The Mystery of the Truth
I was fortunate to visit Rosslyn Chapel (whose formal name is actually the Collegiate Chapel of St. Matthew) in Scotland. If you don't know anything about this place, I would suggest reading up about it. It is a wonder to behold to say the very least.
Mostly it is known from the DaVinci Code book and movie as being a place with hidden symbols (all of which Dan Brown manged to solve, apparently). In that regard, the book and movie are dead on. The entirety of the chapel is covered in carvings and symbols. In many ways it is like looking at a giant hidden picture puzzle in that there seems to always be more there than what you saw the first time you looked.
And conspiracy theories abound about the place - and one can easily see why. The chapel is a trove of symbols and strange carvings. The history of the chapel is pretty well understood, but we don't know what all the designs and symbols meant either to the stone masons or the original congregations who worshiped there or even to us as modern people.
And that's what I loved about the place. Mystery. Lots and lots of mystery.
I would say that a church such as Rosslyn could likely not exist in the US. It contains too many overlapping ideologies and traditions for our linear (or perhaps singular) tastes. Any good fundamentalist Christian would probably move towards apoplexia at such a barrage of images. Our iconoclastic church mentality would balk at the iconodule surrounding and we would call it pagan, heretical, or perhaps even satanic.
Yet it was the overload of symbols and art that took my breath away for the good. It was a place of wonder and awe that was carved with a level of craftsmanship and artistry that boggles the mind. It is also a place where one can tell that passion and devotion were behind every sculpture, every icon, and every flourish in the room.
And there was only one inscription in the entire stonework - in and of itself a marvel that there weren't more - that comes from the book of 1st Esdras (a book in the Apocrypha - again another reason our iconoclast Protestantism would balk) and reads, "Wine is strong, a king is stronger, women are stronger still, but truth conquers all." That statement that truth conquers all is one I found most comforting and great to find inscribed in a chapel. According to the New Testament Gospel of John, the truth shall set us free. While the Rosslyn carving doesn't come from the New Testament, I approve the sentiment and find that any place that holds truth as the ideal is a place to lift up.
The fact that the truth is the only carved word in a chapel of mystery is also something I dearly loved. The truth conquers all, but we may not even know what the truth is in its fullest - yet. Who knows what we will find if the truth is our goal. Perhaps we will find that as we encounter the truth we find more mysteries to examine and to push us to wonder. Perhaps we will also find that in the truth, the mysteries can become the doors which continue to be opened as we find ourselves becoming set free.
Mostly it is known from the DaVinci Code book and movie as being a place with hidden symbols (all of which Dan Brown manged to solve, apparently). In that regard, the book and movie are dead on. The entirety of the chapel is covered in carvings and symbols. In many ways it is like looking at a giant hidden picture puzzle in that there seems to always be more there than what you saw the first time you looked.
And conspiracy theories abound about the place - and one can easily see why. The chapel is a trove of symbols and strange carvings. The history of the chapel is pretty well understood, but we don't know what all the designs and symbols meant either to the stone masons or the original congregations who worshiped there or even to us as modern people.
And that's what I loved about the place. Mystery. Lots and lots of mystery.
I would say that a church such as Rosslyn could likely not exist in the US. It contains too many overlapping ideologies and traditions for our linear (or perhaps singular) tastes. Any good fundamentalist Christian would probably move towards apoplexia at such a barrage of images. Our iconoclastic church mentality would balk at the iconodule surrounding and we would call it pagan, heretical, or perhaps even satanic.
Yet it was the overload of symbols and art that took my breath away for the good. It was a place of wonder and awe that was carved with a level of craftsmanship and artistry that boggles the mind. It is also a place where one can tell that passion and devotion were behind every sculpture, every icon, and every flourish in the room.
And there was only one inscription in the entire stonework - in and of itself a marvel that there weren't more - that comes from the book of 1st Esdras (a book in the Apocrypha - again another reason our iconoclast Protestantism would balk) and reads, "Wine is strong, a king is stronger, women are stronger still, but truth conquers all." That statement that truth conquers all is one I found most comforting and great to find inscribed in a chapel. According to the New Testament Gospel of John, the truth shall set us free. While the Rosslyn carving doesn't come from the New Testament, I approve the sentiment and find that any place that holds truth as the ideal is a place to lift up.
The fact that the truth is the only carved word in a chapel of mystery is also something I dearly loved. The truth conquers all, but we may not even know what the truth is in its fullest - yet. Who knows what we will find if the truth is our goal. Perhaps we will find that as we encounter the truth we find more mysteries to examine and to push us to wonder. Perhaps we will also find that in the truth, the mysteries can become the doors which continue to be opened as we find ourselves becoming set free.
It's hard to read, I know - even looking right at it the words were hard to spot - but the Latin engraving from 1st Esdras is in the scroll work. May the truth conquer all and set us free!
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