend was great in some ways, not so great in other ways. On Friday night Evan and I had a fun, smooey date. 50 First Dates was wonderful (now I want the soundtrack- 80s remakes, though it wasn't an 80s movie). On Saturday I slept in and then went to lunch with Alli and our church friend Rachel. I scrapbooked in the afternoon until Evan was done working on a car, and then we went for a walk. We decided to go out to Cordova and meet Ryan for dinner. Before we left, I started seeing flashes, like when you come into a bright room from a dark one. I was freaked out but tried to be calm about it. By the time we finished dinner, I had a massive headache and felt nauseated and just...weird. We had planned to go to Myla's and watch a movie, and since I really wanted to see her, we went anyway. At her house, when she turned the light out to watch the movie, I suddenly felt better. Thus we figured out that I had a (low-grade) migraine. I've only had one other migraine in my life, so I didn't know the signs. We thought I could sleep it off, but when I got up on Sunday morning it came back almost immediately. I went to church anyway, and then spent the afternoon napping on Ryan's couch while he and Evan watched truck videos. When I woke up I felt well enough to see The Passion with the church group, but since the movie was so emotional, I was right back at square one when it was over. Lather, rinse, repeat. After a fairly quick dinner, I came home and went to bed. Today the headache is lingering, though not as bad, and all I want to do is sleep in a dark room for three days. I don't know how you chronic migraine sufferers deal with it. (Oh, and the movie we watched with Myla was A Mighty Wind, which was absolutely hilarious. I'm still laughing out loud when I think about the movie, and Evan has said "Wha' Happened?!" about twenty times now.)

I have the best boyfriend in the world. News flash, I know. He is so sweet and fun, and takes great care of me. :) He talked to his mom last night, and we've pretty much decided on the last week in August for our trip to New Hampshire. I am so excited.



What can I say about this movie? I'm glad I went, but it was rough. I couldn't talk for about ten minutes afterward, because I felt like anything I could say would be pointless. It's not really an experience that can be described in words. I couldn't watch most of the flogging, or a lot of the Crucifixion. I felt like I should make myself watch it, to know that Christ did this for me, but I didn't think I could handle it. The thing that bothered me most was the constant mockery of the Roman guards as they led Jesus down the street, and even while they nailed Him to the cross. I think it was lajea who said she wanted to stand up and yell, "STOP IT!" That was exactly how I felt. I almost couldn't take it.

The other worst part for me was when Mary rushed out to help Jesus as He fell. Just the look they exchanged, and her agony watching her Son suffer. Then, later, her saying "Son, let me die with you." It was so terrible.

The use of the ancient languages was amazing. It was interesting to find out the correct pronunciation of "Cephas" (Peter)- I had always heard it as seffas.

I don't think the movie was anti-Semitic AT ALL. It clearly placed the blame on the Jews and the Romans. Also, there was a part where several Pharisees protested Jesus' arrest, and they were taken away.

Even though I'm not Catholic, I feel like my experience was enriched by knowing the Stations of the Cross and being able to follow along, sort of. Question: how do we know about Veronica (the woman who wiped Jesus' face)? Is she actually in the Gospels, or is there a historical account of her? I couldn't remember seeing her in the Bible, and I'm curious now.

Basically, this was a soul-wrenching movie experience and I'm still kind of processing it. I urge everyone to go, but I don't know if I can see it again.

Comments

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

My coworker just saw the movie and confirmed for me that I should not see it because of how weak I am about gory stuff. She went over a few scenes for me and they sound horrible. I'm afraid I'd be watching the entire movie with my eyes closed, and in that case I might as well wait until it's on DVD.

I keep wondering, though (and maybe someone here can answer): how much of it is added? Like you mentioned the Veronica thing.. well I keep hearing of little scenes that aren't mentioned in the Bible, and I'm sure something like them happened, but are they just basing it on typical types of torture at the time? Because what I really don't like about Bible movies is when they change the story and people believe certain things actually are in the Bible when they're not. But I can see why they'd have to, and if they have valid reasons for adding them, then I can be more fine with it.

That was a jumbled paragraph. Jumbalaya.

On the headaches--sorry about your experience. I know they always say that migraines are prefaced by lights, etc. and they even have medicine you can take as soon as you get those signs so it might not ever become a headache. I used to have migraines as a kid, but I don't remember having any of those types of signs ahead of time. I did like it dark, though--I'd often sleep with my pillow on top of my face.

