Shaun King is calling for statues of Jesus to be destroyed. Actually, he wants statues depicting Jesus as a white European to be destroyed (Goodbye, Michelango’s “Pieta”). He claims depicting Jesus as a white is an attempt to promote “white supremacy.” I don’t know about that, but I do know artists have been representing Jesus to reflect their own cultural background wherever Christianity has gone. Mexican folk art depicts Jesus as brown-skinned (just as the famed image of the Virgin of Guadalupe depicts Mary with brown skin). A popular Peruvian Nativity scene has the infant Jesus wearing a colorful chullo, with Mary, Joseph, and the shepherds dressed in traditional Peruvian garb. Well before this, a tenth-century mural from what is now east-central China depicts Jesus as (ready?) Chinese.
Maybe, Shaun has never heard James Taylor’s little Christmas carol Some Children See Him. You probably know the words:
Some children see Him lily white,
The baby Jesus born this night.
Some children see Him lily white,
With tresses soft and fair.
Some children see Him bronzed and brown,
The Lord of heav'n to earth come down.
Some children see Him bronzed and brown,
With dark and heavy hair.
Some children see Him almond-eyed,
This Savior whom we kneel beside.
Some children see Him almond-eyed,
With skin of yellow hue.
Some children see Him dark as they,
Sweet Mary's Son to whom we pray.
Some children see him dark as they,
And, ah! they love Him, too!
Maybe Shaun is unaware most Christians—thoughtful Christians, at least—know Jesus didn’t look like blue-eyed Jeffrey Hunter (King of Kings, 1961) or stood almost 6’2” like Jim Caviezel (Passion of the Christ, 2004). Indeed, some Christians suggest Jesus may have more likely resembled Jamie Farr (M*A*S*H’s Cpl. Klinger).[1]
Maybe Shaun doesn’t know taking the Christian doctrine of the incarnation seriously would imply Jesus resembled a Jew of the first century. Shaun apparently takes his depiction of Jesus from Revelation 1:14-15 (and I thought only fundamentalists took the Revelation literally). John probably wasn’t trying to invoke the Jesus who walked the roads of Galilee, but the apocalyptic Lord who was about to do business with the enemies of God’s Kingdom. No, the Jesus who did walk those roads didn’t look European, Asian, Hispanic, or African. He was Semitic, probably no taller than other Semitic men of the time, his musculature was likely that of any man who worked with carpentry or stone mason tools; his voice would have been strong to be heard by the thousands who sometimes came to hear him. We’re probably not told what he looked like because it doesn’t matter; what mattered were his words and what he did—for everyone.
If Shaun King wants Jesus to look African, I get it. But Jesus can’t, indeed won’t, be confined to any culture. He transcends cultures—that’s why his religion is the most widespread in the world. This Jesus would call on white racists to repent, while calling on non-whites to abandon hatred to embrace love and forgiveness. This Jesus longs to instill in each heart—no matter its owner’s color—a vision for a new world.
True, some white Christians haven’t followed the life and teachings of the one they honor with statues and paintings. But neither have some Hispanic Christians, Asian Christians, or African Christians. Yet, still there will be Christians who portray Jesus as having their faces—not to suppress others, but to imagine Him close.
