108. Marriage and Family: Protecting the Weak and the Vulnerable

When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” [John 8:7, NRSV]

Max Beckmann, Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery, 1917.

In focusing on the person before the sin, which was what a previous post [No.106] did, the task of protecting the weak and the vulnerable in society as in the family was already alluded to. In 1 Corinthians 12, Saint Paul has famously insisted that the weakest part of the body demands the greatest care. That Pauline spirituality has found a deep home in the L’Arche communities founded by Jean Vanier.

Early in Matthew’s Gospel, where the spotlight was on Joseph, the Evangelist brought forth the point that, in obedience to the voice of God, Joseph, at great risk to himself, took care of the mother and child – the weak and the vulnerable within his immediate family unit, just as they were the weakest and the most vulnerable in the larger society at the time. Lectio divina at its best would yield these important working principles for all Christians:

Every child is a life and a gift from God. At whatever cost, you protect every child that is born. You have got to be pro-life [not just pro-birth].
You protect every woman caught on the wrong side of the law, for she represents the vulnerable, the prejudiced and the discriminated against, in society.

What we shall do here is to gather a few thoughts on the 1917 masterpiece by Max Beckmann who, more than any other artist that we know, has accentuated for us some key elements in Jesus’ ministerial and pastoral approach to one caught at her most vulnerable. Towards the end of the First World War, Beckmann painted a series of works with religious themes. The piece we are looking at illustrates the woman in John 8 who sought Jesus’ protection from an angry mob ready to stone her to death for adultery. The passage describes a confrontation between Jesus and the scribes and Pharisees over whether a woman, caught in an alleged act of adultery, ought to be stoned.

1. A Drama of Hands

Beckmann has chosen to tell the story through an assembly of characters in the shape of hands. The incredible variety and expressiveness of hands and their gestures has prompted some to view this painting as “a drama of hands.” In that drama, the artist relied on sharp contrasts to bring out the crowd’s legalistic and merciless attacks on the woman – one whom they called “sinner” – against the woman’s plea for mercy, and Jesus’ magnanimous protection of her as a human person, a child of God. While the artist intends every detail to communicate a message, his principal symbolic concentration is on the trio – Jesus, the woman and the clown.

1.1 Hands of Anger, Hate, Condemnation and Contempt

Agitated by the scribes and Pharisees, the mob was primed and ready to stone the adulterous woman. We see this ready-to-explode anger in the angry fists and condemning fingers.
Tightened fists raised in anger appear every which way. They are a direct expression of hate. Hate, Beckmann suggests, is the monster not with two but with three fists. There are three raised fists in the painting: two rude fists shaking furiously in the air shoot out from across the fence; the third, a flying fist right behind the contemptuous-clown appears as if it belongs to him, adding to his role as a hateful and a morally indignant person.
The contemptuous clownish-scoffer is the only character, other than Jesus, of whom the artist presents as having two hand-gestures.
There is the mocking, cruelly aggressive forefinger of the clownish scoffer. Finger-pointing is a direct expression of condemnation, disgust and contempt.
In placing the gesture of contemptuous finger-pointing in a special proximity to the third raised up fist, the artist seems keen to suggest a psychological aggregate. That is, where we see hate there will also be contempt and vice-versa.
The finger-pointing scoffer is contemptuous not only of the woman, dismissing her as a death-deserving sinner, but also of Jesus, laughing at his ludicrous attempt to save a doomed adulteress.
The right hand of the clownish scoffer tells another tale. Closed and withdrawn to its owner, this right hand shows that the owner thinks himself above Jesus and the woman, desiring not to be contaminated by them. This is a brilliant portrayal of a disgusted self-withdrawing from the object of contempt. While Jesus and the woman appear unified in spirit – the woman in her desperate cry for help; Jesus representing God’s compassion and mercy – the clownish-scoffer sets himself apart from the scene, his eyes closed to all this “moral nonsense”.
In fact, the scoffer’s finger-pointing hand practically touches his withdrawn and clasped right hand, both gestures betraying the owner’s ego-centric self who intends both to convey the unmistakable message of his own “sinless” pride even as he laughs to scorn Jesus’ futile help to a sinner such as this. His head is thrown backwards in utter contempt for all these goings-on that are patently “below” him.
The gesture of the hand with finger pointing to the heaven right behind the figure of Jesus, is a little more difficult to decipher. As it points to God’s power and God’s commandments, it can be the gesture of instigating punishment according to the will of God, or a reminder to people that it is not our human business to punish private and non-violent behaviour in the name of God.
The lancer’s hands are bent back by the impact of the crowd’s hatred.
While the soldiers personify militancy and present themselves as the defenders of morality, the artist seeks also to convey them as righteous bigots.

