Who Made The Eyes But I?

Love (III) - George Herbert

Love bade me welcome. Yet my soul drew back
                              Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack
                             From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,
                             If I lacked any thing.
 
A guest, I answered, worthy to be here:
                             Love said, You shall be he.
I the unkind, ungrateful? Ah my dear,
                             I cannot look on thee.
Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,
                             Who made the eyes but I?
 
Truth Lord, but I have marred them: let my shame
                             Go where it doth deserve.
And know you not, says Love, who bore the blame?
                             My dear, then I will serve.
You must sit down, says Love, and taste my meat:
                             So I did sit and eat.

What makes something beautiful? Despite “beauty” being a tricky word to define, how often is it that we find ourselves using it? We employ it when describing a ruddy sunset or the sight of waves as they crash against a cliff. We use it when talking about the glories of a symphony or the excitement of a jazz improvisation. We describe our children with it, our parents, both men and women. For as much as we use it, should we not also be able to define it?

There are many theories and philosophies around understanding beauty (these fall under the discussion of aesthetics). We may not be well versed in all these theories, but each individual has an implicit framework that they employ when considering beauty. This blog is about my understanding of beauty, about the idea that all beauty must come from a single source. This source must be beyond our world and yet it must be present everywhere. I believe this source to be the God revealed to us through the Bible, the good Creator and Artist of all things. I will discuss what are the three premises which form my understanding of art and beauty, the premises upon which the “Who Made The Eyes” blog has been designed. They are as follows:

God owns all beauty
God is gracious with his beauty
All beauty points to Christ

The Monopoly

There are many theories as to what beauty truly is. The predominant view now is that beauty is simply preference. We call things “beautiful” when they conform to what we already have a preconceived liking for. “Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder” as the saying goes. Afterall, some like classical music while others like metal. One will be captivated by an Impressionist painting while another will think it no different than something a child would scribble. Cultures vary significantly in their musical styles, and these differences are often not only uninteresting to us, but also distasteful and unpleasant. In the wake of such multiplicity, how can beauty not be relative to each person?

On the other side of the pendulum, there is the classical theory that there are fixed laws that govern what is and isn’t beautiful. There are laws such as symmetry and proportion which makes things more attractive than they would otherwise be. Artists implicitly subscribe to this view whenever they spend effort honing their craft, considering what they have created and whether it is the best that it could be. If beauty is relative, then how could some things be more beautiful than others? Why is it that your first draft is objectively not as satisfying as your final product?

Additionally, why are there overlaps in what we all consider beautiful? If beauty is all subjective, then why do the majority of us become captivated with roughly the same things? Waterfalls, quiet forests, ancient architecture, singing... Why are we excited to share a movie, a meal, or a song with someone else if we have no assurance that they will enjoy it as well?

So you see the two sides of the debate. How do we balance the multiplicity (the many ways in which people see things as beautiful) and the singularity (the commonality of our experience of beauty)? As disclosed earlier, I believe a fitting solution to this is an infinite God in whom is the definition of beauty. Things are only beautiful in relation to how much they resemble God. In the same way that something will only taste chocolatey if it has chocolate in it, something will only “taste” beautiful if it has some of God in it. We can almost say that beauty is a taste of God.

He as the Source

This may be a strange way to talk about beauty, but think of it this way: when an artist creates something we often say that they have “poured themselves” into it. The way the words rhyme or the way the movie is directed creates in us a feeling that we are in contact with the artist themself. The more you listen to Bach, the more you can identify a work as his simply by the way the music progresses and develops. We create things in our image, in a sense. Similarly, since God is the Artist of all reality, we should expect to find motifs of him throughout it.

This idea isn’t surprising to anyone that has read Psalm 19 (ESV):

The heavens declare the glory of God,
    and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
Day to day pours out speech,
    and night to night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech, nor are there words,
    whose voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out through all the earth,
    and their words to the end of the world.

(You can also read Joseph Addison’s “The Spacious Firmament”, which seems heavily influenced by Psalm 19.)

A rainbow is beautiful because it speaks of its maker. These beautiful things do not just passively point to God, but they actively speak of him. And it’s not merely the case that “when we look at them they remind us of God”, but rather that they proclaim God’s handiwork whether we notice it or not. They objectively speak of God because God made them to do so; he made them with his beauty.

