He sits with one hand raised, a halo of rays around his head.
Bible in art · Matthew
The Sermon on the Mount
Gustave Doré · 1866 (designs for La Sainte Bible, Tours); this printing 1873–1874
National Library of Poland, Warsaw
The engraver A. Gusmand signed this plate at the lower right. Doré sets the scene not on a bare summit but in a shady grove, and uses the trees as a frame: trunks at both sides, branches meeting overhead, and a pool of light in the middle.
Jesus sits at the center with a radiant halo, one hand raised, his disciples close around him. In front, the crowd sits on the ground: women with children, old men, a man leaning on a stick. A palm rises at the far left.
From the text
- “When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain and sat down” (Matthew 5:1)
- “His disciples came to Him” (Matthew 5:1)
- “and He began to teach them” (Matthew 5:2)
The artist’s own
- A grove of trees and a palm instead of an open mountainside
- Women and children in the front rows; Matthew speaks only of crowds
- A halo of rays, as painters traditionally drew it
Details
Jesus
The clearing
Light falls on the open ground at his feet.
The listeners
Women and children sit on the ground in front.
The palm
A palm tree rises at the edge of the grove.
Gustave Doré, French, 1832–1883. National Library of Poland (Biblioteka Narodowa), Warsaw — «Pismo Święte Starego i Nowego Testamentu», vol. 2, Warsaw: M. Glücksberg, 1874 (acc. 75.267 A) · Wood engraving after Gustave Doré’s design · National Library of Poland (Polona): the record of the volume gives the licence «Domena Publiczna» (Public Domain), «copyrightProtected»: false; the scan was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by the library itself («Polona Upload», GLAM-Wiki partnership: “This file was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons as part of a GLAM-Wiki partnership between the National Library of Poland and Wikimedia Polska”), linking its Polona record.