Gospel in Art: The children played the pipes for you, and you wouldn't dance

Le Fifre, by Édouard Manet,1866. © Musée d'Orsay, Paris / Wikimedia

Source: Christian Art

Gospel of 9 December 2022
Matthew 11:16-19

Jesus spoke to the crowds: 'What description can I find for this generation? It is like children shouting to each other as they sit in the market place:

"We played the pipes for you, and you wouldn't dance;

we sang dirges, and you wouldn't be mourners."

'For John came, neither eating nor drinking, and they say, "He is possessed." The Son of Man came, eating and drinking, and they say, "Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners." Yet wisdom has been proved right by her actions.'

Reflection on the painting

Édouard Manet travelled to Spain in 1865, where he was mesmerised by a painting by Diego Velazquez at the Prado in Madrid. Upon his return to Paris in 1866, he began work on a new painting inspired by Velazquez, depicting an anonymous regimental fifer of the Spanish army. Manet presents the uniformed boy, in a manner that imitates the formula of Vélazquez's court portraits, against a flattened, monochrome background of neutral tone, thus frustrating attempts for the viewer to assess the figure's true size or importance. It is all about the young man joyfully playing, no distractions around him, and it isn't important for us to know who he actually was.

Just pure joy to look at this beautiful painting of a fifer joyfully playing. To most of us, the children playing in the market place might just be a normal scene: we don't pay much attention to it. For Jesus, however, such a scene offered a vivid image of life. He says that there are scenes around us of joy, where 'children are playing the pipes for you and you won't dance'.

The reading asks us to notice the small things in our lives, the incidental happenings, the joyful scenes around us, and appreciate them. God is giving us so much, but at times we fail to see it.

LINKS

Gospel in Art: https://christian.art/

Today's reflection: https://christian.art/daily-gospel-reading/matthew-11-16-19-2022/