Theresa Marchmain is not very good at exegesis. You can see the problem here:
Before going on, I will say that I tend to think that Lady Marchmain is so wrong she is sorta right here. I suspect that the point of the eye of the needle is to underline not the impossibility of the rich getting into heaven but to point to the absolute necessity of God's grace for anyone to get to heaven.
But if the ox and the ass are not in the Gospels, where do they come from? They come from Saint Francis Assisi. But even that is a little weird. The whole point of Saint Francis recreating creche scenes with actual animals (a tradition some people keep up to this day) was to make the experience more natural and less superstitious. But generations of Theresa Marchmains have fought hard to turn it all back into Alice in bleepin Wonderland.
Anyway, all this is my excuse to post a Giotto (courtesy of Wikipedia). This is the Madonna Enthroned. Giotto was very much influenced by the then-new Franciscan naturalism.
That is one very real woman. You can imagine her sitting on the bus next to you, and lucky you if she does because that is one very beautiful woman. The key thing, however, if you don't mind being so indiscreet as to check out Our Lady's chest you will note that Giotto's commitment to naturalism extends, as Helen Gardiner quaintly and prudishly puts it, "even to the swelling of the bosom." To be blunt, this Madonna has breasts. Giotto's path-breaking move here started a near revolution in the way Mary was presented. Unfortunately, the bad people won eventually and you hardly see a naturalistic representation of Mary today except as a child.
I've written about this before.
Anyway, I think naturalism is part of Waugh's purpose in Brideshead Revisisted. He is portraying men who behave and think like men actually do on their way to Christianity. This is something to keep in mind as we watch Charles fall in love again.
The first post in the Brideshead series is here.
The next post will be here.
'But of course,' she said, 'it's very unexpected for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, but the gospel is simply a catalogue of unexpected things. It's not to be expected that an ox and an ass should worship at the crib. Animals are always doing the oddest things in the lives of the saints. It's all part of the poetry, the Alice-in-Wonderland side, of religion.As regular readers will know, it is my vocation to make sure that everyone knows that there is no ox and no ass nor any crib for Jesus's birth anywhere in scripture. Nor is there a stable. All there is is a manger, which is a feeding trough, where the baby is laid. Where that manger was is anyone's guess. It might have been in a house or it might have been out in the middle of a field somewhere or it might be a creative interpolation of Luke's.
Before going on, I will say that I tend to think that Lady Marchmain is so wrong she is sorta right here. I suspect that the point of the eye of the needle is to underline not the impossibility of the rich getting into heaven but to point to the absolute necessity of God's grace for anyone to get to heaven.
But if the ox and the ass are not in the Gospels, where do they come from? They come from Saint Francis Assisi. But even that is a little weird. The whole point of Saint Francis recreating creche scenes with actual animals (a tradition some people keep up to this day) was to make the experience more natural and less superstitious. But generations of Theresa Marchmains have fought hard to turn it all back into Alice in bleepin Wonderland.
Anyway, all this is my excuse to post a Giotto (courtesy of Wikipedia). This is the Madonna Enthroned. Giotto was very much influenced by the then-new Franciscan naturalism.
That is one very real woman. You can imagine her sitting on the bus next to you, and lucky you if she does because that is one very beautiful woman. The key thing, however, if you don't mind being so indiscreet as to check out Our Lady's chest you will note that Giotto's commitment to naturalism extends, as Helen Gardiner quaintly and prudishly puts it, "even to the swelling of the bosom." To be blunt, this Madonna has breasts. Giotto's path-breaking move here started a near revolution in the way Mary was presented. Unfortunately, the bad people won eventually and you hardly see a naturalistic representation of Mary today except as a child.
I've written about this before.
Anyway, I think naturalism is part of Waugh's purpose in Brideshead Revisisted. He is portraying men who behave and think like men actually do on their way to Christianity. This is something to keep in mind as we watch Charles fall in love again.
The first post in the Brideshead series is here.
The next post will be here.
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