The depiction of Jesus in art took several centuries to reach a conventional standardized form for his physical appearance, which has subsequently remained largely stable since that time. Most images of Jesus have in common a number of traits which are now almost universally associated with Jesus, although variants are seen.
The image of a fully-bearded Jesus with long hair did not become established until the 6th century in Eastern Christianity, and much later in the West. Earlier images were much more varied. Images of Jesus tend to show ethnic characteristics similar to those of the culture in which the image has been created. Beliefs that certain images are historically authentic, or have acquired an authoritative status from church tradition, remain powerful among some of the faithful, in both Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism. The Shroud of Turin is now the best-known example, though the Image of Edessa and the Veil of Veronica were better known in medieval times.
Contents |
A series of articles on |
|---|
|
Jesus Christ and Christianity |
|
Cultural and historical background |
|
Perspectives on Jesus |
|
Jesus in culture |
No physical description of Jesus is contained in any of the canonical Gospels. During the persecution of Christians under the Roman Empire, Christian art was necessarily furtive and ambiguous. The earliest surviving Christian art comes from the late 2nd to early 4th centuries on the walls of Christian tombs in the catacombs of Rome, although from literary evidence there may well have been panel icons which, like almost all classical painting, have disappeared. Initially Jesus was represented indirectly by pictogram symbols such as the Ichthys (fish), the peacock, or an anchor (the Labarum or Chi-Rho was a later development). Later personified symbols were used, including Jonah, whose three days in the belly of the whale pre-figured the interval between Christ's death and Resurrection; Daniel in the lion's den; or Orpheus charming the animals. The image of "The Good Shepherd", a beardless youth in pastoral scenes collecting sheep, was the commonest of these images, and was probably not understood as a portrait of the historical Jesus.[1] It is also interpreted by some as the Shepherd of Hermas.[2][3]
The appearance of Jesus had some theological implications. While some Christians thought Jesus should have the beautiful appearance of a young classical hero, and the Gnostics tended to think he could change his appearance at will, for which they cited the Meeting at Emmaus as evidence,[4] others including Justin and Tertullian believed, following Isaiah:53:2, that Christ's appearance was unremarkable.[5] The first narrative scenes from the Life of Christ to become common are the Baptism of Christ and the miracle of the Raising of Lazarus, but during the 4th century a much greater number of scenes came to be depicted,[6] usually showing Christ as beardless and with short hair that does not reach his shoulders, although there is considerable variance.[7] [1] Jesus is sometimes shown performing miracles by means of a wand.[8] He uses the wand to change water to wine, multiply the bread and fishes, and raise Lazarus. When pictured healing, he only lays on hands.
From the middle of the 4th century, after Christianity was legalized by the Edict of Milan in 313, and gained Imperial favour, there was a new range of images of Christ the King,[9] often still physically as before, but adopting the costume and often the poses of Imperial iconography. Jesus gradually was shown as older, and in the next century often with a beard and long hair, and a halo.
Themes of the Good Shepherd still remain, as can be seen on the apse mosaic in the church of Santi Cosma e Damiano in Rome, where the twelve apostles are depicted as twelve sheep below the imperial Jesus. By this time Jesus had begun to be depicted with the distinctive "look" that dominated much of the history of art, with shoulder-length hair and a beard.
Once the bearded, long-haired Jesus became the conventional representation of Jesus, his facial features slowly began to be standardised, although this process took until at least the 6th century in the Eastern Church, and much longer in the West, where clean-shaven Jesuses are common until the 12th century, despite the influence of Byzantine art.
French scholar Paul Vignon has listed fifteen similarities (like tilaka) between most of the icons of Jesus at the time, particularly in the icons of "Christ Pantocrator" ("The all-powerful Messiah"). He claims that these are due to the availability of the Image of Edessa (which he claims to be identical to the Shroud of Turin) to the artists. Certainly images believed to have miraculous origins, or the Hodegetria, believed to be a portrait of Mary from the life by Saint Luke, were widely regarded as authoritative by the Early Medieval period and greatly influenced depictions. In Eastern Orthodoxy the form of images was, and largely is, regarded as revealed truth, with a status almost equal to scripture, and the aim of artists is to copy earlier images without originality, although the style and content of images does in fact change slightly over time. Egyptologist John Romer, in his Seven Wonders of the World, has pointed out the portrayal of Jesus is very similar to the surviving portrayals of Zeus or Jupiter, the father of the pagan Gods, who was the protector of the Roman empire.
As to the historical appearance of Jesus, the apostle Paul urges first century Christian men not to have long hair.[10] Jesus was a practicing Jew so presumably had a beard.
