Dershowitz: I could have gotten Jesus off the hook

LOS ANGELES (Christian Examiner) – Alan Dershowitz is one of the most brilliant legal minds in the United States and regarded as an expert on appellate practice by conservatives and liberals alike, but he might think more highly of himself than he ought.

Stopped by a camera crew from the celebrity gossip-binge show TMZ, Dershowitz was asked if there was ever a legal case he regretted not being able to argue. He responded that there certainly was such a case. He regrets, he said, that he had no opportunity to serve as a lawyer to Jesus.

"I would have loved to be the lawyer for Jesus in front of the Sanhedrin," Dershowitz said. "Imagine – a Jewish lawyer winning the case for Jesus and getting him acquitted. Oh, my God. I mean, he was exercising his First Amendment rights as a preacher, a religious preacher. So I would have loved to have been Jesus's lawyer."

This isn't the first time Dershowitz has opined on Jesus. In the late 1990s, he appeared on Geraldo Rivera's talk show with Rev. Jerry Falwell, then the leader of the "Moral Majority," the country's largest Christian voting bloc. Then, Dershowitz said Jesus was an innovative and thoughtful rabbi.

"He's just not my Messiah," Dershowitz said.

Dershowitz is professor emeritus of law at Harvard University.