Category: Music

Roundup: Multiethnic Jesus, egg dancing, new Easter album, and more

Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments

ARTICLE: “Searching for a Jesus Who Looks More Like Me” by Eric V. Copage: I was interviewed the other week for this New York Times piece on multiethnic images of Christ. I comment on paintings by Wisnu Sasongko (Indonesian), Greg Weatherby (Aboriginal Australian), Emmanuel Garibay (Filipino), and Solomon Raj (Indian), and helped select a few of the other images.

Jesus on a Lotus by Solomon Raj
Solomon Raj (Indian, 1921–2019), Jesus on the Lotus Flower, 1998. Batik. Photo: Gudrun Löwner.
Garibay, Emmanuel_Jesus with coffee
Emmanuel Garibay (Filipino, 1962–), Untitled, 2007. Oil on wood. Photo via the artist.

Of those Christians who even permit images of Jesus, some hold to a strict literalism and object to images that show him as anything other than a first-century Jew from Israel-Palestine—even though these same literalists would rightly insist that no image is literally Jesus. As I hope is clear from my website, I embrace a wide range of Christological imagery, which I feel reflects the universal presence and revelation of God. (“Christ is all, and in all,” as the apostle Paul wrote in Colossians 3:11; he continues to manifest spiritually, and through his ecclesial body, all over the world.) I’m not so proud to assume that my way of picturing Jesus is the most right or authoritative; I need others to help me see Jesus more fully, more truly. Like C. S. Lewis said, “My own eyes are not enough for me, I will see through those of others.” And historical realism is not the only, or even necessarily the best (depends on context), art style to show who Jesus is.

Even though the historical Jesus never wore a full-face moko (tattoo) like the Maori, as Sofia Minson paints him, nor did he sit on a lotus flower when he taught his disciples, nor did he appear to Peter, James, and John transfigured between two Yoruba deities, these images and others like them tell us something about Jesus. At a broad level, they proclaim the Incarnation—God in flesh, dwelling among us, as us, that is, fully human. The historical Jesus existed in a specific time and place, and had ethnic particularities, but his coming was not just for the Jews but for the Gentiles too, and not just for his day, for but all time. Through symbol and metaphor and materiality, artists make this truth real.

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UPDATED BLOG POSTS

Occasionally if I’ve covered an art topic in the past and then come across a new image that fits that topic perfectly, I will add it as an addendum to the original post. I’ve done that with two Eastertide posts.

“‘She mistook him for the gardener’”: Humanity was born in a garden and reborn in a garden, as biblical scholars like N. T. Wright are keen to point out, with Easter morning marking the launch of new creation. In art history the resurrected Christ is sometimes amusingly shown carrying gardening tools when he encounters Mary Magdalene outside his tomb—to explain the case of mistaken identity that John records, perhaps, but more likely to establish a metaphor. Two of the paintings I’ve added to this post are by Janpeter Muilwijk, whose New Gardener from 2017 shows the freshly risen Christ in a white T-shirt and overalls, heading with open arms toward Mary, who is dressed like a bride to receive him. (Mary is modeled after the artist’s daughter Mattia, who died.) Butterflies alight on each of Jesus’s five wounds, marking them as sites of transformation, and the flowering branches of a tree crown him with spring glory.

Muilwijk, Janpeter_New Gardener
Janpeter Muilwijk (Dutch, 1960–), New Gardener, 2017. Oil on canvas, 150 × 100 cm. Private collection, Netherlands.

“The Unnamed Emmaus Disciple: Mary, wife of Cleopas?”: Written in 2017, this is one of Art & Theology’s most visited posts. In it I conjecture that the pilgrim who traveled with Cleopas from Jerusalem to Emmaus in the famous Easter story could have been a woman, perhaps Cleopas’s wife. Several artists have conjectured the same, and besides adding to this compilation three Emmaus paintings that the artist Maximino Cerezo Barredo sent me after the initial publication, I’ve also added one by Jyoti Sahi, which shows Jesus sitting with the two disciples—one male, one female—on the floor of a small roadside dwelling, breaking chapati (Indian flatbread) together. He is ablaze with glory, evoking his earlier revelations as I AM in the burning bush before Moses and to Peter, James, and John on Mount Tabor at the Transfiguration.

