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Mountains and glacier, near sunset, Alaska panhandle, 1974.

I took poor notes on a quickly planned trip to Alaska in 1974, and whatever I may have written has long since been lost. I am posting this shot taken somewhere north of Juneau in the Inside Passage because in September we shall be sailing up the Inside Passage from Vancouver to Skagway and thence west along the south coast of Alaska to Dutch Harbor, That will be followed by a southwestward sailing to stops in Japan ending in Tokyo. This will be my first trip up the Inside Passage in over 50 years, and my wife has never made the trip. While I have several trans-Atlantic crossings under my belt, I have never sailed across the Pacific, so this more than three week odyssey is exciting to contemplate. The frosting is a few days in Japan, a county I feared I might never see again despite my fascination with it.

#lndscape #seascape #mountains #glacier #inside passage #alaska #1974 #photographers on tumblr #pnw #pacific northwest

Christ on the Mount of Olives

Artist: Arent de Gelder (Dutch, 1645-1727)

Date: ca. 1715

Medium: Oil on panel

Collection: The Leiden Collection, New York City, NY, United States

Description

Arent de Gelder’s painting captures the essence of a miraculous moment described in the Gospel of St. Luke 22:39–46, when an angel, descended from Heaven, comforts and supports Christ as he prays in a wooded grove at the Garden of Gethsemane near the Mount of Olives. The angel, dressed in radiant white robes, tenderly reaches toward the kneeling Savior, who prays with lowered head and raised hands. Simultaneously, and with a gesture that visually strengthens their bond, the angel’s extended wing wraps around and embraces Christ. The two figures glow in a pool of heavenly light, more spiritual than physical. It overwhelms the profound darkness of the evening, dimly illuminating the surrounding olive trees and three sleeping disciples huddled together in the immediate foreground.

Christ’s encounter with the angel occurred on Passover, shortly after the Last Supper when he had informed his disciples that one of them would betray him, and before Judas betrayed him in the Garden of Gethsemane. After the Passover feast, Jesus, as was his custom, went to the garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives with a few of his followers, whom the Gospel of St. Matthew identifies as Peter and the sons of Zebedee, James and John. When Christ arrived in the garden, according to the Gospel of St. Luke, he urged his disciples to “pray that you will not come into temptation.” He then moved “about a stone’s throw” away and prayed to God: “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not my will, but Yours be done.” As in answer to his plea, an angel descended from Heaven to succor him in his agony. Luke relates that, even with the angel by his side, Christ’s suffering was so intense that “His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground.” He then discovered that his disciples, exhausted from sorrow, had fallen asleep. In the Gospel of St. Matthew, Christ admonished Peter with these words: “So, you men could not keep watch with Me for one hour? Keep watching and praying, so that you do not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”