LEAP year. The study window wide to the sun, the white cat upside down to its warmth, the nesting birds bouncing over the new grass. At St Edmundsbury, we are creating the Edmund centre for arts and theology. Art and theology are indivisible, of course, but sometimes it is necessary to point out their unity. Liturgy is art. Prayer is high art.
The Lenten desert was hideously artless for Jesus. A barbaric experience. Perhaps, when it entered his head that a jump from the Temple dome would rescue him from the degradation of execution, the beauty of Herod’s creation lit up the desert darkness, and art itself revealed its imperishable nature.
Tragically, at the same time, he knew that the Romans would not let a work of art inspire a national rebellion. That they would not allow one stone to stand upon another. The loveliness of the Temple, of Jerusalem itself, made him cry.
Art and theology has to be understood at all levels. To assume that their connection is generally comprehended is one way of demolishing the temple. A friend finds that he has one of those updated hymn-books in his London church, where a politically correct hand has improved Herbert, Cowper, Wesley, etc. Where the little ignorant foxes have nibbled their way through the inspired text. So what to do?
How strange it is that everything should be understood. That a common denominator should be the rule. Our village church sings Newman’s “Praise to the Holiest in the height” with praiseworthy obscurity, getting its tongue round the poetry, and, maybe, its head round the sense. Ancient Mrs Smith in the second pew there, “What is a higher gift than grace?”
I have always enjoyed the clashes between the creative impulse and strict theology in scripture, between the Word and its imagery. It is where the artist, the poet, steps in, not to say big business. St Paul, in his attack on the cult of Diana at Ephesus, threatened its thriving silversmiths and caused a riot. Was the golden calf beautiful? a work of art?
One of my favourite “artist” stories in the Old Testament, because it describes the process of utility to art so accurately, is in Isaiah 44. He takes two craftsman, a blacksmith and a carpenter, to task. As an essential part of society, they could lead us all astray; for, besides being craftsmen, they are apt to be artists. They have the power to make useful things into aesthetic things. They must remain utilitarian, and not make objects that are so wonderful that one wants to worship them.
God told Moses: “Do not make graven images, because, if you do, you are bound to lend them some of my holiness (wholeness).” And yet Moses had glorious works of art in beaten gold, the cherubim with spreading wings and looking into each other’s lovely faces, seated above the Ark.
Other than the silver statues of Diana, there are no images in the New Testament. Yet Christianity would only be a few years old when the face of Jesus would be painted on the catacomb walls, and his early worshippers would begin to picture his teachings in every church. One meaning of iconoclasm is to make a face unidentifiable.
A Victorian St Alban stands on our reredos, a young soldier in a kilt — unworshipped, but loved; far away in time, yet close. An artist made him, and kept him near.