Notes from my Knapsack 12-22-22
Jeff Gill
How modern are we, really, in December?
___
We are modern, connected, high tech, highly evolved people here in 2022, and maybe we're ready for 2023 and maybe we aren't.
What we're still afraid of is the dark.
When nighttime starts just after noon, and morning doesn't come until long after we're up and at 'em, there's not enough daylight to give us the strength and hope and vision we need.
Our screens and texts and online content can't generate enough light and illumination to get us through our days, and we need . . . well, we need light.
So whatever your religion or spiritual orientation, you probably have some lights strung around somewhere. Garlands or menorahs or trees, strands outside or mantlepieces in the family room, we crave and covet and display our lights, shining out as evening settles around us and glowing where otherwise shadows would dominate.
Yard displays and candles in the windows are everywhere, and almost always welcomed. In downtown Newark, the longstanding tradition of lighting the courthouse has been shrouded by the necessity to limit the decorations, due to work finishing the refurbishment of the long-neglected seat of our county judiciary. Windows being replaced and cranes rolling about the lawn means the festive whole is about half this year — not forever, just for now — and the larger displays out on the grounds are nowhere to be seen. And people are fussing like you wouldn't believe, because we do not want less light, we want more.
More colors, more bulbs, in more places. Lighting the tree is not enough, it's got to be the staircases and side tables and up on the housetop if possible. Lights everywhere we can put them.
Because truth be told we're not all that modern. It may be 2022 but it's a thousand years ago or more in our hearts, and while the astronomers and almanac makers are confident that after about the 25th of December days will get longer, there's a part of us that's not sure. Daylight gets shorter and shorter and shorter and we're all getting to where we can't hardly remember what it's like to drive home under the sun and enjoy an evening on the porch. We dress in the dark in the morning and come home to . . . well, we hope to see our lights on if the timers work, because that's what we're pushing back against.
I do think each year at this time about the people who lived here for millennia, building mounds and earthworks, living in their log and bark and hide homes, looking into the fire and watching the smoke rise up to the opening overhead, tracking the sun and the moon but wondering: will days ever get longer again? Will all become night? How can we summon again the light and life of spring?
It's too easy to think of those as primitive times, and the people likewise, but we feel it in our bones as well. A certain uncertainty about day and night and light and dark. So we string our lights, light our candles, shine bulbs and spots and projectors into the night, to push it away, and call back the sun.
Soon, though, we will see it. And feel that, too, in our bones. Life will return; hope is coming.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's ready for some blue sky if not green shoots any day now. Tell him how you get through winter at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Tuesday, December 06, 2022
Faith Works 12-30-22
Faith Works 12-30-22
Jeff Gill
Work, for the night is coming
___
Imperceptibly, the days are getting longer. You may have to take it on faith, but they are.
At year's end, we feel the darkness weighing down on us. Night is coming, we think, starting about half past noon. There's more evening than daylight, and night goes on forever. Or so it seems, getting up in the dark to head to work.
There's a hymn from my childhood that comes to mind this time of year: "Work, for the night is coming." I didn't realize until more recently the song comes from the Bible, in John 9:4 where Jesus says "We must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work." Literally, the Greek of that last phrase is "it is coming night, when no one is able to work," inclusive in emphasis. No woman or man, no one can work when night falls, so let's get the job done now.
Or as the lyrics say: "Work, for the night is coming: Work through the morning hours; Work while the dew is sparkling: Work mid springing flowers…" The first verse starts with a hint of hope before turning to night, reminding us of the light we have, going on with "Work when the day grows brighter; Work in the glowing sun; Work, for the night is coming, When man's work is done."
Anna Louisa Walker was born in England, and when she wrote the lyrics of this hymn as a poem in the 1860s, her family had moved to Sarnia, Ontario where nights would have been even longer in the winter than they are in Ohio. Her father was an engineer on the railroads, which would certainly have been a daylight endeavor in the Nineteenth Century, building them or running on them. "Work, for the night is coming."
