Sam Harris

http//www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/1genesis/4sin/04_3ce4.jpg

For those interested in what Michelangelo might have been thinking as he painted the Sistine Chapel ceiling - here are some possibilities

In the above link you can view the "Fall and the Expulsion of Adam and Eve" - They have just eaten of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" - we can see the "evil angel" in the form of a partial serpent passing something to Eve and then we see the "good angel" directing the father and mother of humanity out of the garden of Eden. 

If you notice the physical posiition of Eve in relation to Adam it becomes rather obvious what she was doing in the moments before the serpent arrived or perhaps after the snake had directed her.  Think of the position of Monika as Bill leaned against his desk in the oval office.  Now is Michelangelo making some statement here, something to the effect that "eating the fruit of the tree" will bring on the knowledge of good and evil?  Of course the fruit itself is not what changes anything, but the fact that a female person could want to satisfy or give pleasure to a male person with oral stimulation says a lot about the depth of the moral aptitude of the female.  What I mean precisely, is that in order for her to willingly provide that kind of sexual service to her mate involves a case of knowing what the other person (Adam in this case) wants and acting according to those desires in an altruistic manner.  This could be a primary case of "putting yourself in the place of the other" one of the prerequisites of having a moval attitude.

So in essence Michelangelo paints the bad angel as an agent of oral sex while the good angel carries a weapon and pushes the couple out of paradise.  It seems a very apt take on Christianity - especially perceptive early in the 16th Century. 

http//www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/1genesis/6adam/06_3ce6.jpg

Now take a look at the painting of "The Creation of Adam" - here Michelangelo suggests that God and his entourage of angels exist in the confines of a very brain-like structure.  In fact, their divine abode exactly resembles the shape of a human brain.  Could Michelangelo be "saying" that the Divine pantheon of Jehovah and his court of spirit-beings are actually the "creations" of the mind of man in a universal sense (in other words, they are the product of our language).

The fact that this is the creation scene it can be taken in two distinct ways - hence the near touch of Adam's and God's fingers.  It can be viewed as the fantasy of God creating a man or the fantasy of mankind creating a god. Of course since both are fantasies, the first is acually a double fantasy.

Anyway, those are some thoughts on Michelagelo Buonaroti's images and perhaps his imagination. I particularly see the vision of the Fall of Adam and Eve as something that a homosexual man such as Michelangelo might visualize and paint.  If the implications are true, we would have to conclude that he wasn't much of a christian, but in 1500 what choice was there except to mock those in power through devious and marvelous imagery that he knew they would never unravel.  The mysteriousness is intriguing.

Sorry I couldn't post the pictures here or even highlight the URLs - in the same way that my computer will not copy and paste the blocks in quotes - I cannot do much of anything (even bold or italics) with this program.  Probably due to my working with Windows 95??

Bob

Very interesting.  I’d never noticed the brain cross-section before in the creation scene.  Ol’ Mikey was clever, wasn’t he?  8)

Ha, nice work = )

Very cool, CanZen.  I think you’re onto a sort of Freudian analysis of repressed sexuality here. 

When denying true expression due to some fear of external authority figures pressing down ill will upon any essence of dissent, how else, but through such manner can a healthy psychology vent?  It’s the artist seeking therapeutic expression of truth through subversive language in the work.  Of course, being openly vocally critical of church authority at the time resulted all too often even in what is common now.  The pain from work put into extra thought coming from masses who’ve been programmed into easy dogma, is transferred onto the freethinker who dares to expose the greater truth, the truer combination of symbolic language:

http://www.beholder.com/sell.htm

The truth that presuming the existence of deities based solely on willful suppositions is at best, a mild form of delusion, which is usually maintained by forcing insubstantiated othodoxy on the world around.  It’s the cult forcing rote, and repetition without reason.  These are not sane times.

[quote author=“CanZen”]http://www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/1genesis/4sin/04_3ce4.jpg

For those interested in what Michelangelo might have been thinking as he painted the Sistine Chapel ceiling - here are some possibilities:

In the above link you can view the “Fall and the Expulsion of Adam and Eve” - They have just eaten of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” - we can see the “evil angel” in the form of a partial serpent passing something to Eve and then we see the “good angel” directing the father and mother of humanity out of the garden of Eden. 

