"We were made to reflect an unstained glory, and our longing for that state won't be silenced by force. At best it can be locked in a closet of our souls, where it can only fester and either deaden or consume us....A shame-tainted theology might argue that bodies are bad, but an incarnational theology will have none of that. In refuting the Gnostics, Irenaeus insisted that God made us of earth and spirit "so that man and woman should be like God not only in their breath but also in their shaped flesh.".To believe in Christ's incarnation is to believe it is possible for mortal flesh to carry God's image". Karen Lee Thorpe - Is Beauty Dangerous?I found myself directed though a mailing this week to a particular conservative Christian website entry on whether it was right for Christians to be engaged in employing nudity in art.
The conclusion ( a clear "no"), and the route to get there was what might be termed a commonplace theological approach - I've encountered essentially the same argument for many years about any proximity to anything to do with nudity and other issues (beauty, for example). What was intriguing to my mind on this occasion was not so much what the article said as what it omitted to say, or at least, to spell out, in any valuable way to its audience. It is this lack or manner of omission, and what it says about a great deal of 'christian' thought that I'd like to seek to touch upon here, because those of us who both acknowledge 'the righteousness of God' manifest in Jesus Christ and that it is this same God who makes 'everything beautiful in its time', including the human form, do have a reason for what we do, and it is imperative that this is understood by the artist and the world in which we live.
The article in question jumps right into the creation story and talks about nudity in Eden and how this became a problem in the fall, so Adam and Eve are then given garments, and that, therefore, is the common state of play - clothing, with regards ourselves and God is to be viewed as 'appropriate and necessary' from then on, so Adam's evaluation in putting on fig leaves was, apparently sound, and we just have to live with that.
There are, however, problems here. The first, and perhaps most important, is that the 'nakedness' of humanity's shame is not the same physical 'nakedness' (known without shame) in the garden. If the problem being addressed here was merely to do with our bodies being naked, then the 'skins' (hides) God gives to them could have easily been provided as something which covers us all from birth to the grave, as with other creatures (actually, that doesn't work for other reasons, which I'll touch on shortly) - but the 'covering' given here by God is a purely practical one. Due to the collapse of what creation was meant to be, the world humanity now occupies will be bleak and harsh, marked with hardship - garments that would help protect in such circumstances were practical.
Adam's shame at his true 'uncovering' (which was much more than skin deep) in the fall was a good thing - it's how we all should feel about our wrong-doing. His seeking to mask his true condition, from God and others, by hiding and by covering-up, is the error so common to our broken race.
So is that the primary 'image', then, for where we are to derive our source approach to nudity and also towards art? Is the image of our expulsion from Eden, de-nuded of our original state and environ, the only basis for our brief engagement with the present until we sink into the dust, rid of the misery of bodies and natures plagued by sin and death? Is that really it?
The image is painfully strong and true - alienation (a profound lack of belonging) is something we all know and experience deeply - but even at the very moment this horror occurs in Eden, God is already showing that it is through the body itself that He will bring about the rescue and total renewal of all that had been lost. The 'seed of the woman' (an actual child) would totally destroy the slavery to a broken world. There, then, in the moment of our world's darkest tragedy, is given the promise, the first image, of reconciliation and recapitulation, and it is a bodily image - not some ethereal escape, dismembering and thereby departing from the physical, but a working through this world that would totally re-affirm our being made (as bodily creatures) as those bearing God's image and likeness (which brings me back to the matter I touched on in my second paragraph - it is our being 'naked and unashamed' that is part of that entire purpose).
Art in the Old Testament is all to do with this - this return to our true place of belonging, for 'religious' or cultural art is all to with the tabernacle and later, the temple, and these sacred places are essentially representations of both Eden and the new creation - that is why these are the places where God 'resides' (as types of a renewed humanity and earth - see G K Beale's 'The Temple and the Church's Mission' - a Biblical theology of the dwelling place of God). The place where these 'works of art' find their 'first' true (permanent) expression is in the Incarnation - in the fulfilment of the ancient promises in the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is this naked coming of God into our world which totally verifies the promise made in Eden.
It is simply not enough to codify our faith into a system whereby something is deemed 'good' or 'bad' because a particular ethic is employed here, or a cluster of Biblical references are made there - we are not Stoics or Epicureans, or their philosophical offspring, but those who evidence the overwhelming shock of 'the lamb, slain before the foundation of the world' being the source and purpose behind all things in Heaven and Earth in the mystery of God manifest in the flesh... that is the vital truth, the essential seed which must be at the very heart of our breath and life, and it is from there we should ask what of art, of the body, and our engagement with such?
In her article on the value of female beauty, Karen Black concludes: If we are going to move beyond pride and shame to a strong humility regarding our bodies, we must stop listening to the voices that tell us beauty is either trivial or dangerous. It does matter that every girl learns to see herself as beautiful and offer her beauty to those around her in appropriate ways. If Christianity is going to engage with nudity in art in a fashion that isn't merely dualistic (and thereby, of no benefit at all), then it must cradle its understanding in the manger of Christ reconciling the world to Himself, and this surely includes the very bodies He has died to redeem and resurrect. Perhaps, if we begin there instead of after the covering of the fall of our race, we will have much more to say and to do.Images: Joy, Contemplation and Consideration. Model:Magenta.
