Picturing God

Images of God for Young Children, by Marie-Helene Delval (illustrated by Barbara Nascimbeni)
Eerdmans, 2011.

Brother Sun, Sister Moon, by Katherine Paterson, illustrated by Pamela Dalton. Chronicle, 2011.

At this distance, thousands of years from the old Canaanite religions and the Nile deities, it’s hard to appreciate the radical nature of the Second Commandment for its time: “You shall not make for yourselves a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.  You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God . . .” (Ex. 20:4-5).  Everybody in the ancient world made idols and bowed down to them; God’s insistence that he could not be pictured was so countercultural (to use a modern term) that it was the very first law his people violated.

We still make images in our heads, though: how many children and grownups hold the idea of an old man in the clouds?  Or how many have adopted from The Shack, subconsciously or not, the image of “Papa” as a rotund black woman?  The old theologians often said God was better understood by what he was not than what he was: not mortal, not changeable, not visible, etc.  A visual image automatically limits him to that image, which is one big reason for the prohibition on images in the first place; God was teaching his people that he was not the deity of sky or sun, or nation or territory, or love or war.  He was God, period.

This may be as difficult for our kids to understand as it was for the Israelites.  Young children (ages 2-10) are very local, busily establishing their own perimeters.  I think it’s safe to say they’re not capable of independent thought about an abstract being; in general, they’ll believe what you tell them about God.  That’s why I think catechism instruction is useful at this age: get the words and the concepts in their heads, and they’ll be there for the maturing mind to chew on and understand and individualize later.

These two picture books are also helpful, within limits.  A Christian parent browsing the picture books shelves at her local library may come across the title Brother Sun, Sister Moon and think, what up with this?  Native American spirituality? Actually it’s a revision of St. Francis’s “Canticle of the Creatures,” a praise hymn in the spirit of Psalm 104.  Katherine Paterson has updated it—and in some places, weakened it—but for the most part it’s a beautiful book, made breathtaking by the illustrations.  Pamela Dalton tells us in an afterword how she was introduced to the technique of scherenschnitte, German ‘scissor cutting,” which came to America with the Pennsylvania Dutch.  Each of her illustrations is cut from one piece of paper, then water-colored and printed on a black background.  The effect is both folksy and sophisticated, simple and stunning. It conveys the beauty of the ordinary in extraordinary form.  You’ll spend hours pouring over the details.  (Dalton’s Story of Christmas is coming out in November—we’ll keep an eye out for that one!)

Katherine Paterson’s interpretation is equally beautiful in places but less successful overall.  “We come to sing a song of praise to you, O God, the Lord of Heaven and Earth, who by your power and out of your love have created all things and called them good . . .”  God is praised for the sun, moon, water, wind (“For when he roars, he reminds us of your might, and when he comes as a cooling breeze, he tells us of your gentleness”).  And even death, “who will usher us at last into your loving presence, where we will know and love you as you have always known us.”  Because a translation of the original song is helpfully provided at the end of the book, we know that Paterson’s paraphrase is a kinder and gentler version of what St. Francis actually wrote: “Woe to those who die in mortal sin.  Happy those whom [death] finds doing your most holy will.”  A bit of PC creeps in at the end as well: “For this life and the life to come, we sing our praise to you, O Lord, the Father and Mother of all creation.”  Ouch!  Granted that God sometimes uses female imagery when describing himself (e.g., as a hen gathers her chicks), the Bible gives us no authorization to refer to God as Mother.  If you’re reading aloud, I would skip those two words.

Images of God for Young Children is a rather clunky title for a nice book.  The author uses actual comparisons from the Bible to describe God, in a positive rather than negative way.  He is (to list them all) breath, light, night, word, silent, secret, our tears, joy, a spring, a rock, a stream, the root, wind, a path, fire, a fortress, a promise, strength, wisdom, deliverance, covenant, mystery, beauty, justice, holiness, peace, mercy, love, shepherd, king, healer, friend, savior, majesty, smallness, a face, a parent, bread, life—and finally, “God is with us.”  Some of these comparisons sound a bit far-fetched, and a scripture reference to each would have been a helpful addition.  The text is orthodox: “We have seen God’s face in Jesus Christ.”  It’s often beautiful as well, though it may stretch a bit: “We know that God is huge.  And yet he makes himself small.  He decided to live in our world, to be a baby that needs its mother, who has to learn to walk and talk.  God is a child that each one of us can carry in our arms.”  Er . . . God the Son was a child.  But he grew up, and died and was buried, and rose again on the third day, and ascended into heaven.  He doesn’t live here anymore, except in the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in every believer.  To speak of him as a child we can carry in our arms may plant a picture in the mind of a five-year-old that’s needlessly confusing or downright misleading.

Stretches aside, though, Images of God is more overtly Christian than Brother Sun.  Too long to read in one sitting, it could serve as a conversation-starter and devotional guide.  The illustrations, though not as stunning as Pamela Dalton’s, are reminiscent of Marc Chagall and well-suited to the text.

For more good picture books to get little kids thinking about God, see our reviews of Sneaky Sheep, God’s Little Princess, God’s Mighty Warrior, and Brave Young Knight.  And don’t forget our early discussion of story Bibles.

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