Wow, August for NH. Cool! Have fun..it'll be quite muggy, but you're more used to it than I am anyway, so it'll only be a slight increase in humidity. :)

[aardwolf.livejournal.com]

Veronica is not mentioned in the Bible as we know it. I can't speak for the extra books that the Catholics use, but it's not in the Protestant bible. :P It's probably one of those oral traditions that was handed down from a long time ago (like the belief that Peter was the first "Pope".) Anyway, it doesn't really matter whether she was there or not I guess... that's just one of those things that 1 Timothy warns us about arguing against. ;)

Speaking of scripture, I bought the NASV translation for my Pocket PC (which comes with Strong's Numbers.) I also got a Greek and Hebrew dictionary. Long story short, I can now look up the literal words used from the original language, as well as the definitions. It's about time... :)

[jmcphers.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen it, obviously, but I've heard that while they did add a fair amount, the vast majority of the additions were made after some careful study of what might actually have happened (not just for dramatic effect). My pastor said it was very Biblically accurate for a film. I'll have to see if I agree with him when I see it sometime.

:(

[(Anonymous)]

I'm sorry that you had a migraine! It sounds to me though that this will be an isolated incident- it just may last a few days. (no fun i know. trust me ;) ) if you need any migraine advice let me know. you might want to wear your glasses instead of your contacts - that sometimes makes my headache feel a little better when my eyes hurt during a migraine.
i hope you feel better soon!

love the brens
love
em

[fraserspeirs.livejournal.com]

So what is the right pronunciation? I would say "see-fass".

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

Right, I am assuming that the additions would've had to been based on study of the traditions of the time, or Christians wouldn't be so in favor of the film. But I guess what confuses me is how a lot of people are walking away from the movie with this idea that it is EXACTLY what happened. "To think he had to ____________." I know that Jesus' torture and death was unbelievably horrific, but we don't know for sure exactly what types of things were done to him. I guess it doesn't matter--the movie makes the point, and that's what matters.

[anulyra.livejournal.com]

Nasty! I had an ocular migrane (http://www.eyeguys.net/ocularmigraine.html) once. I thought my retna was detatching, it was scary. I saw these weird flashes in a circle around everything I looked at. It was VERY distracting, but luckily I had no pain. Sounds like you had both an ocular migraine and the ordinary headache kind combined.

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah I wanted to ask that too. I say, "SEE phus".

[anulyra.livejournal.com]

Ya, and I say "see-fess".

[banzai.livejournal.com]

You're right about that. I think so much of the focus and buzz from the Christian sector has covered over the fact that this is art, not Scripture. Perhaps we should look for God's hand in it the same way we might in, say, Rembrandt's Christian works.

[aardwolf.livejournal.com]

Me too...

[aardwolf.livejournal.com]

Maybe it was like the flash of light that John Travolta saw in Phenomenon. Can you move objects with your mind now?

[chestnutcurls.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we do have historical records of Roman crucifixion procedure. So I guess that's where we get the information?

[chestnutcurls.livejournal.com]

It's "KAY-phas."

[chestnutcurls.livejournal.com]

That's very scary!!

Yeah, my boss used to have them a lot and she said they're sometimes brought on by sinus pressure. We're heading into one of our Wacky Weather times of year, so that might be it.

Re: :(

[chestnutcurls.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I thought of you while my head was hurting. :) LOL. I bet I would feel better with my glasses on. Also, I turned out one of my usual cubicle lights today, and that's helped.

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

I guess.. but what about the stuff before the crucifixion?

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

Wow, really? Bizarro!

[tingilya.livejournal.com]

Girl, get yourself some Excedrin Migraine, just to have around. Don't let that happen again!

[anulyra.livejournal.com]

Haha! LOL!! No. ;)

[suziannabean.livejournal.com]

ack - this didn't go through the first time, so I hope I'm not posting twice!

The extra books are all OT, so Veronica's not there either. She's from Oral Tradition, I believe ...

[ex-lifeofbri692.livejournal.com]

it looks like that is correct.

http://netministries.org/cgi-bin/bbword.exe?word=Cephas&wave=bbWC28&pro=SEE-fuhs

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

Then why would they say it weird in the movie?

[ex-lifeofbri692.livejournal.com]

Pronunciation would most likely change when going to English. I take it this bible dictionary is doing a pronunciation based upon standard American English.

...

[b1ff.livejournal.com]

according to interviews (http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/arizonaliving/articles/0228passionseer28.html), they are based not on scripture but on the 'visions' of Catherine Emmerich (http://www.liferesearchuniversal.com/emmerich.html), 18th century nun, mystic, stigmatist. Read the account of her life - it's positively demonic. here is a part that talks about veronica (http://www.liferesearchuniversal.com/thepassion6.html#thepassion6)