Luke for Lent - Part 6 of 7

Title: The Three Crosses

Artist: Peter Paul Rubens

Medium: Oil on panel

Size: 60.5 x 96 cm

Date: ca. 1620

Location: Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam

Luke 23:39-43 One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

The faith of the thief on the cross is often dismissed, for he has the equivalent of a deathbed conversion. But the testimony he gives in his last moments is a most eloquent evidence of faith. He addresses his colleague first, expresses the injustice of the entire crucifixion by exclaiming, "We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong." Then, anticipating the restoration and resurrection, the thief turns to Jesus with words full of faith, and asks to be included. This man, despite a life full of sin, comes to Jesus, and seeks forgiveness in his last mortal moments. He confesses his guilt and casts himself on Jesus' mercy and saving power. Ironically, though dying amidst mocking, Jesus has saved while on the cross. The request of the taunts has been granted to one who learned to believe. Luke could not have painted a clearer portrait of God's grace…

Peter Paul Rubens (1577 – 1640) was a Flemish/Netherlandish draughtsman and painter, widely considered as the most notable artist of Flemish Baroque art school. A proponent of an extravagant Baroque style that emphasised movement, colour, and sensuality, Rubens is well known for his Counter-Reformation altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects. Art experts have pointed out that Rubens did not intend the three towering crosses in this painting to have such a dramatic impact. It was only later that his original panel was mounted in a larger one. However, the work was reproduced in its present form during his lifetime, so the idea of portraying Christ’s death so bleakly is certainly authentic and came from Rubens’s circle.

A Month of Miracles Part 24 - Christ Healing the Ear of Malchus

Title: Christ Healing the Ear of Malchus
Artist: Unknown
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Size: 121.2 x 96.9 cm
Date: ca. 17th century
Location: The Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle.

Luke 22:47-53 - While he was still speaking a crowd came up, and the man who was called Judas, one of the Twelve, was leading them. He approached Jesus to kiss him, but Jesus asked him, “Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?” When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?” And one of them struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his right ear. But Jesus answered, “No more of this!” And he touched the man’s ear and healed him.

The IVP New Testament Commentary Series notes how the disciples represent those in panic who try to take matters into their own hands. They fight to avoid the path of suffering God has laid out for his messenger and those who follow him. While one asks, "Lord, should we strike with our swords?" another one answers on his own, wielding the sword and cutting off the right ear of the high priest's servant. Sometimes disciples believe they must take matters into their own hands to defend Jesus. But here Jesus stops the attempt to defend him with violence. His path takes a different direction. The healed servant pictures the opportunity that exists to experience God's grace. Here is a man who rejects Jesus and participates in the arrest leading to Jesus' death. Yet the avowed enemy is not beyond Jesus' healing touch. A severed ear can always be restored, if one will listen to him.

In this picture, while a soldier lifts a rope noose to put it around Jesus' arms and chest, Jesus touches Malchus' right ear. The connection between the two is through a flow from Jesus’ right hand on his own chest, that follows the arc of light clockwise across his breast bone, down his left arm, and to Malchus' right ear. The flow of energy becomes visual, and Malchus appears more struck by that than the blow from the sword. Although the identity of the painter of this work is unknown, it has been identified as being from the Flemish school, and was created in the Netherlands during the 17th century.

Descent from the Cross

Title: Descent from the Cross
Artist: Peter Paul Rubens
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Size: 297 x 200 cm
Date: 1617-18
Location: The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

John 19:38-40 Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds. Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs.

John's account of the burial may continue to develop the theme of Jesus' royal identity. The large amount of spice used obviously expresses their love for Jesus, and such excessive amounts of spice were a feature of at least some royal funerals. Plenty of people besides kings had extravagant funerals and were buried in garden tombs, but given all the emphasis in the Passion account on Jesus as king, such details seem to continue this theme here at the burial.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (June 1577 – May 1640) was a prolific seventeenth-century Flemish painter, and a proponent of an extravagant Baroque style that emphasized movement, color, and sensuality. Rubens was one of the most methodically assimilative and most prodigiously productive of Western artists. His abundant energy fired him to study and emulate the masters both of antiquity and of the 16th century in Rome, Venice, and Parma. His warmth of nature made him responsive to the artistic revolutions being worked by living artists, and robust powers of comprehension nourished his limitless resource in invention. He was able to infuse his own astounding vitality equally into religious and mythological paintings, portraits, and landscapes. He organized his complex compositions in vivid, dynamic designs in which limitations of form and contour are discounted in favor of a constant flow of movement. Rubens's major business was altarpieces, particularly suitable for an artist who enjoyed working on a grand scale.

Arrival of the Holy Family in Bethlehem

Title: Arrival of the Holy Family in Bethlehem
Artist: Cornelis Massys
Medium: Oil on oak
Size: 27 x 38 cm
Date: 1543
Location: Staatliche Museen, Berlin.

Luke 2:1-5: In those days, Caesar Augustus made a law. It required that a list be made of everyone in the whole Roman world. It was the first time a list was made of the people while Quirinius was governor of Syria. All went to their own towns to be listed. So Joseph went also. He went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea. That is where Bethlehem, the town of David, was. Joseph went there because he belonged to the family line of David. He went there with Mary to be listed. Mary was engaged to him. She was expecting a baby.

A journey to the ancestral home would have fit Jewish practice, so that the custom was done in a culturally inoffensive manner. This was important, since an Imperial tax would have been a painful reminder of Israel's position before Rome. That Bethlehem is the town of David links Jesus’ birth with the promise of Micah 5:1-2, from Bethlehem will come “one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.” The association of David with the birth sounds a regal note, even if the allusion is made subtlety.

Though not of the Palestinian landscape, this painting is striking for its faithful attention to rustic detail from the homeland of the painter. Shown after having been turned away from the inn, the Holy Family's presence seems almost incidental to such a loving delineation of landscape. Their identity is secured, however, by the celestial light piercing the clouds in the upper left of the image, a luminous line pointing to Mary and Joseph as they try in vain to secure lodging.

Cornelis Massys (1510 - ca. 1556) was a Flemish painter, draughtsman and engraver, and son of Quentin Massys, the first important painter of the Antwerp school. Like his elder brother Jan Massys, Cornelis was admitted to the Guild of St Luke in Antwerp in 1532, before reaching the age of majority. It is unlikely that he ever worked with his father or brother. Cornelis emerged as a fine painter of imaginary landscapes in the manner of Joachim Patenier, but his figures are generally less successful.

The Miraculous Draught of Fishes

Title: The Miraculous Draught of Fishes

Artist: Peter Paul Rubens

Medium: Black chalk, pen and oil on paper, stuck on canvas

Size: 55 x 85 cm

Date: 1618-19

Location: National gallery, London.

The Miracles of Jesus are the supernatural deeds believed by many Christians to have been performed by Jesus Christ in the course of his ministry. These miracles are sometimes categorized into four groups: cures, exorcisms, resurrection of the dead and control over nature. The Gospels include eight pre-resurrection accounts concerning Jesus' power over nature. The first such account, as recorded in Luke 5:1-11, is The Miracle Draught of Fishes.

Jesus was standing on the shore of Lake Gennesaret, teaching the people as they crowded around him to hear God's message. Near the shore he saw two boats left there by some fishermen who had gone to wash their nets. Jesus got into the boat that belonged to Simon and asked him to row it out a little way from the shore. Then Jesus sat down in the boat to teach the crowd. When Jesus had finished speaking, he told Simon, "Row the boat out into the deep water and let your nets down to catch some fish." "Master," Simon answered, "we have worked hard all night long and have not caught a thing. But if you tell me to, I will let the nets down." They did it and caught so many fish that their nets began ripping apart. Then they signaled for their partners in the other boat to come and help them. The men came, and together they filled the two boats so full that they both began to sink. When Simon Peter saw this happen, he knelt down in front of Jesus and said, "Lord, don't come near me! I am a sinner." Peter and everyone with him were completely surprised at all the fish they had caught. His partners James and John, the sons of Zebedee, were surprised too. Jesus told Simon, "Don't be afraid! From now on you will bring in people instead of fish." The men pulled their boats up on the shore. Then they left everything and went with Jesus.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (June 1577 – May 1640) was a prolific seventeenth-century Flemish painter, and a proponent of an extravagant Baroque style that emphasized movement, color, and sensuality. Not only was he an enormously successful painter whose workshop produced a staggering number of works; but he also played an important diplomatic role in 17th-century European politics. Rubens's major business was altarpieces, particularly suitable for an artist who enjoyed working on a grand scale. The central part of the design for his The Miraculous Draught of Fishes shares imagery with the central panel of a triptych in Notre Dame au delà de la Dyle, Malines, painted by Rubens in 1617-19.

Title: Miraculous Catch

Artist: Anton Losenko

Medium: Oil on Linen

Size: 159.5 X 194 cm

Date: 1762

Location: Russian State Museum, Saint Petersburg.

Anton Pavlovich Losenko (August 1737 - December 1773) was born to the family of a Ukrainian cossack. Soon he became an orphan and at the age of seven was sent to a Court Choir in Saint Petersburg. In 1753, as he had lost his voice but had shown talent for painting, he was sent for apprenticeship to the artist Ivan Argunov. In 1758, after five and a half years of apprenticeship, he was admitted to the Imperial Academy of Arts.

