Christian esoterism in paintings by Fiorentino and Pontormo.

TWO HOLY FAMILIES, TWO MARY'S: ESOTERISM IN FIORENTINO'S ALLEGORY (ca.1521) AND PALA (1518) AND IN PONTORMO'S VISITATION (ca.1528). Jos Verhulst, December 17th, 2017 Introduction In the fall of 1909, Rudolf Steiner projected into the public domain 1 the idea of two distinct Jesus children. According to his understanding of the gospels, the nativities in Matthew and Luke refer to two different Holy Families and two disparate birth stories. Invoking Mt.1:6 and Lk.3:31, Steiner coined the terms 'solomonic Jesus' and 'nathanic Jesus'. He claimed the nathanic Jesus to have been an extraordinary human being who had never incarnated before. This exceptional individual can be identified as the 'Son of Man' 2. By contrast, the solomonic Jesus was a human being who had gone through a great many incarnations and was claimed by Steiner to be Zarathustra reborn. Also, the solomonic individuality was claimed to have transmigrated to the twelve year old nathanic Jesus, with both individualities forming a unique kind of unison 3. Allegedly, the solomonic Jesus and Joseph and the nathanic Mary subsequently died and a new family was constituted, bringing together the solomonic Mary, the nathanic Joseph and Jesus with the younger children of the solomonic Mary. Still according to Steiner, Jesus of Nazareth became Jesus Christ at Jesus' Baptism in the river Jordan, when the solomonic human individuality had left Jesus (i.e. the 'Son of Man') to be replaced by the divine being which was called by the Baptist the 'Lamb of God' (Jh.1:29,36). Needless to say, Steiner's interpretations are completely ignored by both academia and churchdom. Nevertheless, the distinction made between the solomonic and nathanic Jesus reflects the diverging genealogies in the gospels of Matthew (Mt.1:1-16) and Luke (Lk.3:23-38). It is corroborated also by the largely different birth stories in Matthew and Luke and by the esoteric chronology encoded in John's gospel 4. Importantly, Rudolf Steiner claimed that he had rediscovered a secret which had been known and transmitted in esoteric Christian tradition and which had been covertly expressed in esoteric 1 See R. Steiner, GA 114. In the fourth lecture (Basel, September 18th, 1909), the distinction between the nathanic and solomonic Jesus was discussed for the first time. 2 See our upcoming paper: “Eisu, King and Prophet, in John's gospel” (Dec.23th, 2017). 3 Lk.2:41-52. The event can be dated at the festival of Pesach Sheni (Sunday, May 14th, 13 AD) as is suggested in Lk.2:42. In Lk.2:49, it is the solomonic individuality who speaks through the mouth of the nathanic Jesus. The expression “...in my Father's house” (actually, the Greek expression 'ἐν τοῖς τοῦ πατρός μου' does not mention any 'house' but has a more general meaning) refers not to Jerusalem's Temple (which was left soon after the event) but to the corporeity of the nathanic Jesus. Indeed, as the latter individuality had not taken part in the biblical fall, it was not a common human 'egoity' but a pure 'altruity' whose body belonged, so to say, to the Father (in the sense of Our Lord's Prayer: “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”). 4 See for instance: https://www.academia.edu/28773248/The_birth_horoscopes_of_the_solomonic_Jesus_and_t he_solomonic_Mary_according_to_Johns_gospel Actually, a reference to the mystery of the two Jesus children is embedded in Jh.1:13. For details, see: https://www.academia.edu/19773779/De_twee_Jezuskinderen_in_het_Johannesevangelie (in Dutch). 1 Christian artwork5. Indeed, High Renaissance artists Raphael and Da Vinci can be shown to have known about the secret of the two Jesus children, as did also the baroque artists Caravaggio and Rubens 6. In the present paper, we discuss three esoteric paintings produced during the intermediate period of Mannerism. Allegory of Salvation with the Virgin and Christ Child, St. Elizabeth, the Young St. John the Baptist and Two Angels (ca. 1521-1522) Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) by Rosso Fiorentino (1495-1540) The title of this painting (figure 1) is taken from the website of the gallery where the work is on display. Nevertheless, this museum also comments: “The subject of this unfinished painting is still unknown. The woman in blue at the right is the Virgin; she holds the frightened Christ Child in her arms. At the left, the young Saint John the Baptist reclines in a troubled sleep and almost appears to be dead. The identity of the old woman at the left is unclear. She may be Saint Anne (mother of the Virgin), Saint Elisabeth (mother of John the Baptist), or a Sibyl from classical mythology who foretold the future. This haunting image is one of the museum's masterpieces”7. As a matter of fact, there is not the slightest indication for the boy in the lower left of the painting being