Editing A Passion Play (section)

===Legacy===
Jethro Tull's business manager, [[Terry Ellis (record producer)|Terry Ellis]], announced in ''[[Melody Maker]]'' that the band would retire from live performances in response to negative reviews of the album and concerts. This was just a publicity stunt of which the band had no knowledge; Anderson felt it made them look petulant and brought them the wrong sort of publicity.<ref>{{cite web |title=Melody Maker |url=http://www.tullpress.com/mm25aug73.htm |website=tullpress.com|date=25 August 1973|access-date=12 May 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304120209/http://www.tullpress.com/mm25aug73.htm |archive-date=4 March 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Press |url=http://jethrotull.com/press/ |website=Jethrotull.com |access-date=1 May 2015}}</ref>

A three-star retrospective review by Bruce Eder for ''[[AllMusic]]'' was gentle in its judgement, saying that "the music puts it over successfully, a dazzling mix of old English folk and classical material, reshaped in electric rock terms. The band is at its peak form, sustaining the tension and anticipation of this album-length piece across 45 minutes, although the music runs out of inspiration about five minutes before it actually ends".<ref name="allmusic.com"/> ''[[PopMatters]]'' ranked ''A Passion Play'' the 17th best progressive rock album of all time.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.popmatters.com/25-best-progressive-rock-albums-2495470374.html|title=The 25 Best Classic Progressive Rock Albums|website=PopMatters.com|first=Sean|last=Murphy|access-date=19 May 2021}}</ref>

Paul Stump, in his ''History of Progressive Rock'', said that "the writing is militantly episodic", with some beautiful moments but an overemphasis on novelty and an overall incoherent sequence of themes that makes the album bemusing and disorienting rather than engaging to the listener.<ref>{{cite book |last=Stump |first=Paul |title=The Music's All that Matters: A History of Progressive Rock |date=1997 |publisher=Quartet Books Limited |isbn=0-7043-8036-6 |page=168}}</ref>

Some members of the band, in retrospect, expressed distaste for the album, including Anderson, saying that "I've always thought that ''A Passion Play'' suffered more than any other album I've ever made from being over-arranged and over-produced and over-cooked" and that Jethro Tull fans who call the album their favourite album of all time "should of course remain in the establishment for the criminally insane in which they probably already reside". Barre has said that he believes that the album exists in "the bottom third of Jethro Tull albums".<ref name="ExtendedPerformance" />