If you notice the physical posiition of Eve in relation to Adam it becomes rather obvious what she was doing in the moments before the serpent arrived or perhaps after the snake had directed her.  Think of the position of Monika as Bill leaned against his desk in the oval office.  Now is Michelangelo making some statement here, something to the effect that “eating the fruit of the tree” will bring on the knowledge of good and evil?  Of course the fruit itself is not what changes anything, but the fact that a female person could want to satisfy or give pleasure to a male person with oral stimulation says a lot about the depth of the moral aptitude of the female.  What I mean precisely, is that in order for her to willingly provide that kind of sexual service to her mate involves a case of knowing what the other person (Adam in this case) wants and acting according to those desires in an altruistic manner.  This could be a primary case of “putting yourself in the place of the other” one of the prerequisites of having a moval attitude.

So in essence Michelangelo paints the bad angel as an agent of oral sex while the good angel carries a weapon and pushes the couple out of paradise.  It seems a very apt take on Christianity - especially perceptive early in the 16th Century. 

http://www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/1genesis/6adam/06_3ce6.jpg

Now take a look at the painting of “The Creation of Adam” - here Michelangelo suggests that God and his entourage of angels exist in the confines of a very brain-like structure.  In fact, their divine abode exactly resembles the shape of a human brain.  Could Michelangelo be “saying” that the Divine pantheon of Jehovah and his court of spirit-beings are actually the “creations” of the mind of man in a universal sense (in other words, they are the product of our language).

The fact that this is the creation scene it can be taken in two distinct ways - hence the near touch of Adam’s and God’s fingers.  It can be viewed as the fantasy of God creating a man or the fantasy of mankind creating a god. Of course since both are fantasies, the first is acually a double fantasy.

Anyway, those are some thoughts on Michelagelo Buonaroti’s images and perhaps his imagination. I particularly see the vision of the Fall of Adam and Eve as something that a homosexual man such as Michelangelo might visualize and paint.  If the implications are true, we would have to conclude that he wasn’t much of a christian, but in 1500 what choice was there except to mock those in power through devious and marvelous imagery that he knew they would never unravel.  The mysteriousness is intriguing.

Sorry I couldn’t post the pictures here or even highlight the URLs - in the same way that my computer will not copy and paste the blocks in quotes - I cannot do much of anything (even bold or italics) with this program.  Probably due to my working with Windows 95??

Bob

You know I wish i read this before I went to the Sistine Chapel.  I would have enjoyed it even more.

I’ve checked out a few more of the main frescos on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and found a couple more with interesting overtones.  The first is “The Creation of the Sun, the Moon and the Planets” - we can see two views of Jehovah, on the right approaching, and on the left leaving. The most intriguing view is of course the one with God’s white bum hanging out of his robes.  Michelangelo must have laughed a great deal doing this send-up of God’s backside, it’s quite hilarious really given all the anti-sodomy rhetoric that He’s so famous for.  But there it is, God actually “mooning” the audience.

http//www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/1genesis/8plants/08_3ce8.jpg

The next one that seems to me to be a very sensual portrayal is the painting of Job. We see him looking into the heavens with an “ecstatic contemplation of God” as he expresses a deep longing for his Creator. Oddly enough the face of Job is in the shadows while the center of the portrait and the most illuminated is focused directly on Job’s groin area especially the well endowed loin cloth. All that is complicated by the sight of two young angels-boys with their attention firmly fixed on the same groin, and even the large mouthed fish appears to be aiming at the same genital area.  One more touch, perhaps suggesting pederasty, is the depiction of a boy’s genitalia on the left hip of Job that might be inferred to be those of the angel nearest to Job’s left side.  All in all a very homo-erotic portrayal - I wonder how many sicko priests got inspired by this bit of Michelangelo ‘code’ to ruin the lives of young boys the world over?? (Just a thought?)

http//www.wga.hu/detail/m/michelan/3sistina/3prophet/10_3pr7.jpg

These are my own impressions of Michelangelo’s works, but it seems quite obviously to indicate a very direct mocking of the church and everythng it stands for right in the very heart of their, so-called, sacred world.

Bob

Oops - got the wrong name on that second one - it’s Jonah.

Bob