Sahi, Jyoti_Supper at Emmaus
Jyoti Sahi (Indian, 1944–), The Supper at Emmaus, 1980. Mixed media on canvas. Photo courtesy of the artist.

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NEW SONGS

“A Bedtime Song for Anxious Children” by W. David O. Taylor and Paul Zach: David Taylor has written a new children’s song (set to music by Paul Zach), which he sings here with his daughter, Blythe. The lyrics are in the video description on YouTube.

“I’ve heard from so many parents recently that their children are struggling with anxiety, fear, frustration, sadness, anger, and restlessness,” Taylor writes, “and so I thought a little song reassuring them of God’s care at night, when they’re most vulnerable, might help their hearts. Our hope is that the melody might be simple enough for parents and children to be able to sing it when they go to bed.”

“See the Day” by Liz Vice: One of my favorite singers, Liz Vice, released a new single on April 10, called “See the Day.” Cowritten by her, Leslie Jordan, and Jonathan Day, it expresses hope for the coming day of the Lord, when justice will roll down like a mighty river, walls of division will crumble into dust, oppression will cease, and the whole world will be startled awake by love. “Precious Lord, come lead us on” to that reality.

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NEW ALBUM: Easter 1 by Mac Meador: Mac Meador, a singer-songwriter from Austin, Texas, released a new EP of six songs for Eastertide this April, a sort of flip side to the Lent 1 EP he released in February. I really enjoyed them both (and the same goes for his Summer of Psalms from 2018). The Easter album strikes just the right note for me right now—of a quiet hope and joy that’s not absent of pain. The songs celebrate Christ the risen king while also expressing longing for the age to come, when the kingdom will be established in full. Lean into that promise!

 

You can stream and purchase Meador’s music on Bandcamp. (Note: To help musicians affected by COVID-19, Bandcamp is waiving its cut of all sales made on its site on May 1.) You might also want to check out his YouTube channel, where he posts additional songs. For the past four weeks he has been releasing “Quarantine Hymn Sing” lyric videos for his church, Grace + Peace Austin, where he serves as minister of music. (He also sets Bible memory verses to music for kids!)

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EGG DANCING: “The Egg Dance: From Peasant Village to Political Caricature”: The Public Domain Review has compiled an amusing gallery of historical paintings, drawings, and prints that show the egg dance, a traditional Easter game with several variations, most associated with western European peasantry of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Brueghel the Younger, Pieter_The Egg Dance
Pieter Brueghel the Younger (Flemish, 1564/65–1637/38), The Egg Dance, ca. 1620. Oil on panel, 26 1/4 × 41 1/4 in. (66.7 × 104.8 cm).

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ART VIDEO: “500 Years of the Herrenberg Altarpiece”: I love seeing all the fun, creative resources being produced by art museums to help educate and engage the public in viewing art. Though I speak not a lick of German, this video from the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart about Jörg (Jerg) Ratgeb’s Herrenberg Altarpiece made me laugh and had me hooked for its full five minutes. (I came across it when I was prepping a Holy Week blog post that features a different painting attributed to the same artist.) Released last October for the five hundredth anniversary of the altarpiece, the video, directed by Valentin Hennig and Oleg Kauz, animates some of the birds from the painted panels and has them narrate as the camera zooms in on details (one of them quite jarring and unseemly!). They then fly through the museum hall and over the town some twenty miles southwest to the church where the piece originally stood.

To add autogenerated subtitles, click the “CC” (closed captioning) button on the bottom of the video player, then select your language using the gear icon.

Painted in 1519, this double-winged altarpiece was commissioned by the Brethren of the Common Life, a Catholic pietist community, for the high altar of the collegiate church of Herrenberg in Swabia. Closed, it shows the apostles about to set out on their mission to spread the word of God. The first open view (interior panels closed, exterior wings folded out) reveals scenes from the passion of Christ, each panel with a primary scene in the foreground and a secondary scene in the background: the Last Supper with the Agony in the Garden, the Flagellation and Crowning with Thorns with the Ecce Homo (presentation to the crowd), the Crucifixion with the Carrying of the Cross and the Entombment, and the Resurrection with the Noli me tangere (appearance to Mary Magdalene). Completely opened (its feast-day configuration), the altarpiece shows scenes from the infancy of Christ, with reference also to the life of the Virgin Mary. It used to have a central Marian statue and predella figures, but these were likely destroyed when the Protestant Reformation came to Württemberg in 1534.

