Two pale arms come down and touch the dark water.
Bible in art · John
The Piscina Probatica or Pool of Bethesda (La piscine probatique ou de Bethesda)
James Tissot · 1886–1894
Brooklyn Museum, New York
Tissot painted the pool of Bethesda as a dark stone basin under high arches, with sick people in white sitting and lying along its edge, waiting.
In the black water he added something strange: two pale arms reach down from above and stir the surface, so that rings spread across it. He followed the longer wording found in many older Bibles, which tells of an angel who stirred the water; the BSB and other modern translations leave that line out.
From the text
- A pool with five covered colonnades, called Bethesda (John 5:2)
- “a great number of the sick, the blind, the lame, and the paralyzed” (John 5:3)
- The water “is stirred” (John 5:7)
The artist’s own
- Only the arms of the angel, reaching into the water
- Vaulted stone arches over the pool
Details
Arms in the water
Waiting
The sick sit wrapped in white along the edge of the pool.
Under the arch
A man lies at the back, propped on his arm.
The ripples
Rings spread across the surface.
James Tissot, French, 1836–1902. Brooklyn Museum, New York (Purchased by public subscription, 00.159.68) · Opaque watercolor over graphite on gray wove paper · Brooklyn Museum (Commons file page, «Permission»): "This image was uploaded by the Brooklyn Museum as a content partnership, and is considered to have no known copyright restrictions by the institutions of the Brooklyn Museum." — "No known copyright restrictions".