The Bridegroom of Blood (Exodus 4:24-26)

I’ve chosen to create paintings that illustrate some of the darker stories of the Bible. Each one has implications that could (and in some sense already do) fill many books. Each has been studied, debated, and negotiated with for millennia. That these tales tell us something about the human condition is obvious. Indeed, they tell us far more about humankind than they do about any divine entity or metaphysical truth. Perhaps it is expressly because their subjects are so much about the body, so viscerally physical, that they remain perennially evocative. They are full of suffering and pain, fear and desire. As such they are keyed to deeply-rooted aspects of the primate psyche, whether that be the animal, the pre-cognitive core, or a more existential, philosophically-based tendency. In Exodus 4 Zipporah takes on the authority of a priest, anointing her husband with circumcision blood from her own adult son, and saving them all from the strange vengeance of God.