The artist had already died by this time—he was executed (drawn and quartered) for treason in 1526 for his role as one of the leaders of the German Peasants’ Rebellion.

Lamb for Sinners Slain (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones6 Comments
Adoration of the Mystic Lamb (Ghent Altarpiece)
Hubert and Jan van Eyck, Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, 1426–32. Oil on panel, 54 1/5 × 95 3/10 in. (137.7 × 242.3 cm). Lower central interior panel of the Ghent Altarpiece, St. Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium.

. . . you were ransomed . . . not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

—1 Peter 1:18–22

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SONG: “I Will Praise Him” by Margaret J. Harris, 1898 | Arranged and performed by The Isaacs, on The Isaacs Naturally: An Almost A Cappella Collection, 2009

When I saw the cleansing fountain
Open wide for all my sin,
I obeyed the Spirit’s wooing,
When He said, “Wilt thou be clean?”

I will praise Him! I will praise Him!
Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;
Give Him glory, all ye people,
For His blood can wash away each stain.

Then God’s fire upon the altar
Of my heart was set aflame;
I shall never cease to praise Him:
Glory, glory to His Name!

I will praise Him! I will praise Him!
Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;
Give Him glory, all ye people,
For His blood can wash away each stain.
Glory, glory to His Name!

[Related posts: “Worthy Is the Lamb” (Artful Devotion)”; “No Other Fount (Artful Devotion)”]

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Ghent Altarpiece (open)
Ghent Altarpiece (open view) by Hubert and Jan van Eyck, 1432. Oil on twelve panels, 11 × 15 ft. (3.4 × 4.6 m). St. Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium.

The monumental Ghent Altarpiece by Northern Renaissance painters Hubert and Jan van Eyck [previously] is one of the world’s finest art treasures—every student who’s taken Art History 101 knows this piece, and it has been the subject of much scholarship.

Perhaps you know it from the detail photos of the recently restored Adoration of the Mystic Lamb panel that went viral in January.

Ghent Altarpiece restoration
Before restoration (left) vs. after restoration (right)

Over the past three years, conservators under the leadership of Belgium’s Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage removed the overpaint that was added to the van Eyck brothers’ original in the mid-sixteenth century, revealing a strikingly humanoid face on the Agnus Dei that surprised everyone. (The rest of the painting is much more naturalistic.) Social media users made fun of the cartoonish appearance of the lamb, but Hélène Dubois, head of restoration, says this lamb has a more “intense interaction with the onlookers.”

The haloed lamb who stands on an altar and bleeds into a chalice is the focal point of the entire fifteen-foot polyptych. He is, of course, a symbol of the self-sacrificial Christ. Angels surround him holding instruments of the passion, and the Latin inscription on the antependium (altar hanging) translates to “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29).

Mystic Lamb (detail)

You can zoom in on all the altarpiece panels and take a look at the restoration process (ongoing since 2010, with the upper interior panels to be tackled in 2021) at the Closer to Van Eyck website, which I’ve mentioned before—though the site appears not to have been updated in a while.

If you’d like to learn more, the Google Arts & Culture online exhibition Inside the Ghent Altarpiece is a great place to start, as is the altarpiece’s Wikipedia page. If you prefer to learn audiovisually, you might enjoy these two Smarthistory videos:

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for the Third Sunday of Easter, cycle A, click here.

God Raised Him Up (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments
Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Resurrection
Resurrection by Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–)

Peter, standing with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them:

“. . . Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know—this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him,

“‘I saw the LORD always before me,
for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken;
therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
my flesh also will dwell in hope.
For you will not abandon my soul to Hades,
or let your Holy One see corruption.
You have made known to me the paths of life;
you will make me full of gladness with your presence.’

“Brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses . . .”

—Acts 2:22–32

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SONG: “Easter” by Bruce Cockburn, on Crowing Ignites (2019)

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The tender hands of God lifting Christ out of the grave is one of Arne Haugen Sørensen’s favorite motifs—he’s painted it dozens of times, often as altarpieces for Danish churches.

Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Resurrection (Ringkobing)
Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–), Resurrection, 1996. Acrylic on canvas, 268 × 190 cm. Ringkøbing Church, Ringkøbing, Denmark.
Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Resurrection (Skelager)
Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–), Resurrection, 1997. Acrylic on canvas, 195 × 130 cm. Skelager Church, Aarhus, Denmark.
Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Resurrection (Bramming)
Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–), Resurrection (triptych), 2003. Acrylic on canvas. Sankt Ansgar Kirke, Bramming, Denmark.
Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Resurrection (Lillerod)
Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–), Resurrection, 2011, installed 2015. Acrylic on canvas, 162 × 130 cm. Lillerød Kirke, Lillerød, Denmark. Photo: Benny Grey Schuster.
Haugen Sorensen, Arne_Crucifixion and Resurrection (Fonnesbaek)
Arne Haugen Sørensen (Danish, 1932–), Crucifixion and Resurrection, 1996, installed 2002, Fonnesbæk Kirke, Ikast, Denmark. Photo: Benny Grey Schuster.

To view more of Haugen Sørensen’s work, visit www.arnehaugensorensen.com, and take this video tour of the Arne Haugen Sørensen Museum in Videbæk:

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for the Second Sunday of Easter, cycle A, click here.

Easter Sunday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones2 Comments
Saric, Nikola_Resurrection
Nikola Sarić (Serbian, 1985–), The Resurrection of Jesus, 2017. Acrylic on canvas, 90 × 90 cm.

Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay.”

—Matthew 28:1–6

Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed . . .

—John 20:1–8

And we are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

—Acts 10:39–41

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SONG: “Hallelujah, Our Lord Is Risen” by the Easter Brothers | Performed by Jeff and Sheri Easter, 1992

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To view more paintings by Nikola Sarić, including ones from his “Cycle of Life” series, visit www.nikolasaric.de.

Music and art from previous Easter Sundays at Art & Theology include

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Easter Sunday, cycle A, click here.

Holy Saturday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones4 Comments
Entombment of Christ (Armenia)
“The Entombment of Christ,” from an Armenian Gospel-book, 1437. MS Or. 2668, fol. 5v, British Library, London.

When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who also was a disciple of Jesus. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. And Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen shroud and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had cut in the rock. And he rolled a great stone to the entrance of the tomb and went away. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were there, sitting opposite the tomb.

—Matthew 27:57–61

After these things Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him permission. So he came and took away his body. Nicodemus also, who earlier had come to Jesus by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds in weight. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there.

—John 19:38–42

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MUSIC: “Tagh for the Funeral of the Lord” by Tigran Mansurian, 1998–2004 | Performed by Kim Kashkashian (viola) and Robyn Schulkowsky (percussion), on Neharo’t, 2009

The tagh is an ancient genre of Armenian monodic music—that is, lamentation over another’s death. “The characteristics of the tagh are its expansiveness of form and volume, its free melodic style, the existence of instrumental passages and richness of rhythm” [source].

“Tagh for the Funeral of the Lord” is the second piece in contemporary Armenian composer Tigran Mansurian’s suite “Three Medieval Taghs for Viola and Percussion” (the other two are for the Crucifixion and for the Resurrection). On YouTube you can find a January 27, 2019, performance by violist Kim Kashkashian and (different from the earlier album recording) percussionist Jonathan Hepfer as part of the Lark Musical Society’s Dilijan Chamber Music Series is Los Angeles. The funeral tagh starts at 4:23:

Note: Sometimes this piece is called Tagh “to” or “of” the Funeral of the Lord.

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The Entombment painting above is from a fifteenth-century Gospel-book copied and illuminated at the Monastery of St. George in Armenia by the priest Awetik. At the center, Christ’s body lies with his head tilted toward the viewer but wrapped, like the rest of him, in a white shroud. Joseph of Arimathea cradles Christ’s head and Nicodemus straightens his legs as the two situate his body in the grave. Two of the Marys stand by, grieving.

The vast swatch of dark blue across the top half of the painting indicates the deep darkness of the cave and accentuates the feeling of emptiness and loss. The figures form a middle band, below which are two more large color fields: brown and green, the colors of the earth.

The inertness is striking, as is the complete hiddenness of God the Son under his burial clothes.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Holy Saturday, cycle A, click here.

