Читать книгу Christ in Art - Ernest Renan - Страница 6

Joseph died before the public life of his son began, Mary thus remained the head of the family, and this explains why her son, when it was desired to distinguish him from the many others of the same name, was usually called the “son of Mary.” It seems that, by the death of her husband, a stranger in Nazareth, she retired to Cana, where she may have been a native. Cana was a small town eight or ten miles from Nazareth at the foot of the mountains which are on the perimeter north of the plain of Asochis. The prospect, less grand than at Nazareth, extends over the whole plain and is closed most picturesquely by the mountains of Nazareth and the hills of Tzippori. Jesus appears to have made this place his residence for some time. There he probably passed a portion of his youth, and thence came his first splendours.

He worked at the trade of his father, which was that of a carpenter. This was no humiliating or unwelcome circumstance. The Jewish customs demanded that the man devoted himself to intellectual labours and should apprehend an acceptable occupation.

What was the progress of the mind of Jesus during this obscure period of his life? Through what meditations did he launch out into the prophetic career? His history having come to us in the state of isolated stories and without exact chronology only allows us to make assumptions.

Jesus has no visions; God does not speak to him from without; God is in Him; he feels that he is with God, and he draws from his heart what he says of his Father. He lives in the bosom of God by uninterrupted communication; he does not see him, but he understands him without need of thunder and a burning bush like Moses, or a revealing tempest like Job, an oracle like the old Greek sages, of a familiar genius like Socrates, or of an angel Gabriel like Mohammed. The imagination and hallucination of St. Theresa, for example, are nothing in comparison. The intoxication of the Son proclaiming himself identical with God is also an entirely different thing. Jesus never for a moment enounces the sacrilegious idea that he is God. He believes that he is in direct communion with God; he believes himself the son of God. The highest consciousness of God which ever existed in the breast of humanity was that of Jesus.

It is clear, on the other hand, that Jesus, setting out with such proclivity of soul, will be in no way a speculative philosopher like Sakya-Mouni. Nothing is further from scholastic theology than the gospel. The speculations of the Greek fathers in regard to the divine essence come from an entirely different spirit. God conceived immediately as Father, this is the whole theology of Jesus. And that was not with him a theoretical principle, a doctrine more or less proven which he sought to inculcate. He used no argument with his disciples, he did not demand any of their attention. He did not preach his opinions, he preached himself. Oftentimes the greatest and most disinterested souls present, associated with a high degree of elevation, this peculiarity of perpetual attention to themselves and extreme personal susceptibility. Their persuasion that God is within them and is perpetually caring for them is so strong that they have no fear of imposing themselves upon others; with our reserve, our respect for the opinion of others, which is a portion of our weakness, they have nothing to do. This exalted personality is not egotism; for such men, possessed by their idea, gladly give their life to seal their work; it is the identification of the me with the object which it has embraced, carried to its last extent. It is pride to those who see in it only the personal fantasy of the founder; it is the finger of God to those who see the result. The fool here almost touches the inspired man; only the fool never succeeds.

Jesus undoubtedly did not at once reach this lofty affirmation of himself. But it is probable that from the very beginning he looked to God as a father. This is his great act of originality; in this he is in no way like his species. The God of Jesus is Our Father. “We hear him when we listen to a low whisper within us which says, “Father”. He is the God of humanity. Jesus will not be a patriot like the Maccabees, or a theocrat like Juda the Gaulonite. Rising boldly above the prejudices of his nation, he will establish the universal fatherhood of God. The Gaulonite maintained that men should die rather than give to another than God the name of “master”; Jesus leaves this name to whoever chooses to take it, and reserves for God a gentler title. According to the mighty ones of the earth, to him the representatives of force, a respect full of irony, he founds the supreme consolation, the recourse to the Father which each one has in heaven, the true kingdom of God which each one bears in his heart.

