The title, Zombie Jesus, is misleading, even if deliberately provocative: Jesus is never portrayed as a zombie in this comic.
Is it Biblical? Maybe. Well, loosely. Okay, hanging by a thread, fine. Matthew 27: 51b-54 does describe some of the dead being raised from their tombs and appearing to the people in Jerusalem, causing the Romans to proclaim, “Truly, this was the Son of God.”
Creator Rob Liefeld expands these verses into an entire storyline, with zombies attacking Jerusalem immediately after the death of Jesus on the cross.
Orthodox. Faithful. Free.
Sign up to get Crisis articles delivered to your inbox daily
“I don’t consider this in any way blasphemous or contradicting my faith,” said Liefeld, who describes Zombie Jesus as “300 meets Dawn of the Dead with the clock from 24 running.” He continued, “The fact of the matter is that the passage in ‘Matthew’ 27 EXISTS! It’s a freaky, crazy, creepy passage. Zombies came out of the ground right after Christ’s death and it’s kind of glossed over like it’s no big deal. I wanted to move on it a year ago when I read it, but I needed time to flesh it out. There are so many mysterious passages in the Bible, and this one may be the biggest mystery of all.”
(HT: Comics Alliance)
The comic isn’t available for sale; it’s solely a web comic, found here. I’m not going to run this as an ongoing serial here, but I thought I’d post the first six pages to give you a feel for the web series.
The story goes an interesting direction in future episodes:
“What I’ve done is construct a story of how the ultimate battle between good and evil continues following the crucifixion of Christ. There are many players in the saga and everyone is racing against time to protect or devour Christ’s remains. Joseph of Arimethia paid to have Jesus buried in a proper tomb and there is quite an exciting series of events as Judas and the zombie horde attempt to keep Christ and his escorts from reaching the tomb. The zombies that attack the city are at first defended by the Roman Centurions who eventually retreat and Governor Pilate decides to sacrifice the population of Judaea to the zombies. (Same HT as before.)
Again, if you want more of the story, you’ll find it here. Liefeld is up to page eight so far. Originally, he was doing a page a day, but there haven’t been any new pages since Nov. 7.
Offended? Amused? Edified? Guiltily-pleasured? Write a comment!