Was Jesus white?

[Elizabeth502]

Jesus was Jewish. And some Jews (some you might know of even) are fair skinned. And blue eyed. And red haired. As well as dark haired and dark eyes. Jews migrated everywhere after 70 AD and the Roman destruction of the Temple.

Yes.

Unfortunately, lots of people do not understand these variations, and have a monochrome view of the world. While intermarriage was less common in Jesus’ day, there was still some variation – and of course, eventually there was a great deal of intermarriage. Thus, the typically East European Jewish look (later) of dark hair/dark eyes among Jews is juxtaposed with the central European Jewish look of (often) extremely fair-skinned, blue-eyed, red-haired, never intermarried Jews whose characteristics trace back over a long period. And those people lived in Jewish ghettos.

 

[CaptFun]

http://www.wearysloth.com/Gallery/ActorsW/18372-6863.jpg

Well known Jewish person with a beard.
Gene Wilder may actually be related to Jesus
(way back)? He always makes me laugh.

There are more blue eyed Jewish people
than I thought. Until I think of the people
I know. Then its a good strong percentage!

(I’m done now. Absolutely can’t post
Jerry Lewis, Albert Einstein, Milton Berle
George Burns or any of the “Stooges” or
Marx Brothers. But I will post …)

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

Sandy Koufax

 

[Nom_the_Wise]

Educated guesses. Possibly true. And yet … Jesus was Jewish. And some Jews (some you might know of even) are fair skinned. And blue eyed. And red haired. As well as dark haired and dark eyes. Jews migrated everywhere after 70 AD and the Roman destruction of the Temple.

Jesus wasn’t white. Posting pictures of modern day Jewish people is not compelling evidence considering that Jesus and the people that he was biologically related to lived 2000 years ago. There are some traditions which suggests that Jesus, the man, was a perfect human specimen. Blonde/red hair and blue eyes are recessive traits. If Jesus was a perfect (or even a mostly perfect) human specimen, that implies darker eyes, darker hair and darker skin (though we may never know the exact hue).

Again this truly cannot be proven (no photographs) but Jesus was clearly darker than the Victorians painted him and most likely did not have blue eyes. And I wonder about the descriptions that visionaries have had, since they saw the resurrected Christ and didn’t necessarily see Jesus as he was in life. We don’t know. The differing descriptions of those visionaries (if they are all telling the truth) implies that even if they all saw Jesus, they didn’t all see the same thing.

But the answer to the OP’s question must still remain: no.

 

[QuestingKnight]

People are talking at cross purposes here.

1. There is what Jesus looked like when he was incarnate.
2. There is how he is depicted in icons.
3. There is how he subsequently chooses to appear in revelations to mortals.
4. There is how he would appear if you could see him as God i.e. transfigured.

No. 2 is what is confusing people. They didn’t have cameras in 1AD, 'though the Turin shroud might qualify!

I’ve tried to attached a picture of what a little savant girl drew, which she said was what he actually looked like when incarnate and how he normally chooses to appear to men in Heaven. This was independently backed up by another little boy subsequently. Both are private revelations, by non-Catholics AFAIK and not authorised by the Church, so you can take it or leave it. It’s a famous pic.

 

[Brendan_64]

Educated guesses. Possibly true. And yet … Jesus was Jewish. And some Jews (some you might know of even) are fair skinned. And blue eyed. And red haired. As well as dark haired and dark eyes. Jews migrated everywhere after 70 AD and the Roman destruction of the Temple.

Yes they did migrate after the destruction of the temple, but this is entirely irrelevant to the possible appearance of Jesus. It is not about whether or not Jesus was Jewish, and looking at the skin colouring of Jews today, it was about the ethnicity of Jews at that time. The fact that some Jews today have blue eyes and fair skin is irrelevant. We are not talking about today, we are talking about Jews at the time.

 

[Brendan_64]

This is one of the heresies about Jesus, by the way: that he was a nice man with a nice message, and it’s “the message” that’s important.

This is absolutely not heresy. Perhaps you misunderstood me.

I did not say he was a nice man with a nice message. I said that his appearance was not important, but it was his message that was. Jesus’s message consists of the Gospels and there is no reference in them to his appearance or personality. This is because his appearance or personality are are not important, but what is important is the message contained in the Gospels. In fact if there was an emphasis on Jesus’s appearance or personality, then this would have detracted the emphasis from the message he brought to us.

