We need to remember, if we ever knew, that human living is more an art than a science. For the stern scientist, life is physical, governed by the laws of nature. Find those laws, adjust to them, and do whatever may be done to assist them, so to find health, comfort and length of days. This is nature’s reality. Concepts related to human and spiritual aspirations are usually seen as additions created from human consternation over life-ending. Science, in the medical context, is the way to go – they say. So it is that mankind becomes the measure of science. Values are to be found, if values are a regard, in whatever improves mankind’s situation. Good is found in health (e.g. tested diet), and evil is found in a tested threat (e.g. radiation). In my readings, I have happened across statements asserting that the only art of interest to most scientists is music. One wonders, if the observation holds, whether this is due to the fact that science may reduce music to vibrations that explain pitches of voice or instrument registering on the ear and body that relate in some way to physical well-being. Science can, with equipment, reproduce voice sounds.
Art begins with human beings, and reflects, at its best, the relationship of mankind with something desired, perhaps God. David made it clear to Solomon that there were persons gifted of God in the arts so to build the Temple. As nature is the guide in science, so art is a guide in the interpretation of nature, including humankind in natural setting and in aspirations, or thought/emotions. So we use sound, color, light/dark, forms, and whatever is available in nature to express an interpretation of life, in self and others. This is where meaning is perceived, where values and perceived life are expressed. We resist being ciphers in nature, even if the perception is that the individual is not really important. There is lasting meaning, if God is included. Without God, mankind has no lasting meaning. God is the secret of our image.
I have just read, several times, a truncated review and critique of Rembrandt’s, Supper at Emmaus. The title of the review: How Rembrandt Reinvented Jesus. The review begins by summarizing many of the paintings of Jesus prior to Rembrandt as presenting a person somewhat Hellenic, of European idealism, with athletic body, even blue eyes – and so the critique proceeds. This is sometimes called the predictable majesty of Jesus. Artists used models, selecting ideal figures for their predetermined purpose, such as the ones used in Michaelangelo’s sculpture, The Pieta. Rembrandt used a Jewish model, so he painted Christ, the ascetic as small, thin, olive skinned, brown eyes as realistic – proved by his model in a physical Jew. However, according to the reviewer citing the progress of the paintings of Jesus by Rembrandt, Jesus changed. The reviewer, Dan Neil, writes: Viewing the pictures in order of their creation shows how Rembrandt’s own coarse features gradually infiltrated the images of Christ. It feels like the most spiritually edifying aspect of these works: When Rembrandt looked into the face of his savior, he saw his own.
Here then, if Neil’s observation is valid, is an important perception beyond human natural patterns, although there is much of humanity in it. If true, there is an illustration of some aspects of a biblical principle. There is a glory somewhere that ought to be recognized. The Apostle Paul referred to it many times in his letters, now seen as Scripture. He made it clear that his reveries in the mystery of glory were not his alone. They belonged to all those who were of Christ. They found decrease in self and increase in Christ. This is unique in God. No investigation in the worthy earth sciences, or in the deep searches of the most intellectual philosophers, or whatever else we may design to discover meaning and hope, will prove the image in us of the hope of our own conscious animation, as well as God’s glory. The creation and appreciation of art, especially as relates to human experience and awareness, is a conjured advance of immortal experience, or what that mystery must feel like. It is not in painted canvas, or carved stone, or beautiful music, or speech alone, but in the mystery brought to each. It is also seen in the birth of a baby, in the view at Niagara Falls, in the perception at the rim of the Grand Canyon. Those who give no time to this concentration have missed something of ultimate meaning. This is our Father’s world. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020