Saint John. The usual attributes of the Baptist (the cross, the camel's hair garment...) are completely lacking and there is not the slightest scriptural ground for depicting young Saint John dead of dying. The older woman, tentatively identified also as Anna the prophetess, keeps a closed book under her right arm. This detail remains unexplained in identifications proposed by mainstream commentators. In anthroposophical literature8 the painting has been interpreted as referring to the nathanic versus solomonic Jesus and to the metempsychosis which allegedly occurred at the festival of Pesach Sheni of 13 AD. We will argue that this esoteric interpretation is indeed the correct one. Firstly, a number of additional elements on the painting should be noticed. The boy at the right is not a toddler but a child of prepubertal age. Shockingly, the 5 A number of books have been devoted to the subject. See for instance: Hella KrauseZimmer (1969, 2001) “Die zwei Jesusknaben in der bildenden Kunst” Stuttgart: Freies Geistesleben (in German); David Ovason (2001) “The Two Children” London: Century; Jos Verhulst (2011) “De Rubens Code” Antwerp: Via Libra (in Dutch); Trond Skaftnesmo (2011) “Prins Immanuel af Bethlehem og Yeshua af Nazareth” Odense: Jupiter (in Danish). 6 See for instance the following papers and references therein: https://www.academia.edu/27702923/THE_ESOTERIC_STRUCTURE_OF_THE_MADONNA_DI_FOLIGNO_RAPHAEL_1511-1512_ https://www.academia.edu/19773794/The_esoteric_content_of_Leonardo_Da_Vincis_Virgin_of_the_Rocks https://www.academia.edu/29537482/The_encodement_of_the_nathanic_birth_horoscope_in_Rubens_Soissons_nativity 7 http://collections.lacma.org/node/230433 (retrieved November 11th, 2017). Геннадий А. Бондарев (Gennadij A. Bondarew) “Тайны эзотерического христианства в изобразительном искусстве”. See: http://bdn-steiner.ru/modules/Books/files/122-tayny-ezoteric-Chr-v-izo.pdf 8 2 agonizing boy at the left is depicted as an 'age hybrid': he seems to be of about the same age as Jesus, except for his legs which are excessively long and large, as if belonging to an adult. Figure 1: Rosso Fiorentino: Allegory of Salvation. Oil on panel; 211 cm x 180 cm. Secondly, clear relationships connect the 'angels' above to the boys below. These 'angels' seem to represent the souls or entelechies of the two youngsters who merge, so to say, into an extraordinary single entity which hovers above the Jesus boy on Mary's lap. Their conjunction is vividly 3 expressed by their close embrace and by the single pair of colorful wings (with the remaining wings all but invisible) suggesting that both souls engaged into some kind of intimate alliance. Note that the 'angel' at the left is looking down at the agonizing boy while extending an arm in his direction, as if to indicate that he has just left the dying body. The other 'angel' mimicks the facial traits and disturbed expression of the uplooking Jesus. Thirdly, the setting is also suggestive of Mary transferring her child to the older woman. She only loosely holds her child with her left hand, whereas her right arm is placed between the boy and herself (with the boy grasping that arm). As a matter of fact, young Jesus is already slipping down from Mary's lap, his right foot landing on the older woman who extends her arm toward the boy and has a yellow blanket draped over her legs, as if for receiving the child. All these disconcerting elements start to make sense when the painting is understood as a depiction of the transformation of Jesus at age twelve, as reported in Lk.2:41-52. This transformation is represented as an overwhelming and traumatizing vision experienced by the nathanic Jesus. The very first passage in the New Testament where Mary is mentioned occurs at the end of the 'book of generations' (Mt.1:1-16). As a matter of fact, the New Testament opens with the very expression 'Book of generations' (Mt.1:1: 'Βίβλος γενέσεως'; compare to Gen.5:1). This 'book' refers to the solomonic lineage in Mt.1:1-16, as opposed to the nathanic lineage in Lk.3:23-38. Given the context, the book held by the older woman is very probably this 'book of generations' which is an attribute identifying her as the solomonic Mary. Fiorentino depicts the second Mary in connection with the solomonic lineage which stands for worldly experience and wisdom acquired over many incarnations and with which the pure but unexperienced soul of the 'Son of Man' has now to be united. From the visionary perspective of the nathanic Jesus, the solomonic Mary appears as an old woman indeed 9. The 'book of generations' is depicted closed and locked, suggesting that esoteric content is embedded in the artwork, for the onlooker to disclose. We are now in a position to evaluate our hypothesis (h: “Fiorentino's painting represents the metempsychosis of the solomonic Jesus to the nathanic Jesus”) using the Bayesian