In this
week, I want to talk about Temptation and Fall of Eve and Adam and Crucifixion
of the Hildesheim Cathedral doors. Firstly I want to describe the panels in
detail. Left panel, which is named Temptation and Fall of Eve and Adam, I can
see the naked man and woman, and I feel like they are trying to eat apples off
the trees. This panel is in the curve in high relief so it looks amazing and animated.
According to the bible in Luke 12:5, "And the LORD God took the man, and
put him into the Garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the LORD God
commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it:
for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die". Adam could
eat of every tree, except one. God had given Adam a Command. Sin is disobeying
God’s Commandments. God also warned Adam of the consequences of disobeying His
Command. The penalty for disobedience was death. Adam’s obedience was going to
be tested. I don’t know many of the bible stories but I absolutely know about
story of the Adam and Even. In
this panel, we could know that Adam and Eve are just about to eat an apple from
the tree of the knowledge. This panel was wanted to express the exact moment of
before eating the apple.
The right
side panel named Crucifixion of Jesus Christ. This panel also carved in high
relief on Jesus Christ body. And his arms are outstretched and his body looks
really weak. Beside him, there are two guards to threat him and one of the
other two persons might be his mother. And four of them carved in low relief. I
guess this panel has meaning of sin. Even the moment of Jesus Christ die, he
said to god that forgives them. This panel also represent the moment of when
Jesus Christ suffering.
Both panels
have great lesson from the bible and implied the forgiveness about sin. But themes
are quite opposite in that left one is showing the beginning moment of sin and
the other one is showing the saving of sinners. Also the composition of these
two panels feel like well organized pieces. The carving of high relief made reality
and feel like they are going to pop up. And both of them related to God and God
letting us the way to be free from the sin. I think these panels are very interesting to me.
I think that the compositions are also interesting because the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is in the center of the composition on the left panel. In the right panel, that tree has been replaced with a crucifix (also in the center).
ReplyDeleteI actually think this is interesting from a biblical standpoint, since some verses in the Bible describe Christ as being "nailed to a tree" (meaning the wooden crucifix). In other words, the tree associated with sin becomes the "tree" associated with salvation.
-Prof. Bowen
It's interesting that in the first panel, Adam and Eve are about to disobey God's commands knowing that "for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die," meaning they would not spend eternity in Heaven with God. Because of that sin, man had to pay for sins until, as is shown in the adjacent panel, God sent His only son to pay for the sins of all mankind, so that mankind may have eternal life with God in Heaven. So I see the theme of eternal life in Heaven vs. death and seperation from God.
ReplyDeleteIndeed it is quite sad what happened with the apple and Eve and Adam. Anyways as for the panel I didn’t notice the sin part of it as you mentioned but it seems you could be right. To the story line of what happened with the beginning and end of sin I agree how you put them together for explaination.
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