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Joseph narrates. Jesus is now twelve years of age. Now read on!
“Et iam bis senos crescens exegerat annos,------------
necdum se populis signo detexerat ullo. [920]
Tum primùm cæpit Iudæa per oppida vulgo
illius apperere, palamque est prodita, virtus,
forte dies aderat genti solennis, et urbi
huic magnæ sacer ante alias, quò regia mecum
venerat et virgo, atque sequens sese aureus illi [925]
implicuit dextræ puer: et iam rite litatis
ipse domum sacris magna cum matre redibam.
Iamque labore viæ fessis lux prima peracta,
et piceam clauso nox coelo involverat umbram.
Defuit hìc puer, et genitricem meque fefellit. [930]
Tum consanguineos frustra et scitatus amicos,
terque, quaterque viam repetens clamore replevi.
Flebat se incusans unam pulcherrima mater,
flaventem fusa crinem per eburnea colla.
Ora decent lacrymæ, disjecti colla capilli: [935]
qualis virginea cùm mollis amaracus urna
et pluviam et ventos pariter perpessa procaces,
demisit turbata comas, iterumque resurgens
extulit os cælo, ac priscum meditatur honorem.
Dumque viam relego, invitum comes ægra sequuta est. [940]
Tres adeò incerti soles erravimus urbe
nequicquam; quarta est vix demum luce repertus.
Nanque mihi, et miseræ cùm spes sublata parenti
cuncta foret penitus, in mentem venit utrique
templa iterum petere, atque preces effundere ad aram. [945]
Vix ingressus eram limen, cùm protinus ambo,
ecce, sacerdotum in medio conspeximus illum
(prima rudimenta, et virtutis signa futuræ),
alta recensentem vatum monimenta, patrumque
primores ultro scitantem obscura, docentemque. [950]
“Illum omnes admirari haud vulgata canentem
supra aciem, captumque hominis, mentemque vigentem,
humana non vi edoctum, non arte magistra,
maturumque animi nimiùm puerilibus annis.
Nec minus insigni cunctis spectantibus ore [955]
gratus erat: neque enim poterant se explere tuendo
flagrantesque Dei vultus, blandosque serena
luce oculos magis, aut propexum verticis aurum,
et florem grati, qui vix inceperat, ævi.
Nam quocunque caput circum torsisset honestum, [960]
luce recens orta, vel sidere pulchrior aureo,
læta serenato ridebant omnia mundo;
et toto dulcem jactabat corpore amorem.
Inculti qualis nitet inter gramina campi,
purpureus se cùm primum foliis narcissus [965]
exeruit, ruptoque caput detexit amictu;
aut qualis nitidi species micat alma smaragdi,
cùm tenui argento, tenuive includitur auro.”
“He was, now, twelve years old, and still had not------------
revealed his true self to the people by any sign. [920]
Then for the first time he went among Judea’s
towns and people, manifesting his powers.
On a holy day, going into the city—
one of the year’s most sacred—the royal
virgin and I went, the golden child holding [925]
her right hand. After I had performed the rites
his blessed mother and I started for home.
Wearied by the journey, as the day ended
and the night sky wrapped the world in its shadow:
the boy was gone! He’d slipped away from us. [930]
We asked among friends and relatives in vain,
I ran the streets, three times, four, calling his name.
Filled with self-reproach, his lovely mother wept,
her blonde hair loose upon her ivory neck:
tears became her, as did her dishevelled hair. [935]
Like a tender marjoram plant in a maiden’s vase
shaken by wanton winds and rainfall, dropping
leaves like hair:—but it rises up again
shows its face to heaven and regains its beauty.
She came with me to look, though I begged her not. [940]
For three uncertain days we searched the city
in vain; but on the fourth we finally found him.
When the two of us had all but given up hope
in our misery we thought to return
to the temple and pray at the altar. [945]
As soon as we entered we saw him, surrounded—
imagine it!—by priests. Every eye was on him
(the first indication of his future powers),
reciting the words of the prophets, asking
and teaching too the elders about hidden things. [950]
“Everyone there was amazed by his wisdom,
displaying knowledge far beyond human ken:
no man had taught him this, no teacher’s skill—
his soul was vastly more mature than his years.