formula: P(h I b) x P(e I h•b) P(h I e•b) = _________________________________________________________________ [P(h I b) x P(e I h•b)] + [P(¬h I b) x P(e I ¬h•b)] 9 According to esoteric Christian tradition, the solomonic Mary was about thirty years when the nathanic Jesus was twelve. However, Fiorentino's Allegory does not depict a well-defined event in the physical world. It is a visionary representation, from the viewpoint of the nathanic Jesus, of the metempsychosis and the occurrences going with it (with the main elements being: (I) the death of the solomonic Jesus, (II) the solomonic soul uniting with the nathanic Jesus, and (III) the transfer of the nathanic Jesus from the nathanic Mary to the solomonic Mary, in a new familial context). https://www.academia.edu/28773248/The_birth_horoscopes_of_the_solomonic_Jesus_and_t he_solomonic_Mary_according_to_Johns_gospel 4 In this formula, P stands for '(subjective) probability', ¬ stands for 'it is not the case that', h stands for 'the hypothesis holds true' and e stands for the 'evidence invoked in support of the hypothesis'. The symbol b, which is present in every factor within the formula, stands for 'background knowledge'. For instance, background knowledge encompasses biographical knowledge with respect to the painter and biblical knowledge with respect to the depicted scene. Background knowledge also includes elements affecting the a priori subjective probability of hypothesis h being true. On the one hand, the fact that other esoteric artwork endorsing the hypothesis has been documented renders the hypothesis more likely to be correct. On the other hand, the fact that almost all Christian denominations and the whole of the academic world ignore or reject the hypothesis, lowers the subjective probability of the hypothesis being valid. Using Carrier's canon10, we can evaluate P(h I e•b) as follows: P(h I b) is the probability of the hypothesis being true given our background knowledge, but without considering the evidence. We put this value at a conservative .01 ('extremely improbable'). This implies P(¬h I b) = .99 . P(e I h•b) represents the likeliness of our evidence existing if the hypothesis is true. In our case (as we will discuss below) a number of elements exist which are expected under the hypothesis but are unlikely to appear under other interpretations (such as the conventional hypothesis that the painting represents Mary and Elizabeth, with Jesus and the Baptist). The evidence is at the expected level of detail and no obvious contraindications are present. However, explanation of certain elements (the woman on the left seeming old and holding a book) requires an extended version of h. Therefore, we put P(h I e•b) = .05 ('very improbable'). P(e I ¬h•b)] represents the likeliness of our evidence e cropping up if hypothesis h were false. We deduce an upper estimate for this value by considering three elements in the painting each of which appears extremely unlikely to occur under any hypothesis except h: (I) The presence on the scene of a dead or dying child. This is an extremely unusual element. It is unexplainable under the interpretation presented by the LACMA (i.e. this child is John the Baptist). However, the presence of this dead or dying child is completely logical under our hypothesis h. We evaluate the probability of this dead child appearing under ¬h as P=.01 (= 'extremely unprobable'). (II) The presence of two embracing angel-like beings right above Jesus. This is also an extremely uncommon element. Angels or putti are common on Madonna paintings. However, in Fiorentino's piece the pair of angel-like beings shows a number of particularities strongly supportive of our hypothe10 “Virtually impossible” = .000001; “extremely improbable' = .01; “very improbable” = .05; “Improbable” = .2 etc. See Richard Carrier (2012) “Proving History” Amherst (NY): Prometheus; p.93. 5 sis. Firstly, the fact that both beings are placed very prominently directly above Jesus is suggestive of a metempsychosis being depicted. The fact that both beings are in close embracement and as if united by a single pair of wings, is suggestive of some unusual kind of unison connecting both 'souls'. Moreover, the two united 'soulmates' each relate to one of the two children below (as we have noticed, the 'angel' at the left looks down at the dying child and even extends his arm in its direction whereas the 'angel' at the right reproduces the fearful face of the Jesus boy). All these details are understandable under our hypothesis h and remain unexplained otherwise. Here too, we evaluate P(¬h) = .01 ('extremely improbable'). (III) The transfer of the Jesus child from his mother to the other woman. We noticed that Jesus' mother only loosely holds her child which glides down off her lap landing upon the older woman's foot. This woman also extends her left arm towards Jesus. This