There is competition for attention in Room 30 of the National Gallery in London – which is open today, as this time last year it was not. The Rokeby Venus by Velázquez dominates one side; Murillo looks out from his harsh self-portrait; Zurbarán captures miraculous tranquillity in his still life, A Cup of Water and a Rose. In another canvas, figures appear from darkness around a pale figure in the light. It is The Lamentation over the Dead Christ (detail, above) by José de Ribera, called Lo Spagnoletto, the Little Spaniard, by his contemporaries in the Naples of the early 1620s, then part of the Spanish Empire.
Jesus Christ is undoubtedly dead. His body is shockingly pallid. His lips and face are turning grey-blue. Blood smears his brow from the crown of thorns, discarded and barely visible in the shadow. The corpse is gently supported by St John, to whom, not long before, Jesus on the cross had entrusted the care of his mother, Mary. A tear starts on her right eyelid as she looks on with exhausted anguish, her hands clasped in misery, or in prayer.
What was the point of the painting? It was commissioned by a rich Genoese art-patron but belonged to a convention of devotional painting evoking empathy for the man depicted, and for his mother and the disciple he loved. In this way it resembled the oratorios of Bach a century later, the St John Passion and St Matthew Passion, which add a dimension of sublime music to the narration of the Gospel. Nothing could be more full of sentiment than Bach’s chorales in the St Matthew Passion giving a variety of harmonies to stanzas from “O sacred head now wounded”, a pre-existing hymn. Ich will hier bei dir stehen, “I will stay here with you,” says one of these chorales addressed to the suffering Christ. “At the last stroke of death, then I will hold you in my arms and breast.”
This is one of the paradoxes of great art: that it turns human sorrow into something else. We like to see a tragedy on stage, though we weep. Nor is it necessary to be a Christian to look forward to the St Matthew Passion on Good Friday. We find satisfaction in a great painting like Ribera’s Lamentation. Who can account for it? Yet our emotions are not made false by this art – quite the opposite. It rebuilds them in the pursuit of beauty, truth, and goodness in reality.
For we have seen the tableau of this Lamentation before – and often, recently. A frequent piece of footage from Ukraine is of a mother weeping for her son. Perhaps it seems intrusive to witness it secondhand, from our safe homes where walls are not pocked nor empty windows blackened. Her sorrow is not our sorrow. Yet in a way it is. Hence the frustration in seeing the development and horrific discoveries of this war. John Donne was not wrong to say that “every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main”. When he wrote “I am involved in mankind” he meant he was wrapped up in humanity, wound round as in a cloak – or grave-clothes.
It is noticeable, though, that this painting by Ribera is not violent as others of his are. The death of Jesus was violent; the dead Jesus is not. He is at peace. “Today there is a great silence over the earth, a great silence and stillness, a great silence because the King sleeps,” says an ancient homily for Holy Saturday, still in use on this day, the eve of Easter. “God has died in the flesh,” it declares boldly
Its motive in emphasising that Jesus was really dead was not to spoil Easter, the celebration of new life tomorrow, in harmony with spring sun and new blossom and lambs and chocolate eggs. It was to show what Easter is a resurrection from. To wake from death is easy if all that has happened is falling asleep. But death, unlike sleep, seems irremediable.
Those who die defending their country, their people, their freedom are truly said to give their lives. The contrary, to wage war on the innocent, as in Ukraine, is terrible. Those made to do it come to hell’s mouth, betrayed by their leaders and made accursed by those who bless their wicked warfare.
Yet as the invasion began, some journalists asked of the defenders: “Wouldn’t it be better to give up now?” The answer is obvious to any nation that has stood alone against evil ideologies – No. Not giving up might mean death; but giving up means worse. If the defence of innocence and right is abandoned and sold, Easter never comes. Christians believe that God took the first initiative and said, like Bach’s chorus: “I will stay here with you.” Emmanuel, a title given to Jesus before his birth, means God With Us. That presence in the worst of times, of pain, anguish and death, allows an utter transformation later that is more like a new creation than a new birth. When presented in story, music or art, it is a myth conveying a deep truth. But it makes Easter possible.