Beauty is related back to God in the same way that truth and goodness are. A common Christian phrase is “All truth is God’s truth”, essentially meaning that anything that is discovered as true belongs to God, since he is the author of all reality. So all truths in science, math, philosophy, and so on are actually God’s property, whether their discoverers give the credit to him or not. The same exact relationship exists with beauty. All beauty is God’s beauty. And because of this, beauty is not from our world, but from his.

This framing fits perfectly with the “strangeness” of our experience with beauty. Beauty feels supernatural; it seems to point beyond this world. It is the ocean of God's infinity pouring into the small cup of our reality. Edgar Allan Poe states something similar in “The Poetic Principle”:

An immortal instinct, deep within the spirit of man, is thus, plainly, a sense of the Beautiful… This thirst belongs to the immortality of Man. It is at once a consequence and an indication of his perennial existence. It is the desire of the moth for the star. It is no mere appreciation of the Beauty before us — but a wild effort to reach the Beauty above.

The part of humanity that resonates with beauty is that which is non-natural; it is the image of God in us captivating our natural senses. For Poe and other Romantics, this capital-B “Beauty” reads as some abstract, impersonal force utterly beyond our natural world. How sad is it that so many of them failed to take Beauty to its end, to a personal God who wants us to reach for him.

His Infinity

So God provides us with a solitary source for Beauty. What then of the multiplicity in what we humans call beautiful? This is encapsulated by the word “infinite” used earlier. As finite creatures, we create art that reflects numerous aspects of ourselves, limited as those may be. But as an infinite Creator, God is able to reflect an innumerable array of beauties and glories. God has given us eyes to see these wonders, and he has done so by directing us each toward different beauties. Just as we each uniquely reflect a small aspect of who God is, we are each uniquely equipped to appreciate one of the infinite ways that God’s beauty is manifested.

One consequence of this truth is that, since we are all made in the image of the same God, we all possess the ability to appreciate any type of beauty. (This is also why we are able to share our joys with each other.) As an American I may not naturally enjoy Eastern music, but I still can. I can listen to it, learn how it works and what techniques the artist employs to create what they do. I can do this because we both share a common ground for beauty: God.

All beauty comes from God. He has a monopoly on it. And because of this, all credit and praise for it belongs to him. It is a fool who attempts to create beauty for his own glory. He may be able to impress others in this world, but in the end, when all things are sifted through God’s thorough judgment, the praise will only fall to God. Using beauty to speak against God is equally laughable. It is self-defeating. It is like protesting the tyranny of China with signs that have “Made in China” clearly stamped in the corner.

Beauty is an objective reality, not subjective to the passing whims of the beholder, but fixed, defined, and eternal. This beauty is God himself. He is not simply “the highest” beauty; he is beauty and beauty is him.

Beauty is in the eyes of the one who made the eyes.

The Charity

To speak of such a supreme being is daunting. Imagine this all-powerful God, who is not only, by definition, the most beautiful, but is also the one who receives the glory for all beauty that exists. What disgust would this being have for creatures like us, ugly and sinful as we are? What hatred would he have toward us who misuse the beautiful and attempt to turn it against him? What sorrow would he feel to see us purposefully deform ourselves and others into objects of further ugliness? Why should he continue to let us delight in his beauty when we idolize its delight over him?

God’s wrath is real, and a judgment awaits. Yet in this time of waiting he has shown a charity to us. He has been gracious and long-suffering. He has embedded his beauty throughout Creation and he has given us eyes to see it. He has shared himself with us.

He has every right to snatch away all delight and joy in the world; yet he doesn’t! The sinner awakes to see God’s sun shining through his window, dappling colors and shadows across his walls and bed. The sinner can be a mother to a child, to enjoy in its face the enormous beauty of a new human, made in God’s image. The sinner can sing! The sinner can write music, tell stories, act in plays and hike through a forest. This is a charity indeed, for we are poor in ourselves and he has given us that which makes most people’s lives worth living.

This is what George Herbert captures in “Love”. The honest sinner resists Love, aware of his unworthiness to be treated to Love’s hospitality.