Family Lessons 164: Depictions

In response to a blog I wrote about the Crosse family of Liverpool and their coat of arms, a kindly relative painted a wooden shield using their heraldic design. It rather pleasingly matches my study’s colour scheme and hangs upon the wall, next to an Edwardian family photograph. I would very much like to have seen a portrait of my medieval ancestors but only kings and the highest nobles enjoyed the funds or inclination for such an image, and even then, they were often stylised cartoons rather than accurate depictions. Instead, we have armorial symbols, such as the Crosse Family’s Jerusalem ‘cross potent’. By 1902, my ancestors had the funds and technology for photographs, even if none of them dared smile.

The Biblical writers, much like medieval ancestors, employed symbol rather than depiction. There are few descriptions of biblical characters and no original illustrations to supplement the text. Yet in Zechariah chapter 3, we encounter High Priest Joshua clothed in ‘filthy garments’. This is not because he was a careless fellow with little regard for personal hygiene, but because it symbolises his, and his nation’s, sinful hearts. In the next verse, his filthy rags are removed and clean linen is given him:

Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the angel. And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment. And I said, Let them set a fair mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon his head, and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the Lord stood by. (Zechariah 3:3-5)

This is also symbolic of the righteous robes which Christ gives to all who trust in Him, clothing with His righteousness rather than their own soiled apparel. I do not know what we shall look like in the world to come, whether we are just younger and fitter, or whether we shall possess glowing faces like Moses for keeping such splendid company. Yet I do know that we shall be divested of all filth and shame, wearing instead the white robes of the cleansed, the purified and the glorified. The symbolism is beautiful, but the reality shall be greater.

A D