Tag Archives: motive

The Primary Motive You need to (Do) God

A cloud is mentioned as the source of the voice of God in the gospel accounts of the Transfiguration of Jesus (see below). Gertrud Schiller distinguishes three functions of the hand in Christian art: as symbol of either God’s presence or the voice of God, or signifying God’s acceptance of a sacrifice. There are three occasions in the gospels when the voice of God is heard, and the hand often represents this in visual art. In depictions of the Life of Christ, the hand often appears at the Baptism of Christ representing the voice of God, above the dove representing the Holy Spirit, which is much more common, thus showing the whole Trinity as present and active. In the Vienna Genesis the hand appears above the Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise. In early Christian and Byzantine art, the hand of God is seen appearing from above in a fairly restricted number of narrative contexts, often in a blessing gesture, but sometimes performing an action.

In Christian art, the hand of God usually occupies the form of a blessing gesture, if they are not performing an action, though some just show an open hand. In Christian art, the hand of God has traditionally been understood as an artistic metaphor that is not intended to indicate that the deity was physically present or seen in any subject depicted. In the art of the Amarna period in Egypt under Akhenaten, the rays of the Aten sun-disk end in small hands to suggest the bounty of the supreme deity. In the Paris Psalter, Moses, Jonah and Isaiah are all shown blessed by hands, from which rays of light come. How can we be transformed while we live – just as we are comforted by the transformation that happens in death, when we no longer have the struggles of life? He knows very elementary and natural characters of human beings so He has provided the settlement of all current struggles and subjects of contemporary world. It is my thought that says I can not imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation and is a reflection of human frailty .Our perception of God generally leads to a misunderstanding that severely affects our spiritual development.

Aleksei German who co-wrote the screenplay with Svetlana Karmalita. In Christianity, Paul the Apostle, in Romans 4:11-12, refers to Abraham as “father of all”, including those “who have faith, circumcised or uncircumcised.” From its founding, Islam likewise conceived of itself as the religion of Abraham. It is found from the 4th century on in the Catacombs of Rome, including paintings of Moses receiving the Law and the Sacrifice of Isaac. The Sacrifice of Isaac first appears in Christian art in 4th century depictions from the Roman catacombs and sarcophagi, as well as pieces like a fragment from a marble table from Cyprus. Abraham is restrained by the hand, which in the Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus grasped his knife hand, as the angel often does in other depictions. The motif of the hand, with no body attached, provides a problem for the artist in how to terminate it. A well known modern variant of the traditional hand motif is a sculpture of 1898 by Auguste Rodin called the Hand of God, which shows a gigantic hand creating Adam and Eve. Especially in Roman mosaics, but also in some German imperial commissions, for example on the Lothair Cross, the hand is clenched around a wreath that goes upwards, and behind which the arm then disappears, forming a tidy circular motif.

In Christian art the hand will often actually represent the hand of God the Son, or the Logos; this is demonstrated when later depictions start to substitute for the Hand a small half-length portrait of Christ as Logos in a similar circular frame. This relates to the approval of his sacrifice mentioned in the biblical text, and possibly also to the hand’s association with divinely ordained monarchy (see below), as Melchizedek was both priest and king according to Genesis 14:18-20, and his appearance in art is often to evoke this as well as his function as a type for Christ. This may or may not be a cruciform halo, indicating the divinity, and specifically the Logos, or Pre-existing Christ (see below). However, in many contexts the person of the Trinity intended cannot be confirmed from the image alone, except in those images, like the Baptism of Christ, where Jesus the Incarnate Christ is also present, where the hand is clearly that of God the Father. References to the hand of God occur numerous times in the Pentateuch alone, particularly in regards to the unfolding narrative of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt (cf. In Christian narrative images the hand most often emerges from a small cloud, at or near the top of the image, but in iconic contexts it may appear cut off in the picture space, or spring from a border, or a victor’s wreath (left).