Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ

“Why should such a God limit his love and benefaction to one land, and, as it were, to one family? I set my heart upon knowing. At last I broke through the man’s pride, and found that his fathers had been merely chosen servants to keep the Truth alive, that the world might at last know it and be saved.”

When Gaspar learns about Judaism from a Jewish man who has been shipwrecked, he intuits that this is a religion dedicated to the one, true God. When the Jew tells him that the Messiah will only redeem the Jews, Gaspar does not accept it, reasoning that a loving god would not withhold salvation from the great majority of the world.

“The happiness of love is in action; its test is what one is willing to do for others. I could not rest. Brahm had filled the world with so much wretchedness.”

Through intense prayer, the wise man from India, Melchior, has realized the truth that there is a single, loving God. Melchior’s description of his attempt to live a life dedicated to love parallels much of Jesus’s good works and trials. Both Melchior and Christ minister to those condemned as unclean, and both are called heretics and attacked by the religious establishment for doing so.

“Perfection is God; simplicity is perfection. The curse of curses is that men will not let truths like these alone.”

It appears here that Wallace is inveighing against the elaborate prohibitions and mandates of ancient Jewish custom and, probably, Catholicism. Wallace’s novel is focused upon the affective, charismatic aspects of Christianity, and he clearly considers those its most authentic aspects.

“Heaven may be won, not by the sword, not by human wisdom, but by Faith, Love, and Good Works.”

Balthasar’s quote points to the novel’s main argument. Ben-Hur and the other characters who witness the Crucifixion must abandon their preconceived notions of redemption coming from military conquest or careful study of the scriptures to be receptive to Christ’s message. The wise men have each been rewarded with the revelation of the coming Messiah because they have acted in accordance with those three values.

“The comeliness of the Roman was severe and chaste, that of the Jew rich and voluptuous.”

The contrast between Messala’s severe appearance and Ben-Hur’s voluptuous appearance reflects the perceived difference between the West and the East. According to this view, it was the stoicism and martial discipline of the Romans which allowed them to conquer their empire. The “East” which fell to Rome, however, is depicted as “voluptuous,” defined by its dedication to pleasure rather than duty.

“‘War is a trade,’ he continued, more soberly. ‘To learn it thoroughly, one must go to school, and there is no school like a Roman camp.’”

Ben-Hur is explaining here why he chose to take advantage of the opportunity to learn to fight like a Roman. In order to defeat Rome, he must learn its secret arts of war.

“There is an opinion that the extravagance and dissoluteness of the age had their origin in Rome, and spread thence throughout the empire; that the great cities but reflected the manners of their mistress on the Tiber. This may be doubted. The reaction of the conquest would seem to have been upon the morals of the conqueror. In Greece she found a spring of corruption; so also in Egypt; and the student, having exhausted the subject, will close the books assured that the flow of the demoralizing river was from the East westwardly, and that this very city of Antioch, one of the oldest seats of Assyrian power and splendor, was a principal source of the deadly stream.”

The dichotomy between the perceived West and East is explicit. Although Rome’s glory came from discipline and self-denial, its conquest brought it into direct contact with the “East,” a place that is depicted in Orientalist thought as dedicating itself to the earthly pleasures that have corrupted the Rome of Ben-Hur’s time.

“[…] devotees of the unmixed sensualism to which the East was almost wholly given.”

Despite the presence of characters from diverse “Eastern” countries (Egypt, India, Judea, and Syria), they are treated as an undifferentiated mass collectively referred to as “the East” and defined by their decadence, despite the novel’s extensive descriptions of the austere living of the ancient Jews.

“[A]t this age, there were in all earth but two peoples capable of exaltations of the kind referred to—those who lived by the law of Moses, and those who lived by the law of Brahma. They alone could have cried you, Better a law without love than a love without law.”

This passage reflects the general misunderstanding of Indian religious beliefs during Wallace’s time. Brahma is often the creator of the Universe, but he is not a supreme God equivalent to that of the Abrahamic faiths.

“Unlike the colder people of the West, he could not protest the driver’s inability, and dismiss him civilly; an Arab and a sheik, he had to explode, and rive the air about him with clamor.”

The stereotyping of people from the Middle East as childish and overly emotional is a crucial part of Orientalist perspective. This characterization of people from the Middle East is contrasted with the characterizations of Europeans as deliberate, rational, and emotionally controlled. In Wallace’s lifetime, this framework was widely deployed to justify European colonial expansion into the continent of Asia, with Asian people depicted as infantile and in need of education from supposedly enlightened Europeans.

“‘In the East,’ he continued, ‘we have no gods, only Wine, Women, and Fortune, and the greatest of them is Fortune.’”

Messala boasts of his lack of spiritual life, attributing this attitude not to the Imperial decadence of life in Rome but to the philosophy of the “East.” This triad of debauchery—wine, women, and fortune—is intended to contrast with Melchior’s pious triad—faith, love, and good works.

“Before his time, and since, there have been men indispensable to particular people and periods; but his indispensability was to the whole race, and for all time—a respect in which it is unique, solitary, divine.”

Here, and elsewhere, Wallace is keen to emphasize the singular nature of Christ and that the whole world needed the salvation gained from the Resurrection, not merely the Jewish population. This point is critical to Ben-Hur’s eventual conversion to Christianity. He has envisioned a Savior for the Jews, not all humans, and Ben-Hur’s story is about him learning that truth.

“[I]nasmuch as I loved him in childhood, and also because he was very handsome—I used in much admiration to call him my Ganymede.”

