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Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI |
Part II: The Necessity of the Four Gospels
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| Figure 2. Portraits of Maria
Lani by (above) Goerg; (top right) Braque; and (right) Matisse. |
Figure 3. Portrait of Maria Lani
by Roualt. Courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago |
pg.4
of 13 
The medium of expression so far has been graphic art. Does this still apply when portraiture is in words? Cassirer has this to say: (11)
No example is more characteristic and instructive in this respect than the change in our portrait of Socrates. We have the Socrates of Xenophon and Plato; we have a Stoic, a skeptic, a mystic, a rationalistic, and a romantic Socrates. They are entirely dissimilar. Nevertheless, they are not untrue, each of them gives us a new aspect, a characteristic perspective of the historical Socrates and his intellectual and moral physiognomy.
Plato saw in Socrates the great dialectician and the great ethical teacher; Montaigne saw in him the anti-dogmatic philosopher who confessed his ignorance; Friedrich Schlegel and the Romantic thinkers laid the emphasis upon the Socratic irony.
And in Plato himself we can trace the same development. We have a mystic Plato, the Plato of neo-Platonism; a Christian Plato, the Plato of Augustine and of Marsillio Ficino; a rationalistic Plato, the Plato of Moses Mendelssohn; and a few decades ago we were offered a Kantian Plato.
We may smile at all these different interpretations, yet they not only have a negative but also a positive side. They have all in their measure contributed to an understanding and to a systematic evaluation of Plato's work. Each has insisted on a certain aspect which is contained in his work but which could only be made manifest by a complicated process of thought. When speaking of Plato in his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant indicated this fact: "...it is by no means unusual," he said, "upon comparing the thoughts which an author has expressed in regard to his subject...to find that we understand him better than he understood himself."
11. Cassirer, Ernst, ref. 10, p.180.
pg.5
of 13 In
short, we have a better understanding--I think it is safer to
say a more complete understanding--of the Lord by reason of the
four Gospels than we would have had if some super author had
left us with only one Gospel combining the substance of the others.
And I think it is remarkable how frequently it happens that to
make the composite picture complete, four portraits, not less
and not more, seem best suited. It is as though three portraits
provide us with a three-dimensional picture in space and
one more is required to complete the picture in time. In the
present case the three Synoptic Gospels seem clearly to be within
the single framework of space, while the fourth seems to add
the time dimension--opening with the words, "In the beginning...."
There is one other point of view
from which we may approach this subject, and it involves us in
a brief consideration of the nature of stereoscopic vision. Stereoscopic
sight involves the use of two eyes spaced a sufficient distance
apart that views are obtained from two slightly different angles
of vision. The mind in some mysterious way combines these two
views, different as they are, into a single picture that has
depth. Stereoscopic vision thus allows us to perceive the relative
distance of objects from us regardless of their size. We can
manage after some time of training to estimate these distances
with only one eye. We do this by a very rapid assessment of the
relative size of the objects which naturally appear to be smaller
as they recede into the distance. We learn to gauge distance
because of size. For every object, the mind somehow preserves
a kind of standard reference dimension. Two eyes make this particular
form of mental exercise unnecessary, and our gauge of distance
becomes much more
pg.6
of 13 accurate � exceedingly
accurate, in fact, at close range. It allows us to touch something
without missing it by coming short, or without stubbing our finger
by over-estimation
An ordinary camera takes only one
picture, and it is flat. We "read" it in depth because
we learn so to read it. Children do not automatically recognize
that things in the distance appear smaller, and they therefore
draw distant objects as large as near ones. They are being more
truthful, but we find it a disturbing way to present reality
to the eye because it is not the way we customarily perceive
it. I have a stereoscopic camera which has two lenses and takes
two simultaneous pictures, the spacing between the lenses being
the mean distance between the human eyes (65mm). A special viewer
is required, but the effect is marvelous. One sees everything
in the round, whether it be a few trees receding into the distance
or even a fly trapped by the camera in midair. The fly hangs
in space. An entirely new dimension is added to the photograph.
A simple experiment can be performed
by anyone who will sit down in his living room and sight across
a chair or an object on the table to the wall behind it. By closing
one eye and then the other, it will be seen that the nearer object
shifts its position specifically with respect to some more distant
object in line with it. Each eye therefore is giving a slightly
different picture of the same scene, and the mind is able to
integrate them into a single view which has depth. However, because
our eyes are set in a horizontal plane, we have this stereoscopic
vision only in a horizontal plane and not in a vertical one.
We can obtain stereoscopic vision
in the vertical plane by lying down on a couch so that the eyes
are in the vertical with respect to each other. But now we lose
stereoscopic vision in the horizontal plane. Thus, to obtain
vision in depth in every direction we would actually have to
have four eyes. I think that in Nature certain creatures may
have been provided with this facility, not by being given four
eyes, but by being given the habit of bobbing the head up and
down very rapidly every so often. If we assume that their central
nervous system is designed to accept this sudden shift in the
vertical direction, stereoscopic vision might be achieved both
horizontally and vertically. Birds that live and feed in shallow
water while standing much of the time out of the water must be
able to compensate, when they strike for food in the water, for
the refractive index: and it is possible that they are able to
correct for this by the rapid bobbing up and down of the head.
I have no research evidence for this, but discussion with some
ornithologist friends indicates that it is a very real possibility.
pg.7
of 13 Virtually
everyone has had the experience of watching a dog intently putting
his head first on one side and then on the other. The movement
is a rather delightful one. It seems to me that it, too, may
serve to enhance the dog's total perceptive capabilities in depth,
because it increases its range of stereoscopic vision above the
mere horizontal plane to which most animals are normally limited.
At any rate, whatever may or may
not be valid in the above observations regarding animal vision,
it is certain that to obtain 100 percent perception in depth,
we would have to have four eyes and a mind designed to unify
the four points of view. Both are required, for otherwise we
should be in effect imposing photographs shot from different
angles upon each other and trying to obtain a single print from
the composite. The result would undoubtedly be a blurred image.
There are some diseases known to man in which even the images
from the two eyes we have are not fused, and a conflicting double
image has to be eliminated by preventing the light from entering
one eye � or in a few cases by a mental process which is
learned and by which one picture of the two is somehow ignored.
Only special circumstances enable us to create a harmonious picture
out of "conflicting" material. The process is in the
mind.
Reverting to our consideration
of the four Gospels, it is only due to special circumstances
that we are able to create a harmonious picture out of apparently
conflicting records. The process here is a spiritual one. Just
as God has designed our minds to accept the conflicting evidence
of our two eyes that we might gain more complete vision, so God
has designed our spirits that we may somehow accept the conflicting
evidence of the four Gospels so that we might gain more nearly
perfect understanding. Just as the visual input to the mind is
perfectly integrated without our being aware of any conflict,
so do we for the most part read the four Gospel accounts without
being aware that they are in conflict. And finally, just
as by upsetting our vision we can make ourselves aware of the
divergence of the two pictures received by the eyes, so we can
if we wish become aware of the conflicts between the Gospel accounts.
In physical health we are not aware of any conflict between the
eyes, nor in spiritual health are we disturbed by any conflict
between the Gospels. By a virtually unconscious process we "integrate"
and gain in depth of vision. Years ago, Principal Cairns wrote,
with true eloquence, (12)
12. Cairns, Rev. Principal. "Christ the Central Evidence of Christianity," Tract No. 3 Present Day Tracts, Vol.1, Religious Tract Soc., London, 1883, p.9.
pg.8
of 13 In the narratives of the Evangelists, the impossible is achieved. The living Christ walks forth and men bow before Him. Heaven and earth unite all through: power with gentleness, solitary greatness with familiar intimacy, ineffable purity with forgiving pity, unshakable will with unfathomable sorrow. There is no effort in these writers, but the character rises till it is complete. It is thus not only truer than fiction or abstraction, but truer than all other history, carrying through utterly unimaginable scenes the stamp of simplicity and sincerity, creating what was to live forever, but only as it had lived already; and reflecting a glory that had come so near and been beheld so intently, that the record of it was not only "full of grace," but of "truth."
Subsequently
the same writer concludes by saying, (13) "The difficulties of the Gospels from divergence
are as nothing compared with the impression made by them all
of one transcendent creation; and for my part, if I rejected
inspiration, I should have reason to be still more astonished...The
very diversities so often appealed to as an objection to this
conclusion really strengthen it and prove that writings which
can so bring forth the one out of the manifold have in them not
only truth but inspiration."
I cannot leave this aspect of the
subject without one further observation. In the previous chapter
we underscored the difference between what a man actually says
and what a man really means. In drawing a portrait with brush
or pen, it is equally important to distinguish between what a
man looks like and what he really is. Those who have had occasion
to do portraiture will know that if the subject is prepared to
pose for long enough, the superficial facial mask tends to relax
unconsciously and one slowly finds oneself drawing or painting
the real character rather than the superficial one.
I had occasion to draw a well-known
businessman. The drawing was to be a presentation to him by the
family. I had sufficient time with him to be able to draw him
as he was inwardly: and standing out from the page, rather surprisingly,
was a somewhat different and less pleasant character than the
man whom one saw in a casual encounter. Several persons who had
little or no respect for his integrity as a businessman, said
in effect, "Hmmm...that's him all right." He was not,
to those who knew him well, a pleasant man to have to deal with
in business. I hardly need to say that his relatives turned the
picture down. So I ended up in possession of one of the best
portraits I have drawn, technically speaking--and one of the
most worthless! I still have it...
