A few weeks ago I posted on a philosophical case for objective beauty. I promised to return to the subject and address what the Bible says about beauty. The Bible never defines beauty, but the writers generally use it as an aesthetic or artistic description that evokes pleasure in the beholder. Beauty is used to describe a variety of things including God, nature, people and actions. The vast majority of biblical references see beauty as positive and valuable. The Dictionary of Biblical Imagery offers an extensive list of these references.
Perhaps the most obvious references to beauty that come to mind are the romantic visions of it found in Song of Solomon. Additionally, a number of women are called beautiful, one being when Abraham referred to his wife as “a beautiful woman” (Gen 12:11), as well as men (1 Sam 25:3; 2 Sam 14:25; Is 44:13) and children (Acts 7:20). Proverbs 20:29 tells us that “the glory of young men is their strength, but the beauty of old men is their gray hair” (RSV).
Various objects are called beautiful including houses (Is 5:9), crowns (Is 28:5), garments (Josh 7:21) and flocks (Jer 13:20). More important was the beauty of the temple and the tabernacle. We are told that God’s “strength and beauty are in his sanctuary” (Ps 96:6). It was a place where the people could behold aspects of God’s beauty and they called each other to “worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness” (1 Chron 16:29, RSV). The many materials, designs and objects that were part of the sanctuaries were likely used, in part, to help worshipers experience aesthetic beauty.
Above all else is the beauty of God. David said it is the one thing he will seek after (Ps 27:4). Expressions of beauty in relation to God cannot easily be distinguished from His majesty, glory and sovereignty, as in Ps 96:6 and Is 28:5. Two of my favorite passages convey God’s beauty, though the word is never used: Is 6:1-4 and Rev 4:1-6. Even the description of Jesus in Rev 1:13-18 expresses beauty.
As I stated at the beginning, most references see beauty as a good thing. But the Bible puts beauty in perspective in a number of ways. For one, it points out that earthly beauty fades and can be destroyed (Is 28:1, 64:11). Beauty can also be dangerous, since it can deceive and seduce (Prov 6:25) and we are warned that outer beauty does not necessarily entail inner beauty (Prov 31:30). The danger is in trusting in beauty, either in the beauty of others or in the beauty of oneself. Ezekiel 16 describes judgment against Jerusalem and explains that “you trusted in your beauty” (v15) and “made your beauty an abomination” (v25) by whoring it around. In chapter 28 we are told that Satan was perfect in beauty prior to his fall.
The Dictionary of Biblical Imagery’s entry on beauty concludes offering this thought: “We can infer from the biblical images of beauty that the longing for beauty, along with an ability to recognize and experience it, exists in every human being. Although the Bible does not state it explicitly, it is a fair inference that experiences of earthly beauty awaken a longing for a beauty that is more permanent and transcendent than anything this life can give- a longing for the beauty of God.”
This notion of longing is a central component of C.S. Lewis’s writings. I could not help but include his thoughts on beauty from his sermon “The Weight of Glory”:
“We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words-to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it… For if we take Scripture seriously, if we believe that God will one day give us the Morning Star and cause us to put on the splendour of the sun, then we may surmise that both the ancient myths and the modern poetry, so false as history, may be very near the truth as prophecy. At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and purity of morning but they do not make us fresh and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendours we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumour that it will not always be so. Some day, God willing, we shall get in.
By Roger Overton The A-Team Blog
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