There's a somber turn in the lyrics: "Work, for the night is coming, Under the sunset skies; While their bright tints are glowing, Work, for daylight flies." And then downright morbidly: "Work till the last beam fadeth, Fadeth to shine no more; Work, while the night is darkening, When man's work is o'er."
Jesus may not have meant quite what Annie was saying, but in either case, the point is the same: use the time you have. Use it well, because as another more recent song says, we may never pass this way again.
If there is a midnight thought, a nighttime reflection I would take from both Christ's words in John's Gospel and this old-fashioned hymn, it's less about the waning of the light, as the fact that with night comes rest, and dreams, and in what Jesus is fairly directly implying, a new sort of day is coming where things are different, where work may not even be part of the next phase of the plan. We have light to do the work set before us, but when night falls, the task changes.
May the turn to the new year open up new light for you, as the sun sets on the year now past. Not so much an end, as a new beginning; but until then, let's finish what's at hand, or at least be ready to set it aside and move on to where God calls us.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's ready to move on from 2022. Tell him what you're looking forward to at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Work, for the night is coming
___
Imperceptibly, the days are getting longer. You may have to take it on faith, but they are.
At year's end, we feel the darkness weighing down on us. Night is coming, we think, starting about half past noon. There's more evening than daylight, and night goes on forever. Or so it seems, getting up in the dark to head to work.
There's a hymn from my childhood that comes to mind this time of year: "Work, for the night is coming." I didn't realize until more recently the song comes from the Bible, in John 9:4 where Jesus says "We must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work." Literally, the Greek of that last phrase is "it is coming night, when no one is able to work," inclusive in emphasis. No woman or man, no one can work when night falls, so let's get the job done now.
Or as the lyrics say: "Work, for the night is coming: Work through the morning hours; Work while the dew is sparkling: Work mid springing flowers…" The first verse starts with a hint of hope before turning to night, reminding us of the light we have, going on with "Work when the day grows brighter; Work in the glowing sun; Work, for the night is coming, When man's work is done."
Anna Louisa Walker was born in England, and when she wrote the lyrics of this hymn as a poem in the 1860s, her family had moved to Sarnia, Ontario where nights would have been even longer in the winter than they are in Ohio. Her father was an engineer on the railroads, which would certainly have been a daylight endeavor in the Nineteenth Century, building them or running on them. "Work, for the night is coming."
There's a somber turn in the lyrics: "Work, for the night is coming, Under the sunset skies; While their bright tints are glowing, Work, for daylight flies." And then downright morbidly: "Work till the last beam fadeth, Fadeth to shine no more; Work, while the night is darkening, When man's work is o'er."
Jesus may not have meant quite what Annie was saying, but in either case, the point is the same: use the time you have. Use it well, because as another more recent song says, we may never pass this way again.
If there is a midnight thought, a nighttime reflection I would take from both Christ's words in John's Gospel and this old-fashioned hymn, it's less about the waning of the light, as the fact that with night comes rest, and dreams, and in what Jesus is fairly directly implying, a new sort of day is coming where things are different, where work may not even be part of the next phase of the plan. We have light to do the work set before us, but when night falls, the task changes.
May the turn to the new year open up new light for you, as the sun sets on the year now past. Not so much an end, as a new beginning; but until then, let's finish what's at hand, or at least be ready to set it aside and move on to where God calls us.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's ready to move on from 2022. Tell him what you're looking forward to at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Faith Works 12-23-22
Faith Works 12-23-22
Jeff Gill
A manger is also a library of sorts
___
When you look at a manger scene, or crèche as some call them, you see a visual sermon that goes back to St. Francis of Assisi, we're told.
He arranged what today we call a "living nativity" outside a church at Christmastime, and you still see those, but from Italy now around the world it's common to see manger scenes in ceramic or plastic, woodcarved or handcrafted in any number of media, to depict the scene of Jesus having been born in Bethlehem.
We don't know there were three magi, but we go with it because of three gifts; the wise men are in a completely different account than the shepherds adoring the child born to be the Christ, in Matthew versus Luke's account where the stable setting may or may not be accurate to the time and place.
