Ben Hur

I’ve said it many times that ‘Ben Hur’ is my all-time favorite movie, produced in 1959 with Charlton Heston in the main role, and I make it a point every Lent to watch it. I want to highlight today one particular scene, actually, two of them that show a fascinating parallelism that develops between Jesus and Judah Ben Hur. The two photos seen here explain clearly the beauty of this spiritually altruistic moment. After Ben Hur is condemned to the galleys, he is seen walking through the desert with other convicts. They come to a water station where they are allowed to drink a little water, along with the horses and the Roman soldiers. The centurion cruelly refuses water to Ben Hur until a figure appears with a gourd in his hand and bends down to fill it with water and let Judah Ben Hur drink. As the group walks away, one can see the figure of Jesus standing with the gourd in his left hand. 

Later on in the movie, during the procession towards Calvary, Jesus falls to the ground and Ben Hur is close by to pick up a gourd and fill it with water from a nearby fountain and approach Jesus to offer him a drink. At that moment Ben Hur recognized the man who had earlier helped him in the desert quenching his unbearable thirst. As Jesus walks away accompanied by Simon of Cyrene, now we see Ben Hur standing with the gourd in his right hand, replicating the exact scene of the desert. It is my all-time favorite scene in all movie-making history, showing reciprocal love, concern, and altruism. It is truly a prayerful moment we can all learn from. This is cinematography at its very best!