handing over of the child from the nathanic to the solomonic Mary helps explaining the fearful expression on Jesus' face. The transfer of Jesus does not follow from our hypothesis as such (i.e. “the solomonic individual transmigrated to the nathanic Jesus”). However, the event becomes understandable when the broader context of the hypothesis is considered. We already mentioned that, according to Rudolf Steiner, the nathanic Mary died soon after the transformation of the nathanic Jesus in the temple, and that a new family was constituted wherein young Jesus was united with the solomonic Mary. We also remarked that the aged appearance of the woman at the left side, and her holding a book, can be explained with reference to Mt.1:1,16. Thus, even the finer details of the central scene on the painting become understandable from the viewpoint of our hypothesis 11, when the latter is put in broader context. We evaluate the probability of these correspondences occurring at P = .1 (which looks like a conservative estimate). Plugging all these values into the formula, we obtain: .01 x .05 P(h I e•b) = _____________________________________________ = > .95 [.01 x .05] + [.99 x .01 x .01 x .1] Thus, we conclude that very probably, hypothesis h holds true. 11 A peculiar detail is the representation of the dead solomonic Jesus as an age-hybrid. We conjecture that this strange element refers to the age difference of both Jesus boys, which is ambiguous. From the common point of view, the age gap separating the two children (born on Sept.15th, 7 BC and Jan.14th, 1 AD, respectively) was 6.333 years (i.e. 1/3 of a metonic cycle). Thus, at the transformation of the nathanic Jesus in the temple (May 14th, 13 AD, which is the festival of Pesach Sheni), the solomonic Jesus must have been a young adult of eighteen. However, after the metempsychosis, the solomonic individuality, while transferring to the nathanic Jesus the knowledge and abilities which he had acquired during these eighteen years, also regressed, so to say, to the developmental stage of the latter. Before the metempsychosis, the solomonic individuality was incarnated as an 18-year old young adult. After the metempsychosis, this individuality was incarnated in a human being of about twelve years old, and hence the developmental phase between twelve and eighteen years carried on, once again, but with preservation of the insights and abilities that had been acquired previously by the solomonic Jesus. This resulted in the premature wisdom and knowledge displayed by the twelve year old nathanic Jesus in the temple (Lk.2:47). See also: https://www.academia.edu/19773794/The_esoteric_content_of_Leonardo_Da_Vincis_Virgin_of_the_Rocks 6 The Visitation (1528) Santi Michele e Francesco, Carmignano by Jacopo Carucci said Pontormo (1494-1557) Figure 2: Jacopo Pontormo: The Visitation. Oil on panel; 202 cm x 156 cm. Pontormo produced his Visitazione (figure 2) around 1528-29, which is about seven years after his contemporary Fiorentino created his Allegory. The work remained unnoticed up to 1904, when it was discovered in the church of Carmignano, a small village west of Florence. Recently, the painting has been 7 restored. It was the flagship piece in the exhibition “Pontormo e Rosso. Divergenti vie della 'Maniera'" (Florence, Palazzo Strozzi, from 8 March to 20 July 2014). The painting shows the meeting of the nathanic Mary and Elisabeth (Lk.1:3945). In the close background, alter ego's or doppelgangers of both women stand side by side, interacting neither with each other nor with Mary and Elisabeth but staring directly at the onlooker. Occasionally, this backstage pair has been interpreted as a couple of handmaidens who happened to assist at the meeting of Mary and Elisabeth. Of course, such a conventional reading does nothing to explain the striking likeness of these 'servants'12 to Mary and Elisabeth or the august stance of the duo. Rather, the composition of the painting suggests that some hidden meaning involving Mary and Elisabeth is embedded in the artwork 13. In recent years, Pontormo's masterpiece has been discussed in lyrical terms 14 but the mystery of Mary's and Elisabeth's doubles has remained unsolved. 12 In certain visitation scenes, a maiden follows Mary (see for instance the left side-panel of Rubens' Descent from the Cross in Antwerp, Belgium). However, the two mysterious women on Pontormo's Visitazione lack the attributes normally associated with servants. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/The_Descent_from_the_Cross_%28Rubens%29.jpg 13 At the left side of the painting, four additional figurines are depicted: an arguing pair of men bearing whitish masks; a shadowy donkey peeping at them around a corner; and exactly above the leftmost of the two men, a laughing woman looking down at them from a window. From another window, still higher up, a piece of linen seems to hang out, exactly above the woman. These details, easily overlooked, are not discussed in the present paper, but they certainly have esoteric meaning. 