The Bridegroom Cometh

The reference here is to one of Jesus's parables. In it the expected Messiah, the "Son of Man," is likened to a bridegroom, who is expected at his wedding. Gnostics would have made something of this myth, and it still applies easily to Catholic doctrine in which the Church is the Bride of Christ. Of course, if the expected Messiah is the bridegroom then the bride is easily the world, or at least the body of believers in the world.

Again I've used my figure of Seth, with his lantern, as the Messianical figure. The animals that surround him were most directly influenced by Raphael's painting of Ezekiel's vision. In that scripture Ezekiel describes cherubs with the faces of a bull, a lion, a man, and an eagle. These animals were likely always the beings that, in some form, composed the figures of cherubs, but they've been given other associations too. They are the four animals that symbolize the evangelists of the gospels, and, if you want to get more esoteric, the four animals that symbolize the fixed signs of the zodiac. In the bottom left corner the bride and her maid are shown in an inset. The attendant points to a light in the sky, which is, of course, the light of the coming bridegroom.

 

Return to "the Bridegroom Cometh"