Losenko depicts the Miraculous Catch as it is hauled ashore where people have gathered in order to witness the miracle. Peter has fallen down to one elbow before Christ to proclaim “I am a sinner”, as James, John and the others drag in the nets. This event signifies not only what disciples are called to do, but who the disciples are as they do it. Simon Peter and Jesus represent different sides of the theology that undergirds the community Jesus is forging. Simon, for his part, knows that he is a sinner who is not worthy to experience the benefits of God's power and presence - there is no presumption that God owes him anything. Jesus, exemplifying God's grace, makes it clear that such a humble approach to God is exactly what God will use. Losenko’s skillful blending of stoic classicism and realism, was powerful enough to make an impression on Catherine II of Russia, who acquired this picture for the emperor hermitage.

Christ and his Disciples on the Road to Emmaus

Title: Landscape with Christ and his Disciples on the Road to Emmaus

Artist: Jan Wildens and Hans Jordaens III

Medium: Oil on canvas

Size: 123 x 168 cm

Date: C. 1640s

Location: The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

Mark 16:12-13 Afterward Jesus appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking in the country. These returned and reported it to the rest; but they did not believe them either.

He is said to have appeared to them in another form, perhaps in the form of a traveler, in another dress than what he usually wore. Regardless, these disciples should have recognized him, and in an event more fully related in Luke 24:16–31, when they finally shed their doubts, they knew him immediately. The rest also did not believe, and suspected that the others eyes had deceived them. The proofs of Christ’s resurrection were given gradually, cautiously, that so the assurance with which the apostles preached this doctrine afterward might be the more satisfying. That his staunchest followers were disbelieving at first, shows that afterward they did not believe it capriciously but rather with a full conviction.

Jan Wildens (Antwerp, c. 1596 – 16 October 1653) was a Flemish Baroque painter and draughtsman. He is best known for painting landscape backgrounds for Rubens and for many artists in his circle, but his finest independent work shows he was an accomplished master in his own right. The figures in this landscape were painted by Hans Jordaens III, another Antwerp artist. Jordaens (b. 1595 - 1643, Antwerp), who appears to have been fairly successful, trained with his father, Hans Jordaens II, who was also a painter. The younger Jordaens was responsible for finishing works by Abraham Govaerts after the latter's death in 1626.

Crucifixion

Title: Crucifixion

Artist: Anthony van Dyck

Medium: Oil on canvas

Size: tbd.

Date: c. 1622

Location: San Zaccaria, Venice.

Mark 15:34-35 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"—which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

When some of those standing near heard this, they said, "Listen, he's calling Elijah."

Jesus’ cry is an Aramaic quotation of Psalm 22:1, which was sometimes recited at this time of day in prayer but takes on a special significance when Jesus prays it. The first line would evoke this whole Psalm for the religious sufferer - and its hope of vindication.

Anthony van Dyck (March 22, 1599 – December 9, 1641) was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England. In 1620, at the instigation of the brother of the Duke of Buckingham, van Dyck went to England for the first time where he worked for King James I and James VI, receiving £100. His most famous portraits are of King Charles I of England and Scotland and his family and court, painted with a relaxed elegance that became the dominant influence on English portrait-painting for the next 150 years. He also painted biblical and mythological subjects, and was an important innovator in watercolor and etching.

Return of the Holy Family from Egypt

Title: Return of the Holy Family from Egypt

Artist: Jacob Jordaens

Medium: Oil on oak

Size: 63 x 50 cm

Date: c. 1616

Location: Staatliche Museen, Berlin.

As recorded in Matthew 2:19-23, after Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared again in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead." So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: "He will be called a Nazarene."

Every unjust empire in history has ultimately fallen, but God's church continues to endure. To oppressed Christians, whether persecuted for their faith or repressed for other unjust reasons, this reminder of the oppressors' mortality is a reminder that all trials are temporary and our loving Father remains in control. The angelic orders to return to the land of Israel because those seeking the child's life were dead explicitly recall Exodus 4:19-20. Jewish readers would have immediately recognized the allusion: like Moses, Jesus had outlived his persecutor and would lead his people to salvation.

Jacob Jordaens (May 19, 1593 - October 18, 1678), was one of three Flemish Baroque painters, along with Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony van Dyck, to bring prestige to the Antwerp school of painting. Like Rubens, he studied under Adam van Noort, who was his only teacher. During this time Jordaens lived in Van Noort's house and became very close to the rest of the family. After several years, in 1616, he married his teacher's eldest daughter, Anna Catharina van Noort, with whom he had three children.

This painting, of a happy family’s triumphant return, is dated from the same year as his own marriage, and shows the Antwerp master working with a new freedom of color and brushwork.

... And, as it states in Luke 2:40 “the child grew and became strong; he was filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him.”

Amen.

The Adoration of the Magi

Title: The Adoration of the Magi

Artist: Quentin Massys

Medium: Oil on wood

Size: 103 x 80 cm

Date: 1526

Location: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Matthew 2:11 chronicles how the wise men, on coming to the house, saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.

