Elon Musk raised eyebrows and prompted eyerolls by using a bawdy Jesus photo to troll former President Donald Trump on the site Sunday night.
Mr. Musk’s photo showed an image of Jesus praying and looking to heaven. The religious figure was labeled “Donald Trump.”
Mr. Musk commented by saying “lead us not into temptation.”
What was so tempting?
A young woman in scanty modern clothes and bending over. On her otherwise-bare buttocks is the Twitter symbol.
The apparent point is that Mr. Trump, whose account Twitter’s new owner recently restored, hasn’t tweeted since but has posted on his own Truth Social website. The former president seems to be resisting a great temptation that he secretly wants.
Many Twitter users were mystified about the post and said it sowed further doubts about Mr. Elon’s ownership of the social-media behemoth.
“This was … ill-advised,” said Jonah Goldberg of the Remnant and a prominent conservative critic of Mr. Trump.
Kyle Smith, film critic for the Wall Street Journal, deadpanned that “this will totally reassure advertisers.”
Others had a more personal reaction.
“Bro at least give me credit for my work,” said artist Leaf Singh.
But the tweet was a hit.
In its first half-hour after posting, it had received more than 18,000 retweets and quote tweets and 127,000 “like” reactions.