The earliest image believed by some to be of Jesus is a unique piece of wall graffiti near the Palatine hill in Rome. The inscription has been ascribed dates ranging from from the 1st to the 3rd centuries AD. [11][12][13][14][15].It was apparently drawn by a Roman soldier to mock another soldier who was a Christian. The caption reads, in Greek, "Alexamenos worships God", while the image shows a man raising his hand toward a crucified figure with a donkey's head. The head of the donkey seems to refer to a Roman misconception about Jewish religion, so that the image would be at once anti-Semitic and anti-Christian. A small minority of scholars dispute whether this image depicts Jesus, proposing that this image may be a reference to another deity.[13]
Conventional depictions of Christ include the narrative scenes of the Life of Christ, and many other conventional depictions:
Narrative scenes from the Life of Christ include:
Devotional images include:
Many modern artists have focused on the incarnational aspects of the Jesus story and thus some have created images with unconventional depictions of Jesus, sometimes to reflect a belief in the universality and non-literal existence of Jesus. Hence there are paintings of black, European, and Chinese Jesuses, and also of Jesus as a woman.
There are, however, some images which have been claimed to realistically show how Jesus looked. One early tradition, recorded by Eusebius of Caesarea, says that Jesus once washed his face with water and then dried it with a cloth, leaving an image of his face imprinted on the cloth. This was sent by him to King Abgarus of Edessa, who had sent a messenger asking Jesus to come and heal him of his disease. This image, called the Mandylion or Image of Edessa, appears in history in around 525. Numerous replicas of this "image not made by human hands" remain in circulation. As recently as the 19th century, it was not uncommon to find prints of this icon in the homes of Anglicans, along with framed copies of the correspondence between Jesus Christ and the King of Edessa.[citation needed]
The current image used by the Vatican is based on the Shroud of Turin, whose records go back to 1353. Controversy still surrounds the Shroud of Turin and some have speculated it to be the same image as the Mandylion of Edessa, which disappeared in the wars surrounding the fall of the Byzantine Empire shortly before then. The image from the Shroud of Turin is based on amateur photographer Secondo Pia's photograph of 1898 and is used by the Vatican as part of the official Catholic devotion to the Holy Face of Jesus. The image can not be clearly seen on the Shroud of Turin with the naked eye and surprised Pia to the extent that he stated that he almost dropped and broke the photographic plate when he first saw the developed image on it the evening of May 28, 1898.
Prior to 1898 devotions to the Holy Face of Jesus used an image based on the Veil of Veronica, where legend recounts that Veronica from Jerusalem encountered Jesus along the Via Dolorosa on the way to Calvary. When she paused to wipe the sweat from Jesus's face with her veil, the image was imprinted on the cloth.
The establishment of these images as Catholic devotions traces back to Sister Marie of St Peter and the Venerable Leo Dupont who started and promoted them from 1844 to 1874 in Tours France, and Sister Maria Pierina De Micheli who associated the image from the Shroud of Turin with the devotion in 1936 in Milan Italy.
There are also icon compositions of Jesus and Mary that are traditionally believed by many Orthodox to have originated in paintings by Luke the Evangelist.
Several Hadith quote the Prophet Muhammad describing Isa (the Islamic name of Jesus) as he appeared in a dream, and during prophet Muhammad's ascension to Heaven:
 Jesus as the Good shepherd. Ceiling of S. Callisto catacomb, mid 3rd century. |
 A representation of Jesus as the sun-god Helios/Sol Invictus riding in his chariot. Mosaic of the 3rd century on the Vatican grottoes under St. Peter's Basilica. |
 Mural painting from the catacomb of Commodilla. One of the first bearded images of Jesus, late 4th century. |
 Jesus depicted on an early 8th-century Byzantine coin. After the Byzantine iconoclasm all coins had Christ on them. |
 11th-century Christ Pantocrator with the halo in a cross form, used throughout the Middle Ages. Characteristically, he is portrayed as similar in features and skin tone to the culture of the artist. |
 Christ in majesty, still with no beard, from an English 12th century illuminated manuscript. |
 An unusual image of Jesus as a medieval knight bearing an attributed coat of arms based on the Veil of Veronica |
 The Baptism of Christ, by Piero della Francesca, 1449. |
 Christ as Man of Sorrows by Andrea Mantegna |
 Christ Carrying the Cross, 1580, by El Greco |
 An traditional Ethiopian depiction of Jesus and Mary with distinctively "Ethiopian" features. |
 Jesus, aged 12, in discussion with scholars at the Temple, by José Ribera. |
 A Chinese depiction of Jesus and the rich man, from Mark chapter 10. |
 A mural depicting the baptism of Jesus in a typical Haitian rural scenery, Cathédrale de Sainte Trinité, Port-au-Prince, Haiti. |
 Depiction of Jesus and His Most Sacred Heart |
2007-08-16.jpg) The Divine Mercy painting by Adolf Hyla (1943).The polish writing at the bottom means "Jesus I trust in you" |
 Michelangelo's Pietà shows Mary holding the dead body of Jesus. |
 Cristo de la Concordia in Bolivia is the largest statue of Jesus ever made. |
.jpg) Cristo del Otero, above Palencia, Spain |
|
 Statue at Santuario di Oropa, Italy |
 4 ton bronze statue of Jesus placed high in the Andes mountains, on a road between Chile and Argentina. |
 Bertel Thorvaldsen's Christus, Church of Our Lady, Copenhagen |
 Infant Jesus of Prague, one of several miniature statues of an infant Christ that are much venerated by the faithful. |
