Venus was a Nun: and Other Things Your Mother Never Told You
Though my post‘s title may sound like a Monty Python quip, it derives from a real phenomenon, that of syncretism. Syncretism is the reconciliation of disparate or contradictory beliefs, a term first coined by Plutarch (“Fraternal Love,” Moralia [2.490b], 1st c. AD). It regularly occurs in visual, literary and philosophical arenas as a means to unite in difference; it is a means to forge powerful compromise in cosmopolitan cultures.
On this subject, back in 1953 W.S. Heckscher published “Aphrodite as a Nun,” an interesting article written in the heyday of the faddish pursuit of tracing the Afterlife of Antiquity down through the Ages.1 Heckscher’s project charts the direct lineage of Cesare Ripa’s emblem of PVDICITIA (Chastity) from its unlikely antique roots in Venus iconography; he begins with the ancient authors Pausanias and Plutarch, continues with the Italian humanist Alciati, et al, and ends with the fertile imagination of Ripa – “the encyclopaedist of emblem makers.” The resultant chaste goddess of love thus epitomizes the cleverly described “strange unity in disparity” that characterized much of the Baroque period in Europe.2
In the headlining example, we can see how two virtually opposing ideas can circuitously be combined into a hybrid symbol. If Antique ideas could be morphed so completely by the time of their absorption during the Renaissance and Baroque, just imagine how changed some of our ideas of the past have become today, another five centuries later.
Take, for example, the mistaken idea that the three great Monotheistic traditions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) have nothing in common, that they are singular and irreconcilable. In fact, as Karen Armstrong demonstrates in A History of God: the 4000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam (NY: A. A. Knopf, 1993), each of these religions share parts of their history, scripture, and modes of religious experience. These Abrahamic religions, as revealed religions, have much to share with each other about how to find divinity within each individual and how to build a community of respect. That is, if we would take the time to familiarize ourselves with our own storied, received traditions rather than simply reading contemporary, often fundamentalist gloss. In doing so, we might recognize their intersections rather than their divisions.
It will be interesting, following the Olympics and the national election this year, to see how the popular rapport between the Middle East, Far East and West will continue to stir our imagination and perhaps syncretize our cultures over the next few years. I have great hope it will show us how similar we all are in our humanity, especially as natural and manmade tragedies loom large in the collective consciousness.
For, when faced with great tribulation—as Erasmus of Rotterdam put it—“Concord is a mighty rampart.”
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1. W.S. Heckscher, “Aphrodite as a Nun,” Phoenix 7, no. 3 (Autumn 1953), 105-117.
2. Ibid., 105.
