Risen Quotes

Yeshua: What frightens you?

Clavius: Being wrong.

Clavius: I cannot reconcile all this with the world I know.

Yeshua: With your own eyes you've seen, yet still you doubt. Imagine the doubt of those who have never seen. That's what they face.

Clavius: I ask you one last time, where are the other disciples? I will not ask again. Tell me, and you're free.

Bartholomew: Give your word.

Clavius: My word. Where are they?

Bartholomew: [gets up, walks towards Clavius and whispers in his ear] They're... everywhere.

[laughs joyously]

[first lines]

Inn Keeper: Roman, huh? That's a Tribune's ring?

Clavius: Yes.

Inn Keeper: Have you come far?

Clavius: [narrating as he remembers a battle in Judea] Thirty years the Roman Emperor Tiberius Caesar has ruled the wasteland of Judea and its people. As Tribune to Prefect Ponpiu Pilate, my task is to keep order in a city that is steeped in unrest. The Jews pray to their single God, Yahweh, for the arrival of the mystical Messiah. As their religious leader, the Sanhedrin try to keep an uneasy peace. But each day creates more zealots to challenge the rule of Rome, and bring freedom. Instead, we bring them death.

Zealot Leader: [on his knees] I know how this ends.

Clavius: Then tell Yahweh you are coming, courtesy of Mars.

Zealot Leader: It must pain you to know that the one true God chooses us over you.

Clavius: But not today he didn't.

Zealot Leader: When the Messiah comes, Rome will be nothing!

Clavius: Until then...

[stabs him]

Pilate: The Nazarene... did you find him different?

Clavius: I found him dead.

Clavius: Yahweh manifests himself through a crazy, poor dead Jew?

Bartholomew: Well, so it appears!

Clavius: What does this rebirth mean?

Bartholomew: Eternal life! For everyone. For everyone who believes.

Clavius: What if I ordered your crucifixion?

Bartholomew: What? I would happily submit. Strike!

[drop to his knees with his arms outstretched]

Clavius: Have you watched a man crucified?

Bartholomew: No.

Clavius: No? I don't remember seeing you there. Probably because you ran. Didn't you? Shall I tell you what you missed.

[throws a large nail at his feet]

Clavius: Feel it!

Bartholomew: [picks it up]

Clavius: Imagine having this driven through your arms. And then the same driven through your feet. Your feet. Can you imagine it? That's what you hang from. Nails rubbing on bone. You have to decide what's worse. The agony here

[grabbing his arm]

Clavius: or here?

[kicks him in the ribs]

Clavius: You choose which torture your own weight will inflict, constantly. And then you discover you can't breathe. And you realize you will never breathe easily again. And that every breath for the rest of your horrific life will be like sucking through wet cloth. Yeshua was lucky, he only hung like that a few hours, most take days - gasping for someone to kill them. And if he still felt anything at the end, he surely felt the spear that thrust up under his ribs to pierce his heart and lungs. I didn't look closely, but they must have had to break bones just getting him down. Sometimes they bury them with nails still in...

Bartholomew: Enough!

Clavius: At this point any corpse could be the Nazarene. Still, I could find who took him. That's the threat.

Pilate: Threat is a creature with many heads.

Lucius: [finding a note] "Do not seek me. Do not follow or wander. Persecute no one on my behalf. I have seen two things which, which cannot reconcile. A man dead, without question. And that same man alive again. I pursue him, the Nazarene, to ferret the truth. Clavius Aquila Valerius." It's his seal, Sir. Must be a plague.

Pilate: My right hand turned against me. How could he follow that Hebrew?

Lucius: Perhaps... it's true.

Pilate: Well, if it is... I'll kill him again.

Clavius: Did you know he would rise?

Bartholomew: He said he would, but... truth be told, we doubted it.

Clavius: What made you follow Him?

[suddenly there is a leper being chased away]

Peter: The Spirit he promised, we are called to receive it there, Roman.

Clavius: Your goal is to fish.

Peter: Aye, for men! How could I do anything else now? Will you fish too, Clavius?

[last lines]

Clavius: [lost in thought after telling his story]

Inn Keeper: Tribune?

Clavius: My payment.

Inn Keeper: Tribune! Do you truly believe all this?

Clavius: I believe... I can never be the same.

Pilate: Your ambition is noticed. Where do you hope it will lead?

Clavius: Rome.

Pilate: And?

Clavius: Position. Power.

Pilate: Which brings?

Clavius: Wealth. A good family. Someday, a place in the country.

Pilate: Where you'll find?

Clavius: An end to travail. A day without death. Peace.

Pilate: All that for peace? Is there no other way?