VISION OF THE BLESSED

Baxandall offers a near mind blowing set of quotes and statements. They describe the Vision of the Blessed. A quote by Maffei, written in 1504, starts things off:

“Vision will be so keen that the slightest difference and variations in color will be discernible, and it will not be impeded by distance or by the interposition of solid bodies.”

At which point Baxandall states that this last concept, that vision will not be impeded by the interposition of solid bodies, “will be strange to us.” And then Rimbertinus, writing in 1498, continues with this blockbuster thought:

“An intervening object does not impede the vision of the blessed…If Christ, even though himself in heaven after his Ascension, saw his dear Mother still on earth and at prayer in her chamber, clearly distance and the interposition of a wall does not hinder their vision. The same is true when an object’s face is turned away from the viewer so that an opaque body intervenes…Christ could see the face of his mother when she was prostrate on the ground…as if he were looking directly at her face. It is clear that the blessed can see the front of an object from the back, the face through the back of the head.” Rimbertinus in Baxandall. p104.

Baxandall then offers a transparent drawing by Pierro della Francesca, titled A Well Head, and states that this is the nearest mortal experience that we can come to the view of God. On page 15 of Transparent Drawing, I include Paolo Uccello’s Perspective Drawing of a Chalice, done in 1425, which is similar to della Francesca’s. This is simply the first time that I have ever read anyone putting together vision, morality, knowledge and transparency as manifest of the view of God.

Again, I’m not making this stuff up. All of this has been foretold. I am stunned by the fact that Baxandall didn’t simply make the connection…well, if you want the knowledge of God, if you want the vision of the blessed, which is all the knowledge, then you need to see thru the wall, you need to see thru the solid body, and you need to see objects from the back at the same time as the front.

We are not done with this vision of the blessed thing, as the next page, or one of the next pages, will explore the relationship of sin and how we see.

1. Baxandall, Michael. Painting & Experience in 15th C Italy. Oxford University Press. 1972.