1.2 Hands of Plea, Prayers and Desperation

The woman, in a kneeling posture, with her hands clasped in prayer, symbolise a repentant and desperate supplicant’s plea for help.
With her eyes closed in the face of raised fists and haughtily pointed fingers of an angry mob, her raised and clasped hands signify her trust in Jesus’ saving help.
As the crowd’s hand-gestures point to a vehement demand for the termination of a worthless life, the woman’s hands communicate a plea for life, for allowing her to stay human, and be spared a punishment for sin that would virtually reduce her to the sub-human level of a “whore”.
Seeking not for eternal salvation at this pressing time, her prayers centre essentially on the right to life, to human dignity and to self-respect.
Her shawl is of the same colour as the hair of an anonymous man peering from behind the lances of the soldiers. Is the artist suggesting that this was the fellow with whom the woman had the adulterous rendezvous – hidden in the crowd and escaping attention? He is of course already on the other side of the fence, having escaped from the scene when they were caught “in the act”. But why was the man spared and the woman alone caught and charged? Why such grossly unfair treatment of the woman? Why such severe discrimination against the female? Why such deep prejudice? Why and how did the man get scot-free? [Do you find the same culture of prejudice against women in your church which you might want to speak up against or do something about?]

1.3 Hands of Divine Grace and Protection

Against those fired-up negative characters, Jesus is positioned by the artist as the central authoritative figure who firmly stands his ground. He is privileged to have not one, as do most of the protagonists of the painting, but two gestures. His hands tell some powerful tales.

In art, the right hand signifies the “good” hand, the divine hand, the saving hand of grace and mercy and so on. Here, Jesus’ cupped right hand, serving as a divine receptacle, signifies the magnanimity and the grace of God who elevates the value of the sinner in spite of her sin.
The wounded spirit of the woman is received into the divine receptacle for protection, consolation and rest.
The thrust of the mocker’s index finger, symbolsing the insults of the mob, is absorbed by Christ’s cupped right hand signifying the conciliatory force of God.
Jesus’ left hand, “shaped like an elongated Gothic arch”, is raised uncompromisingly in defence of the sinner, blocking people’s offence and neutralizing their hate. Like a concave mirror, this left hand collects and repels all the scorn of the self-righteous accusers, pushing back insults and menaces.
The desperate supplicant’s wave of devotion is taken up by Christ, conducting it heavenward by His left fingers.
Jesus’ gestures in both hands point to the heart of the God-Son which is always oriented towards people – one stopping hate and contempt, the other helping the victim of hate and contempt.
the woman’s hands that are clasped in prayer are lined up with the Gothic-church-shaped left hand signify her desperate trust in Jesus’ saving help.

2. A Super-Human Pretense Exposed

Beckmann appears to deliberately counterpose Jesus with the scoffing clown. To both, Beckmann provides the ability for making two opposing gestures.

In the opposing postures of the clown and Jesus, Beckmann suggests that the emotional psychology of contempt and disgust has a super-human pretense. A person who feels contempt towards another human being positions oneself above the human level while treating the other person as beneath him or her. To be sure, the emotion of contempt operates differently from the emotion of hate. Hate is a peer emotion and is rather ordinary, human, or horizontal in dimension. Contempt, in this light, is a rather hierarchical feeling – considering other people as being “below” them, and so must be “obedient” to them! This, incidentally, is the common psychology of the “colonizer” towards the “colonized” wherever we find it in human activities – international and domestic politics; global and domestic trade and commerce; at work; in marriage and family life; and in religion.

