Thursday, April 18, 2019

Why never a neat, short-haired Jesus?

We're in the Easter season, so let's talk about it.

I watched some of a documentary Jesus - Countdown to Calvary the other night, hosted by that actor Hugh Bonneville.   It was of some interest, although they kept inserting some pretty cheesy looking  re-enactments with a Jesus played by an actor whose physical appearance was all scruffy helmet hair and anger.   Here:




I mean, does this look like a charismatic bloke?  And the (I think) apostles behind him look like they walked off the stage from the latest production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.  
Sure, I suppose Hitler looked a dork yet persuaded millions, but really, I'm getting rather sick of long haired Jesus.

Why?  Because there is a good chance he was pretty short haired, perhaps with a short beard, or maybe with none at all:

When early Christians were not showing Christ as heavenly ruler, they showed Jesus as an actual man like any other: beardless and short-haired. 
But perhaps, as a kind of wandering sage, Jesus would have had a beard, for the simple reason that he did not go to barbers.

General scruffiness and a beard were thought to differentiate a philosopher (who was thinking of higher things) from everyone else. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus considered it "appropriate according to Nature".

Otherwise, in the 1st Century Graeco-Roman world, being clean-shaven and short-haired was considered absolutely essential. A great mane of luxuriant hair and a beard was a godly feature, not replicated in male fashion. Even a philosopher kept his hair fairly short.

A beard was not distinctive of being a Jew in antiquity. In fact, one of the problems for oppressors of Jews at different times was identifying them when they looked like everyone else (a point made in the book of Maccabees). However, images of Jewish men on Judaea Capta coins, issued by Rome after the capture of Jerusalem in 70AD, indicate captive men who are bearded.

So Jesus, as a philosopher with the "natural" look, might well have had a short beard, like the men depicted on Judaea Capta coinage, but his hair was probably not very long.

If he had had even slightly long hair, we would expect some reaction. Jewish men who had unkempt beards and were slightly long-haired were immediately identifiable as men who had taken a Nazirite vow. This meant they would dedicate themselves to God for a period of time, not drink wine or cut their hair - and at the end of this period they would shave their heads in a special ceremony in the temple in Jerusalem (as described in Acts chapter 21, verse 24).

But Jesus did not keep a Nazirite vow, because he is often found drinking wine - his critics accuse him of drinking far, far too much of it (Matthew chapter 11, verse 19). If he had had long hair, and looked like a Nazirite, we would expect some comment on the discrepancy between how he appeared and what he was doing - the problem would be that he was drinking wine at all.
I did post briefly on this topic back in 2011, but it would seem no matter how many times people with knowledge of the era point out that neat hair was common back in the day, we just never get movies or re-enactments which depict him and the apostles that way.

Time for this to be rectified. 

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