Book Comment: In the beginnning

“The very first story in the Bible tells us that God made the world and everything in it. … our world did not simply begin by accident.”

In the beginning  (1984) is book number one in the Lion Story Bible (Lion Publishing plc, Oxford, England), It is a paraphrase suitable for elementary school aged children.  The book emphasizes God’s delight in the world which He created.  The gentle text of the book feels like a prose poem.

Here is a sample from the beautiful illustrations by Tony Morris.

Read this book to a child or, better yet, let those on a late second grade or early third grade reading level read it for themselves.

“That’s good,” said God.

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I believe that the illustration snippet above is a "fair use" of the artwork for the purposes of this blog post. If it is not, I will immediately remove the illustration upon notification.

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A general caution: books may give you wonderful new insights and explanations of subjects, but you should never base your Christian beliefs on any one book or the teachings of one person, no matter who they are. All teachings must be consistent with scripture. Read as the Bereans did, with discernment. “… for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so.” Acts 17:11 NASB

Any doctrines must be consistent with the historical full body of Christian thought. Doctrines or teachings inconsistent with scripture in any way must be rejected. You would not eat cheese which had a fuzzy fungus growing on it.

Thousands of Images of Jesus

Good Salt identifies itself as “The world’s leading source of religious imagery,”  It licenses Christian art for publishing, church ministries, advertising, and websites.  The company was founded in 2000 by Lars and Kim Justinen, who are both illustrators.

http://www.goodsalt.com/search/jesus.html

Jesus Right Before Our Eyes

This image is an optical illusion and has no supernatural or religious meaning in and of itself.  It is, however an illustration of what I have been talking about for the last few days.

Look at it very closely.  Move close to your computer's monitor screen and focus on the wooden blocks.  If you immediately see the word “Jesus,” you are one of the few.  Most people will see a randomly arranged set of rectangular wooden blocks.  Pull back from the screen and focus on the background rather than the blocks and you should suddenly see the word “Jesus.”  From that time on, you will see “Jesus” every time you look at the image.

The world is like that.  Non-believers do not see Jesus even though He is standing right in front of them.  Believers see Jesus in everything.

Christian Illustrators: Karen Hargett

Christian illustrators often work in secular markets.  Karen Hargett is a Christian artist (pencils and pastels) in Buda, Texas (USA).  She is a professional working artist who does nature scenes, animals portraits, and work for commission.

Karen Hargettt lives in Buda, Texas, a rapidly growing community.  In the 2000 census, Buda had 2404 residents; in 2010 the population had grown to 7295.  Originally known as DuPre, the town became Buda late in the 19th century.

There are two possible known derivations for the name of the town.  Both sound plausible.  Perhaps both sources contributed to the name.

The Carrington Hotel in Buda is popularly known as the "Buda House"because of the "viudas" (Spanish = "widows") who worked in the kitchen.

The second explanation is that the town is named for the hometown (Buda) of Hungarian refugees who settled in the area after the failed 1848 revolution in Hungary.  Budapest, Hungary was formed from the merging of the cities of Buda and Pest. 

The city name Buda may derive from the name of its founder, Bleda (Buda), the brother of the Hunnic ruler Attila.   It may also be derived from the Slavic word "вода, voda" ("water"), a translation of the Latin name "Aquincum", which was the main Roman settlement in the region

Christian Illustrators: Tim Baron

This is a new recurrent feature on this blog.  I will provide links to the websites of Christian illustrators.  Today: Tim Baron .

Book Comment: The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb

You may never have heard of Robert Crumb (b. 1943, Philadelphia), but he is an internationally respected cartoonist closely associated with the underground counter-culture of the late twentieth century.  His pen or pencil is constantly moving and people have been known to follow him to grab left behind napkins, matchbook covers, and scraps of paper on which he has compulsively doodled.  His artwork sells for thousands of dollars.

Crumb has been described as a genius, a misogynist, a devoted and loving father, the founder of the underground comix movement, a misanthrope, a philanderer, a 78 RPM record collector, the creator of Fritz the Cat, a recluse, a talented musician, a counter culture icon, an illustrator capable of near-photographic portraits and highly stylized caricatures, an obsessive man, a man so famous that a documentary about his life and work has been made as a feature film, a compulsive man, a vulgar artist sometimes accused of producing pornography, a member of the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame (1991), and so on.  He is a very complex man.

Many were shocked, and some were highly offended, when R. Crumb decided to illustrate the Book of Genesis.   Crumb is known to not be religious in any traditional sense and, indeed, does have a history of producing images which could be interpreted as pornographic.

Crumb originally intended to do a "takeoff" of Adam and Eve but decided instead to do a literal verse by verse illustration of the entire book, as he says, "All 50 chapters." What resulted is a fascinating, massive, and controversial book illustrated in Crumb's distinctive highly detailed and intricate comic book style which I believe actually shows reverence for the book by not glossing over anything.  I mean that.  That is why the book is controversial.

Where people are naked in the Bible, they're naked in the book.  Where they have sex in the Bible, they have sex in the book.  Where there is killing, blood and guts abound.  The "begat lists" have a different face associated with each name.  The people are very plain, some are ugly, just like real people.  God is presented as a stern old man in flowing robes and with hair and beard hanging down to his feet.

Robert Crumb, in his introduction to the book says, "... I, ironically, do not believe the Bible is 'The Word of God."  I believe it is the words of men.  It is, nonetheless, a powerful text with layers of meaning that reach deep into our collective consciousness, our historical consciousness, if you will.  It seems indeed to be an inspired work..."

It may be that a man who is, at best, an agnostic, has shown more respect for a biblical text than those who squeamishly sanitize and euphemize the "hard parts." The sort of people who would be horrified to find out what "hand under thigh" (Genesis 24:2) means.

Crumb, R., The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2009)

New Blogs to Watch

I have added the following blogs to the list of blogs I check regularly:

Dead Theologians: http://deadtheologians.blogspot.com. Discussions and insights drawn fro the writings of John Calvin, Martin Luther, St. Athanasius, St. Jerome, etc. Written by a pastor in Georgia.

Look Both Ways: Art and Faith: http://lookbothwaysartandfaith.blogspot.com. Absolutely beautiful graphic adaptions of biblical passages by Earnest Graham, an Episcopal priest.

The Bible Artist: http://www.bibleartist.com. This is a resource for artists and illustrators which features costume and figure reference photographs posted by Graham D. kennedy.

Joel plus Jenny: http://joelplusjenny.blogspot.com. A blog by a Mennonite missionary couple in Mozambique.