14 “Peinture presque musicale, au sens où le mouvement de la ligne est organisé selon une conception non descriptive mais eurythmique, bien visualisée dans la position dansante donnée aux pieds des deux personnages principaux. La « bella maniera » se confirme comme recherche d’une grâce ornementale ; elle est pourtant ici, en accord avec le thème glorificateur, orchestré sur le mode de la grandeur : la disposition perspective fait surgir les figures dans une monumentalité à la fois fragile et héroïque”. https://www.aparences.net/periodes/le-manierisme/pontormo/ “Pontormo ambienta questa scena in una anonima via oscura. In uno spazio imprecisato e metafisico, quattro donne sembrano quasi avvolte in un'unica figura. I loro drappi, di diversi colori, definiscono in primo piano l'incontro tra Maria ed Elisabetta, mentre altre due misteriose donne assistono sullo sfondo con lo sguardo rivolto fissamente all'osservatore del quadro. L'incrocio delle braccia segue l'incrocio degli sguardi, di una intensità quasi insostenibile”. http://fabriziofalconi.blogspot.be/2015/09/la-visitazione-di-pontormo-un-quadro.html “The painting depicts in an almost metaphysical way the biblical meeting of the Virgin Mary, pregnant with Jesus, and Elisabeth, pregnant with St. John the Baptist. Staring fixedly into space, two statuesque figures in the background represent their alter egos. The younger of the two wears the same color clothing of the Virgin Mary, but reversed [sic]. The older one appears to be Elizabeth shown in a sort of doubling. 'This intensely abstract atmosphere is sustained by the disproportionate size of the figures in comparison to the Florentine architectural backdrop and by the artist’s multiplication – as though in a mirror – of the number of figures witnessing the scene,' art critic Antonio Geremicca wrote in the exhibition catalog. 'These figurative devices make it more complicated to interpret the painting, whose significance scholars have yet to fathom in full,' he added”. http://www.foxnews.com/science/2014/03/27/16th-century-masterpiece-reveals-cheese-glue-recipe.html 8 Figure 3: Detail of Pontormo's Visitation, showing the face of Mary's double, which we identify as a representation of the solomonic Mary. Apparently, this picture has been made in preparation of the restoration; technical details unknown. However, some commentators 15 have noted that the colors of Mary's red dress and blue mantle are inversed with respect to the outfit of her doppelganger, who wears a blue dress and a red mantle. This is a highly significant point, as this combination of blue and red constitutes an iconographic standard for Mary's outfit. For instance, Mary wears a red dress and a blue mantle on Raphael's Madonna's. The inverse combination, a red “Le due misteriose donne che appaiono sono in realtà le stesse Maria ed Elisabetta viste di fronte. Anche i colori dell'abito sono gli stessi ma invertiti. È questo sdoppiamento che rende unica e misteriosa quest'opera d'arte”. from: http://www.gliscritti.it/blog/entry/3362 The painter also used complementary colors (blue-orange and red-green) for the mantles and dresses of Mary respectively Elisabeth. 15 9 mantle and blue dress, is preponderant in icons of orthodox Christianity. Thus, the woman at the left is also dressed as Mary, but in a complementary way. A dual relationship connecting both Mary's is also indicated by the shared facial traits, hair color and hair dress and by the hair ribbons which have complementary colors (pinkish versus dark green). Clearly, the woman with the red mantle is meant to represent some complementary Mary, which can only mean that she must be the solomonic Mary. Apparently, Pontormo knew about the secret of the two Jesus children and the two Mary's, as did Fiorentino. Under the supposition of the woman with the red mantle being the solomonic Mary, the whole composition starts to make sense. Clearly, the other woman on the background is again Elisabeth. Her position at the side of the solomonic Mary, but without any personal interaction, depicts the relationship between both women. On the one hand, the solomonic Mary did not meet Elisabeth, as did the nathanic Mary; and Elisabeth is not her kin. But on the other hand, a relationship of a more abstract type connects both women, because the solomonic Jesus was destined to merge with the nathanic Jesus. Thus, when Elisabeth's son John the Baptist baptizes Jesus of Nazareth, this event equally concerns both the nathanic and the solomonic Mary because both their sons took part in the formation of adult Jesus' constitution (cfr. figure 1). This parallellism is represented in the painting by both Mary's being placed aside Elisabeth. However, only