The new James Cameron sci-fi movie Avatar has made box office history, gathering the biggest worldwide gross for any film including Titanic, another Cameron produced movie, writes John Brown in his Notes and Essays blog.

Besides its huge box office success and innovative use of technology and stunning visual effects, Avatar has also managed to stir up debates regarding its alleged connection to American propaganda and foreign policy.

In an article for the Huffington Post, Brown compares the protagonist Jake Sully's venture into Pandora, the Garden-of-Eden-like planet, to the experiences of a public diplomacy service officer placed in a foreign country to provide intelligence.

Brown describes how meeting people from other societies and facilitating understanding between cultures as a service officer in Eastern Europe is similar to Sully's encounter with the Na'vi from Pandora.

Currently an adjunct Professor of Liberal Studies at Georgetown University, Brown warns that while the film is ideally meant to be watched using 3-D glasses to better grasp the producer's message, viewers should use their "third eye" to focus on every dimension in the movie, with keener vision and deeper understanding.

He concludes on his Notes and Essays blog that the moral of the movie has been condemned by some as slick propaganda reflecting a leftist, pantheistic, anti-Americanism point of view.

On the other hand, Brown claims that the controversy surrounding Avatar has grabbed the attention of religious viewers, who called for some theological analysis of the film's subtle messages. Vatican City in particular showed concern over the spiritual overtones of the movie.

A cultural critic for the Vatican's Holy See daily newspaper reviewed the movie, concluding that despite its "stupefying, enchanting technology," the film "gets bogged down by a spiritualism linked to the worship of nature."

The review was reprinted in Catholic journals around the world, with the consensus that Avatar's "implied heresy overrides any other reasons to warrant approval for viewing."

However, not all religious figures held the same view. In Rabbi Benjamin Blech's opinion, Avatar is a movie that should not be missed because of the numerous positive Jewish references and insights portrayed.

Brown remarks that the "connections with Torah, Midrash, and Hebrew words are just too frequent and striking to be accidental."

Cameron's choice of words and names in the movie may have lead to this assumption. The root of the word Na'vi, the inhabitants of Pandora, means "seer" in Hebrew, or someone with the capacity to see more than others, and also happens to mean prophet. Similarly, Brown notes that the name of the God the Na'vis revered, Eywa, is a mere re-arrangement of the four-letter Jewish name for the Almighty.

In an interview with Agence France-Presse, Cameron discussed his vision of the movie as a metaphor of modern society's abuse of guns, technology and power. He notes that this lifestyle will lead to adverse effects on mankind "if we don’t wise up and start seeking a life that’s in balance with the natural cycles of life on earth.” Brown points out that a similar message is repeated countless times in the Torah.