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The Finding in the Temple, also called Christ among the Doctors or the Disputation (the usual names for the subject in art), is an episode in the early life of Jesus depicted in chapter 2 of the Gospel of Luke. It is the only event of the later childhood of Jesus mentioned in a canonical gospel. [1]
The episode is described in Luke 2:41–52. Jesus, at the age of twelve, accompanies Mary and Joseph, and a large group of their relatives and friends to Jerusalem on pilgrimage, "according to the custom" – that is, Passover. On the day of their return, Jesus "lingered", staying in the Temple, but Mary and Joseph thought that he was among their group when he was not. Mary and Joseph headed back home and after a day of travel realised Jesus was missing, so they returned to Jerusalem, finding Jesus three days later. [2] He was found in the Temple in discussion with the elders, "listening to them and asking them questions". [3] They were amazed at his learning, especially given his young age. When admonished by Mary, Jesus replied: "How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" [4]
The story was slightly elaborated in later literature, such as the apocryphal 2nd-century Infancy Gospel of Thomas (19:1–12). The losing of Jesus is the third of the Seven Sorrows of Mary, and the Finding in the Temple is the fifth Joyful Mystery of the Rosary. [1]
Friedrich Justus Knecht comments on the loss of Jesus by his parents:
Mary lost Jesus through no fault of her own; but with what sorrow she sought Him, with what joy she found Him! We lose Jesus through our own fault when we separate ourselves from Him by mortal sin. This is the greatest of all misfortunes, for he who has lost Jesus, has lost all, and can never be happy without Him. He to whom this misfortune has happened must seek Jesus with sorrow and tears of penance, and he will find Him again in the Temple (His Church), if he will reconcile himself to God by a good and contrite confession. [5]
Cornelius a Lapide gives three reasons why Jesus is found asking the teachers questions:
(1.) Because it was fitting that the child should ask questions of these learned men, and not teach them.
(2.) To teach the young modesty, and the desire to hear, to question, and to learn, "Lest", says Bede, "if they will not be disciples of the truth, they become masters of error."
(3.) That, asking them questions, He might be questioned in turn by them, and might teach them by His replies. [6]
William Robertson Nicoll measures the three days (verse 46) from the time when Mary and Joseph had last seen Jesus, not from their re-arrival in Jerusalem, as "the place where they had lodged and the temple would be among the first places visited in the search". Nicoll also notes that some writers suggest the place was a synagogue adjacent to the temple. [7] F. W. Farrar also observes that "one of the numerous chambers which ran round the Court, and abutted on the actual building" might have been the location. [8]
The Sunday School Teacher of 1881 suggests that a valuable lesson may be learned in reflecting on "how, at the bidding of His parents, [Jesus] immediately accompanied them home, setting in His obedience a lovely example to all children". [9]
Pope John Paul II refers to the story as "joy mixed with drama". Jesus "appears in his divine wisdom as he listens and raises questions, already in effect one who "teaches". The revelation of his mystery as the Son wholly dedicated to his Father's affairs proclaims the radical nature of the Gospel, in which even the closest of human relationships are challenged by the absolute demands of the Kingdom". [10]
This event is frequently shown in art, and was a common component in cycles of the Life of the Virgin as well as the Life of Christ . In early Christian depictions, Jesus is usually shown in the center, seated on a raised dais surrounded by the elders, who are often on stepped benches. The gesture usually made by Jesus, pointing to his upraised thumb (illustration), may be a conventional rhetorical gesture expressing the act of expounding text. These depictions derive from classical compositions of professors of philosophy or rhetoric with their students, and are similar to medieval depictions of contemporary university lectures.
This composition can appear until as late as Ingres (Montauban, Musée Ingres ) and beyond. From the Early Medieval period the moment shown is usually assimilated to the finding itself, by the inclusion of, initially, Mary, and later Joseph as well, usually at the left of the scene. Typically, Jesus and the doctors, intent on their discussions, have not noticed them yet. From the 12th century Jesus is often seated in a large throne-like chair, sometimes holding a book or scroll.
In late medieval depictions, the Doctors, often now carrying or consulting large volumes, may be given specifically Jewish features or dress, and are sometimes overtly anti-Semitic caricatures, like some of the figures in Albrecht Dürer's version in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid. From the High Renaissance onward, many painters showed a "close-up" of the scene, with Jesus closely surrounded by gesticulating scholars, as in Dürer's version of the subject.
Rembrandt, who enjoyed depicting Jewish elders in the Temple in various subjects, made three etchings of the subject (Bartsch 64–66) as well as one of the much more unusual scene of "Christ returning from the Temple with his parents". [11] The Pre-Raphaelite painter William Holman Hunt painted a version called The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple , now at Birmingham, as one of a number of subjects from Jesus's life, for which he travelled to the Holy Land to study local details.
The subject has attracted few artists since the 19th century, and one of the last notable depictions may be the one painted, as a forgery of a Vermeer, by Han van Meegeren in front of the Dutch police, in order to demonstrate that the paintings he had sold to Hermann Göring were also fake.
In Christianity, the Visitation is the visit of Mary, who was pregnant with Jesus, to Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist, in the Gospel of Luke, Luke 1:39–56.
The agony in the Garden of Gethsemane is an episode in the life of Jesus, which occurred after the Last Supper and before his betrayal and arrest, all part of the Passion of Jesus leading to his crucifixion and death. This episode is described in the three Synoptic Gospels in the New Testament. According to these accounts, Jesus, accompanied by Peter, John and James, enters the garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives where he experiences great anguish and prays to be delivered from his impending suffering, while also accepting God's will.