The artist suggests here that contempt is a demonic feeling, quite unacceptable to Jesus. Embodied in a clown, this contemptuous trait at once renders him a morally disgusting person who personifies a sin of pride.

The schema used by the artist to present a kind of Christian theology is interesting. On the one hand, God humbles Godself and became man. On the other hand, the devil plays super-human and manipulates people into sin by emulating his super-human wiles.

In Beckmann’s use of imageries, then, the devilish sin of being contemptuous is much more serious than sexual transgression because the emotion of contempt is self-affirming and self-asserting at the expense of another human being, at once humiliating him or her by reducing his or her personhood.

In the end, though it is outside the scope of this masterpiece to include it, compassion and mercy won. Jesus shamed the crowd into dropping their stones. They dispersed, and the woman was saved from execution.

3. A Dark Closet-Existence Revealed

In his narrative, John the Evangelist portrays Jesus succeeding brilliantly in exposing the sins of the finger-pointers and their hypocritical accusations against the woman while hiding their own “sins” and “vices” in the deep closet.

Here in his painting, the artist unearths for us the frightening psychological truth that the more silently a person sits inside the closet, cleverly hiding dirty secrets from the public, the noisier he or she becomes outside of that closet, loudly denouncing all and sundry whom he or she judges as sinners.

4. Lessons for Marriage and Family Life

There is the strong reminder not to be too legalistic and demanding towards each other and other members of the family. Christ is the standard. That standard always begins with compassion and not law, and seeing the broken heart before the broken law, showing mercy before even thinking about “stoning” someone. It is not good to keep “stones” in the household, really!
There is a shocking message of the violence in human hearts and that implicates everyone in the marital and familial contexts.
Between spouses and family members, there is a strong call to temper whatever we deem to be “justice” with a strong dose of mercy. To each one of us, the reminder is that having been forgiven, blessed and graced, we ought to try and treat each other with a little bit more grace, and to learn to forgive and to bless rather than to tear down and to destroy.
There is a vehement reminder not to be quick to condemn when one is not blameless. This is a humbling reminder that before we wag our tongues, point our accusing fingers, or even raise our angry fists at our spouses and any other members of the family, we ought first to cool off and remember how sinful we ourselves are in the first place.
There is the stark reminder that unless we come with clean hands in making any demeaning and damaging accusation in marriage and family life, we shall be “judged” and shamed by the Lord [“Let anyone who has no sin cast the first stone”].
Under Beckmann’s paint brush, Christ occupies a central position of authority, not the male accusers. There is an underlying warning against all the males to cease and desist from bullying the females in our midst. Males in households are reminded that hate and contempt brew violence and Christ’s call is to stop all bigotry.
The artist draws on Scripture to deliver an ironic comment, that Christians who are legalistic and dogmatic are prone to be intolerant and manipulative especially of dissimilar people. You cannot claim to worship Christ, if you lack empathy and compassion. But empathy and compassion are possible within marriage and family life only if one is capable of identifying with the otherness of the other person – with his/her humanity in spite of otherness. We need a truly Christian sensibility to live a marriage and family life well.
There is the urgent reminder not to look down on anyone in the family. To be contemptuous is to elevate yourself while you humiliate someone else, robbing him or her of self-respect, and reducing his or her personhood.
And then, there is the consoling reminder to all who suffer under inconsiderate bullies, accusations and abuses in marriage and family life, that Christ is always around to defend us with compassion and mercy and, like a divine receptacle that he is, to receive us into his bosom for consolation, rest and peace. Resisting the urge to retaliate, we do well to turn to Christ in faith and trust.

You are most welcome to respond to this post. Email your comments to jeffangiegoh@gmail.com. You can also be dialogue partners in this Ephphatha Coffee-Corner Ministry by sending us questions for discussion.

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