THREAD

How Christ should be depicted in light of racial controversies.

-What is Christ's skin colour?
-Why does he have white skin in some depictions?
-Can we depict him as a variety of races?

Here is the response from Holy Scripture and the venerable Tradition

Fisrtly, the Scriptures don't give many details on the particular physical characteristics of Christ. However, the Bible does give a precise genaeology for Our Lord.

He is, among other things, from a Royal lineage in the Levant stretching all the way back to Adam.

This lineage defines Christ as a descendent from mediterranean peoples of his time. Modern research has demonstrated that these peoples are characterized by having a white-ish skin that is slightly tanned and dark hair.

One of the men in Christ's genaeological lineage to whom his is most often compared is the King Prophet David, who is described in the Scriptures as having light hair.

We can thus suppose that the lineage Christ is in had lighter skin than we may have perhaps already thought.

Now let us consider the depictions of Christ himself. The first attestation of a detailed image of Christ is that of Edessa. The piece of cloth, which after having been placed on Christ's face by St. Veronica left an imprint of his likeness.

This relic is from the 4th century.

Unfortunately this relic was lost or destroyed after the sack of Constantinople in 1204 after the crusades, but the tradition tells us that the image shows Christ as being white-ish skinned, having dark/brown hair, brown eyes and a beard.

There is an interesting factor to note about the Shroud of Turin, which was similarly taken from Constantinople during the crusades of 1204 - However it has remained in tact and the facial structure of the imprint in the shroud remarkably resembles that of the image of Edessa.

It is worth noting that the more ancient frescoes that represent Christ depict him with similar characteristics (with the exception of the beard, perhaps to denote youthfulness), like this frescoe from the 3rd century.

The most ancient detailed icon of Christ is the Pantocrator icon from St. Catherine's Monastery in Egypt, dated from the 6th century.

We can again see the similar characteristics of tanned white-ish skin, dark brown hair, and brown eyes.

The iconographic canons of the Church have always historically been followed by the Church.

For example, the icon 'made without hands' from 1100 AD Novgorod in Russia does not depict Christ as Slavic or Nordic.

There exists two exceptions to this usual representation, that make the Christ look more ethereal.

-The transfiguration (where Christ shines forth the divine energy of uncreated light)

-The ancient of days of Daniel 7, sometimes associated with Christ, having grey hair.

Saint Paisios, one of the most famous contemporary saints, recounts once having been visited by Christ.

Here is the icon which was written after the encounter.

Christ retains his mediterranean-like semitic characteristics, but is slightly paler in his transfigured state.

These days, some obtuse zealots obsess over race and want to erase this consistent 2000 year old tradition, for ethno-centric and ego-centric reasons.

They do this by saying 'white' depictions of Christ are racist, and that he was *really* sub-saharan African etc..

An argument often made is that Christ is universal, and saves all of humanity so we can represent him as any race we desire.

But to demand your own race to be depicted out of alleged concern for salvific accuracy is ironically a denial of universal human nature.

Doing this also negates the historicity of Christ. He in fact became incarnate at a specific moment in time, in a specific geographical location *with Pilate* and born of a specific ethnic group.

This approach borders on gnosticism, a denial of the real human body of Our Lord.

The Councils also insist, contrary to some heretics who believe Christ is not truly human, that the Christ should not generally be depicted symbolically - like as a lamb.

We depict Christ in iconography as he really was.

Representing Christ as other races foreign to Israel also denies his status as Messiah. The scriptures are clear that the Messiah will be a descendent of David, and a Judaean who himself said he came for the 'lost sheep of the house of Israel'.

The entire basis of the 7th ecumenical council was to insist on Christ's real humanity to be depicted in the icons of the Church, insisting on a real incarnation.

Playing around with different ethnic representations denies the universal aspect of human nature.

This is because ethnicities are merely accidental qualities of human subjects, St. John of Damascus says. Insisting Christ be depicted as your race to emphasise that he saves your race too totally misss the metaphysics of the incarnation & universal recapitulation of human nature