13. Ibid., p.11.
pg.9
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pg.10
of 13 
One of the greatest
figures of Michaelangelo's time was Lorenzo the Magnificent.
As a man of very great wealth, a patron of the arts, a person
of integrity, charm, intelligence, and wisdom, he became Michelangelo's
patron. When Lorenzo died, Michelangelo carved the figure which
adorned his tomb in the Medici Chapel in Rome. I have redrawn
the head of this reclining figure, which in the original is carved
out of marble. My pencil drawing cannot, of course, do credit
to the original, but it does show something of the genuine greatness
of Lorenzo's character (Fig. 4).
However, we happen to have both
a written description of Lorenzo and a portrait from a medal
struck in his honor. Both the written and the pictorial images
of Lorenzo's visual appearance agree in this, that he struck
the eye as rather a mean character with little manifest greatness,
with no physical presence that was immediately
pg.11
of 13 impressive, with
a slight deformity in his back, and with a nose and mouth that
gave him a rather "untrustworthy" look. I have
redrawn the medallion, and it requires some stretch of the imagination
to equate it with Michelangelo's beautiful tribute to his benefactor
(Fig. 5).
Which is the true portrait: the
one which portrays how Lorenzo looked, or the one which portrayed
what he was? Michelangelo preferred the latter and although his
portrait contradicts the other one, they are both true portraits,
but from different points of view. To give the complete picture
of reality, it is necessary to perceive reality in different
ways so that what may appear to be two different statements of
the truth may really only be one. It seems likely that with our
minds constituted as they are, contradictions will always be
essential to the perception of truth, particularly truth about
a person.
There is a tremendous difference
between knowing the facts and perceiving the truth. Contradictory
evidence is likely to confuse the man who seeks only to know
the facts, but contradictory statement is often the only way
in which truth may be represented. In our present state of knowledge
it is customary to say that light is to be described both as
corpuscles and waves. Under certain circumstances it behaves
as though it were composed of discrete particles which have some
kind of mass and are subject to gravitational forces. At other
times its behavior is best explained by viewing it as having
some kind of nonmaterial wave form. The two views are seemingly
irreconcilable, which means that the "facts" are contradictory.
But scientists have learned to live with this contradiction,
since the most complete picture seems to depend upon both contradictory
views being accepted at the same time. Even in science therefore,
the statement of the truth may demand the use of contradictory
terms.
One of the wonders
of the Gospel story is that so few people in reading the four
Gospels year after year ever become aware of the "contradictions"
which are to be found between them. The fact is that we have
been given spiritual vision that enables us to see a single picture
of the Lord which, although it is presented from four different
points of view, reaches us without disharmony. The skeptic is
like the man with faulty vision whose mind cannot resolve these
four views except by a very deliberate effort and even then only
by some artifice. The Christian, on the other hand, can by an
equally deliberate process--as though he were closing one eye
at a time--separate out these different pictures and study them
profitably in isolation without at the same time destroying his
power to see the unified whole.
pg.12
of 13 Of such a nature are
these four gospels that, as Rousseau said, the inventor of such
a Character as they present would be even more astonishing than
the Character Himself. It is undoubtedly true.
The portrait of the Lord Jesus
which emerges from the combined impact of the four Gospels demonstrates
indeed that fact is more amazing than fiction, that creative
imagination is no match for inspired record of truth. Here truly
is an uncreatable figure. Albertus Pieters, in his wonderful
little book, Divine Lord and Saviour, has a quotation
from the work of Carnegie Simpson which captures something of
the sheer beauty and splendour of the Saviour. (14)
They [the Gospels] do not merely affirm His stainlessness, which were easy. They exhibit it, which it were simply impossible to do except from the life. We have there what Jesus said and did in all kinds of circumstances and on all manner of occasions--in public and private, in the sunshine of success and the gloom of failure, in the houses of His friends and in face of His foes, in life and in the last great trial of death. It is the detailed picture of a man who never made a false step, never said the word that ought not to have been said, never, in short, fell below perfection. Such a portrait is of necessity a true portrait. It simply can not be an idealized picture. That which is so above; human criticism is not less above our conception....Only one thing accounts for their being able to do it. That is simply veracity. They had a model, and they copied it faithfully. And because, first, the model was faultless, the reproduction, being faithful, was perfect too.
14. Pieters, Albert, Divine Lord and Saviour, Revell, New York, 1949, p.96.
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