However, I want to sing out loud and strong on behalf of crèche sets and manger scenes, whether anachronistic or historically accurate. With good Francis and many other manger aficionados I celebrate how the classic crèche actually nods to a wide range of prophecies and citations from across the Bible to get us to that holy night. It's a library in miniature, the Bible fleshed out in an assembly of figures.
First there's the overall setting of Bethlehem, which we get from Micah 5:2: "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."
As for the stable, however you translate "ketaluma" from the Greek, there's Isaiah 1:3: "The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand" as the prophet notes that people in general will not realize what's going on, but everyday farm animals might.
A little further on in Isaiah, chapters 7 & 9, we get the young woman, a virgin giving birth, a baby to save the nation: "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel… For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder - and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."
In Hosea 11 we hear of how the Messiah will come "out of Egypt" and in Psalm 72 the kings of the East come with gifts and gold; again we hear from Isaiah in chapter 60, "A multitude of camels shall cover you, the young camels of Midian and Ephah; all those from Sheba shall come. They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall bring good news, the praises of the LORD."
In fact, the star they follow along with the idea of distant kings coming to draw near and worship is foretold all the way back in Numbers 24, with the narrative of Balak the king and Balaam the vessel of God's blessings, and specifically in verse 17 "a star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel."
And shepherds are all over scripture, but Isaiah 40:11 gives us a familiar picture of God: "He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young."
Your manger scene is a three-dimensional Bible waiting to be read by you this Christmas.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's got a few manger scenes around the house with stories of their own. Tell him your tales at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
A manger is also a library of sorts
___
When you look at a manger scene, or crèche as some call them, you see a visual sermon that goes back to St. Francis of Assisi, we're told.
He arranged what today we call a "living nativity" outside a church at Christmastime, and you still see those, but from Italy now around the world it's common to see manger scenes in ceramic or plastic, woodcarved or handcrafted in any number of media, to depict the scene of Jesus having been born in Bethlehem.
We don't know there were three magi, but we go with it because of three gifts; the wise men are in a completely different account than the shepherds adoring the child born to be the Christ, in Matthew versus Luke's account where the stable setting may or may not be accurate to the time and place.
However, I want to sing out loud and strong on behalf of crèche sets and manger scenes, whether anachronistic or historically accurate. With good Francis and many other manger aficionados I celebrate how the classic crèche actually nods to a wide range of prophecies and citations from across the Bible to get us to that holy night. It's a library in miniature, the Bible fleshed out in an assembly of figures.
First there's the overall setting of Bethlehem, which we get from Micah 5:2: "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."
As for the stable, however you translate "ketaluma" from the Greek, there's Isaiah 1:3: "The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand" as the prophet notes that people in general will not realize what's going on, but everyday farm animals might.
A little further on in Isaiah, chapters 7 & 9, we get the young woman, a virgin giving birth, a baby to save the nation: "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel… For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder - and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."
In Hosea 11 we hear of how the Messiah will come "out of Egypt" and in Psalm 72 the kings of the East come with gifts and gold; again we hear from Isaiah in chapter 60, "A multitude of camels shall cover you, the young camels of Midian and Ephah; all those from Sheba shall come. They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall bring good news, the praises of the LORD."
In fact, the star they follow along with the idea of distant kings coming to draw near and worship is foretold all the way back in Numbers 24, with the narrative of Balak the king and Balaam the vessel of God's blessings, and specifically in verse 17 "a star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel."
And shepherds are all over scripture, but Isaiah 40:11 gives us a familiar picture of God: "He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young."
Your manger scene is a three-dimensional Bible waiting to be read by you this Christmas.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's got a few manger scenes around the house with stories of their own. Tell him your tales at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Faith Works 12-16-22
Ben — you've got the last of the courthouse series in hand, I trust, for 12-9, and here's 12-16; I will send along 12-23 & 12-30 shortly since I'm sure you're doing set-ups early.
