Playboy ends Portugal edition after Jesus cover

Kim Kardashian on a cover of Playboy (U.S.). Image source: Playboy Magazine

Playboy is pulling the plug on its Portugal edition after the July issue's cover showed Jesus and a topless woman on a bed.

Playboy Enterprises Inc. said its Portuguese partner, Frestacom-Lisbon Media Publishing, breached the licensing agreement by not letting Playboy see the cover before publication.

"We did not see or approve the cover and pictorial in the July issue of Playboy Portugal," Playboy spokeswoman Theresa Hennessey told AOL News in an e-mail.

"It is a shocking breach of our standards, and we would not have allowed it to be published if we had seen it in advance."

The magazine contained pictures of Christ looking at two seminude women who are about to kiss, as well as one of him standing beside a topless woman on the street, according to a posting on Gawker.

Gawker said the pictures were meant as a tribute to Jose Saramago, the Portuguese Nobel Prize-winning novelist who died last month.

Saramago's novel "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" portrayed Jesus as a deeply flawed and human individual.

"We do not believe this is respectful treatment of a great writer and humanist," Hennessey wrote. "It is instead exploitative and offensive."

Saramago tackled religious themes throughout his career with books such as "Land of Sin." In 1992, the then-Portuguese minister of culture opposed his nomination for the European Literary Prize, while the Vatican condemned him as "an unreconstructed communist."

Playboy has 26 international editions, including Portugal's.

International publishers agree to use the Playboy format, but publish magazines "that reflect both the standards and culture of their own country, as well as our own standards," Hennessey wrote.