From bone box to big screen, Jesus reconsidered

This stands at odds with many rationalist scholars, who have called the resurrection everything from "not a historical event" to "a conjuring trick with bones." Indeed, in some views, Jesus is more a political than religious figure.

But Wright - who's soon to be appointed a top Church of England leader - asserts that the only reason early Christians were so energized, despite facing ridicule, arrest, and torture, was their view that Jesus' overcoming death signaled the start of a new era.

And they wanted to spread the word.

Ultimately, Wright's detailing of the resurrection leads to the view that, "God is in the business of changing and transforming this current world - and that this process begins at Easter," Wright says in an interview.

And this has big implications for today's churches and believers, he says: "God's new world has begun, and we've got to go forth and make it happen."

Yet the details of Jesus' life can also spark controversy.

The ossuary, for instance, creates problems for the Roman Catholic doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity: If Jesus had a brother, as the ossuary implies, then his mother did not remain a virgin her whole life.

Indeed, some Roman Catholic scholars are saying that the word "brother" in the ossuary's inscription can also mean "kin" or "cousin."

Mr. Gibson's movie is already controversial - even though it's not likely to be released until 2004. The project is reportedly being bankrolled largely by the star himself. It focuses on the 12 hours leading up to the crucifixion, including Jesus' great suffering.

Gibson is a conservative Roman Catholic who attends masses said in Latin. And the film's actors speak only in Latin and Aramaic. Jewish groups worry it will revive charges that "Jews killed God."

And perhaps because discussion of Jesus' suffering is sometimes used to try to lure converts to Catholicism, it's regarded warily in largely secular Hollywood.

All in all, too much focus on the details can be "a cop out" that distracts from the broader import of Jesus' time on earth, argues well-known scholar John Dominic Crossan, author of "The Historical Jesus."

For him, the fact that matters most is the bigger point that Jesus was publicly executed by the established powers of the day - by what he calls "the normalcy of civilization."

That portends, he says, that Jesus' followers will always be in opposition to the establishment. It means they must constantly work to emulate Jesus' model of both "personal decency" and broader social justice.

But in the end, he says, whichever version of the details one believes in, "There's something else more important - and that's why it's lasted 2,000 years."

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