Jesus’s message to us, as contained in the Gospels, is absolutely important. Are you trying to argue that it is not?

 

[St_Francis]

Something I love to contemplate is Nativity scenes from around the world.

…

OK, If I try to post them, they come out enormous! So just run a search for “nativity scene around world” and look in the images section.

I first saw this on a show on EWTN close to 20 years ago… it was so beautiful, and lovely to contemplate people from around the world making creches for their Baby Jesus. I love the idea that people think the Holy Family looks like them, and so they draw nearer to them, maybe saying, I know Mary’s hut/igloo/yurt/etc didn’t look like this, but it was like this to her… she was like me; Joseph worked hard like my husband; Jesus lived as we do… and so growing closer to the Holy Family.

 

[St_Francis]

…No,that was not my point, and not Jesus’ point. His point was a personal relationship because to “know” Him was to know the Father.

This is one of the heresies about Jesus, by the way: that he was a nice man with a nice message, and it’s “the message” that’s important. It’s the relationship that’s important. There have been numerous prophets and charismatic figures throughout history with great messages, and none of those were the singular God-man with a universal intimacy available to all of us.

This is absolutely not heresy. Perhaps you misunderstood me.

I did not say he was a nice man with a nice message. I said that his appearance was not important, but it was his message that was. Jesus’s message consists of the Gospels and there is no reference in them to his appearance or personality. This is because his appearance or personality are are not important, but what is important is the message contained in the Gospels. In fact if there was an emphasis on Jesus’s appearance or personality, then this would have detracted the emphasis from the message he brought to us.

Jesus’s message to us, as contained in the Gospels, is absolutely important. Are you trying to argue that it is not?

It’s not either/or! The Person of Christ is tremendously important! And the message of Christ is important also. Christ did not become incarnate so that we could assiduously live by His message; He became Man so we could learn to love Him. At the same time, His message allows us to learn more about Him, and also how best to love Him!

But each, Person and message, is much more important than His appearance per se.

 

[Brendan_64]

There are some traditions which suggests that Jesus, the man, was a perfect human specimen.

That runs counter to the prophecies of Isaiah which said (I’m paraphrasing here) that the Messiah would be a person of unremarkable appearance and not a person of physical beauty.

Unlike in the movies of course (and in artist’s pictures) where Jesus is almost always depicted as a very photogenic person.

I do like the Virtual Bible ‘movies’ (the way they use the Bible word for word, OK the RSV would be better than the NIV, but you can’t have everything) but the actor playing Jesus in those really is a very handsome guy. I doubt Jesus would have been that good-looking.

 

[Nom_the_Wise]

That runs counter to the prophecies of Isaiah which said (I’m paraphrasing here) that the Messiah would be a person of unremarkable appearance and not a person of physical beauty.

I didn’t say he was beautiful per se. You can still have an “everyman” look and still be a perfect or nearly perfect human speciman. They wore a lot of robes back then so it’s not like he would have been strutting around flexing his pecs or showing off a six pack. Jesus would have had the strong physique of a working carpenter, that much we know, but not a body like Schwarzenegger.

 

[CaptFun]

Jesus wasn’t white. Posting pictures of modern day Jewish people is not compelling evidence considering that Jesus and the people that he was biologically related to lived 2000 years ago. There are some traditions which suggests that Jesus, the man, was a perfect human specimen. Blonde/red hair and blue eyes are recessive traits. If Jesus was a perfect (or even a mostly perfect) human specimen, that implies darker eyes, darker hair and darker skin (though we may never know the exact hue).

Again this truly cannot be proven (no photographs) but Jesus was clearly darker than the Victorians painted him and most likely did not have blue eyes. And I wonder about the descriptions that visionaries have had, since they saw the resurrected Christ and didn’t necessarily see Jesus as he was in life. We don’t know. The differing descriptions of those visionaries (if they are all telling the truth) implies that even if they all saw Jesus, they didn’t all see the same thing.

But the answer to the OP’s question must still remain: no.

MUST it now? I says in my mischievously contentious Irish brogue (per my ethnicity I’m allowed)

**Lamentations 4:6 ** The punishment of the daughter of my people is greater than the penalty of Sodom, Which was overthrown in an instant without the turning of a hand.

7*** Brighter than snow were her princes, whiter than milk,*** More ruddy than coral, more precious than sapphire.

Ruddy? Red. Red hair? Red skinned as in fair skinned with a slight burn?

Look who turns out to be “ruddy”. Jesus’ ancestor David!

**1 Samuel 16:12 ** Jesse sent and had the young man brought to them. He was ruddy, a youth handsome to behold and making a splendid appearance. The LORD said, “There-anoint him, for this is he!”

13 Then Samuel, with the horn of oil in hand, anointed him in the midst of his brothers; and from that day on, the spirit of the LORD rushed upon David. When Samuel took his leave, he went to Ramah.

Also:

**1 Samuel 17:40 ** Then, staff in hand, David selected five smooth stones from the wadi and put them in the pocket of his shepherd’s bag. With his sling also ready to hand, he approached the Philistine.

41 With his shield-bearer marching before him, the Philistine also advanced closer and closer to David.

42 When he had sized David up, and seen that he was youthful, and ruddy, and handsome in appearance, he held him in contempt.

Looks like Goliath, who lived in the same region, looked substantially different than David.
At the very least. Something. No?

Song of Songs 5:10
My lover is radiant and ruddy;
he stands out among thousands.

11 His head is pure gold;
his locks are palm fronds,
black as the raven.

Black hair here, but that unusual ruddy appearance. This is not David, but the literature is Jewish and so “the lover” is of that ethnicity. Jesus’ ethnicity.

When David is singled out … that is not only the same tribe (Judah) but the same house and ancestor within the tribe of Judah. Your ruling OUT present day Jews (also descended from that same tribe of JUDAH if not converts) is dismissive and curious.

All of them “look white” to me. And they are. Caucasian? Israel is closer to the Caucuses than Ireland is (though further south where its more sunny). Still one doesn’t breed oneself into a whole new race when you are as historically clannish as the Jews have been throughout their history. “Ruth” being an outlier.

What the hey?! If Jesus was white He was white. Might just as easily go nuts because He was Asian (per where he lived) or something. I suspect political correctness in all this.

I myself have gotten several shades darker (on the arms and face especially) since moving from Chicago to California. I look real tan next to my milky white cousins who live in a place where the sun doesn’t break through the clouds for months on end in the winter.

My race and theirs? The same. White. I could probably say “Irish isn’t white … It’s Hibernian” or some such thing. And we Irish Catholics weren’t considered “white” by the Ku Klux Klan in the narrow sense they meant it.

But I’ll contend that most Jewish persons I can think of today would be classified as
“white” if the categories were: White, Black or Yellow. Caucasian using the other words for the races. “Middle Eastern?” Yes of course. But you know what?

Here’s a well known Lebanese born Christian. The late Danny Thomas.
So help me he “looks white” to me too. For all THAT matters.

 

[Nom_the_Wise]

Jesus would have had the strong physique of a working carpenter, that much we know, but not a body like Schwarzenegger.

…and it would have been the physique of a strong carpenter who didn’t own power tools like the carpenters of today. If you think about it, I imagine Jesus of Nazareth was quite a rugged man.

 

[Will_B]

After reading all the previous post, this clip from the Cosby Show came to mind… Does the shade of the skin of Jesus really matter?

It’s the artist conception… Look at pictures of the Crucifixion prior to the finding of the Shroud of Turin; the nails were in the palm of the hand, now most artist place the nails in the wrist. (( Artist conception ))

youtube.com/watch?v=Uk6SQj0K5lE

 

[Nom_the_Wise]

MUST it now? I says in my mischievously contentious Irish brogue (per my ethnicity I’m allowed)

Your ruling OUT present day Jews (also descended from that same tribe of JUDAH if not converts) is dismissive and curious.

I could say the same thing by your insistence to keep ruling them in. I think you’re taking this way too seriously. Using the poetry of prophetic language is hardly proof positive of anything.

David was born 1000 years before Jesus. Lots can happen to a gene pool in 1000 years.

People keep (rightly) asking the question “Does any of this really matter?” In the economy of Salvation, the answer is no. The OP posted a question and a number of us essayed to answer it. As someone who loves Jesus of Nazareth, both as a person and as God Incarnate, it is natural to be curious, to wish to see the man as he actually was, and perhaps that will be shown to us one day. But it won’t be today.