the nathanic Mary has also a kin relationship to Elisabeth. Therefore, both women on the foreground are interacting, whereas the pair in the background does not show any personal interplay. The parallellogrammic pairing-up of both duo's reflects the abstract similarity of the relationships connecting Elisabeth to each of the two Mary's. As in Fiorentino's painting, we can estimate the probability of our hypothesis (h: “In Pontormo's 'Visitation', the woman with the red mantle represents the solomonic Mary”) being true. Given the unusual arrangement of the depicted scene, which is already suggestive of some esoteric content involving Mary, we can safely put P(h I b) = .01 ('extremely improbable'). Nature and extend of the evidence is as expected. There are no pictorial elements contradicting the hypothesis16. Thus, it is also reasonable to put P(h 16 Pontormo could have faced some kind of dilemma when producing his Visitazione. On the one hand, the solomonic Mary had to be depicted in such a way that she could be believed by a superficial observer to be just some random woman, perhaps a handmaiden. On the other hand, esoteric artwork just as esoteric writing should do justice to truth. Thus, an esoteric depiction or statement may be ambivalent, it should nevertheless express truth, both in the physical and spiritual sense of the word. Then, a question could arise with respect to the aureoles. Being saints, both Mary and Elisabeth have a circular aureole. Elisabeth's doppelganger, being just a double, could lack an aureole. However, if the leftmost woman truly is the solomonic Mary, we could perhaps expect her to bear an aureole of sorts. Of course, providing the woman with the red mantle with an aureole such as the one of the nathanic Mary and Elisabeth would invalidate any exoteric reading of the painting. But perhaps some hidden form of aureole was present (figure 3). The head of the woman with the red mantle seems to show a halo of kinds around the head, at precisely the place where an aureole could be expected, given the position of the head. This suspected halo extends both over the sky and the building in the background, but not over the woman's shoulder, again as would be expected if this was meant to be an aureole. In the restored painting, this possible aureole is all but invisible. We did not explore this remarkable element in more detail. 10 I b) = .05 ('very improbable'; as a consequence, P(¬h I b) = .95). These are the same conservative values that we already used for Fiorentino's painting. In order to fix an upper bound for P(e I ¬h•b) we will again consider three elements: (I) The presence of an 'alter ego' or 'doppelganger' of the nathanic Mary, placed directly behind her. There is no indication that this woman with the red mantle is a servant or handmaiden. She shares Mary's facial traits, hair color and hair dress. Within the context of the painting's set-up, the presence of this alter ego is a prerequisite for an esoteric representation of a second Mary, namely the solomonic Mary. We evaluate the probability of such a doppelganger of Mary on a 'Visitation' at P = .05 (= 'very unprobable') at most. (II) Inverted red-blue colors of dress and mantle of both Mary's. This detail identifies the woman with the red mantle as a complementary (i.e. the solomonic) Mary. Supposing that six colors including blue and red are available, and that mantle and dress should be differently colored, the probability of the solomonic Mary getting a blue dress and a red mantle is 1:30. (III) Pictorial depiction of the abstract relationship connecting the solomonic Mary to Elisabeth, as opposed to the vivid relationship connecting the nathanic Mary and Elisabeth. This complex representation inspired the painter to represent a true doppelganger of Elisabeth, which is an absolutely exceptional element. We evaluate the probability of such a doubling occurring, moreover in a way that conforms to hypothesis h, as P = .01 ('extremely improbable'). Plugging these values in the formula we obtain .01 x .05 P(h I e•b) = __________________________________________________ > .95 [.01 x .05] + [.99 x .05 x (1/30) x .01] which leads us to conclude that hypothesis h is most probably true. Remarks on Fiorentino's Pala dello Spedalingo. Both Fiorentino and Pontormo must have had some access to esoteric Christian tradition. It is thinkable that the paintings discussed in the present paper (which in both cases have an exceptional position within the artist's oeuvre) were produced under some form of external guidance. Perhaps, the paintings resulted from some very detailed order which was merely executed by the painter. However, given the high degree of prowess and genius emanating from these pieces, they have been more likely created out of the painter's own insights and convictions. This seems to be confirmed by the fact that elements of esoterism can be discerned in other work by both artists. 