Dark Knight Rises
Friday, August 17, 2012
© NaimaLett.com/blog

© Warner Brothers

Finally saw The Dark Knight Rises, the final installment of director Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy.

I won’t give away any specific details, just in case you waited to see the film, like I did. I was still processing the horrible shooting in Aurora; so it took me a minute. But the film is all that the critics and fans said it would be: an all-out epic conclusion to this Warner Brothers reboot. It’s 3 hours of power-packed, non-stop engagement.

A fascinating article by Jewish blogger Arie Hasit in the Haaretz Newspaper in Israel caught my attention, ‘Finding messiah in ‘The Dark Knight Rises’. Arie’s tagline for the article is “The Jewish people have a responsibility not to wait for the messiah, but to do our part to improve our society.”

Arie submits that many of his peers see a clear Jewish message in the film and that Batman represents a savior to all people. He argues that society faces a problem today in that ‘people are waiting for a messiah to come and solve the world’s problems for them’ when in actuality, all citizens should take part in maintaining society. He concludes that Bruce Wayne/Batman wants people to believe that anyone can be Batman. Therefore, if any of us can be Batman, any of us can be the messiah.

While I can respect Arie as my Jewish brother, we obviously have two totally different worldviews. I am quite aware that I am nobody’s messiah. I can’t even save myself, much less anybody else. I cannot take away anybody’s sins and I certainly can’t ensure eternal life with God. I can point people to the One who is the Messiah, which is not me, no matter how much I could want to think it. And while I agree that every person should indeed do what we can to improve our society, I also believe that our ‘doing good’ doesn’t make us the messiah.

When the prophet Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 53:12, he said that the messiah would be one who: poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

The messiah, the savior of all people, is the one who pours out his life unto death to bear our sins and make intercession for our transgressions. I believe that messiah is Jesus, the Son of God, the One Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death — even death on a cross. Philippians 2.

Some folks are still looking for the messiah.
Some, like Arie, say we should stop waiting on the messiah and get to work being the messiah.
I believe the messiah is Jesus, and I thank God that He did something I couldn’t do – sacrificed His perfect life in place of my sinful one, so that I could be reconciled back to God.

You’ll have to see The Dark Knight Rises for yourself to see if you catch any savior-like messages. Of course, when Christopher Nolan and his brother wrote and directed it, they weren’t drawing conclusions to messiahs, etc. We do all that afterwards. Probably because deep down, we want a messiah. We want to believe that good will win over evil and that there is someone who can save us.

I’ve found Him.
And I pray that you will too,
Naima

Have you seen The Dark Knight Rises? What did you think?
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