I spent a large part of my preparation for this talk searching for depictions of the Holy Family in Western Christian art from the Middle Ages onward. I looked at many different paintings, drawings, and engravings on the World Wide Web, and each depiction could be classified in one way or another into one of two different types:
The first type could be called the Nazareth Home: Saint Joseph is doing his carpentry work in the workshop; Jesus, as an already grown boy, is helping him; and Mary is to the side, silently, with her eyes downcast, spinning on a spinning wheel or weaving on a loom. This type has been present in Christian iconography since the Middle Ages; Rembrandt van Rijn also used it in several paintings, placing the Holy Family in a setting reminiscent of a Flemish bourgeois house of the time, with carpentry tools hanging on the walls. However, the baby Jesus is still too small to help Joseph. However, this way of depicting the Holy Family probably became most widespread in the nineteenth century—we have all probably seen those color-printed pictures, certainly heavily influenced by romanticism. It is an image of settledness in everyday life, an image of family stability and order, and, in fact, an illustration of today’s first and second readings. This is how it should look! Perhaps the fighters for the so-called traditional family would say. We see a clear division of roles here; the father is the breadwinner, the mother is the protector of the hearth, and the creator of the home environment. And with an obedient and industrious son, the family idyll is complete.
However, in Western Christian art, the second type is more common, in which the Holy Family is depicted in a state of unsettledness, as pilgrims – either in their makeshift home in the Bethlehem cave, or outright on the road—under the open sky, in sandals, sometimes with a donkey carrying Mary and Baby Jesus. A common title for such paintings, drawings, or engravings in the Renaissance and Baroque periods is “Rest on the Road to Egypt.”
The New Testament has only one instance of the first type of depiction: Jesus returned to Nazareth with Joseph and Mary after the Jerusalem Temple episode and listened to them. However, the second type of depiction of the Holy Family as pilgrims is depicted in much more detail in the New Testament. From Nazareth to Ain Karim, the pregnant Mary travels approximately 120 kilometers to visit Elizabeth. Joseph, Mary, and the unborn Jesus then travel roughly the same distance to Bethlehem for the census. Forty days after Jesus’ birth, they travel to the Jerusalem Temple to present their firstborn son to the Lord. Then they have to flee to Egypt; after Herod’s death, they return home. And even in today’s Gospel, we find them as pilgrims. Here, we depict Mary and Joseph in constant motion, engaged in a desperate search for their lost son.
The image of the Holy Family as pilgrims is much more appealing to us, much more dynamic, and much more in line with real life than that idyllic image of the Nazareth household. It is much closer to us, even if our family and we have lived our entire lives in one place, in one house or apartment. We realize that the family is the one with whom we journey through this life towards eternity. They are those with whom the story of our life is written. We are not lonely pilgrims; we walk hand in hand with others in community. This community evolves – some join us at birth, while others leave us when they reach the goal of life earlier. Occasionally someone moves away like the prodigal son, and we pray for his return and patiently wait for him to discover that home is home after all. Many pitfalls await us on the way, which we must face and not give up on the pilgrimage.
However, what is most important is Jesus, who is present throughout the Holy Family’s journeys. At the beginning, he is only in Mary’s womb, but he is still there, still traveling with Joseph and Mary. Families often embark on their journeys in darkness and fog, unable to see the goal and prone to confusion and lostness. However, Jesus’ constant presence on this journey with us is a fixed point, a clear orientation – and a joyful certainty that with him we will definitely reach the goal.