That the Magi offer Jesus both homage and standard gifts from the East fits Eastern practices; for instance, royal courts there used frankincense and myrrh (though these spices also had many other uses). The Magi's homage to Jesus may reflect biblical language alluding to the pilgrimage and homage of nations in Psalm 72:10 or Isaiah 60:6. Regardless, this homage reinforces the point of the narrative: if God's people will not honor Jesus, former pagans will.

This intentionally claustrophobic composition is characteristic of works produced by the first generation of Renaissance painters in Antwerp. The scene is viewed up close, with half-length, gesticulating figures separated from the viewer by a fictive ledge. Finely wrought goldsmith work—such as was actually produced in Antwerp—abounds. The caricature-like features of the Magi and their retinue reveal Massys's interest in the extreme physiognomic types popularized by Leonardo da Vinci and made available to Northern artists through prints. It was this interest in the psychology of physiognomy that made Massys such a gifted portraitist.

Quentin Massys, also spelled Matsys, Metsys, or Messys (b. 1465, Leuven, d. 1530, Antwerpen), was a Flemish artist considered the first important painter of the Antwerp school. We are not told expressly by whom Massys was taught, but his style seems to have derived from the lessons of Dirk Bouts, who brought to Leuven the influence of Memling and van der Weyden. When Massys settled at Antwerp at the age of twenty-five, his own style contributed importantly to reviving Flemish art along the lines of van Eyck and van der Weyden.

The Dream of Saint Joseph

Title: The Dream of Saint Joseph

Artist: Philippe de Champaigne

Medium: Oil on canvas

Size: 210 x 156 cm

Date: 1642-3

Location: National Gallery, London.

Matthew 1:18-21 describes how Joseph was pledged to be married to Mary, but before they came together he learned that she was with child. Because Joseph was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua, which means the Lord saves.

The basic account of the virgin birth is from an earlier tradition than either of the Gospels that describe Jesus' infancy; neither Gospel is clearly dependent on the other. Members of Jesus' family remained in positions of prominence in early Christianity when this pre-Matthew tradition (shared with Luke) was circulating. But Matthew is less concerned to prove the virgin birth to his audience, which both accepted Jesus as Messiah and acknowledged the miraculous. Matthew is more interested in teaching, and an important lesson his narrative teaches is that Jesus' birth fulfills Scripture. Immediately following the this account of the dream that alerts Joseph to the true nature of his betrothed's pregnancy, it is written in Matthew 1:22-23 that “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’ —which means, "God with us."

Champaigne painted this subject at least three times. The example pictured above was likely commissioned for the now demolished church of the Minimes near the present Place des Vosges, Paris.

Philippe de Champaigne (26 May 1602 – 12 August 1674) was a Flemish-born French Baroque era painter, a major exponent of the French school. Throughout his career he made many official commissions, for monasteries, for the Church, and for Louis XIII. He collaborated with Nicolas Poussin in decorating the Luxembourg Palace, then worked for the queen mother, Marie de Medicis, for Louis XIII, and after 1635 primarily for the king's chief minister, Cardinal Armand Richelieu, for whom he decorated the Palais Royal, the dome of the Sorbonne, and other buildings.

St Andrew

Title: St Andrew

Artist: Artus Wolffort

Medium: Oil on canvas

Size:116 x 91 cm
Date: c. 1620

Location: Private collection.

According to New Testament scripture, St. Andrew, the Apostle, son of Jonah, or John, was born in Bethsaida of Galilee. Both he and his brother Simon (Peter) were fishermen, and at the beginning of Jesus' public life occupied the same house at Capernaum. From the fourth Gospel we learn that Andrew was a disciple of the Baptist, whose testimony first led him and John the Evangelist to follow Jesus. Andrew at once recognized Jesus as the Messiah, and hastened to introduce Him to his brother, Peter. Thereafter the two brothers were disciples of Christ.

The feast of St. Andrew the Apostle (30 November) is used as a marking point for the beginning of Advent, the period of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus, which begins with the Sunday nearest to the feast day and embracing four Sundays. The first Sunday may be as early as 27 November, and then Advent has twenty-eight days, or as late as 3 December, giving the season only twenty-one days. With Advent the ecclesiastical year begins in the Western churches.

Artus Wolffort (1581 – 1641), also Wolffaert, was a Flemish Baroque painter from Antwerp. Wolffort’s work was virtually unknown until the late 1970s; some paintings were even thought to be early works by Rubens. The starting-point for the reconstruction of his oeuvre is the fully signed Women Bathing, together with several pictures bearing a monogram. He executed a number of commissioned altarpieces, such as the Ascension and the Assumption of the Virgin (both c. 1617; Antwerp, St Paul). Among his most characteristic works are his serial representations of the Twelve Apostles, the Four Evangelists and Four Fathers of the Church.