Good Friday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones2 Comments
Gil, Kim Young_Crucifixion
Kim Young Gil (Korean, 1940–2008), Crucifixion, before 1991. India ink and coloring on rice paper. Sourced from “The Bible Through Asian Eyes” (p. 175) and posted with permission of the artist’s estate.

Who has believed what he has heard from us?
And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
For he grew up before him like a young plant,
and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.
He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.
By oppression and judgment he was taken away;
and as for his generation, who considered
that he was cut off out of the land of the living,
stricken for the transgression of my people?
And they made his grave with the wicked
and with a rich man in his death,
although he had done no violence,
and there was no deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him;
he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.
Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied;
by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant,
make many to be accounted righteous,
and he shall bear their iniquities.
Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many,
and he shall divide the spoil with the strong,
because he poured out his soul to death
and was numbered with the transgressors;
yet he bore the sin of many,
and makes intercession for the transgressors.

—Isaiah 53:1–12

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SONG: “He Was Wounded for Our Transgressions” | Words by Thomas O. Chisholm, 1941 | Music by Merrill Dunlop, 1941 | Performed by Shane Clark, on Deep Blue Hymns, 2017 | CCLI #7068347

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In Kim Young Gil’s Crucifixion, the torso, arms, and legs are eliminated, focusing attention on Christ’s face and his four nailed extremities. Kim’s use of light and shade creates a compelling contrast: Christ is both illuminated, as if by a divine spotlight, and in darkness, such that even those light rays from above bear tinges of black. The bright-red color of the Passion, of blood, dominates the image.

I scanned this image from the wonderful book The Bible Through Asian Eyes, edited by Masao Takenaka and Ron O’Grady of the Asian Christian Art Association (AACA) and published by Pace in Auckland in 1991. A short write-up on the facing page describes how the painted print, made in the seventies or eighties, came to be: One day Kim, who was working as a schoolteacher in Korea, invited a self-isolating, troublemaking student to his studio. He asked him to remove his shoes and then proceeded to cover them with black ink, and had him step onto a clean sheet of paper. He did the same with the boy’s hands. Those foot- and handprints form the basis of this Crucifixion image, which, when Kim showed it to the class, led the other students to see this former bully of theirs in a new light and start warming to him, and vice versa. The student later spoke of that surprising art collaboration as a turning point in his life and the beginning of his Christian experience.

I noticed a strong similarity between this and the terracotta cross sculpture of Hyo-sook Kim that appeared on the cover of the June 1988 issue of the AACA’s Image journal. The man who manages Kim Young Gil’s website, James Yun, told me, after asking Kim’s widow, that Kim did not know this other artist, so the two either arrived at this concept independently or one was inspired by having seen an image by the other.

Kim, Hyo-sook_Cross
Hyo-sook Kim, Cross, ca. 1988. Terracotta, 50 × 45 cm.

Hyo-sook Kim wrote that she intended for the hands to look like wings, alluding to the resurrection. The lotus, which bursts upward from the wrists, can also be read as a resurrection symbol, as the plant takes root in the mud, but its stem grows up through murky waters and its flower blooms on the surface, having risen above the mire. In Buddhist iconography the lotus symbolizes purity or spiritual perfection.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Good Friday, cycle A, click here.

Maundy Thursday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones7 Comments
Kazanivska, Solomia_Washing of the Feet
Solomia Kazanivska, Washing of the Feet, 2018

Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. During supper, when the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you.” For he knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”

When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”

. . .

When [Judas] had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once. Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

—John 13:1–17, 31b–35

The Thursday before Easter is referred to as Maundy Thursday—the Middle English word maundy being a derivation of the Old French mandé, from the Latin mandatum, “commandment.” The name refers to John 13:34, where, after the Last Supper, Jesus commands his disciples to love one another.

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SONG: “Ubi caritas” | Words: Traditional | Music by Ola Gjeilo, 1999 | Performed by Voces8, on Lux, 2015

 

“Ubi caritas” is an ancient (or early medieval—it’s disputed) Latin text that is traditionally used as an antiphon, or sung refrain, for the foot-washing ceremony on Maundy Thursday. The current Roman Catholic Missal reassigns it to the offertory procession of the Maundy Thursday Mass.

