The life of Jesus or more precisely: his life, his death and his second, now eternal life, that is "The greatest story of all time".

At least that's the title of a monumental film from 1965, which was harshly panned by the critics, but whose judgment about its subject can hardly be doubted.

The power of language and images is gigantic, as is its effect and distribution – there is no bigger blockbuster on the book market than the Bible.

Jorg Thomann

Editor in the “Life” section of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sunday newspaper.

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However, history's biggest pound is also its Achilles' heel.

Jesus' resurrection, the foundation of the Christian religion celebrated at Easter, basically bursts all imagination, it is difficult to understand rationally - and can therefore only be believed.

"But if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, so is your faith in vain," wrote Paul to the Corinthians;

Almost 2,000 years later, Benedict XVI warned that if faith in the resurrection waned in the Church, "everything would fall apart."

Without the sensational twist at the end of his story, Jesus would have remained a charismatic benefactor who was said to have supernatural powers;

so he is the leading figure of Christians for all eternity.

It is easy for those who believe little or not at all to question the story.

Ambitious attempts have been made to provide well thought-out secular explanations for what the Church holds to be historical truth, which seem coherent and yet somewhat sly.

After two millennia, no more traces of DNA will be found, which is why the counter-arguments presented with a criminalistic gesture ultimately deal with questions of faith.

Did his disciples, when they thought they would meet Jesus again, only have hallucinations, the breeding ground of which was their guilty conscience?

Had they secretly removed the body from the rock tomb to spread the legend of the resurrection?

Or was the Savior's tomb actually empty - though because

because he didn't succumb to his bad injuries and was therefore not buried, but fled to a safe place?

Such theories may seem more logical to the enlightened mind than a resurrection - and yet sound like the scripts of moderate television series.

Pop culture would be different without Jesus

Whether you believe the resurrection or not, the story of Jesus shaped the world.

Our culture would be different without them, and so would popular culture.

There have been great epics before him, in which one individual bears a heavy responsibility for many, but Jesus seems to provide the blueprint for the heroes whose fate still ties us to the cinema seat or sofa to this day.

The fantastical worlds into which we flee are teeming with profaned redeemer figures: almost always male, young, and set apart from the crowd by talents that have often been bestowed on them through supernatural means (e.g.: bite of a radioactive spider; magic potion; God ).

Their mission is selfless, their compassion immeasurable, their morale high.

They defy dark enemies (Lex Luthor; Joker; Satan), are adored and admired,

are alone in their hardest hours.

A peaceful, bourgeois existence is beyond the realm of possibility for them.