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Black Jesus painting will be installed in one of UK’s oldest cathedrals
Black Jesus painting will be installed in one of UK’s oldest cathedrals
By Hannah SparksJune 30, 2020
One of Britain’s oldest churches is paying tribute to the Black Lives Matter movement by installing a version of Leonardo Da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” with Jesus recast as a black prophet.
Dubbed “A Last Supper,” the reinterpretation of the original 15th-century artwork was painted by British painter Lorna May Wadsworth, who hired Jamaican model Tafari Hinds to pose as the son of God. The 9-foot print will be installed at the alter of St. Albans Cathedral in Hertfordshire — a move prompted by the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby.
“The church is not in a strong position to preach to others about justice, racial or otherwise,” the Rev. Dr. Jeffrey John, dean of St. Albans, said in a recent statement. “But our faith teaches that we are all made equally in the image of God, and that God is a God of justice.”
He added that the church transformed the altar because “black lives matter.”
In an effort to reconcile centuries of European colonization, Welby recently asked Church of England officials to consider the strong likelihood that Jesus Christ of Nazareth was not white. He went further by challenging churchgoers to embrace the many representations of Jesus, regardless of the Messiah’s depicted ethnicity.
“Jesus was Middle Eastern, not white. It’s important we remember this,” tweeted the archbishop on Saturday.
“But the God we worship in Christ is universal,” he continued, “and the hope he offers is good news for us all.”
Wadsworth’s controversial piece, completed in 2009, became a symbol of resistance after vandals used a pellet gun to deface the artwork.
“Experts agree he would most likely have had Middle Eastern features, yet for centuries European artists have traditionally painted Christ in their own image,” said Wadsworth. She explained that her intention was to “make people question the Western myth that he had fair hair and blue eyes” when she cast Hinds to pose as Jesus.
“My portrayal of him is just as ‘accurate’ as the received idea that he looked like a Florentine,” she continued.
St. Albans Cathedral, which dates back to the eighth century, said that the reimagined replica will not replace the copy of Da Vinci’s original work, which also hangs in the church.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday, the Archbishop was asked if the “way the Western church portrays Jesus needs to be thought about again,” the Daily Mail reported.
“Yes of course it does,” he responded.
“You go into churches [around the world] and you don’t see a white Jesus,” he said. “You see a black Jesus, a Chinese Jesus, a Middle Eastern Jesus — which is of course the most accurate — you see a Fijian Jesus.”
Welby explained that his intention was not to suppress past traditions, but to promote the “universality of the God who became fully human.”
https://nypost.com/2020/06/30/black-...ium=SocialFlow
I mean, while we can say that Jesus wasn't a European person but rather was a Semitic Jewish person, the idea of him having blue eyes and/or light pigmentation isn't far fetched really since there are Levantines who do have blue eyes and/or blonde hair. Now, the oldest depictions of Jesus doesn't show him as a Black man whatsoever, and thus, he would have resembled either like Bashar al-Assad or like some of the ancient Arab christians like Abjar the Great.
10th century depiction Abjar the Great, the Arab king of Edessa, with the icon of Jesus:
Bashar al-Assad:Abgar was described as "king of the Arabs" by Tacitus, a near-contemporary source.[2] According to Movses Khorenatsi, Abgar was an Armenian.[3] Yet both Robert W.Thomson and Richard G. Hovannisian state Abgar's Armenian ethnicity was invented by Khorenatsi.[4] Modern scholarly consensus agree that the Abgarids were in fact an Arab dynasty.[5][6][7][8][9][10]
Abgar V came to power in 4 BC. He became a Roman client, lost his throne in 7 AD and regained it five years later.
Armenian historian Movses Khorenatsi, or Moses of Chorene (ca. 410–490s AD), reported that the chief wife of King Abgar V was Queen Helena of Adiabene, the wife of King Monobaz I of Adiabene, and thus the kingdoms of Edessa and Adiabene were linked in some manner. Robert Eisenman suggests Queen Helena as one of the wives of King Abgar V, who allotted her the lands of Adiabene.[11] Professor Eisenman derived this association from Movses Khorenatsi mentioning the same famine relief to Judaea as does Flavius Josephus:
As to the first of Abgar’s wives, named Helena... She went away to Jerusalem in the time of Claudius, during the famine which Agabus had predicted; with all her treasures she bought in Egypt an immense quantity of corn, which she distributed amongst the poor, a fact to which Josephus testifies. Helena’s tomb, a truly remarkable one, is still to be seen before the gate of Jerusalem.[12]
Professor Eisenman goes on to equate King Abgarus V with the Agabus in Acts of the Apostles (Acts 11:27-30), because Agabus was identified with the same famine relief as Queen Helena. By necessity Eisenman then equates the biblical Antioch Orontes with Antioch Edessa, indicating that Paul the Apostle and Barnabas went to Edessa.[13]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abgar_V#Life
Either way, he was never Black whatsoever. If you think that identity politics will not creep into religion then think again.
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Originally Posted by Blondie
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