Pax, Jeff
Faith Works 12-16-22
Jeff Gill
Angels in the architecture
___
Angels are part of the Christmas story, in Luke & Matthew, speaking and singing to shepherds and sleepers alike. Both Mary & Joseph hear from angels of the Lord, messengers of God.
Some are named, like Gabriel, others part of a heavenly host, a solid phalanx of angelic representatives.
I like how angels can appear in dreams, or in person; in the air, or behind closed doors. They are wherever God wants them to be; they speak for God, and keep the plans of God on track.
Jesus is not an angel; those who die are not transformed into angels although folk spirituality has created that impression. You could debate at length the nature and make-up of a heavenly host, which perhaps includes both angels and the saints in glory, all mixed together in a chorus of celebration.
What angels are is the Word of God made active; messenger is a close approximation of the Hebrew or Greek we translate into our English word which is mostly a transliteration of the Greek. "Messengers divinely appointed and empowered" is a wordy way to translate "angelos" or "mal'akh" but it helps to get away from the sweet faced winged robe-wearer, which is the visually "wordy" way we see angels when we think of them.
"Angels bending near the earth" is the carol's phrase, evoking their heavenly home while pointing out where they're at work, right here. A perennial challenge of the Christmas season is to get to where we "in solemn stillness" can get ourselves to that we might "hear the angels sing."
We may not talk about "cloven skies" as that Unitarian minister did in 1849 for his lyrics, a war ending in Mexico and peace, then as now, elusive, but we share with Rev. Sears a desire to "rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing." Over the cacophony of our world's "Babel sounds, the blessed angels sing" but we have to listen, we have to hear with open ears, welcoming hearts, in order to notice that God's messengers really are at work in the world. Angels, yes, some noticeable; some, well, as Hebrews 13:2 says "Forget not to show love unto strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."
Angels may sing through classic carols and new, contemporary praise songs; they're even more likely to be encountered through those you help or even, God help us, those we let help ourselves. God can use almost anyone, even any donkey or ox or lamb, as a messenger, but kindly person is perhaps the most likely to be a messenger, intended or otherwise, unawares or entirely mindful.
We have angels in the art at the courthouse, whispering something I'm still straining to hear; there are angels at work in the streets, on Saturdays at noon along Main Street or evenings at the Salvation Army, on Sundays in churches and on any given Tuesday in the most unexpected of places. The world in solemn stillness waits, perhaps, to hear the angels speak of good will; to hear fellow creatures sing for joy, to hope for peace on earth, in angelic music or more earthly whispered reassurances.
May you never drive faster than your guardian angel can fly, as the old saying goes, and may your hearing never grow so dim as to not be able to hear the angels singing.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's glad to run into angels even when they have to remind him to be not afraid. Tell him what you hear them singing at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Pax, Jeff
Faith Works 12-16-22
Jeff Gill
Angels in the architecture
___
Angels are part of the Christmas story, in Luke & Matthew, speaking and singing to shepherds and sleepers alike. Both Mary & Joseph hear from angels of the Lord, messengers of God.
Some are named, like Gabriel, others part of a heavenly host, a solid phalanx of angelic representatives.
I like how angels can appear in dreams, or in person; in the air, or behind closed doors. They are wherever God wants them to be; they speak for God, and keep the plans of God on track.
Jesus is not an angel; those who die are not transformed into angels although folk spirituality has created that impression. You could debate at length the nature and make-up of a heavenly host, which perhaps includes both angels and the saints in glory, all mixed together in a chorus of celebration.
What angels are is the Word of God made active; messenger is a close approximation of the Hebrew or Greek we translate into our English word which is mostly a transliteration of the Greek. "Messengers divinely appointed and empowered" is a wordy way to translate "angelos" or "mal'akh" but it helps to get away from the sweet faced winged robe-wearer, which is the visually "wordy" way we see angels when we think of them.
"Angels bending near the earth" is the carol's phrase, evoking their heavenly home while pointing out where they're at work, right here. A perennial challenge of the Christmas season is to get to where we "in solemn stillness" can get ourselves to that we might "hear the angels sing."
