The LION & the CARDINAL
« August 2009 »
S M T W T F S
1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 31
Blog Tools
Edit your Blog
Build a Blog
RSS Feed
View Profile

E-mail me at:
danmitsui[at]
hotmail[dot]com


Web log:




My artwork:


Religious art


Biological art


Bookplates


Christmas cards


Wedding
invitations

Heraldry


Supported
Sites:


Durandus
of Mende

Adam of
St. Victor


Hyperlinks:

Golden Legend
Digital
 Scriptorium
Fish Eaters


19 August 2009



HORNS of MOSES



It is commonly known that Moses, in mediaeval art, is depicted with horns on his head. The supposed reason for this is also commonly known; every art history teacher informs his students that the Vulgate Bible contains a mistranslation, which resulted in an absurd artistic convention. I myself am disinclined to think that St. Jerome and centuries of iconographers were all idiots.

Upon further investigation, I learned that the Hebrew word - keren - that St. Jerome translated into the Latin as "grew horns" means, literally, "grew horns". His supposed mistake was not knowing that the word also has an idiomatic meaning of "emitted rays of light". Modern scholars, looking at two possible translations for the word, think: Of course! His face began to radiate! How silly that nobody realized this sooner!

This provokes from me the question: How exactly are rays of light shooting out of a man's head any more or less plausible than horns growing? I have never seen either happen. They would be equally miraculous phenomena, and I really cannot say which one a multitude of ancient Hebrews would have found more impressive (bear in mind that when God wanted Moses to impress a multitude of ancient Hebrews, He gave him a staff that could turn into a snake). I suspect that several centuries of looking at Baroque and Romantic art have accustomed our minds to imagining rays of light shooting out of things. And cinematic special effects have lately influenced our expectations even more. But projecting those expectations back onto the book of Exodus is snobbery.

Newer | Latest | Older