Jacob Jordaens’ Virgin and child with St John and his Parents

June 20th 2026

Jacob Jordaens,  “The Virgin and Child with Saint John and his Parents”, about 1620
The Dutch artist Jacob Jordaens was known for setting biblical scenes in contemporary, ordinary settings. Here, an older couple with a young child visit a younger mother with her child on her knee. The two children are at the centre of the scene. In fact, this domestic scene shows Zachariah and Elizabeth taking their son John to visit Mary and her child, Jesus. This meeting of St John the Baptist and Jesus is not narrated in the Bible, but the tradition that John the Baptist’s parents took him to visit the Holy Family was a popular one in Italy and the Low Countries. Mary sits in a wicker chair. With its high back, intended to keep out draughts, it may look as if it was made in Orkney, but there are similar chairs in other paintings by Jordaens, so it must have been a common piece of furniture in Jacob Jordaens’ Antwerp. The whole scene could simply be intended to show one family with a young child visiting another. The visitors have brought a bird for the child in a wicker cage and released it. It hovers before the child Jesus, who looks at it with delight. Notice that none of the characters looks out at us. They are focused on the child’s reaction to the bird. However, Catholic eyes will see this domestic scene in a deeper light. In the high-backed chair, there is a suggestion of the heavenly throne of Mary, Queen of Heaven, and the light catching the back of the chair suggests her halo. Her child wears a swaddling cap decorated with flowers, which suggests both a halo and the crown of thorns. The older child looks up at his younger cousin. We are in no doubt as to his identity. His arm rests on a lamb, anticipating the day when he will point to Jesus and call out, “Behold the Lamb of God.” Notice that only the lamb looks out at the viewer, perhaps to suggest the sacrifice of the cross. The liberation of the bird may be intended to prefigure the way Christ’s death will offer liberty to the human soul. All these details are intended to evoke future events in the lives of these two children, which will accomplish our salvation. What might look like an ordinary domestic scene is endowed with profound significance. The little bird, now freed from the cage, hovers before Christ, like a soul freed from the snare of the enemy. The bird may also be there to remind us of the gift of the Holy Spirit, sent from the Father and the Son, who, together with the Son, would make their home in us.

 

Jacob Jordaens’ Virgin and child with St John and his Parents

Edinburgh Catholic Chaplaincy

The Catholic Chaplaincy serves the students and staff of the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Napier University and Queen Margaret University.

The Catholic Chaplaincy is also a parish of the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh (the Parish of St Albert the Great) and all Catholic students and staff are automatically members of this parish.

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