Peter A. Bien, the psychology in The Last Temptation is based on the idea that every person, Jesus included, is evil by nature as well as good, violent and hateful as well as loving. A psychologically sound individual does not ignore or bury the evil within him. Instead, he channels it into the service of good. Controversy In February 1955, the Holy Synod of the Greek Orthodox Church in Athens attempted to have all of Kazantzakis' books banned in Greece, arguing that The Last Temptation of Christ "contains evil slanders against the Godlike person of Jesus Christ....derived from the inspiration of the theories of Freud and historical materialism, [this book] perverts and hurts the Gospel discernment and the God-man figure of our Lord Jesus Christ in a way coarse, vulgar, and blasphemous." In 1963, a Roman Catholic priest in Ashland, Wisconsin, forbade one of his parishioners from returning a library copy of The Last Temptation of Christ, arguing "that it would be a mortal sin to make it available to others." In 1964, a conservative group called the Citizens Group for Clean Books demanded that the novel be removed from public libraries in Arcadia, California, on the basis that it was "blasphemous, obscene and defamatory"; as a result, the book was made "available on a limited basis to persons over the age of 18." The book was banned in Singapore in 1988. Film version The director Sidney Lumet acquired the film rights to Kazantzakis' novel, describing it as the story "of how a man pushes himself to extremes he never knew he was capable of," with Judas emerging "as a strong man, a sort of hero". Lumet commissioned a screenplay written by Lazarre Seymour Simckes and announced his plans to shoot the film in the fall of 1971, though the project did not come to fruition. After many delays, a film version directed by Martin Scorsese was released in 1988, starring Willem Dafoe as Jesus, Barbara Hershey as Mary Magdalene, and Harvey Keitel as Judas Iscariot. Play version A drama based on The Last Temptation of Christ, named Christuvinte Aaram Thirumurivu ('The Sixth Holy Wound of Christ'), written by P.M. Antony and depicting Jesus as a mere good-hearted man instead of the Son of God, was staged in India's state of Kerala. On August 10, 1986, the play debuted in Alappuzha. It was performed about 42 times, but the Church