In spite of myriads of issues to be tackled in christology, could you believe this is really still fussed over?
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Is this the true face of Jesus of Nazareth?
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We know of his rhetoric, his death and his miracles but none know the true face of Jesus Christ. The complexion and facial features of Christ and his various pictorial representations among different cultures and time periods has proved to be as much of a controversial topic in the early church as it is today. c. 305 AD, the synod of Elvira, an ecclesiastical ecumenical council (meaning a church council consisting of ministerial dignitaries and theologians which met to discuss issues) recorded various Canons’, of which Canon 36 states “Pictures are not to be placed in churches, so that they do not become objects of worship and adoration.” The Byzantine Council of Hieria in 754 AD also extended this view, condemning the “unlawful art of painting… the Incarnation of Christ”. Nonetheless, throughout Christian empires and tribes images of Jesus Christ have been produced and many have come to find comfort in these representations and even take these images as dogma for what Christ looked like. The issue the synod identified of “Pictures” becoming “objects of worship and adoration” is applicable to the problem of having several images of Christ. When one worships Christ and has a conceptualised image of him based on art it could be suggested that this is not truly Christ that is worshiped, but rather a false image. None can know the true features of Christ and, unhappily, scholarly theology has failed to identify his face or skin tone.
Even more unhappily, humans will be humans, and the race of Christ is prioritised in our question of who the man really was. I for one say that Jesus was in fact black and that Seth MacFarlane’s comic sketch of which “ass” he rode into town in was apt.
Of course, I’m not being serious. It would seem rather obvious to conclude that since Jesus is a Jew, born around 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem, modern day Palestine in the Middle East we could logically deduce that Jesus was of a brown complexion with Arabic features. However, many of the most popular paintings of Christ in European churches portray him as a white man with flowing brown locks and a beard, with this image being plastered on stained-glass windows, primary school RS textbooks and in Mel Gibson’s ‘The Passion of the Christ’. We know that images of Jesus proliferated several hundred years after his crucifixion with a spectrum of ethnicities representing Christ in their own way. Study of Art would have it that Jesus has many shades of skin. We have Indian Christ, Egyptian Christ, Italian Christ and Thai Christ but it seems that we do not have the true Christ, or even if we do images of the ‘white’ Christ have superseded these other multicultural renditions. It would seem to me that many societies have attempted to capture their concept of Christ in a way that would be familiar and comforting to its people, and therefore the varying images of Christ are dependent on the society of which they originate. Many white Europeans throughout history have assumed Jesus to be white. I can’t really imagine that when 17th century English Christians went to church to learn about Christ they thought they were learning about anything but a Caucasian figure as this image had been bombarded in their churches. It’s oh so simple to say that Jesus was not white and ignore the plethora of traditional blue eyed, white skinned images that are presented. But, how could anyone deny the dogma that is the representation of Christ that their church has given? Perhaps many men and women of colour are bitter at these commonly accepted white images of Christ because, as Rockwell Dilliman a pastor of Allegheny Centre Alliance Church in Pittsburgh said “the relations of white people to other ethnicities have often been marked by injustice and distrust.” So could Dillman be suggesting that slavery, genocide by Aryan white Nazi’s and catholic crusaders cause abhorrence toward the concept of a white Christ?
Perhaps this entire theological issue is why there is not much description of Christ’s colour or appearance in the bible, to avoid disputes that we have still managed to create for ourselves. The most you could find in the bible is the description of Jesus's feet being of "burnished bronze" or "burnt brass" in revelations 1, though the utility of this is questionable as it may simply represent his excellence and in position. But the point is, why on earth does it matter what colour Christ was? The idea of the debate itself definitely sums up the society in which we live in where a divine figure is unable to transcend the rudimentary practice of racial profiling. It seems that people want Christ to belong to a particular race, almost as if this would identify which race is “superior” as it is the race that Christ has chosen, pretty embarrassing. Does this proves that humans are incapable to discriminate against useful and unnecessary fact? The focus of Christ should be based upon his teachings of love, charity and selflessness, regardless of whatever skin tone he was. Why can’t his race simply be left in the dust? I care about what colour Christ was as much as I care about what size sandals he wore. In spite of its tediousness, people develop their most dogmatic and passionate arguments over the colour of Christ's skin. What is the real gain from it? If we find out the colour of Christ, then great. Now what? Does the race his human incarnation belongs to suddenly inherit ¾ of the earth’s land and solid gold medals? I doubt that even needs to be answered.
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| Chinesus Christ [耶穌基督] |
Our concern with the colour of Christ is tasteless and whether he be black, white, brown, oriental or kaleidoscopic it should never make an impact on the way we view him. It doesn’t make sense to belittle Christ’s legacy through petty disputes over his racial category. I’d rather not learn the true colour of Christ. To me, it simply doesn't matter. There is no problem with cultures or individuals developing their own depictions as this allows each of us to make the figure of Christ more personal as it is in our own idealised image. Does this mean that each of us is learning of the wrong christ because we may imagine his looks differently? No. What is of real importance is to focus on Christ’s sacrificial crucifixion, teachings and claim of being the son of God, not colour. Truly, I’m just waiting for the whole debate to end. His race is of no relevance and of no use.