11 Figure 4: Rosso Fiorentino Sacra Conversazione with four saints or Pala dello Spedalingo (= 'the Altarpiece of the Hospital's Director') (1518; 172cm x 141cm; tempera on wood; Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence). The saints are identified as John the Baptist, Saint Anthony of Egypt, Saint Stephen and Saint Jerome of Stridon. For instance, Fiorentino's Madonna shown in figure 4 reminds us of Raphael's Madonna di Foligno17 and his Sistine Madonna18 (both produced in 15111512, a few years before Fiorentino's Madonna; see also figure 5). In the Sistine Madonna, the two Jesus children are represented by two cherubs 19 underneath the Virgin; in the Madonna di Foligno, the solomonic Jesus is depicted as a cherub. Apparently, Fiorentino embedded the secret of the two Jesus children in his Conversazione (figure 4) which contains elements used by Raphael a fews years earlier. The sacred conversation shows John the Baptist adressing the Jesus child, whereas Saint Jerome speaks to Mary. The Baptist points to the pair of cherubs (who are of remarkable beauty and 17 https://www.academia.edu/27702923/THE_ESOTERIC_STRUCTURE_OF_THE_MADONN A_DI_FOLIGNO_RAPHAEL_1511-1512_ 18 https://www.academia.edu/9963817/De_esoterische_structuur_van_de_Madonna_Sistina 19 Rubens also depicted the two Jesus boys a pair of cherubs. See appendix in: https://www.academia.edu/9963752/THE_ENCODEMENT_OF_THE_BIRTH_HOROSCOPE_OF_THE_NATHANIC_ JESUS_IN_RUBENS_ADORATION_OF_THE_SHEPHERDS_IN_CARAVAGGIO_S_MADONNA_OF_THE_ROSAR Y_AND_IN_BOTTICELLI_S_MADONNA_OF_THE_MAGNIFICAT 12 execution) whereas Jerome's pointing pair of fingers seem to bespeak the number '2'. The symmetrical position of both saints and the red versus blue colors of their mantles suggest that they are both discussing the same topic, namely the secret of the two Jesus children (we remember that, in Pontormo's Visitation, the two Mary's have blue versus red mantles – see figure 2). The two cherubs are shown in intimate closeness, and just as in Fiorentino's Allegory (figure 1) they look as if encased within one single pair of wings. Moreover, one cherub seems to instruct the other, which mimicks the nature of the relationship connecting the solomonic to the nathanic individuality. Figure 5: Some astrological elements embedded in Fiorentino's Pala (see text for details). 13 Figure 6: The birth horoscope of the nathanic Jesus (Bethlehem, Friday, January 14th, 1 AD; 21:05 local time; Julian calendar). Orb setting: 30%; only the classical planets are shown. Sun: 23°21'26” Capricorn; Moon: 7°41'10” Aquarius; Mercury: 8°36'42” Aquarius; Venus: 9°55'56” Pisces; Mars: 18°17'55” Aries; Jupiter: 9°54'35” Libra; Saturn: 10°30'1”R Gemini; ascending lunar node: 28°56'17” Sagittarius; Ascendant: 11°20' Virgo; Midheaven: 9°54' Gemini. Clearly, Fiorentino's Pala contains a number of horoscopic elements as well. As shown in figure 6, the nathanic birth horoscope is characterized by a great trigon connecting Saturn, Jupiter and the conjunction Moon-Mercury. This trigon is represented by the equilateral triangle connecting the navel of the Jesus Child to the base of the index finger of Saint Jerome and John the Baptist, respectively. The idea seems to be that the angle formed by thumb and index (not in the plane of the painting but in the space evoked by the painting) images the angles of 60° at the vertices of the triangle (figure 6, inset). Of course, the navel evokes birth (note also that the centroid of the triangle is placed at about the place where the mother's navel is expected) 20. The planets at the three vertices of the triangle are symbolized in quite an original way. Jesus adopts a stance evoking the h-shaped symbol for Saturn (figure 5, blue lines). Jerome's two extended fingers, which we interpreted as suggesting the existence of two Jesus children, receive a superposed second 20 For Rubens using the navel for encodement of the horoscopes of both Jesus children, see: https://www.academia.edu/9963752/THE_ENCODEMENT_OF_THE_BIRTH_HOROSCOPE_OF_THE_ NATHANIC_JESUS_IN_RUBENS_ADORATION_OF_THE_SHEPHERDS_IN_CARAVAGGIO_S_MAD ONNA_OF_THE_ROSARY_AND_IN_BOTTICELLI_S_MADONNA_OF_THE_MAGNIFICAT (figure 3; navel of Venus shepherdess at horoscopical center) and https://www.academia.edu/9803898/Unbearable_beauty_unfathomable_depth_the_encodem ent_of_the_day_and_hour_of_birth_of_Jesus_descendant_of_Solomon_in_Matthew_1_1-17 (appendix; navel of third king indicating the center of the horoscope). 