We may not talk about "cloven skies" as that Unitarian minister did in 1849 for his lyrics, a war ending in Mexico and peace, then as now, elusive, but we share with Rev. Sears a desire to "rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing." Over the cacophony of our world's "Babel sounds, the blessed angels sing" but we have to listen, we have to hear with open ears, welcoming hearts, in order to notice that God's messengers really are at work in the world. Angels, yes, some noticeable; some, well, as Hebrews 13:2 says "Forget not to show love unto strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."
Angels may sing through classic carols and new, contemporary praise songs; they're even more likely to be encountered through those you help or even, God help us, those we let help ourselves. God can use almost anyone, even any donkey or ox or lamb, as a messenger, but kindly person is perhaps the most likely to be a messenger, intended or otherwise, unawares or entirely mindful.
We have angels in the art at the courthouse, whispering something I'm still straining to hear; there are angels at work in the streets, on Saturdays at noon along Main Street or evenings at the Salvation Army, on Sundays in churches and on any given Tuesday in the most unexpected of places. The world in solemn stillness waits, perhaps, to hear the angels speak of good will; to hear fellow creatures sing for joy, to hope for peace on earth, in angelic music or more earthly whispered reassurances.
May you never drive faster than your guardian angel can fly, as the old saying goes, and may your hearing never grow so dim as to not be able to hear the angels singing.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's glad to run into angels even when they have to remind him to be not afraid. Tell him what you hear them singing at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Faith Works 12-2-22 & 12-9-22
Faith Works 12-2-22
Jeff Gill
Turning from thanksgiving to expectation
___
We spent most of November talking about the Courthouse angels, figures perhaps of harvest and death, but perhaps a bit more.
From the outside, four figures of Justice dominate people's image of the courthouse square. But if you go inside, if you are caught up in the austere majesty of the law at work, you will find Ludwig Bang's two angels keeping your attention. But let's not forget the man, the woman, and the child, clearly meant to be the same persons repeated in both paintings, while the angels seem different.
And the tools. In one the man wields a scythe, the other the same man a musket. It does not take a preacher, I think, for this passage to come to mind: "They shall beat their swords into plowshares; and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore."
From Isaiah 2:4 we get a comprehensive vision of harvest tools, plowshares for grain, pruning hooks for grapevines. Mingled and mixed, grain and grapes, bread and wine.
But there's also an evocation of Revelation, chapter 14, in a section often headed "The Harvest of the Earth": "Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and seated on the cloud one like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head, and a sharp sickle in his hand. And another angel came out of the temple, calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, "Put in your sickle, and reap, for the hour to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe." So he who sat on the cloud swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped."
You might well be thinking now not only of the Bible or the courthouse paintings, but of a song made famous by the Civil War, often sung in 1901 and still well known now: "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," with the lines "He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored." Grapes, wheat, pruning hooks, scythes, terrible swift swords, muskets.
The Revelation passage goes on: "Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, the angel who has authority over the fire, and he called with a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, "Put in your sickle and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth, for its grapes are ripe." So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God."
You could ask the question of our two angelic paintings behind the bar of justice in the heart of our courthouse: do I read them left to right like the printed page, or right to left? Is the message one of the soldier with the gun heading into battle, later on to turn his hand to the harvest, symbolically giving up his weapon for farming tools as Isaiah foretold? That works against the story of the nursing infant on the left, now an upright if young child clinging to a protesting mother now also erect on the right. The growing child indicates a traditional narrative from left to right, while the prophetic story runs right to left, as does the echo of Winslow Homer's "Veteran in a New Field."
Perhaps the story is a question for us, the citizens whose courthouse this is.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's thinking that the prophetic call to beat swords into plowshares or scythes or pruning hooks is for every generation. Tell him what you think we need for peace to prevail at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
=+=+=+=
Faith Works 12-9-22
Jeff Gill
Preach the Gospel at all times, in many ways
___
Ludwig Bang is a minor German regional artist who has been preaching the Good News to Licking County since somewhere around 1901.
