Black Jesus: Christian rapper Tedashii is relaxed about the controversial comedy

TedashiiReach Records

Black Jesus has been a subject of talk ever since Adult Swim first announced its new comedy show complete with the pot-smoking mock Jesus.

Black Jesus readily hangs out with the locals in Compton, California, smoking up and dropping the occasional F-bomb. 

But his mission is to spread "love and kindness throughout the neighbourhood" with his band of "downtrodden followers", the network said in its blurb for the show. 

Before it even aired on August 7, some Christians were calling for the Aaron McGruder series to be pulled, calling it "disprespectful". 

But the show has also had support from unlikely places, with the Catholic League no less saying that Black Jesus had "many redeeming qualities".  

"The Jesus character parks illegally, curses, smokes pot, drinks and hits on women," said Catholic League president Bill Donohue.

"At one point, he is depicted as the getaway driver for a drug deal gone wrong. He is eventually robbed and gets busted. But he is also forgiving, kind, respectful, and condemns violence. No one questions his divinity and even an atheist detective who interviews him after his arrest appears to sense that there is more to this man than what first appears."

So what does Tedashii think about it?  The Reach Records artist was asked that question by Vlad TV and although he admitted he wasn't familiar with the show and hadn't watched it, his verdict on the concept of a comedy pot-smoking Jesus is "it's just funny TV" and an acceptable degree of artistic licence.   

"I'm not offended by the dude who plays it and I'm not going 'oh they should cancel'," he said.  

That being said, the rapper says he can appreciate people being offended by it.  

"If you take someone you love dearly or consider to be some one of high regard and you then you start placing him in moments and situations that don't line up then you go, 'ok this is offensive,'" he told Vlad TV. 

And while he feels he knows his Bible well enough to know the difference between the caricature Jesus and the true Jesus, the Black Jesus character is a caricature nonetheless.  

"The other side of it for me is, who he's playing is a caricature of who Christ is, that's not who Christ was," Tedashii said.  

He said he would probably feel like a line had been crossed if the TV show started to portray that as the biblical Jesus.

And while Western portrayals of Jesus as a white man bother him to some extent, he said he was "concerned for accuracy's sake but I'm more concerned about what He accomplished".  

Watch his comments below: