The Italian Renaissance has often been viewed as a time when people moved away from the pious medieval world and entered a more secular, maybe even pagan way of life. Artists took their cues from Greek and Roman works, painting and sculpting nude forms and scenes from daily life at a rate unseen during the Middle Ages. Yet Renaissance artists produced some of the most famous, moving pieces of religious art: a good example is Michelangelo's Pièta at the Vatican in Rome.
And while Renaissance painters brought to life ancient pagan gods and goddesses in their works, many also turned their brushes to the Christian God and the most important saint, His mother. It is unknown how many Madonna and Child works were produced in the Renaissance, but when we see that most major artists of the time created one - and more likely several - Mary and Jesus works, we see that this intimate family scene was still the most popular in religious art.
What was so appealing about the Madonna and Child? Surely part of it lies in the universal symbolism of a mother with her firstborn. But we can also look at the very simple, and at the same time complex relationship between the teenage mother Mary and her God-infant.
From the Bible we know that Mary was betrothed to Joseph. Betrothal was a much more binding relationship than our modern idea of "being engaged." Mary was probably a teenager, for girls tended to marry young in ancient Judea. There may have been a strain between the couple because of the scandal that likely erupted in Nazareth when the townspeople discovered the unmarried girl was pregnant. When the Roman Emperor Augustus called for a census throughout his realm, everyone traveled to the town of their birth to register. Joseph returned to Bethlehem, taking his betrothed with him. The trip must have been hard for Mary; nine months pregnant and riding a donkey, exposed to the weather, fatigue and dirtiness that comes with travel. As she endured the irregular gait of the donkey on the dusty roads of Palestine, she must have considered how unworthy the whole situation was to bring the incarnate God - as the angel had told her at the conception - into the world. A king born to so lowly a handmaiden, in such simple circumstances! How much this sentiment must have grown when Joseph found no room at the inn in Bethlehem, and was forced to make his betrothed as comfortable as possible in a stable. How horrified Mary must have been, as her labor pains grew, that she could not bare Jesus in a house of men, but of animals. We aren't told exactly how Jesus came into the world, whether Joseph fetched a midwife, whether some experienced women of Bethlehem helped Mary, or whether Mary and Joseph performed this miraculous birth alone.
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