28 members of Stanmore and Belmont shuls gathered in the entrance of the National Gallery on Sunday 5 July for a fascinating and fun tour led by Dr Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz of LSJS.
Lindsey took us around galleries looking at paintings of biblical scenes – questioning and probing us to respond to what we saw in front of us, comparing the paintings to their Biblical sources from Tanach. From Elijah and the Ravens to the Golden Calf via Lot and his Daughters and Guercino’s huge painting of King David and many more, we traversed both the galleries and the Tanach. We delved into Rashi’s commentaries and Talmudic arguments, noting how these non-Jewish painters interpreted our Tanachic and Talmudic sources.
We also looked at artwork which used Tanachic texts to support a Christian theology – this was a less comfortable but very important part of our tour.
We ended with the highlight of our morning – looking at the amazing light in Rembrandt’s Belshazzar’s Feast, from the Book of Daniel, painted in 1635. Rav Kook, who spent some of the years of WWI in London, was quoted as saying that “when I first saw Rembrandt’s works, they reminded me of the legend about the creation of light. …. The light in [Rembrandt’s] pictures is the very light that was originally created by God Almighty.” With its cryptic Hebrew letters, magnificent colour scheme and contrasts and use of light, it was a fitting way to end a wonderful morning at the National Gallery.
Jacqui Rudolph