When the angel greeted Mary saying: “Rejoice you who are full of grace” he meant that what dwells in her is merely grace; or that her existence is only in the presence of God since no one or nothing can exist if He does not “touch” it. If all what is in you is not a reflection of Him then it is all for nothing. So if we admit that the Lord is in everything, we mean to say that He puts all things under His Lordship and apart from that nothingness is your portion.
The giving of ourselves to God cancels our closed in self-fullness, and so our life becomes as such a march with our face looking God-ward after it used to be only His “journey” towards us, that is only He looking Man-ward. In His union with us, He does not cancel our self, so “humanity” remains in us in full, but that humanity becomes full of Divinity. Of course the self becomes divinized as Islam says or deified as Christianity says especially in Eastern Christianity. The humanity of the person with its created aspect is not cancelled, but you inherit in your created humanity, while still in this world, the Divine Glory that is uncreated since the Beginning.
The insistence on the “I” and its individualism in the history of world civilizations ranging from the sciences to philosophy gave the signal for the emergence of the Humanities in the West; for instance, the nude body in graphic art put an end to the symbolic nature of painting and drawing and hindered Man from knowing himself as a creature in the image and likeness of God. Man started to “worship” his body and get mesmerized with a kind of beauty leaving aside the knowledge of himself as an heir of the Lord. And he got to cancel the face in the human body while in iconography the face represents the “presence” of God.
Contrary to the grace in that view of things is the fall of “braggadocio” and show off; that imprisons Man in his earthliness which in its nature does not “face Upwards”. Show off is an open statement of the triviality of our humanity starting with the pretentiousness there is in the beauty of the body. That means nothing when it is not a recognition of the beauty of God and His splendor shining on us. That is the difference between the Icon and the painting. The Icon speaks of the Lord and the painting speaks of the human body or of human nature without pointing to what is “above” them.
In the West, that was at the core of the Renaissance that was determined to sever the relationship between Nature and its creator. In fact, historically, European art has brought in atheism since the sixteenth century. Man did not “utter” atheism verbally first, but through art; and after that through words and ideas.
Yet, in the first place, life is not philosophical precepts but attitude and conduct. Thinking of things in depth, one wonders what the bragging of a pretty woman of her beauty really means. in the last analysis, seduction by a woman is a summoning for others to adore her namely to adore her body. Braggadocio can mean nothing except the seeking of adoration, or worship in other words, which is actually blasphemy since it is basically impossible to worship two things simultaneously.
Money is more dangerous to worship than the flesh since the Lord says that it is “a worship of idols” in Colossians 3: 5. The Lord has made you make it (money) so that you can distribute it as the Scriptures say “They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor, their righteousness endures forever; their horn will be lifted high in honor” (Palms 112: 9). Beauty and money are two possessions which when you make them “reign” in your life, you become a person whose freedom has been usurped from him. Each of the passions we have is a distraction from the “the grace that saves all people” (from Titus 2: 11).
The believer who has beautiful features does not give heed to praise; he might not be aware of the gift of creation or might not think about it and accepts its dissolution when the time comes. He does not approach it as possessed only by him or by others. His “possession” is only that which comes down on him from above. Perhaps intelligence is the most “seductive” gift since it is splendor par excellence since it is linked to something greater and since the “divine mind” which is the mind of Christ, is reflected in it. Every smart person, regardless of his religion, is essentially close to God whether his faith is great or little. God manifests Himself in him in a splendid way and perhaps without his knowledge. And when compared with richness in beauty and money, intelligence reveals God as no other gift does. And in contrast with money and beauty, intelligence does not remain in custody of its owner since in its nature it spreads and is given to others.
Does that mean that a person does not know his qualities or even his spiritual virtues? He who renounces his money understands that but the ascetic, if he is a true believer, does not attribute goodness to himself and acknowledges only the gift that is Divine. In the same way, it is hard for a pretty woman to attribute her beauty to God; but He is able to put such faith in her and then she would have obtained a good sum of holiness.
What is loftier than that is for the very cultured person to consider himself nothing and to say: “I am nothing. All what my mind has is partly a training, but sense is poured in me from above and I will not dissipate it so that wisdom obtains; and blessed is he who can depart from what he has known in me of wisdom to Him who has all knowledge.
“And at the end, Christ will submit all the Kingdom to God the Father who has submitted all things to Christ.” After this God will be all things and in all things (from 1Corinthians 15: 24-28). All the gifts that we are given are from Christ and the gifts essentially come from Him. And we are nothing if we do not admit and acknowledge that. But if we believe that God is all things and in all things, then we also understand that He is in our beauty no matter what its nature is; we also will realize that we have torn asunder the veil that is made of money and beauty and intelligence in order to behold the Word that is from the Beginning.
Translated by Riad Moufarrij
Original Text: “التباهي” – An Nahar – 12.01.2013
