Jesus was white, right? (photos)

Pharyngula; Memphis Flyer; The Conversation; Sheldon S., S. Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

European artists go to town promoting a fantasy: Nordic Jesus Christ Surfer Dude

Jesus wasn't white: he was a North African/Middle Eastern Jew (theconversation.com)

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I'm Nordic-Aryan Jesus. I surf.

There's lots of cheesy "Christian art" that looks like this. And the same message comes from all of it. At worst, it’s — trying to draw the "Ideal Man," fitted to the Western, Northern European mold.

• "Jesus Christ Surfer Dude"? (Memphis Flyer)

Most charitably, it says that Jesus isn’t a historical figure to most Christians; his reality isn’t a concern, and they need make no effort to put him in a place, time, or people.

Republican/Conservative, too

He’s a myth, a wish, a legend, so he’s a plastic figure with a weak attachment to history.

He can be freely warped to fit the ideology of Europe, Rome, the USA, anything. Either way, who feels a need or desire to worship or respect a cartoon? (via Zeno)

• I have forgiven Jesus – Stuff and Things (freethoughtblogs.com)
• Why Israel can't be in Africa (even though it is); A "Middle East" was invented to obscure North Africa with distorted maps online

How Jesus became white — and why's it time to correct that

Emily McFarlan Miller, Religious News Service, June 24, 2020

Head of Christ  (Warner E. Sallman)

CHICAGO, Illinois — The first time Reverend Lettie Moses Carr saw Jesus depicted as Black, she was in her 20s.

It felt “weird,” Rev. Carr said. Until that moment, she’d always thought Jesus was white. At least that’s how he appeared when she was growing up.

A copy of Warner E. Sallman’s painting “Head of Christ” hung in her home, depicting a meek Jesus with blue eyes turned heavenward and blond hair cascading over his shoulders in waves with highlights.

The painting, which has been reproduced a billion times, came to define what the central figure of Christianity... More

"Viking Jesus"? Yes, he's a Germanic Saxon

Nordic: An old Saxon poem depicts Jesus as a Viking warrior chief (wearethemighty.com)

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If I get any lighter, I'll become the holy ghost

When Christianity was getting its start, the religion didn’t exactly spread like wildfire. In its early days, the world was a tough place to be spreading new gods. To create converts, Christians had to appeal to many different kinds of people for centuries.

Selling the “Prince of Peace” to the Germanic-Saxon tribes of Northern Europe was particularly hard, so Christians reframed Jesus in a way the locals could better understand. Saxons were pretty much forced to accept Christianity in the 8th and 9th centuries after a killer named Charlemagne rolled across Northern Europe with a giant sword he called “Joyous” and forced everyone there to take communion [become Christian] or take three feet of steel. More

To make accepting the Christian God easier for Pagan northerners, "Jesus" was recreated in a Saxon poem called Heliand, an epic that mixed Christian ideals with the Germanic warrior ethos.