Michaelangelo's painting of God reaching out to Adam on the Sistene Chapel ceiling has been appreciated and studied for centuries. It has recently come under a lot of scrutiny from Medical people and artists who see a hidden representation of a huge brain behind the figure of God.
Take a look for yourself and see what you think. It seems to me that the Physicians and Artists have a good point. The dark background certainly looks a lot like the human brain and it also makes a lot of sense.
God is seen offering Adam something of importance. Adam's eyes are open and he is alive and looking at God to receive something. What? I have my ideas. Do you have an idea? Write and let me know.
4 comments:
Hi Gary,
Perhaps the 90% of the brain we humans do NOT utilize will "come alive" when we are fully spirit beings again?! Perhaps Adam was, (PRE "the fall") already fully Spirit and utilizing that 90%? Perhaps sin made us, for lack of a better term, "brain dead" in many ways? Just a theory...
I know during my seminary days I would have an occasional flash of insight regarding something spiritual, that would be truly "beyond" my typical ability to comprehend. And it "felt like" every fiber of my being came alive with that realization...however, it would be only a "flash" and then gone again. I found it difficult to describe, write or otherwise "express" the flash...but I KNEW it was there...
I often wonder if this is a brief, mental "photograph" of what utilizing more of the brain might be like?
Think of it this way. John reports Jesus as saying we will have the Holy Spirit "with us and in us". Paul also notes that "God holds all things together" so we know that the Holy Spirit is the mysterious "Strong Force" in the universe that holds it together.
What, then, does it mean to be reborn, converted, forgiven and adopted? What is the difference? I do not know but here is my idea. At the new birth we are made alive, and the spirit that we had in us was pulling us away from God to do our own thing but now we have gotten a "New Polarity and are drawn to follow God. Our spirit is unified with His Spirit and these "Unitive" or "Transformative" experiences are anointings much like turning on the afterburner of a car.
Every time we pray and meditate a part of the brain is stimulated. Worship seems to awaken one part, verbal prayer another and spiritual prayers another with meditation another. "Unitive Experiences" are called that in spiritual formation because we seem to become united with God's Spirit and have an "out of our mind/body experience. According to a CD series from a Neurologist who is doing brain scans with people in prayer, worship, etc. brains are turned on in differing ways with different interactions with God. So, we may indeed be using all of one part of the brain plus the Holy Spirit.
Fascinating stuff, Gary. It would be quite an inside joke if that were his intention.
It does cut to the core of just what it means to be a person. Animals have brains and can intelligently interact with the world, but they are not persons. Modern computers can do some of the same but again they are not persons.
The touch God gave Adam and every human being since is a bit of Himself. When scripture says "Let Us create man in Our image" God made something that went beyond the animals that responded to their world to persons that not only responded but could initiate action.
That ability to initiate or create is where we are most like God and most different from the rest of creation. And I agree that touch should be volitional and continuous. We humans are in touch with God we create the most wonderful things, cut off from Him we sink to the level of mere animals.(& below since we are capable of evil)
BTW, I don't buy the view that we only use a small portion of our brain. I think we are smarter than we think but we don't have the tools to properly measure it. See Malcolm Gladwell's book Blink for more.
Jerry, there is a lot of mystery here for sure. On my dissertation I studied what it means to be created in the imago Dei-image of God. Most theologians say it is the difference between us and all other creation. We are born with a "Moral Law" deep within ourselves. Even aggressive atheists who write books must use God's Moral Law to criticize us Christians for not being kind and loving all the time. Where does the Moral Laws come from?
But the imago Dei is also a term used in the ancient Middle East to mean "Ambassador to the King". This takes it deeper because all humans were created to be Vice Regents to King Jesus.
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