The flight into Egypt is a story recounted in the Gospel of Matthew and in New Testament apocrypha. Soon after the visit by the Magi, an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream telling him to flee to Egypt with Mary and the infant Jesus since King Herod would seek the child to kill him. The episode is frequently shown in art, as the final episode of the Nativity of Jesus in art, and was a common component in cycles of the Life of the Virgin as well as the Life of Christ. Within the narrative tradition, iconic representation of the "Rest on the Flight into Egypt" developed after the 14th century.
The baptism of Jesus, the ritual purification of Jesus with water by John the Baptist, was a major event described in the three synoptic Gospels of the New Testament. It is considered to have taken place at Al-Maghtas, today located in Jordan.
The Parable of the Lost Sheep is one of the parables of Jesus. It appears in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. It is about a shepherd who leaves his flock of ninety-nine sheep in order to find the one which is lost. It is the first member of a trilogy about redemption that Jesus tells after the Pharisees and religious leaders accuse him of welcoming and eating with "sinners."
In Christianity, feeding the multitude comprises two separate miracles of Jesus, reported in the Gospels, in which Jesus used modest resources to feed thousands of followers who had gathered to see him heal the sick.
The Parable of the Rich Fool is a parable of Jesus which appears in the Gospel of Luke. It depicts the futility of the belief that wealth can secure prosperity or a good life.
The parable of the Pharisee and the Publican is a parable of Jesus that appears in the Gospel of Luke. In Luke 18:9–14, a self-righteous Pharisee, obsessed by his own virtue, is contrasted with a publican who humbly asks God for mercy.
Jesus' teachings referring to little children and infants/babies appear in a few places in the New Testament and in the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas.
The kiss of Judas, also known as the Betrayal of Christ, is the act with which Judas identified Jesus to the multitude with swords and clubs who had come from the chief priests and elders of the people to arrest him, according to the Synoptic Gospels. The kiss is given by Judas in the Garden of Gethsemane after the Last Supper and leads directly to the arrest of Jesus by the police force of the Sanhedrin.
The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple (1854–1860) is a painting by the English artist William Holman Hunt intended as an ethnographically accurate version of the subject traditionally known as "Christ Among the Doctors", an illustration of the child Jesus debating the interpretation of the scripture with learned rabbis. The passage illustrated is from the Gospel of Luke, 2:41, which states:
Every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover. When he was twelve years old, they went up to the Feast, according to the custom. After the Feast was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, "Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you." "Why were you searching for me?" he asked. "Didn't you know I had to be in my Father's house?" But they did not understand what he was saying to them.
Calming the storm is one of the miracles of Jesus in the Gospels, reported in Matthew 8:23–27, Mark 4:35–41, and Luke 8:22–25. This episode is distinct from Jesus' walk on water, which also involves a boat on the lake and appears later in the narrative.
Healing the paralytic at Capernaum is one of the miracles of Jesus in the synoptic Gospels. Jesus was living in Capernaum and teaching the people there, and on one occasion the people gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left inside the house where he was teaching, not even outside the door. Some men came carrying a paralyzed man but could not get inside, so they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and then lowered the man down. When Jesus saw how faithful they had been, he said to the paralyzed man, "Son, your sins are forgiven."
The commissioning of the Twelve Apostles is an episode in the ministry of Jesus that appears in all three Synoptic Gospels: Matthew 10:1–4, Mark 3:13–19 and Luke 6:12–16. It relates the initial selection of the Twelve Apostles among the disciples of Jesus.
The return of the family of Jesus to Nazareth, also known as the return from Egypt, appears in the reports of the early life of Jesus given in the canonical gospels. Both of the gospels which describe the nativity of Jesus agree that he was born in Bethlehem and then later moved with his family to live in Nazareth. The Gospel of Matthew describes how Joseph, Mary, and Jesus went to Egypt to escape from Herod the Great's slaughter of the baby boys in Bethlehem. Matthew does not mention Nazareth as being the previous home of Joseph and Mary; he says that Joseph was afraid to go to Judea because Herod Archelaus was ruling there and so the family went to Nazareth instead. The Gospel of Luke, on the other hand, does not record anything about the flight to Egypt, but says that Joseph had been previously living in Nazareth, and returned there after the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple.
The Bread of Life Discourse is a portion of the teaching of Jesus which appears in chapter 6 of John's Gospel and was delivered in the synagogue at Capernaum.
According to the Gospel of Luke, the road to Emmaus appearance is one of the early post-resurrection appearances of Jesus after his crucifixion and the discovery of the empty tomb. Both the meeting on the road to Emmaus and the subsequent supper at Emmaus, depicting the meal that Jesus had with two disciples after the encounter on the road, have been popular subjects in art.
Christ among the Doctors is an oil painting by Albrecht Dürer, dating to 1506, now in the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain. The work dates to Dürer's sojourn in Venice, and was executed hastily while he was working at the Feast of the Rosary altarpiece.
This narrative is told in Luke 5:1-3, Mark 4:1, and Matthew 13:1–3. Owing to the vast crowds that followed him from the surrounding towns and villages to listen to his doctrine, Jesus retired to the sea coast. There he entered a boat, that he used as a pulpit, and addressed the crowd on the shore.
In the Gospel of Luke alone, Jesus follows the beatitudes with a set of woes. Thus He starts by saying that poverty for the sake of God is the cause of all good, and that hunger and weeping will not be without the reward. Next He denounces the opposite to these as the source of condemnation and punishment. These woes are universal and differ from the woes of the Pharisees.
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