No less remarkable were his fine features [955]
the people there could not get enough of looking
at his divine face, his seductive and serene
eyes beaming with light, on his golden hair
and the first flowering of his gracious youth.
As he turned his noble head this way and that, [960]
lovely with light, more beautiful than a star,
all the world seemed to laugh with sheer delight;
and everything about him inspired sweet love.
He was like a flower growing brightly in the field,
a purple narcissus unfurling its petals [965]
unveiling its beautiful head; or like a
a precious sparkling emerald set in a
gorgeous filigree of silver and of gold.”
This celebrated episode is from Luke:
His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover. And when He was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem according to the custom of the feast. When they had finished the days, as they returned, the Boy Jesus lingered behind in Jerusalem. And Joseph and His mother did not know it; but supposing Him to have been in the company, they went a day’s journey, and sought Him among their relatives and acquaintances. So when they did not find Him, they returned to Jerusalem, seeking Him. Now so it was that after three days they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were astonished at His understanding and answers. So when they saw Him, they were amazed; and His mother said to Him, “Son, why have You done this to us? Look, Your father and I have sought You anxiously.”At the head of this post is Holman Hunt’s Finding of the Saviour in the Temple (1860)—one of my absolute favourite paintings (I have a full-sized reproduction framed and hanging in the downstairs hall: a present from my wife). Click on it to embiggen. It's an image that manages, somehow, to be absolutely crowded with detail without being over-busy or entailing any horror vacui clottedness. More, it balances figurative precision with an intuitive almost Bridget-Riley-esque grasp of abstract patterns of lines and cross-hatching (the pattern on Jesus's shift; the fretwork of the screen in the background; just astonishing). Hunt spent five years in the Holy Land sketching and researching the image. The models are all locals. This means that, in an unprecedented move in western art, Jesus looks like a Jew (because the model was Semitic)—unlike Vida's improbably blond-haired young god, described above.
And He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” But they did not understand the statement which He spoke to them. [Luke 2:41-50]
In Jerusalem Hunt met three generations of Rabbi from the same family, and painted them. You can see the family resemblance.
Grandfather, on the left, is blind, and clutches the Torah scroll like a safety-blanket: he represents the old order, too sightless to see that the messiah for whom he has waited all his life is right in front of him. The father, in the middle, might recognise Jesus for what he is, but is more concerned with his dad. That he has never emerged from his father's shadow is symbolised by the tefillin he is holding in his hand; not strapped onto his brow or forearm, as it would be if he were worshipping correctly, but balanced daintily in his fingers, to emphasise the disproportion between the hefty scroll his father clutches and the tiny fragment of the torah inside the little box. But the third generation, the young man on the right, the son, is a different matter. You can see in his eyes that Jesus is reaching him.
Unlike Millais' Christ in the House of His Parents (which headed yesterday's blog) Hunt's giant picture was a big hit with critics and public alike. Art-dealer Ernest Gambart bought it for £5,500—a huge sum in the 1860s (to call this ‘two million pounds in today's money’ would be ball-park, but neglects the radical differences in purchasing power of Victorian money: some things were much more expensive, relative to earnings, than today; others were much cheaper). Gambart didn't expend this enormous amount just to sit and look at the picture, mind you. It was a money-making proposition. First he toured the painting around the UK and Europe, then took it on a world-tour that crossed America and made its way as far as Australia. Punters queued to buy tickets so they could examine the painting up-close. Gambart earned £10,000 in the first year of this tour alone (though half of this sum went back to Hunt, part of the deal he'd negotiated on sale) and the picture continued earning though the 1860s. Moreover Gambart commissioned a large-scale and very detailed engraving from premier French engraver Auguste Blanchard. It cost Gambard dearly, but again he more than recompensed the money; the print sold all over the world.
Overall Gambart made many tens of thousands of pounds profit out of this one purchase. It did no harm to Hunt's commercial reputation either; his next painting, 1873's The Shadow of Death sold (to a rival dealer) for £20,000. There was big money to be made in these religious-themed masterpieces.
[Next: lines 969-1020]
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