re was jesus black this subject seems to be incredibly inflammatory those who subscribe to biblical archaeology review will remember a spectacular letter battle set off when someone complained about a franklin mint ad bar is a great magazine but the contrast between the rather scholarly articles and the incredibly sleazy ads is extreme in this ad they were hawking a doll with a head based on the famous bust of nefertiti giving the face a typical doll pink complexion the letter complained about this as a misrepresentation on the grounds that nefertiti was a beautiful black queen this set off an exchange of hotheaded letters than ran for several issues to the point where they had an article from an egyptologist titled was cleopatra black the answer to the title is no she was greek i have to say that i hear a hysterical note in much of the complaining i personally have seen only one blond haired jesus in the national shrine in wash dc and i found it very jarring western representations vary enourmously but in general the image of is of a youngish male with dark hair and beard of a sort that can be found modulo the nose all up and down the mediterranean also if what i remember is correct the black madonna doesn t represent a person with negroid features it is black because of an accident joe buehler in the presence of all those marble statues one is prone to forget that greeks are rather likely to have black hair when one crosses the bosporus the situation breaks down completely are turks white how about persians or various groups in the indian subcontinent was gandhi white how about the arabs or picture nassar and sadat standing side by side and then there are the ethiopians those of a white racist bent are not likely to say that any of these people are white i e of the racist s race if i may risk a potentially inflammatory remark one undercurrent of this seems to be the identification of modern jews as members of the oppressor race considering the extreme dicotomy between medieval religion on the one hand and medieval antisemitism on the other i don t think that this jesus was white thesis ever played the roles that some hold it did representations of jesus as black or korean or whatever are fine it seems awfully self serving to insist that jesus belongs to one s own racial group c wingate the peace of god it is no peace but strife closed in the sod mangoe cs umd edu yet brothers pray for but one thing tove mangoe the marv lous peace of god