That's been my theme for some weeks now: to unveil the symbolism and messages in two paintings that perhaps too long have been seen as cryptic and obscure, not as the richly allusive and potentially compelling narratives they are.
Placed squarely behind the chief judge's bench in the center of the main courtroom in the Licking County courthouse, not only the artist who painted them but the officials who paid for and approved them had to be aware of what was being said in these visual images. They're not just two pictures selected for attractive, placid, decorative value.
There's a saying attributed to St. Francis of Assisi: "Preach the Gospel at all times; if necessary, use words." We're not sure who said it first, and it can be abused (nothing wrong with a good sermon!), but the message is clear. Good news, God's good news in particular, needs to be communicated by image and example and in song and story, not just from pulpits on Sundays.
I do not know Mr. Bang's religion. It would be safe but not certain to call him a Lutheran from his place of origin and ultimate destination, the resort community of Bad Doberan in northern Germany. I'm quite certain he knows his Bible from Isaiah in the Hebrew Scriptures to Revelation at the conclusion of the Christian testament.
And he knows his art, Winslow Homer much beloved in America, and Greek sculpture as seen through the lens of the Louvre.
The echo of "The Veteran in a New Field" is changed not just by the addition of a wife and child and angel overhead, but a subtle difference: he's wearing breeches and stockings in Bang's painting, evocative of Revolutionary garb. And the counterpart work showing the same man going off to war, if you look closely (and perhaps soon more visible after restoration work), shows unmistakably British soldiers marching across a distant battlefield. This may be work done in 1901 or just after, but the year 1876 is still blazoned across the exterior stonework, marking the centennial of American Independence, and the reminders are still all around of a heritage in wars both revolutionary and civil.
You could read the two paintings as a grim harbinger of doom, sacrifice bravely accepted even as a spouse mourns in advance, the child all uncomprehending, invoking the losses in 1776 and the 1860s as having built our republic to this date, flanked by two assassinated presidents on either side, Lincoln and McKinley. The price of liberty.
Or you could read them as a pairing which interrogates one other, and asks of us as the viewers: which way do we want the story to go? The angel of God's presence is with us in either case, but the initiative is with us as citizens, and as a nation. Do we continue to turn scythes into swords, or muskets, or worse, or can we send our veterans back to the farm, to their children and families, to peace?
The choice, Bang is saying, is ours.
You could call these paintings cryptic, and to the casual viewer, they are. But if you spend time reflecting and considering what the respective images are saying, to each other, and jointly to us, the viewers — witnesses and defendants and officers of the court and citizens in general — they are evocative and instructive works, which are still speaking to us, even in 2022.
And I suspect for many years to come.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he appreciates your patience in letting him guide you through these narrative paintings. Tell him if you think antique art can teach us today at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Turning from thanksgiving to expectation
___
We spent most of November talking about the Courthouse angels, figures perhaps of harvest and death, but perhaps a bit more.
From the outside, four figures of Justice dominate people's image of the courthouse square. But if you go inside, if you are caught up in the austere majesty of the law at work, you will find Ludwig Bang's two angels keeping your attention. But let's not forget the man, the woman, and the child, clearly meant to be the same persons repeated in both paintings, while the angels seem different.
And the tools. In one the man wields a scythe, the other the same man a musket. It does not take a preacher, I think, for this passage to come to mind: "They shall beat their swords into plowshares; and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore."
From Isaiah 2:4 we get a comprehensive vision of harvest tools, plowshares for grain, pruning hooks for grapevines. Mingled and mixed, grain and grapes, bread and wine.
But there's also an evocation of Revelation, chapter 14, in a section often headed "The Harvest of the Earth": "Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and seated on the cloud one like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head, and a sharp sickle in his hand. And another angel came out of the temple, calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, "Put in your sickle, and reap, for the hour to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe." So he who sat on the cloud swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped."
