About
the Painting
"HE
WAS LOST, AND IS FOUND" (Luke
15: 24)
Rembrandt Harmensz
van Rijn
Oil on canvas. 262x205 cm
Holland. Circa 1668
Collection of Duke d'Ancezune,
Paris. 1766
L’ Hermitage, Saint Petersburg,
Russia.
www.hermitagemuseum.org
The Diocese of Bridgeport has been granted permission to use
this painting throughout the Lenten Confession Campaign. This
is one of the last paintings by Rembrandt before his death.
This
masterpiece is based on the Parable of the Prodigal Son, found
in the Gospel according to Luke (15: 11-32). In brief, the parable
refers to a son who asks his father for his inheritance and leaves
the parental home, only to fritter away all his wealth. Arriving
at last at sickness and poverty, he returns to his father's house.
The old man is blinded by tears as he forgives his son, just
as God forgives all those who repent.
This whole work is dominated by the idea of the victory of love,
goodness and charity. The event is treated as the highest act
of human wisdom and spiritual nobility, and it takes place in
absolute silence and stillness. Complex emotions are expressed
in the figure of the bent old man and his suffering, kneeling
son: repentance and charity, boundless love and regret at the
belated spiritual awakening. Drama and depth of feeling are
expressed in the figures of both father and son, with all the
emotional precision with which Rembrandt was endowed.
These images
represent the summit of Rembrandt's psychological mastery. The
broad, sketchy brushstrokes of the artist's late style accentuate
the emotion and intensity of this masterly painting.
Read what Pope Benedict XVI
writes about
the parable
of the Prodigal Son in his book,
Jesus
of Nazareth
(Doubleday,
2007),
pages 202-211:
Pope
Benedict XVI,
"The Parable of the Two Brothers and the Good
Father"
