The Young Messiah (2016) on Netflix
Seven-year-old Jesus Bar-Joseph lives in Alexandria, Egypt, where his family fled King Herod's massacre of children. His parents keep the truth of his birth from him and set out for Nazareth.
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb5.7/104,125 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes49%
Trailer
Plot summary
Joseph and Mary are raising Jesus Bar-Joseph, now seven, in Alexandria, Egypt, where the family fled to escape King Herod's massacre of children. Jesus knows his parents are keeping secrets from him about his birth and about the traits that make him different from other boys, and they believe he is too young to grasp the truth. When Joseph dreams that Herod the Great is dead, the family prepares to return to Israel, and Mary insists on Nazareth rather than Bethlehem. Jesus's uncle Cleopas travels with them, coughing and unwell, and Jesus says he has been asked not to heal him. The news of a boy healer reaches Herod's son, the new king, who orders a centurion to find the boy.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Young Messiah (2016)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Director Cyrus Nowrasteh portrays James and Salome, referred to in the Bible as Jesus' brother and sister, as his cousins; he said the idea is that they had "sort of been adopted", and that people all referred to one another as brother and sister in those times.
- The filmmakers had cross-denominational support and positive feedback from evangelicals and Catholics alike, and Nowrasteh's wife Betsy helped rewrite two scenes taken from the apocryphal Infancy Gospel of Thomas to bring them more into line with the Gospels.
