Saint Joseph the Carpenter

About the artwork

The Louvre points to the contrast between Joseph’s working hands and the light passing through the child’s fingers. Earlier painters, including Gerrit van Honthorst, had shown Joseph working by the Christ Child’s light; La Tour concentrates the subject into two figures and a shared task. The Gospel does not narrate this particular night in the carpenter’s workshop.

An X-ray revealed another face beneath the child’s, which the Louvre compares with Irene in the lantern-lit Sebastian composition. Conservator Élisabeth Martin concluded that a different painting had been begun and abandoned. Percy Moore Turner unsuccessfully offered the finished canvas to London’s National Gallery in 1938, then gave it to the Louvre in 1948 in memory of Paul Jamot.

Featured in: Georges de La Tour’s Bible Paintings: The Candle Painter Hidden Under Other Names

What does Luke 2:51 mean?

Luke 2:51 follows the twelve-year-old Jesus’ stay in the Jerusalem temple. He returns to Nazareth with Mary and Joseph and is obedient to them, while Mary treasures these things in her heart. The verse returns the extraordinary temple exchange to the long life of the household.

La Tour imagines an ordinary form that obedience might take: holding a light so Joseph can work. The picture adds a scene that Luke leaves undescribed, but grounds its intimacy in the relationship the verse does name.

Luke 2:51 connects the child holding the candle with Jesus’ life of obedience in the Nazareth household.

Sources

Musée du Louvre, Paris collection record.

Image source and rights declaration.

Luke 2 — Berean Standard Bible. The paired text read with its surrounding chapter.

Georges de La Tour’s Bible Paintings: The Candle Painter Hidden Under Other Names. Exact-work research, history and interpretive qualifications for this reading.