 

[NHInsider]

All of the picture I have or have seen of Jesus he is white or of fair skin. But aren’t a lot of people in that part of the world brown-skinned? Or am I wrong? Is it possible Jesus was brown? Just curious. It’s something a friend pointed out to me last year and has haunted me ever since. What do you guys think?

Jesus was an Israelite, so He undoubtably looked like the various Semitic peoples, “browner” than northern Europeans, certainly, and not blue-eyed or blonde haired.

In art, Jesus and the other people of the Bible have tended to be represented as looking like the artist’s own people. And it’s interesting that when Our Lady has appeared to people in different parts of the world, she has done so in a way that is comfortingly familiar to the visionary - the Aztec princess on Juan Diego’s tilma bears little resemblance to the Lady who appeared to Bernadette, but she looks a lot like the Juan Diego (and, not incidentally, like the conquistadores). This, I think, helps us to understand and accept the Incarnation.

 

[SwizzleStick]

Jesus would not have been ‘White’. He was bom in the Middle-east, of middle-eastern parents, so he clearly would have been of the ethnic origin of the people there. He wouldn’t have been some white guy with light brown hair, who suddenly popped up in the 1st century middle-east, where the indigenous people were brown-skinned with dark brown hair.

Jesus would have looked just like one of the locals (which he was). Isaiah 53 explains that the Messiah would not be someone that would be in any way special in appearance, “he had no form or comeliness that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.” Jesus would have looked just like any other Galilean. He would certainly not have been white.

Yep, brown skin, maybe light brown skin, brown hair, brown eyes. He would have also been strong as a carpenter.

 

[SwizzleStick]

Only during the Transfiguration.

 

[HolyRosaryChild]

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My interpretation of Jesus’ physical image when here on Earth are both; olive/brown and white/fair skin.

It is what your Soul believes Jesus to appear like!

How well do you know Jesus and how well do you know your Soul? Through Jesus and your relationship with Jesus you will come to better know your Soul and then discover a great number of things about your own Soul; all through heartfelt daily constant prayer!

I picture Jesus in my own mind praying The Holy Rosaries in many different Holy Garments and only see Jesus in long sleeves or three quarter sleeves; therefore His skin colour has never been a query for me. His coat of many colours with stripes, His Holy Powder Blue and White Garments, His Holy white garment with a Maroon Sash, His all White Holy Garment with His Sacred Heart always pictured; words cannot describe His Sacred Heart.

So… you will see Jesus and how He appears to you in your own Mind, Soul, Heart and Body when you are ready through prayer and fully opening up your Heart to Him!

I am not talking Apparitions here I am referring to our communication and relationship with God and how I picture Jesus in my mind during prayer!

 

[SwizzleStick]

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

My interpretation of Jesus’ physical image when here on Earth are both; olive/brown and white/fair skin.

It is what your Soul believes Jesus to appear like!

How well do you know Jesus and how well do you know your Soul? Through Jesus and your relationship with Jesus you will come to better know your Soul and then discover a great number of things about your own Soul; all through heartfelt daily constant prayer!

I picture Jesus in my own mind praying The Holy Rosaries in many different Holy Garments and only see Jesus in long sleeves or three quarter sleeves; therefore His skin colour has never been a query for me. His coat of many colours with stripes, His Holy Powder Blue and White Garments, His Holy white garment with a Maroon Sash, His all White Holy Garment with His Sacred Heart always pictured; words cannot describe His Sacred Heart.

So… you will see Jesus and how He appears to you in your own Mind, Soul, Heart and Body when you are ready through prayer and fully opening up your Heart to Him!

I am not talking Apparitions here I am referring to our communication and relationship with God and how I picture Jesus in my mind during prayer!

I agree that that is likely true now, each person sees Jesus as we imagine Him to look. But, when He walked this earth, Jesus was a man. He looked a certain way.

 

[GEddie]

We just don’t know.

While the stereotypical citizen of the Middle East has dark skin, remember that it is the crossing point for three continents, and so they saw every “body.”

There are many Mideasterns who have light, even freckled, skin, and are not Euro-Israeli.

It doesn’t matter anyway. When we see our LORD, we will not see HIS natural self and skin; we will see HIS luminous pneumatikon soma.

ICXC NIKA