Originally the text was set to a Gregorian chant melody, but it has since been set and/or arranged by Maurice Duruflé, Ola Gjeilo, Paul Mealor, Ivo Antognini, Audrey Assad, and many others. I’ve chosen the setting by Ola Gjeilo, a Norwegian composer and pianist born in 1978 and now living in the United States.

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.
Exsultemus, et in ipso jucundemur.
Timeamus, et amemus Deum vivum.
Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero.

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Simul ergo cum in unum congregamur:
Ne nos mente dividamur, caveamus.
Cessent iurgia maligna, cessent lites.
Et in medio nostri sit Christus Deus.

Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
Simul quoque cum beatis videamus,
Glorianter vultum tuum, Christe Deus:
Gaudium quod est immensum, atque probum,
Saecula per infinita saeculorum. Amen.

English Translation:
Where charity and love are, there God is.
The love of Christ has gathered us into one.
Let us exult, and in Him be joyful.
Let us fear and let us love the living God.
And from a sincere heart let us love each other.

Where charity and love are, there God is.
Therefore, whensoever we are gathered as one:
Lest we in mind be divided, let us beware.
Let cease malicious quarrels, let strife give way.
And in the midst of us be Christ our God.

Where charity and love are, there God is.
Together also with the blessed may we see,
Gloriously, Thy countenance, O Christ our God:
A joy which is immense, and also approved:
Through infinite ages of ages. Amen.

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The main panel of contemporary iconographer Solomia Kazanivska’s Washing of the Feet shows Christ, whose halo bears a faint cross-shape, washing the dirt off Peter’s feet, as the other disciples, silhouetted in white, look on. At first Peter was much distraught by the notion of his superior stooping to such a menial act of servitude, and he objected. But when Jesus told Peter that Peter would have no part with him unless Peter received the foot-washing, Peter changed his tune completely: he figured that if this were true, then a full body wash would give him an even bigger part with Jesus, so he exclaimed, “Wash my hands and my head too!” That’s why icons show Peter pointing to his head (not, as might be assumed, to signal his initial discomfort, as in “Oh dear . . .”).

What strikes me most about Kazanivska’s icon is the bottom panel, which seems to show the disciples washing one another’s feet, following their teacher’s example. (It’s possible that this band is meant to show Christ washing different disciples’ feet, as the biblical text says he did, but the different clothing of the kneeling figure in each of the six tableaux inclines me toward the other interpretation.) Kazanivska is not suggesting that that’s how it literally went down that evening—the disciples immediately understanding Christ’s meaning and faithfully imitating him. Rather, I read this an aspirational and metaphoric image, of how Christians are to interact with one another: in love and humility, time after time (hence the repetition). And that’s why I chose it to complement the “Ubi caritas” hymn.

Follow Solomia Kazanivska on Facebook @Kazanivska.Icon.Art or on Instagram @kazanivskaicon.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Maundy Thursday, cycle A, click here.

Holy Wednesday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones5 Comments
Ratgeb, Jorg_Last Supper (detail)
Attributed to Jörg Ratgeb (German, ca. 1480–1526), The Last Supper (detail), 1505–10. Oil on panel, 38 7/10 × 36 in. (98.5 × 91.5 cm). Boijmans van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Even my close friend in whom I trusted,
who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me.
But you, O LORD, be gracious to me,
and raise me up . . .

—Psalm 41:9–10

“. . . the Scripture will be fulfilled, ‘He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me.’ I am telling you this now, before it takes place, that when it does take place you may believe that I am he. . . .”

After saying these things, Jesus was troubled in his spirit, and testified, “Truly, truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me.” The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he spoke.

One of his disciples, whom Jesus loved, was reclining at table at Jesus’ side, so Simon Peter motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. So that disciple, leaning back against Jesus, said to him, “Lord, who is it?”

Jesus answered, “It is he to whom I will give this morsel of bread when I have dipped it.” So when he had dipped the morsel, he gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot.

Then after he had taken the morsel, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, “What you are going to do, do quickly.” Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him. Some thought that, because Judas had the moneybag, Jesus was telling him, “Buy what we need for the feast,” or that he should give something to the poor.

So, after receiving the morsel of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night.

