The Parable of the Lost Sheep

After the critical success of his painting The Resurrection of Lazarus (1896), African American artist Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859–1937) travelled to the Holy Land driven by a desire to paint biblical scenes that were as faithful to their cultural and historical context as possible (Woods 2017: 124). He was struck by the overlap of past and present; by how little the landscape and lifestyle of Jerusalem seemed to have changed since the times of Jesus.

He evokes this sense of continuity in his painting The Good Shepherd (1903). Two ancient trees dominate the horizon, which have presumably watched over the treacherous mountain path for many centuries—perhaps since the time of Christ, or even of King David.

The scene is set at night with the silhouettes of the shepherd and his sheep outlined against deep blues and misty greens. The landscape is illuminated only by a moon whose rays are obscured by spindly branches. The nocturnal setting brings to mind the Psalmist’s words:

Even though I walk through the darkest valley,

 I fear no evil;

for you are with me;

    your rod and your staff—

    they comfort me. (Psalm 23:4, NRSV)

By uniting the imagery of the Hebrew Bible and Jesus’s parable of the Good Shepherd with the contemporary landscape of Palestine, Tanner evokes the constancy of God’s divine and loving care: the God who cared for his sheep in the times of David and of Jesus will care for humankind even still. But now, as then, this guidance often takes place in the dark; it requires trust, patience, faith. And the journey through the Valley of the Shadow of Death is one which David, Christ, and every human being must face.

References

Woods Jr., Naurice Frank. 2017. Henry Ossawa Tanner: Art, Faith, Race, and Legacy (Milton Park: Taylor & Francis)

Inspired by a four-month stint of shadowing shepherds in the Scottish Highlands, Richard Ansdell’s (1815–85) gripping painting The Rescue manages to portray just how much trouble it would be to rescue a lost sheep.

The viewer is confronted with steep cliffs, jagged rocks, and the foreboding shadow of a carrion bird which the shepherd’s dog watches with alert concern. It is not only the one lost sheep that is in peril; in the background the rest of the herd waits by the loch, apparently contented but clearly vulnerable, overshadowed by an ominous raincloud. Whether or not the artist intended to reference the scriptural parable, transposing the drama of retrieving a sheep from the hills of ancient Israel to the brooding landscape of Scotland refreshes the sense of struggle and risk involved in the task of rescue that Jesus describes.

This parable centres around a question: ‘What do you think? If a shepherd has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray?’ (Matthew 18:12). The way the question is asked seems to imply an affirmative answer, but this painting reveals that a ‘yes’ is by no means self-evident. From the danger to the rest of the flock, to the immense physical and practical burden, to the potential economic loss, such a calculation makes no sense, and yet to Jesus such a venture is clearly worth it.

Jesus’s evident loyalty to pursuing the one sheep illuminates the care of the Divine Shepherd, whose love is not utilitarian, efficient, or disinterested. Indeed, the trouble seems to increase his joy: ‘he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray’ (Matthew 18:13). The Shepherd delights most in his troublesome sheep.

This photograph is part of a series taken of Romney Marsh in Kent by the painter, printmaker, and designer John Piper (1903–92). It depicts a Romney sheep, a breed admired throughout the centuries for its fine wool and ability to thrive in unfriendly climates. The Romney Sheep Breeder’s Association writes that the breed has a ‘reputation for soundness of feet and good resistance’ (‘About’, n.d.)—a description which captures well the sheep in Piper’s photograph, who seems to challenge the viewer, its gaze direct, its ears extended in alert attention.

Over the course of Christian history, there has been much conjecture about the attitude of the sheep in the parable of the Lost Sheep. Perhaps thinking of the sheep in his own native Essex, the influential preacher Charles Spurgeon (1834–92) describes sheep as utterly incapable of caring for themselves: ‘Of all wretched creatures a lost sheep is one of the worst’ (Spurgeon, ‘Lost Sheep’, 1884). Others emphasize the wilfulness of sheep as an allegory of humankind’s proclivity to sin and wander away. ‘Sheep are stubborn’, writes Augustine. ‘What do you want us for’, he imagines the sheep asking Jesus; ‘Why are you seeking us out?’ (Augustine, Sermon 46).

One could imagine either attitude (senselessness or stubbornness) in the piercing stare of the Romney sheep in Piper’s image. Perhaps it has wandered away on purpose and does not wish to be found; its breed is known, after all, for resilience in difficult terrain. And yet there is also a helplessness in its rebellion, mired amongst spiky plants with no clear exit route. The Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew seems not primarily to be interested in the reason the sheep is lost (by contrast with Luke, whose sheep illustrates the effects of sin; v.7). Matthew’s focus is on the persistence of the shepherd towards his ‘little ones’ (vv.10, 14).

Like the sheep in Piper’s photograph, the lost sheep of Jesus’s parable may be rebellious or pitiable; it remains unclear which. But this we know: it is seen and sought out.

References

‘About’, Romney Sheep Breeder’s Association, available at https://www.romneysheepuk.com/about [accessed 11 August 2022]

Rotelle, John E. (ed.), Edmund Hill (trans.). 1990. Sermons, vol. 2, The Works of St Augustine (Brooklyn: New City Press), p. 272

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon. 1884. ‘The Parable of the Lost Sheep’ (Sermon, September 28th, 1884), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 30 (London: Banner of Truth Trust), pp. 517–28