Theological Briefs

The Commentary of The Saint John's Bible

Behind each of the 160 illuminations that appear in the seven volumes of The Saint John’s Bible there is a story — a theological story. It is up to a committee of artists, medievalists, theologians, biblical scholars and art historians to create these theological stories for Donald Jackson, the artistic director of The Saint John’s Bible. This committee meets on a regular basis to discuss each of the passages that will be illustrated and to record their reflections for Jackson. They do so with a keen understanding of scripture and the relevant issues of today and the changing world.

"We have drawn up a composite picture for each of the passages," remarks Michael Patella, OSB, chair of The Saint John’s Bible Committee on Illumination and Text (CIT). "Donald likes to work with a catalog of ideas even if they are inconclusive. It has been a communal effort between Donald, the artists and the CIT. What you are going to see in anything that comes out in the Bible is the product of the interaction between Donald and the committee."

The CIT has developed a commentary or "brief" for each of the passages that will be illuminated in the 73 books of the Bible. These exegetical (an explanation or critical interpretation of a text) and theological briefs are narratives that vary in length and are in an outline form. They provide Jackson with suggested verses, scriptural cross-references, free association about the text and its imagery, and local associations/references to existing works of artistic interpretation.

Once the briefs were forwarded to Jackson, he studied the commentary and created a series of pencil sketches of the passage. These sketches were presented to the CIT for input. Jackson took his sketches with feedback from the committee and creates a color draft of the illumination.

The commentary of The Saint John’s Bible, based on the "themes" of the Bible, has been under discussion at Saint John’s University and Abbey for the last few years. These themes were emphasized when the project was publicly announced in March 1999. The themes guided the development of the Illumination Schema developed by Patella and David Cotter, OSB. An atmosphere of discussion and conversation allows the CIT to keep these themes and others in the forefront while working through each book and passage.

"The reason we have embarked on this project is that we were approaching the third millennium of Christ’s birth," Patella said. "This is a proclamation to the world of the glories of Christ’s redemption. If anything is to be learned from the creation of The Saint John’s Bible it is the ‘why of God’ rather than the ‘how of God.’ And the ‘why of God’ is always going to come down to love.

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