—John 13:18b–19, 21–30

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SONG: “Judas Song (Psalm 41​:​9​–10)” by Matt Grimsley (words adapted from the Trinity Psalter) | Performed by the Green Carpet Players, on Morning to Evening (2014)

 

ORCHESTRAL REPRISE: “Judas Song, Pt. 2: The Betrayer” by Amy Porter, based on a melody by Matt Grimsley | Performed by the Green Carpet Players, on Morning to Evening (2014)

 

The Green Carpet Players is the recording alias of the musicians of Redeemer Church of Knoxville. Since they released this second album in 2014, chief musician Matt Grimsley, who wrote “Judas Song,” has become the founding pastor of Resurrection Presbyterian Church in Madison, Wisconsin, and Amy Porter is now worship director at Church of the Redeemer in Maryville, Tennessee.

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Ratgeb, Jorg_Last Supper
Attributed to Jörg Ratgeb (German, ca. 1480–1526), The Last Supper, 1505–10. Oil on panel, 38 7/10 × 36 in. (98.5 × 91.5 cm). Boijmans van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, Netherlands.

In Jörg Ratgeb’s Last Supper, the disciples have laid aside their pilgrim’s staffs and have sat down to a Passover meal of roast lamb, bread, and wine. Jesus, having just announced that one of them would betray him, looks across the table at Judas, the group’s treasurer—who wears not one but two purses! Jesus tenderly and regretfully feeds Judas an unleavened wafer, indicating that he’s the one. The others seem not to notice—groups of two discuss among themselves who the traitor might be; one disciple guzzles down more wine from a tubed bottle, while another pours more from a jug; John’s asleep to Christ’s left, and to his right Peter stares blankly into space, knife in hand (foreshadowing his cutting off the ear of one of Jesus’s arresters later that night); and one crass disciple turns his head to shoot snot out his nose.

Jesus has just washed all their feet, as indicated by the water basin and towel in the foreground—a stunning act of humility. (We will visit that episode in tomorrow’s Gospel reading.) His supremest act of humility is but a day away. It’s alluded to by the poster at the left of a snake lifted up on a staff (see John 3:14–15), as well as by the monstrance (a receptacle for the consecrated Eucharistic host) that two angels raise above Jesus’s head, proclaiming his impending sacrifice.

The sweet, generative nature of this sacrifice is underscored by the lily-of-the-valley that’s strewn all over the floor and table, as the flower is connected with the advent of spring and the promise of new life.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Wednesday of Holy Week, cycle A, click here.

Holy Tuesday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones2 Comments
Cox, John Rogers_Wheat Field
John Rogers Cox (American, 1915–1990), Wheat Field, ca. 1943. Oil on Masonite, 16 × 20 in. The John and Susan Horseman Collection of American Art, St. Louis, Missouri.

And Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.

“Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.”

Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”

The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.”

Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die.

So the crowd answered him, “We have heard from the Law that the Christ remains forever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?”

So Jesus said to them, “The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.”

When Jesus had said these things, he departed and hid himself from them.

—John 12:23–36

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SONG: “Glorify” by Joe Kurtz and Josh Compton, on Last Days by The Brothers of Abriem Harp (2015)

Read my comments on this Bible passage and song at https://artandtheology.org/2018/03/24/album-review-last-days-by-the-brothers-of-abriem-harp/.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Tuesday of Holy Week, cycle A, click here.

Holy Monday (Artful Devotion)

Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments
Supper at Bethany (Vaux Passional)
Illumination from the Vaux Passional, England, ca. 1503–4. Peniarth MS 482D, fol. 15v, National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth. [see full page]

Six days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So they gave a dinner for him there. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table. Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (he who was about to betray him), said, “Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?” He said this, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it. Jesus said, “Leave her alone; she intended to keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.”

When the large crowd of the Jews learned that Jesus was there, they came, not only on account of him but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. So the chief priests made plans to put Lazarus to death as well, because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and believing in Jesus.

—John 12:1–11

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SONG: “Said Judas to Mary” by Sydney Carter, 1964 | Performed by ValLimar Jansen and the choir of Christ the King Church, Kingston, Rhode Island, 2015

View the lyrics and sheet music at www.hopepublishing.com.

This post belongs to the weekly series Artful Devotion. If you can’t view the music player in your email or RSS reader, try opening the post in your browser.

To view all the Revised Common Lectionary scripture readings for Monday of Holy Week, cycle A, click here.