14 meaning, suggesting the presence of a planetary conjunction at the right vertex. John the Baptist, by means of his staff, represents Jupiter 21. Figure 7: Left: Pontormo's Sacra conversazione di san Ruffillo (1514; 223cm x 196 cm; detached fresco; detail). Right: Bedrukte Moeder Gods22 (not dated; 28 cm x 40 cm; panel from unknown master; detail) with bicolored mantle at the shoulder. Feet placed upon a horizontal line can symbolize the horizont, with the ascendant at left and the descendant at right. Thus, Mary's right feet repre21 According to Maunder (“The origin of the symbols of the planets” The Observatory 57, p.238-247; 1934), the planetary icons presently in use developed from symbols appearing around the beginning of our era. The h-shaped Saturn icon developed from a sickle, the Venus symbol from a necklace, the Mars symbol from a spear, the Mercury symbol from a caduceus. The initial symbol for Zeus or Jupiter was a staff or sceptre (in antiquity, Jupiter used to be depicted with this attribute). However, because the corresponding symbol is a quite undistinctive single trait, it was replaced by the Greek character Z (the first character of Ζεύς). Close to the end of the Middle Ages, these planetary symbols were supplemented by small crosses (thereby transforming 'h' in '♄' etc.; apparently, this happened also to the 'quatre de chiffre'). Thus, the staff held by the Baptist can be understood as a christianized version of Jupiter's staff. 22 https://www.academia.edu/27762006/A_remarkable_esoteric_painting_at_St.Andrews_Church_Antwerp_Belgium_ 15 sents Virgo standing upon the ascendant A whereas her left feet represents Virgo standing upon the descendant D (figure 5, red line). The nathanic Jesus, represented by the left cherub who is listening and being instructed, has Virgo upon the birth ascendant (figure 6). At the birth of the solomonic Jesus, represented by the instructing right cherub, the Sun and descendant stood in Virgo (cfr. red wing underneath the Virgin's right foot) 23. The painting contains still more astrological elements, which we will not discuss here. Although Mary, as represented in Fiorentino's Pala, can be identified as the nathanic Mary, it should be taken into account that the scene depicts an imaginary conversation taking place in the Christian era. Therefore, the Virgin on the painting can be expected to refer more generally to the eternal being Sophia24, wherewith both the solomonic and the nathanic Mary are united 25. This eternal female being, called by Christ the 'Queen of the South' (Mt.12:42), is depicted on Michelangelo's Last Judgment sitting at Christ's right hand26. In quite a remarkable way, this unison of both Mary's has been represented in Pontormo's 'sacred conversation' (figure 7). In this painting, Mary's mantle shows a bicolored pattern, with one half of the mantle being blue and the other half reddish. It looks as if the mantle is blue at one side and reddish at the opposite side and that inside and outside are somehow switched around the head. The Madonna's in figures 4 and 7 represent the same spiritual being, with the bicolored mantle in Pontormo's Conversazione (figure 7) directly reflecting the dual coloring of the mantles of both Mary's in Pontormo's Visitation (figure 2) or of the Baptist and Jerome in Fiorentino's Pala (figure 4). Apparently, both painters had access to a common treasure of esoteric knowledge. Moreover, they both made use of very similar imagery when embedding such content in their artwork, suggesting that the two of them were connected to one same center of Christian initiation. 23 In a similar way, the rising and setting of Virgo in respectively the nathanic and solomonic horoscopes has been encoded in Rubens' Inmaculada Concepción (Prado; 1628/29). See appendix in: https://www.academia.edu/9963752/THE_ENCODEMENT_OF_THE_BIRTH_HOROSCOPE_OF_THE_ NATHANIC_JESUS_IN_RUBENS_ADORATION_OF_THE_SHEPHERDS_IN_CARAVAGGIO_S_MAD ONNA_OF_THE_ROSARY_AND_IN_BOTTICELLI_S_MADONNA_OF_THE_MAGNIFICAT 24 Proverbs 8:22-31. For background, see Michael Debus “Maria-Sophia” (2000). This unification is discussed by Rudolf Steiner in: GA 148, p.85: “In demselben Augenblicke, als diese Taufe im Jordan geschah, fühlte auch die Mutter etwas wie das Ende ihrer Verwandlung. Sie fühlte - sie war damals im fünfundvierzigsten, sechsundvierzigsten Lebensjahre - , sie fühlte sich mit einem Male wie durchdrungen von der Seele jener Mutter, welche die Mutter des Jesusknaben war, der in seinem zwölften Jahre das Zarathustra-Ich empfangen hatte, und die gestorben war. So wie der Christus-Geist auf Jesus von Nazareth herabgekommen war, so war der Geist der anderen Mutter, die mittlerweile in der geistigen Welt weilte, herniedergekommen auf die Ziehmutter, mit der Jesus jenes Gespräch hatte. Sie fühlte sich seitdem wie jene junge Mutter, die einstmals den Lukas-Jesusknaben geboren hatte” (Oslo, October 6th, 1913). According to esoteric tradition the age of the solomonic Mary at Jesus' Baptism was about 48 years 7 months. However, the age of the deceased nathanic Mary would have been close to 46 years. 26 https://www.academia.edu/8972988/THE_EMBEDMENT_OF_THE_FACE_ON_THE_SHRO UD_OF_TURIN_IN_MICHELANGELOS_LAST_JUDGEMENT 25 16