Jesus Christ Superstar

1) Determining whether the Jesus presented in the movie Jesus Christ Superstar represents a high or low Christology is a difficult task to do because of evidence supporting both viewpoints. One could say that Jesus is presented in a very high Christology in this movie based on many different events in the movie. As the beginning of the movie unfolds and the characters emerge from the bus, the fact that Jesus is viewed as God and stands out as the leader becomes quite clear when he emerges from a dancing circle of His followers to open His arms and bask in the glory of the sun. Many other scenes in Jesus Christ Superstar present Jesus in this same light of high Christology. Looking at scenes such as Jesus’ parading entrance into Jerusalem or the Zealots praising Him as the Lord, assuming that Jesus is being presented as God seems to be correct. However, many of this movie’s scenes show Jesus displaying very human-like qualities such as anger and doubt. Although He is being greatly praised and worshipped when He enters Jerusalem, Jesus shows an expression of fear and doubt when His followers sing out about His dying to save them. In a similar way, Jesus shows doubt of whether the Zealots will ever truly understand the manner in which He came to save them when they are praising Jesus for being a great military leader. Jesus also displays the human quality of anger when He enters the Temple and starts destroying it because they are using it as a market rather than the house of the Lord. Based on this evidence, it seems that the Jesus in this movie is seen in a manner of very high Christology by most of His followers, but is actually a Savior who represents a very low Christology because of his anger and doubt that arises soon before the time of His death.

2) Three major beliefs that Jesus clearly displays in this movie are accepting all people no matter where they come from, having the courage to stand up to evil rulers with a peaceful protest, and understanding that sometimes you have to make sacrifices fulfill God’s will.
First of all, Jesus shows His belief of accepting all willing people into His Kingdom no matter where they come from. He lives out this belief by allowing all different sorts of people to follow Him and listen to His Word. Jesus stands by Mary Magdalene even as His close friend Judas accuses her of having a questionable nature. Jesus stands by Mary and says that if Judas also has many sins in his past, he should not be putting others down because of theirs. Jesus also accepts the Zealots and allows them to follow Him even though they incorrectly believe that Jesus will drive the Romans out of their land with military force. Instead of seeing the flaws in people such as Mary Magdalene and the Zealots, Jesus strives to see their faithfulness and love towards Him.
Jesus also lives out the belief of standing up to the evil rulers of His time in a peaceful protest. In the movie Jesus Christ Superstar, Jesus runs across many wicked leaders that try to ruin the Kingdom that He preaches so much about by getting rid of Jesus. First, Caiaphas’ men capture Jesus after being tipped off to where Jesus might be by Judas. After being blamed of blasphemy by this Roman ruler, He is sent to Pontius Pilate who decides to have the Son of God sent to King Herod, a fellow Jew, to be questioned. However, because Herod is an evil leader to the Jews who just acts as a puppet for the Romans, Jesus is sent to Pontius Pilate once again by this Jewish king because of His unwillingness to perform a miracle for him. Finally, Pontius Pilate decides that Jesus will be put to death by crucifixion. Even through all of this injustice and detestation, Jesus remains bravely composed and continues to claim He is the Son of God no matter what the rulers say they will do to Him. In the end, Jesus knows that He is the Son of God and He doesn’t want to lie to all of those around Him. Through a form of peaceful protest, Jesus stands up to His enemies and brings His “turn the other cheek” lessons to life through His actions.
Finally, in this movie, Jesus displays His belief that one must make sacrifices if they want to follow the Lord. This one of Jesus’ beliefs from Jesus Christ Superstar is probably the easiest to realize and see the Savior living out because He ends up giving up His life to save us all from our sins. This action must have been extremely hard for Jesus, because He would have had to realize that there were more important things than His life on Earth. He must have realized how much He had affected the lives of the people around Him, and letting go of those people and hoping they will continue to follow the Lord even after He is gone would have been extremely disheartening and confusing for Jesus. However, Jesus understands that His Father would not let Him down and realizes that He must drink the poison instead of letting the cup pass from Him. Jesus’ understanding that sacrifices must be made for His faith and his Father is one of the greatest revelations one can go through and stands as an example for all Christians to follow in His footsteps.