The Bible I didn't say that, as long as you have firm belief in even a tiny grain of mustard seed, then you are saying to a mountain, if you move into the sea, it will never neglect after it has obeyed your order. Yes... If I really tried all this at that time, and sincerely said to the mountain, quickly crush those torturers to death, but it did not crush them, then I ask: At that time, especially at the moment of life and death, it was extremely terrifying How can I not doubt it? Even if I did not doubt it, I would have known that I would not be able to enter the kingdom of heaven, so why should I let people skin me for no benefit? … I can't see any benefit or reward anywhere, so I just want to at least keep my skin and flesh. What's wrong with me doing this? So I trust God's mercy very much, and I believe that I will get full Forgiveness..."
At the end of the 19th century, when reason and nothingness began to "kill God", Dostoevsky had argued this question about martyrdom. In the era described in "Silence", no one could accept this "rebellious" logical reasoning. Dedication to religious beliefs remains a sacred act, and is seen by many lower-class believers as a way to give transcendental meaning to their paltry life and death. But as Tuo pointed out, once people no longer believe in the existence of this meaning - the "promise of the kingdom of heaven", everything will collapse.
Most believers living after this collapse admit that God's silence is largely responsible for people's doubts. At a time when atrocities are rampant, this silence shatters the meaning of faith and brings great doubt and pain to believers. Although religious concepts interpret it as a "trial," what does this mean for those who are tortured and then die? Even more tragic is that, like Yoshijiro, he had to give in, and then he fell into endless guilt and repentance, and he was no longer human inside or outside.
The clergy from other lands have also fallen into this embarrassing gap: the silence of God has cut off the possibility of transcending the mundane by means of faith. At first, they called themselves "messengers", and the local people's reverence became the driving force for their hard work and gave them a sense of accomplishment; but after witnessing the gospel they brought, they could only make believers tortured and killed, as a human instinct. Overwhelmed by their sense of morality and conscience, they have to resort to religious heroism (Catholicism is especially keen on canonizing martyrs as saints), and even take the confusion and suffering of Christ as an example (here, we must pay special attention to the use of scriptures for self-improvement and Compare the self to the difference of Jesus). In the end, they had to accept that the mission that God had arranged for them was just as a humble and weak mortal, to suffer the shame and suffering of abandonment, without the glory of being famous in history, but like sinking into a swamp and dying silently.
The second half of the film is chewy. Behind those suffocating tortures lies a refined, neat, methodical civilization. Compared with the priest who is full of fanaticism and resentment, the daimyo and the attendants appear rational and calm. Their views on Catholicism are not entirely unreasonable. Tadanobu Asano's lines are full of universal values: Why does Catholicism have to compete with Buddhism? Isn't it a prejudice that Catholics see the Buddha as a human being, not a creator? Why does Japan have to choose Catholicism as its "legal monogamy"? On the contrary, it was Rodriguez's response that he insisted on "the only truth", looking like a paranoid angry youth. Because for the believers of monotheism, this is an either-or problem, and there is no room for doubt.
Practical beliefs are not only difficult to explain with reason, but even transcend the boundaries of reason. Through the mouth of the Grand Inquisitor, Tuo recounted the three trials that Jesus suffered: bread, sword and miracles. He believes that any faith can win believers only by relying on them. If it does not allow believers to be fed and clothed, and does not rely on secular authority, let alone show mysteries and miracles, then religion will lose its fulcrum of reality:
"When a man abandons miracles, he also abandons God, because man seeks not so much God as miracles. . . Come down, we will believe that this is your time. You didn't come down from the cross. You didn't come down because you didn't want to subdue people by miracles. You asked for free faith, not miracles. The love that longs for freedom, not the servile exclamation of a prisoner in the face of a power that has forever terrified him."
Thus, praying for the kingdom of heaven and for a miracle is actually a utilitarian motive. From the perspective of "fundamentalism" beliefs, they are all unacceptable ideas. But for ordinary people, pure and purposeless belief and sacrifice can only be classified as lunatics. So, the church, who must face the reality, chose to forsake Christ, otherwise they would not be able to build the "Kingdom of Heaven on Earth." The consequence of this notion was that Tolstoy, a devout Gospel, was expelled for criticizing the official Orthodox ordinance—the hearts of believers and religious rules went their separate ways.
Therefore, the abandonment in the film, especially Ferreira's abandonment, also brings an ambiguous color: a believer accepts the cruelty and hardness of reality, acts according to the logic of reality, and abandons the "one way to the dark". A true awakening of his ego as a human, or a forced distortion? Obviously, non-believers will think that this is some kind of lost track, or at least they can be forgiven, while believers think that this is the consequence of the interference of the faith by the power. It was just too embarrassing for the Catholic Church, who was busy running the Inquisition and burning "heretics" in Europe at the time.
Unconsciously, I think of Martin's "The Last Temptation of Christ". At that time, Jesus was almost forced by all kinds of coercion and lure, and he was forced to "cultivate and achieve a positive result." However, it was this Jesus, who was overwhelmed, unsure, reluctant, and regretted on the cross that he wanted to go home and marry a wife to live, and that was the "chosen" one. But it was Judas who was determined and loyal from beginning to end, and who did not hesitate to act as a villain for the great religious cause and betray the name of a traitor. This extends an eternal thought: how should people treat faith? What does faith really mean to the human soul?
And God does not give these answers: When the Inquisitor finished speaking, Jesus "suddenly approached the old man without a word, and silently kissed his ninety-year-old bloodless lips." That's the whole answer.
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