Concerns the last twelve hours in the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In the Garden of Gethsemane near the Mount of Olives, Jesus is betrayed by Judas Iscariot. Jesus is condemned to death for blasphemy and brought before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, for sentencing. The roaring crowd demands his death, so Pilate orders his crucifixion. Jesus is severely beaten and made to carry his cross up to Golgotha, the hill outside Jerusalem, where...

Switches back and forth between four separate stories from Babylonian times to the twentieth century to show humanity's inhumanity and intolerance through the ages. The Babylonian story deals with the fall of Babylon in 538 B.C. The Judean story treats the life of Christ. The French story centers on the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day in 1572. The modern story is set in an American mill town and the slum area of an American city.