This name of “kingdom of God” or “kingdom of heaven” was Jesus’ favourite expression of revolution. Like nearly all the Messianic terms, it came from the Book of Daniel. According to the author of this extraordinary book, to the four profane empires, destined to be destroyed, will succeed a fifth empire which will be that of the saints and which will endure forever. This reign of God upon the earth naturally received the most diverse interpretations. In Jewish theology, the “kingdom of God” is usually nothing but Judaism itself, the true religion, the monotheistic worship, piety. During the latter portion of his life, Jesus believed that this reign was to be realized materially by a speedy renewal of the world. But this undoubtedly was not his first thought. The admirable moral which he draws from the idea of this father God is not that of enthusiasts who believe the world near its end, and who are preparing by ascetics for a chemical catastrophe. It is that of a world which desires to live and which has lived. “The kingdom of God is within you,” said he to those who subtly asked for external signs. The material conception of the divine advent was only a cloud, a passing error which death consigned to oblivion. The Jesus who founded the real kingdom of God, the kingdom of the meek and lowly, this is the Jesus of the earlier days, chaste days without alloy, when the voice of his Father resounded in his heart with a purer tone. There were then some months, perhaps a year, when God actually lived upon the earth. The voice of the young carpenter suddenly assumed extraordinary sweetness. Infinite charm radiated from his person, and the companions of his youth no longer recognized him. He still had no disciples, and the throng which pressed around him was neither a sect nor a school; but they felt already a common spirit, something gentle and penetrating. His lovely character, and doubtless one of those transporting countenances that, created around him a circle of fascination which hardly any, among this friendly and artless people, could resist.

Paradise had been, indeed, transported upon earth, had not the ideas of the young master too widely overstepped the level of common goodness, above which the human race has been incapable of being elevated. The brotherhood of men, sons of God, and the moral consequences which result from this, were deduced with an exquisite sentiment. Like all the rabbis of the time, Jesus had given little thought to consecutive reasoning, and instead, compressed his doctrine into aphorisms of a concise and expressive form, sometimes strange and enigmatical. Some of these maxims come from the books of the Old Testament. Others were the thoughts of more modern sages, especially of Antigonus of Soco, Jesus, the son of Sirach, and Hillel, which were known to him, not through learned studies, but as proverbs often repeated. The synagogues were rich in maxims very happily expressed and formed a sort of current proverb literature. Jesus adopted nearly all this oral instruction, infusing into it a higher meaning. Increasing ordinarily upon the duties declared by the Law and the elders, he demanded perfection. All the virtues of humility, of forgiveness, of charity, of abnegation, of severity to self, virtues that are rightly named Christian, if by that is meant that they were really preached by Christ, were in seeds of these first teachings. For justice, he contented himself with repeating the well known axiom, “Do not to others that which ye would not that they should do unto you.” But this ancient wisdom, which was still somewhat selfish, was not enough for him. He went far beyond:

“Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.”

“If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee.”

“Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you, pray for them that persecute you.”

“Judge not that ye be not judged. Forgive and ye shall be forgiven. Be merciful as your Father in heaven is merciful. It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

“Whosoever exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”

Rogier van der Weyden, The Adoration of the Magi, central panel, c. 1455.

Oil on oak panel, 138 × 153 cm.

Alte Pinakothek, Munich.

Gentile da Fabriano, Adoration of the Magi, 1423.

Tempera on wood panel, 303 × 282 cm.

Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

Lorenzo Monaco, Adoration of the Magi, 1421–1422.

Tempera on panel, 115 × 170 cm.

Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

Concerning alms, pity, good works, gentleness, the desire of peace, complete disinterestedness of heart, he had little to add to the doctrines of the synagogue. But he gave to them an accent full of unction, which made new aphorisms uttered long before. Morality is not composed of principles more or less expressed. The poetry of the precept, which makes it lovely, is more than the precept itself, taken as an abstract truth. Now, it cannot be denied that the proverbs borrowed by Jesus from his predecessors, produced, in the gospel, an effect totally different from that in the ancient Law. It is not the ancient Law, it is not the Talmud, which has conquered and changed the world. Little original in itself, if by that is meant that it can be recomposed almost entirely with more ancient maxims, the evangelical morality remains none the less the highest creation which has emanated from the human conscience, the most beautiful code of perfect life that any moralist has traced.