Ad Imaginem Dei: Of Rocks and Stones

Monday, June 2, 2008

Of Rocks and Stones

Moses Strikes the Rock
From Weltchronik
German (Regensburg), c. 1355-1365
New York, Pierpont Morgan Library
MS M 769, fol. 118r

“Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.

The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. But it did not collapse; it had been set solidly on rock.

And everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who built his house on sand.

The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. And it collapsed and was completely ruined.”

Matthew 7:24-27 (Excerpt from the Gospel for the Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

The readings for today’s Mass, the ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time,Year A, are full of references to rocks. In the Psalm the Lord is the rock of refuge and a fortress (Psalm 31:3-4, with the response “Lord, be my rock of safety”). While, in the Gospel, Jesus uses the analogy of buildings built on stone and those built on sand for those who take His message to heart and act upon it to those who do not (Matthew 7:21-27). When storms and troubles come, the house built on stone survives; the house built on sand is destroyed.

The meanings of the words “rock” and “stone” in the Scriptures often seem to mean the same thing. I know that there have been debates over the exact meanings of the original words and their precise meanings, but in English there is little difference. We call cliffs “rock” formations, we call building materials “stone” and we call small particles of minerals “rocks” or “stones” pretty interchangeably. In jewelry we call most of the shiny minerals we insert into gold, silver or platinum "stones" while unusually large units of one particular clear stone, the diamond, are often referred to as "rocks".

Master of the Roman de Fauvel, Moses Striking the Rock
From a Bible historiale by Guiard des Moulins
French (Paris), c. 1320-1340
The Hague, Koninklijke Bibliotheek
MS KB 71 A23, fol. 57r

These occurrences today led me to do a little musing on some rocks and stones in Scripture. The list is by no means all inclusive, just a few things that popped to mind.

“God alone is my rock and my salvation” (Psalm 62:3)

In the desert, Moses strikes the rock to produce water (Exodus 17:1-7).

Christ is the “spiritual rock” that refreshed the Israelites in their wanderings (1 Corinthians 10:4).

Christ is “the living stone, rejected by human beings” and His followers are themselves “living stones to be built into a spiritual house” (1 Peter 2:4-5).

Peter is the rock on which the church is founded (Matthew 16:13-18).

Rocks and stones figure prominently in the temptation of Christ. Satan demands that Jesus change rocks into bread, that He throw Himself off the temple parapet so that He will be supported by angels “lest you dash your foot against a stone” and takes Him to a “high mountain” (a very large rock) (Matthew 4:1-9 and Luke 4:1-12).

Temptation on the Mountain
from Pelerinage de Jesu-Christ by Guillaume de Digulleville
French (Rennes), 1425-1450
Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France
MS Francais 376, fol. 193v

And, of course, Jesus is laid in a tomb cut out of the rock, with a large stone blocking the opening (Matthew 27:59-60; Mark 15:46; Luke 23:53).

Michelino de'Molinari de Besozzoll, Jesus is Laid in the Tomb
From a Prayer Book
Italian, c. 1425-1435
New York, Pierpont Morgan Library
MS M 944, fol. 24v

On Easter morning, the stone is rolled away (Matthew 28: 2; Mark 16:2-3; Luke 24:2; John 20:1).

Agnolo Bronzino, The Resurrection
Italian, 1552
Florence, Church of Santissima Annunziata

There are many, many such Scriptural images of stones and rocks and, in the history of Christian art, there are far too many images using rocky landscapes for me to attach appropriate images. However, one of the stoniest images I can think of is the Venetian painter Vittore Carpaccio’s “Meditation on the Passion”.

Vittore Carpaccio, Meditation on the Passion

Italian, ca. 1490

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art

In this imaginative painting, the dead Christ is seated in a chair resembling a throne, which includes a Hebrew inscription on the back. The chair is broken, as if struck by lightening and plants have begun to grow on it. To the right sits the figure of Job, dressed in a loincloth. To the left sits Saint Jerome, the translator and commentator of the Bible. He is identified by the inclusion of his pet lion, located in the distance behind his chair.

Almost everywhere one looks there are rocks. In the left background is a rocky cliff, in which there appears to be a cave, or possibly, a rock cut tomb. Small stones and parts of skeletons litter the ground. We are invited by the two figures, one from the Old Testament, one a Father of the Church to contemplate the Divine Mystery of the Redemption.

© M. Duffy, 2008

Uniquely among the monotheistic religions Christianity permits the use of images of God. Why? The answer lies in the Christian belief in the reality of the Incarnation. Since God has assumed human nature and form the Biblical prohibition against making images of God ceases to apply. As the second Council of Nicea declared in 787 "Following the divinely inspired teaching of our holy Fathers and the tradition of the Catholic Church (for we know that this tradition comes from the Holy Spirit who dwells in her) we rightly define with full certainty and correctness that, like the figure of the precious and life-giving cross, venerable and holy images of our Lord and God and Savior, Jesus Christ, our inviolate Lady, the holy Mother of God, and the venerated angels, all the saints and the just, whether painted or made of mosaic or another suitable material, are to be exhibited in the holy churches of God, on sacred vessels and vestments, walls and panels, in houses and on streets."
(Council of Nicaea II: DS 600)

This decree of Nicea II was promulgated for the entire church, both Greek and Latin speaking, and was a response to the strongly held beliefs of the iconoclasts, who wished to suppress the use of images, which had convulsed the Byzantine Empire and the eastern churches for almost 100 years. In addition, St. John Damascene, last of the Greek Fathers and a staunch defender of images, had written in De imagine ("In Defense of Images") "Of old, God the incorporeal and uncircumscribed was never depicted. Now, however, when God is seen clothed in flesh, and conversing with men, (Bar. 3.38) I make an image of the God whom I see. I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake, and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter." (St. John Damascene, De Imagine, Part I, 15-16, from Internet Medieival Sourcebook.)

The ways in which this imaging of the divine has been accomplished in the course of time is the subject of Christian iconography. To quote from the Merriam-Webster dictionary, iconography is "1: pictorial material relating to or illustrating a subject; 2: the traditional or conventional images or symbols associated with a subject and especially a religious or legendary subject; 3: the imagery or symbolism of a work of art, an artist, or a body of art".

The iconography of any subject develops and changes over time. Christian iconography develops and changes too, as reflection on the Gospels and Tradition develops over time and as the act of making art develops and changes as well. This is the background for this blog.

Ad Imaginem Dei

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Monday, June 2, 2008

Of Rocks and Stones

Central Park Sunset

Oscar Wild 1997(?)-2014