A subversive re-telling of the OT Exodus from a pagan POV

Rating: 3/10 (26 August 2010)

Be advised, Abrahamic themes discussed here.
Technicals aside, Avatar is Cameron's take on how the biblical Book of Joshua might play out allegorically, but reversed and depicted in SF terms. Imagine a fantasy where the alien enemies of some fantastical, space-faring "Israel" nation have the righteousness and might of the true deity on their side. In his cinematic brilliance, Cameron shows just how that futuristic "Israel" is brought to its knees by its pagan targets. The humans are snarkily depicted as claiming the superior means and values, but in this fantasy they are THE god-forsaken, rapacious foreigners - in the eyes of the aliens.
The Na'vi represent a fantastic, figurative version of the Anakite giants (Anakite: long-neck) of the biblical land of Canaan, metaphorically represented here by Pandora. Since the movie is from the traitor's and aliens' POV (Sully: "Excuse me, this is my video log here!"), there is no attribution to a divine hand behind this metaphorical Israelite army. OTOH, it is a force which does possess a thematic proxy for the Hebrew deity, in the form of unimaginable - to the aliens - advantages in armaments, high technology, and organization. Not coincidentally, the human army is depicted transiting the wilderness of space from a blighted Earth (Egypt) while subsisting on in-flight rations (manna), bent on an overarching mission to seek their race's survival and future prosperity by winning the rights to the promised rock (land) of Pandora (Canaan). The idea of "Israel" as the divinely favored people is allegorized as an unobtainable "Rock" aka "UnObtainium". Which is precisely Cameron's point, and likely motivation.
Jake Sully is an ex-Marine (figurative Israelite warrior) with crippled legs and is figurative of OT unbelievers "undercut" by the Israelis. His role as traitor-to-be is strongly predicted by this. After being forced to take a swim (biblical Jordan) by the nasty wildlife (biblical "land swallows up people and things"), he meets Na'vi princess Neytiri, a figurative stand-in for the ravishingly beautiful biblical Rahab. In this tale, Neytiri's/Rahab's character is uplifted into a stalwart and loyal Na'vi (biblical Canaanite) princess in a reversal of the historical role the fearful prostitute played in hiding the two Israelite spies sent to scout Jericho by Joshua. Cameron's version of Rahab also plays a secondary role as the infamous Moabite sex-princess but in reverse, one who instead carries out the orders of a pagan king (paralleling the biblical advice of Balaam to the Canaanite King Balak to confront Israel indirectly) to seduce an Israeli warrior into betraying his own nation. Instead of getting speared in the act with said enemy (biblical Zimri incident) as in the original story, this Rahab-cum-sex-princess gets to turn the tables by spearing the enemy commander (biblical Joshua). Her character ends as stand-in for the ancient pagan war-goddess Neith/Anat - she of nakedly aggressive beauty and skill with bow and arrow.
Among other things, Pandora/Canaan's magical floating mountains stand for the biblical mountaintops from where biblical King Balak and Balaam attempted to hex their Israelite enemies. Not to mention the high places where biblical Israelis would not only practice worship but more importantly seal holy covenants, or marriages between entities. The off-site Avatar link couch assigned by Dr. Augustine to Sully is tellingly named "Beulah", which means "Israel" or "married" in Hebrew. The elder chief scientist's age and expertise in botany marks her character as figurative of the first spy team tasked by Moses to scout Canaan's agriculture. Sully is buddied in a paired spy team, just as in the original story. We are not even touching on details about the ancient Canaanite mother goddess Asherah, associated with the living tree and fertility and child-sacrifice rites, the inexplicable RDA attempt to burn the alien columns unless they were heeding the advice of certain OT Hebrew prophets.
Other reverses/parallels abound. The treasonous RDA science team almost directly parallels the biblical ten faithless spies of Moses's 12-man spy team, of whom only Joshua (figured by Colonel Quaritch here) and Caleb proved strong and faithful (Colonel to initially-zealous Sully: "I wish I had ten more like you"). Then there are the 12 human sectors corresponding to the biblical distribution of land among ancient Israel's nominal twelve tribes. Jake Sully as a traitorous refiguring of the biblical Caleb who in this revision meets Princess Neytiri (biblical Rahab) at Hometree (Jericho) which eventually falls to the circling human army (Walls and trumpets).
Then there's the alien wildlife communicating with the indigenes (Balaam's biblically hilarious donkey). Oh, and up there is a naked and feathered Jake with a crown of thorns sailing the sky on the back of a serpent-tailed red dragon-beast, holding at times a serpentine twist of hair-fiber and looking for all the world like your typical reincarnation of the ancient Canaanite gods Astaroth/Ashtoreth. Pagans rejoice! As for the biblical Ark which brought down Jericho's walls on the seventh run after circling the city 6 times, figuratively substitute Shuttle 1-6 and its humongous daisycutter bomb as proxy for the presence and power of the Hebrew deity. Watch as Cameron delightfully orchestrates the on screen failure of the daisycutter/Ark to deliver the final providential blow, while the supposedly unaligned Eywa-cum-mother-earth (Neytiri/Rahab/Neith: "Our Great Mother does not take sides Jake") finally does the Abrahamic God divine intervention routine. It's pagan catnip, I tell you.
BTW, check out the humorous Cheesus reference when Parker (figurative Eleazar) searches the holotank for Sector 12 (figurative of the 12th tribe of Benjamin, from whence Jesus and 11 of the apostles came) and exclaims, "Where .. Stop. Jesus... ...I mean, look at all that cheddar." Marvelously mocking word-play.
If today's neopagans could somehow revise the original OT story into a fantastical triumph for the Canaanites in place of their historical defeat and conquest by Israelites, this movie would be their gift. It seems Cameron speaks for all vanquished pagans, voicing ghostly wishes from beyond the grave for what could have been but never was.
Excellent movie-making, though.