That You May Be Mature and Complete

Christoph Weigel’s Biblia ectypa (‘pictorial Bible’) consists of approximately 834 copperplate engravings that portray passages from, or represent books of, the Hebrew Bible and New Testament.

In the New Testament section, the majority of engravings interpret key passages from the narratives of the Gospels, Acts, and Revelation—Luke’s Gospel, for example, includes 68 images. By contrast, each Epistle is represented by only one engraving, with which it is introduced. The Epistle’s Latin title is inscribed above the image and its German title below. All the images of the Epistles depict their authors holding quills and either books or scrolls. Most of the authors are looking at visions from heaven that relate to key elements of the letter.

In this print, James sits, quill in hand, writing his Epistle. Instead of looking at the vision above and behind him, he gazes steadily into a mirror, reinforcing the Epistle’s lesson that its readers should not be like those who observe their reflections and later forget what they look like (1:23–24). The Epistle contrasts ‘natural’ mirrors with the ‘perfect law of liberty’. In a tradition of employing mirrors metaphorically to symbolize practices of self-examination and moral improvement, Weigel thus denounces people who look at the perfect law of God but allow it to make no lasting impression on them, praising instead those ‘doers who act’ and ‘persevere’ (1:25).

In the background, the wind—personified by a head in the clouds blowing on the sea—creates great waves, a reminder not to be double-minded and doubting, driven and tossed by the wind (1:6–8; see also Peter walking on the water, Matthew 14:22–33). As the sun rises, a flower wilts in its scorching heat, denoting that the rich will suffer the same fate (1:9–11).

These negative metaphors illustrate the devastating consequences that befall those of inadequate, immature, incomplete, or inactive faith: they are unstable people at the mercy of the wind. As James notes, faith without works is dead (2:18–26).

Weigel’s engraving, like James’s Epistle, argues that wealth provides only a brief illusion of security: the rich will be humbled and fade away like flowers in withering heat—just as the grass of the field, in Jesus’s teachings, is ‘thrown into the oven’ (Matthew 6:30; see also Job 24:24; 27:21). In contrast, James urges its readers, as does Weigel’s engraving its viewers, to put their faith into action.

The Armenian Cathedral of Saint James stands where tradition holds that Jesus ‘ordained the Apostle James, Brother of the Lord, as the first bishop of Jerusalem’ (Atajanyan 2003: 15; Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.1.2). The cathedral—seat of the Armenian Patriarchs—is located in the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem and named for both James of Jerusalem and James the Apostle, son of Zebedee—hence the cathedral also is referred to as Saints James Cathedral.

Most images of James the brother of Jesus in the cathedral thus depict him as the first bishop of Jerusalem (e.g. on the episcopal chair, wearing bishop’s robes).

Another title given to James, ‘the Righteous’ (or ‘the Just,’ the earliest reference of which is Gospel of Thomas 12), stresses both James’s faithfulness to the law and his place in a tradition of righteous sufferers (Painter 2004: 112; James 5:6). Thus, other visual representations in the cathedral, like this painting on the south wall of the cathedral’s main sanctuary, show his faithful endurance of the ultimate trial: martyrdom.

James stands on the ‘parapet’ (pterugion) of the Temple, bearing witness to his faith (Clement of Alexandria, and Hegesippus in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.1.4; 2.23.11–16). Hegesippus (c.110–180 CE) has James declare that Jesus sits ‘at the right hand of the great Power’, so James’s gaze and right hand guide viewers to an image of God seated in heaven at the upper left of the composition. Seated to the right of God the Father is Jesus, holding a cross, which likely also foretells that James’s martyrdom is near, with the Holy Spirit, depicted as a dove, above them. Although the physical resemblance between Jesus and James is not as strong in this image as it is in many other visual representations, the colour of their mantles connects them as do their martyrdom stories.

James’s martyrdom is depicted on the right side of the painting. The upper section shows him falling after being thrown from the Temple’s parapet, while below he is shown kneeling in prayer, as a man with a fuller’s club prepares to strike him. In Hegesippus’s version (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.23.8–18), James prays, as did Jesus on the cross, for God ‘to forgive them, for they know not what they do’ (Luke 23:34; see also Stephen in Acts 7:60) in a final act of faithful endurance.

References

Atajanyan, Emmanuel. 2002. The Armenian Sanctuaries in Jerusalem (Moscow: Slovo)

Gowler, David B. 2014. James Through the Centuries (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell)

Painter, John. 2004. Just James: The Brother of Jesus in History and Tradition (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press)

A.B. Frost, ‘the dean of American illustrators’, was famous for his images portraying rural life and sport in an unpretentious and often humorous fashion. Early in his career, however, Frost was an illustrator for Harper’s Weekly, a magazine based in New York City, who created biting, satirical political cartoons during the infamous 1876 U.S. presidential election.

Scandals during the Grant administration and an economic depression caused by a bank panic in 1873 made the Democrats’ message of civil service reform and improved monetary policy attractive to voters. Samuel Tilden, Democratic candidate for president, thus portrayed himself as a reformer and proponent of sound fiscal policy.

Frost’s cartoons attack Tilden as corrupt, accuse him of Confederate sympathies, and support instead the campaign of the Republican candidate, Rutherford B. Hayes.

The cartoon ‘Mr. Facing-Both-Ways’ has its roots in how the biblical term ‘double-souled’ (dipsychos in James 1:8) has been used to attack opponents. Such allusions build on John Bunyan’s 1678 The Pilgrim’s Progress (which introduces the character of ‘Mr. Facing-both-ways’—a man whose soul is divided between faith and the world), Goethe’s Faust (1808), and A. H. Clough’s Dipsychus (1850).

Frost’s two-faced Tilden alludes to the politician’s alleged hypocrisy. Tilden’s ‘public’ face declares his support of reform. The mostly hidden second face, however, directs viewers to consider his alleged Confederate sympathies, the Democratic Party’s support of ‘soft’ money (paper money not backed by gold), and corruption (Democrats in the House of Representatives fired staff who were Union veterans and hired Confederate veterans).

The document Tilden hides behind his back contains other accusations: Tilden was a ‘copperhead’, a northern Democrat opposed to fighting the Civil War, and a ‘sham reformer’ because of his early connections with the corrupt Boss Tweed Ring.

Thomas Hendricks, the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, also appears in this cartoon at the lower right as a ‘rag-baby’ crawling out of Tilden’s top hat—a caricature signalling his own support for ‘soft’ money, whose inflationary effects are suggested by the rising balloon. The ‘fireworks’ of reform also emerging from the hat allude to the flashy and sometimes spectacular appearance of reform that was, in reality, ephemeral.

Tilden’s apparel also reflects his status as a rich corporate lawyer. Frost believed the multimillionaire Tilden corruptly gained his fortune by representing titans of industry. In terms of James’s Epistle, Tilden was one of the greedy, corrupt rich who should ‘wither away’ (v.11).

References

Gowler, David B. 2014. James Through the Centuries (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell)