John the Evangelist

In the Christian mystical tradition one of the great texts is Dark Night of the Soul by Saint John of the Cross, in which he talks about the periods of loneliness, fear, and doubt that one goes through after the initial awakenings into the light. Evagrius,

The author of John’s first letter announces that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). The author is not saying that God is a Father who loves but that God is love.

Just as Benjamin is the “beloved (Greek ēgapēmenos) of the LORD” (Deuteronomy 33:12), so John is the “disciple whom Jesus loved (Greek ēgapa)” (John 19:26).

During the decade of 1506–16, as he wandered between Milan and Rome pursuing his passions and seeking patronage, Leonardo worked on three paintings that have an elegiac and spiritual quality, as if he realized that his days were numbered and was contemplating what lay on the road ahead. These include two sensuous paintings of Saint John the Baptist

The word for saint in the New Testament is the word that means “sanctified one,” one who has been set apart by the Holy Spirit and called inwardly by Christ to Himself.

He will lay of His glory on us: As the name of our Lord is Jesus is glorified in us, we are glorified in Him (2 Thess.1:12). He acknowledges us as His true and worthy representatives; He entrusts us with His power; He admits us to His counsels, as He allows our intercession to influence His rule of His Church and the world; He makes us the vehicles

From sketches in his notebook, we know that Leonardo had already begun working on his portrait of Saint John the Baptist (fig. 128) while in Milan in 1509.4 But as with many of his late paintings, most of which he ended up working on out of personal passion rather than to fulfill a commission, he carried it around with him and intermittently enhanc