Christianity Today claimed that Jesus Christ was “Asian.”
The claim was made in an X post, where the magazine wrote that “Jesus was born in Asia. He was Asian.”
Jesus was born in Asia. He was Asian.
— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) December 24, 2023
The artists in this photo essay bring him back to Asia—but not to ancient Israel.
These nine artworks "proclaim the expansiveness of Christ’s kingdom." https://t.co/qGmeOo79Ak
The article, titled, “How Asian Artists Picture Jesus’ Birth From 1240 to Today,” asserts that Jesus as Asian despite Christian art portraying Jesus Christ as “Western.”
“Jesus was born in Asia. He was Asian. Yet the preponderance of Christian art that shows him at home in Europe has meant that he is embedded deeply in the popular imagination as Western,” the article reads.
It adds that some “may object to depicting Jesus as anything other than a brown male born into a Jewish family in Bethlehem of Judea in the first century, believing that doing so undermines his historicity. But Christian artists who tackle the subject of the Incarnation are often aiming not at historical realism but at theological meaning.”
The article claims that by portraying “Jesus as Japanese, Indonesian, or Indian, they convey a sense of God’s immanence.”
According to the authors of the article, “Muslims produced many fine examples in the medieval and early modern periods—whether for economic reasons, as an outworking of their own faith tradition’s reverence for Jesus, or simply out of curiosity and attraction. And in the 20th century, Hindu and Buddhist artists were also significant contributors.”
The article was widely criticized on social media.
Former Trump administration official William Wolfe wrote, “Please delete your account.”
One individual, Samuel Sey, said, “Blasphemy. Jesus is a Jew. It’s necessary for our salvation that he is a son of David, from the tribe of Judah, and born in Bethlehem.”
Another response read, “Please rebrand yourselves as Blasphemy Today.”