This passage from Messala’s letter to Gratus hints at a possible motivation for Messala’s treachery. In Greek mythology, Ganymede was a mortal made immortal so that he might serve as both the cupbearer of Olympus and Zeus’s lover; Messala seems to be indicate that he loved Ben-Hur romantically. The fury of a scorned suitor serves as a much better motivator for Messala’s actions than mere wickedness.

“‘Ambition is forbidden a son of Israel.’ ‘What, then, of revenge?’ The spark dropped upon the inflammable passion; the man’s eyes gleamed; his hands shook; he answered, quickly, ‘Revenge is a Jew’s of right; it is the law.’”

The Jewish preoccupation with law is a recurring topic in the novel and a foil to the Christian emphasis on love and mercy. Only when Ben-Hur accepts the nature of Christ and abandons his dreams of vengeance against Rome does he find peace. Just as Ben-Hur must let go of his understanding of the Messiah from Jewish scripture, he must also let go of the vengeance that those scriptures promise him as his due.

“Esther kept her seat; but Iras arose, and gave him a smile and a wave of her fan—favors not the less intoxicating to him because we know, O reader, they would have fallen to Messala had he been the victor.”

Iras does not desire to be a partner in love and faith with a man; she desires a man solely for the power and wealth he commands. Although Iras acts coquettishly with Ben-Hur, it is not out of interest in him, but because he seems the most likely avenue for her to gain access to the influence she craves. This passage also foreshadows the revelation that Iras prefers Messala and has been secretly acting on his behalf.

“To the purely Christian nature the presentation would have brought the weakness of remorse. Not so with Ben-Hur; his spirit had its emotions from the teachings of the first lawgiver, not the last and greatest one. He had dealt punishment, not wrong, to Messala.”

This passage highlights the central contradiction between the tenets of Jewish scripture and the mode of behavior promoted by Christianity. Ben-Hur’s native custom specifies “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life,” and he has not yet learned the Christian doctrine of “turning the other cheek.” Ben-Hur will understand this only after witnessing Christ’s placid acceptance of his execution.

“The Galilean loves honor, and the Jew money.”

This is a strange statement considering that the Galileans are Jewish. This is most likely meant to differentiate the more innocent residents of Galilee—Jesus is from Galilee after all—from those of Jerusalem where financial and political interests have corrupted the Temple. To the modern reader, however, the statement is shocking in its direct antisemitism.

“[I]t was as if he were there bending over them or sitting at their side—a Friend whose favors were to be had by the most unceremonious asking—a Father to whom all his children were alike in love—Father, not more of the Jew than of the Gentile—the Universal Father, who needed no intermediates, no rabbis, no priests, no teachers. The idea that such a God might send mankind a Saviour instead of a king appeared to Ben-Hur in a light not merely new, but so plain that he could almost discern both the greater want of such a gift and its greater consistency with the nature of such a Deity.”

This quote refers to Ben-Hur’s thoughts and feelings after Balthasar receives news of the Messiah’s arrival and makes a simple, fervent prayer. It is as if Ben-Hur is being divinely inspired to see the true nature of God as the loving father of all mankind, not just the Jews. Further, this divine inspiration is distinctly Protestant in its theology by asserting that no intermediary is necessary to know God.

“Who is this man? And what? Messiah or king? Never was apparition more unroyal. Nay, looking at that calm, benignant countenance, the very idea of war and conquest, and lust of dominion, smote him like a profanation. He said, as if speaking to his own heart, Balthasar must be right and Simonides wrong. This man has not come to rebuild the throne of Solomon; he has neither the nature nor the genius of Herod; king he may be, but not of another and greater than Rome.”

Ben-Hur, having seen the meek nature of Christ, begins the final step in his journey to accepting Balthasar’s vision of the Messiah. Now that he has been confronted by the physical reality of Christ, it is impossible that Ben-Hur can conceive of him as a great warrior. It appears that Ben-Hur is on the edge of acceptance, but some iota of doubt persists, and he will not fully believe in the true nature of Christ until his arrest and Crucifixion.

“[F]or there it is all vanity, here all truth; there ambition, here duty; there selfishness, here self-sacrifice….”

Ben-Hur compares Iras to Esther following Iras’s betrayal. Although he is comparing the two women, Ben-Hur could just as easily be summarizing Wallace’s view of the difference between Christian and non-Christian ethics. Where so-called “pagan” ethics celebrate individual glory and achievement, Christian and Jewish ethics emphasize community, obligation, and honesty.

“‘His blood be upon us and our children.’ ‘Holy Father Abraham!’ cried Ben-Hur; ‘a Roman kinder to an Israelite than his own kin! And if—ah, if he should indeed be the son of God, what shall ever wash his blood from their children?’”

Ben-Hur anticipates the antisemitic “blood curse” that some Christians believed was upon Jews for their supposed role in Christ’s death.

“The cup my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it? [...] This death may not be averted. The man has been travelling towards it with full knowledge from the day he began his mission: it is imposed by a will higher than his; whose but the Lord’s!”

From Jesus’s statement that he will drink the cup—fate—given to him from his father, Ben-Hur realizes that the Crucifixion is necessary for Christ’s mission of redemption. His understanding of this informs his repeated decision to not intervene in the Crucifixion.

“‘I have seen all the castes of Jerusalem, all the sects of Judea, all the tribes of Israel, and all the nationalities of earth represented by them.’ The Libyan Jew went by, and the Jew of Egypt, and the Jew from the Rhine […] all to behold one poor Nazarene die, a felon between felons.”

Having depicted the Jews of Jerusalem as eager to take responsibility for the execution of Christ, Wallace makes clear the Antisemtism in the novel, as he explicitly implies that all Jews share this guilt, not merely those descended from the ancient inhabitants of Judea.