Second Week of Lent Reflection

Looking at the art:

This piece illustrates the commotion that ensued when Judas led a crowd of soldiers to arrest Jesus. One of the soldiers is carrying a torch because the place is so dark. Judas knew that Jesus would not be alone, so he had arranged to identify Jesus as the one he would kiss. That encounter is depicted on the right side of the background group. Notice that Judas not only kisses Jesus but he also draws him to himself with his arm extended around him, a gesture that is doubled by the armored arm of the arresting soldier. Another soldier is stationed behind Jesus wielding a rope at the ready to haul Jesus away. Spears and shields complete this frenetic scene. Amidst all this frenzy Jesus remains passive, not resistant, his two hands clasped at his waist in front of him between him and Judas, not returning Judas’s embrace. The foreground shows Simon Peter raising his sword to cut off the ear of Malchus, the slave of the high priest. See the slave on the ground as he falls and lets go of his lantern. 

All this action is captured as a woodcut. Woodcuts are made by cutting into the surface of a wooden printing block so that what remains are the raised lines that will be printed on a page when the block is inked and pressed on paper. Thus, this labor-intensive process involves cutting away what you don’t want to print. Imagine the patience and steadiness required to cut out all these intricacies, especially the design on the soldiers’ armor! The advantage is that the artist could make numerous portable prints which could be sold. In addition, woodcut images could easily be combined with the printed word as an illustration since, like the raised lines on a block, the printed word is formed by raised letters. It was perfect for illustrating scenes in a printed bible at a time when mechanical printing was replacing books printed and illustrated by hand. Albrecht Dürer was a master woodcutter and this piece is one of three biblical scenes our museum has on view as The Small Passion. 

Reflection

Dürer presents us with a very busy image of the betrayal of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. As I have gotten older, I am more and more in awe of how much the gospel writers can say in so few words. That happens here. In the narratives this is one paragraph at best, and for years it seemed to me like it was something that had to happen to get to the next scene. Today I am struck by how much there is in this brief little scene. What strikes me first is the setting, the garden. We have come full circle. Humanity begins in a garden and humanity steps away from God in a garden, the Garden of Eden. Now the first act of our salvation, our return to God, takes place in a garden, the Garden of Gethsemane. Some of the early writers believed that salvation was achieved here in the Garden of Gethsemane since the moment that Jesus accepted what was going to happen to him it was completed. Whether that is true or not I am struck by the garden not just because we come full circle but because gardens are special places, archetypically gardens are for lovers. They are places where young love is nurtured, where a couple sneaks off for some alone time. So, the world’s greatest lover, Jesus, comes to a garden to spend time alone with his God. We are told that he goes through an agony. In Greek, agonia, carries not just the present meaning of suffering and pain but was also used to describe the warm-up, the preparation that an athlete went through before a race or wrestling match, specifically the working up of a lather of sweat so that they would be ready to compete.  Jesus is suffering but he is also getting ready for, preparing himself for what is coming, his passion and death. It is true that Jesus accepts his death, but I think more importantly, as the evangelist will show us, Jesus is preparing himself for how he will die. He is alone, only three of his disciples are nearby and they fall asleep. Like all of us he will face his death alone. He will be abandoned by most of his trusted followers.

In Mark there is a sentence that disrupts the flow and seems to say nothing important: A young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus. When they seized him, he fled naked, leaving his garment behind. In this sentence the evangelist has much to say about the total abandonment that Jesus must have felt from his followers at this moment. Think of the hemorrhaging woman who wanted to just touch the hem of Jesus’s garment to be cured.  Clothes carried identity in this culture. Here a young man wants to get so far away from what is happening that he is willing to leave his garment, his identity behind. 

Jesus meets the soldiers after accepting his death and having chosen to die held securely in the arms of the God who has loved him. He has not given into the despair of being abandoned by those he loved or by asking his God to save him. He will continue to love even when he is betrayed by an act of love, a kiss. He will continue to heal, as he will heal the ear of Malchus that we see cut off. He will not let go of the light. 

Will I go to the garden? If I go, how will I be present? What will my agonia be like? Like Simon Peter will I fight, even though that is not what is being asked of me? Will I fall asleep, will I run away and refuse to be who I am because it is safer? Will I continue to love regardless of how I am treated? Will I hold onto the light?