You might well be thinking now not only of the Bible or the courthouse paintings, but of a song made famous by the Civil War, often sung in 1901 and still well known now: "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," with the lines "He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored." Grapes, wheat, pruning hooks, scythes, terrible swift swords, muskets.
The Revelation passage goes on: "Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, the angel who has authority over the fire, and he called with a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, "Put in your sickle and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth, for its grapes are ripe." So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God."
You could ask the question of our two angelic paintings behind the bar of justice in the heart of our courthouse: do I read them left to right like the printed page, or right to left? Is the message one of the soldier with the gun heading into battle, later on to turn his hand to the harvest, symbolically giving up his weapon for farming tools as Isaiah foretold? That works against the story of the nursing infant on the left, now an upright if young child clinging to a protesting mother now also erect on the right. The growing child indicates a traditional narrative from left to right, while the prophetic story runs right to left, as does the echo of Winslow Homer's "Veteran in a New Field."
Perhaps the story is a question for us, the citizens whose courthouse this is.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's thinking that the prophetic call to beat swords into plowshares or scythes or pruning hooks is for every generation. Tell him what you think we need for peace to prevail at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
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Faith Works 12-9-22
Jeff Gill
Preach the Gospel at all times, in many ways
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Ludwig Bang is a minor German regional artist who has been preaching the Good News to Licking County since somewhere around 1901.
That's been my theme for some weeks now: to unveil the symbolism and messages in two paintings that perhaps too long have been seen as cryptic and obscure, not as the richly allusive and potentially compelling narratives they are.
Placed squarely behind the chief judge's bench in the center of the main courtroom in the Licking County courthouse, not only the artist who painted them but the officials who paid for and approved them had to be aware of what was being said in these visual images. They're not just two pictures selected for attractive, placid, decorative value.
There's a saying attributed to St. Francis of Assisi: "Preach the Gospel at all times; if necessary, use words." We're not sure who said it first, and it can be abused (nothing wrong with a good sermon!), but the message is clear. Good news, God's good news in particular, needs to be communicated by image and example and in song and story, not just from pulpits on Sundays.
I do not know Mr. Bang's religion. It would be safe but not certain to call him a Lutheran from his place of origin and ultimate destination, the resort community of Bad Doberan in northern Germany. I'm quite certain he knows his Bible from Isaiah in the Hebrew Scriptures to Revelation at the conclusion of the Christian testament.
And he knows his art, Winslow Homer much beloved in America, and Greek sculpture as seen through the lens of the Louvre.
The echo of "The Veteran in a New Field" is changed not just by the addition of a wife and child and angel overhead, but a subtle difference: he's wearing breeches and stockings in Bang's painting, evocative of Revolutionary garb. And the counterpart work showing the same man going off to war, if you look closely (and perhaps soon more visible after restoration work), shows unmistakably British soldiers marching across a distant battlefield. This may be work done in 1901 or just after, but the year 1876 is still blazoned across the exterior stonework, marking the centennial of American Independence, and the reminders are still all around of a heritage in wars both revolutionary and civil.
You could read the two paintings as a grim harbinger of doom, sacrifice bravely accepted even as a spouse mourns in advance, the child all uncomprehending, invoking the losses in 1776 and the 1860s as having built our republic to this date, flanked by two assassinated presidents on either side, Lincoln and McKinley. The price of liberty.
Or you could read them as a pairing which interrogates one other, and asks of us as the viewers: which way do we want the story to go? The angel of God's presence is with us in either case, but the initiative is with us as citizens, and as a nation. Do we continue to turn scythes into swords, or muskets, or worse, or can we send our veterans back to the farm, to their children and families, to peace?
The choice, Bang is saying, is ours.
You could call these paintings cryptic, and to the casual viewer, they are. But if you spend time reflecting and considering what the respective images are saying, to each other, and jointly to us, the viewers — witnesses and defendants and officers of the court and citizens in general — they are evocative and instructive works, which are still speaking to us, even in 2022.
And I suspect for many years to come.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he appreciates your patience in letting him guide you through these narrative paintings. Tell him if you think antique art can teach us today at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
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