page_title: Law and Gospel (Cranach)
section_title: Description
hierarchical_section_title: Law and Gospel (Cranach) / Description
caption_attribution_description: English: this version without the accompanying Scripture passages; Weimar, Schlossmuseum; London, British Museum
context_page_description: Law and Gospel is one of a number of thematically linked, allegorical panel paintings by Lucas Cranach the Elder from about 1529. The paintings, intended to illustrate Lutheran ideas of salvation, are exemplars of Lutheran Merkbilder, which were simple, didactic illustrations of Christian doctrine.
  Cranach probably drew on input from his lifelong friend Martin Luther when designing these panels, which illustrate the Protestant concept of Law and Gospel. The earliest forms of the picture are the panels in Gotha, Germany and the National Gallery in Prague; the Gotha panel is thought to be earlier. The paintings were the basis for many similar works by Cranach and his workshop, Lucas Cranach the Younger, and other artists in diverse forms such as printmaking, relief sculpture and household furnishings.
context_section_description: On the left, "Law" side of the Gotha painting, a naked man is tormented by a demon and a skeleton (Death) as they force him toward Hell. Other motifs on the left include Christ in Judgment, the Fall of Man, the Brazen Serpent, and Moses with his tablets. On the right, "Gospel" side, a man interacts with John the Baptist, who is pointing to Jesus as if to say, "He died for you." He stands before both Christ on the Cross and the Risen Christ, whose blood streams onto the man, through the Dove (Holy Spirit), making Christ's blood into "the saving waters of baptism". The Lamb of God stands atop the trampled demons from the left half. A tree divides the two halves of the panel, shown dying on the left side but living on the "Gospel" side. The bottom of the Gotha painting has six columns of New Testament scripture in German, likely chosen by Philip Melanchthon.
  The Prague version unifies the two halves by portraying one man sitting in front of the tree, flanked by a prophet on the left and John the Baptist on the right, both of whom point towards Christ. The two panels can be read somewhat differently: it is easier for the viewer to identify with the man when he is the centered subject. Temporally, the Gotha panel shows two men simultaneously facing the consequences of past actions, while the man in the Prague panel clearly has a choice before him. While his "baser" lower body points to the "Law" side, his head and torso turn affirmatively toward John and the "Gospel" half. The painting includes many of the same symbols as the Gotha panel, such as the Brazen Serpent, Moses (at top left), the Fall, and the Crucified and Risen Christ. The Virgin now stands on a hill at right. This panel originally contained text that labelled the motifs, but they were lost during cleaning. The Prague composition was the preferred one for many derivative works by Hans Holbein the Younger, Erhard Altdorfer, the engraver Geoffroy Tory and others.
  Cranach moved the Brazen Serpent motif from the left side in the original two panels to the right in later versions, such as the woodcut. It is an Old Testament story in which God punishes Israelites fleeing Egypt by inflicting them with serpents; they need only look upon the serpent placed on a cross by Moses to be saved. Luther considered the story an example of faith and illustrative of Gospel. The mixture of Old and New Testament concerns in both halves of the panels illustrates that Gospel is not only found in the New Testament.
caption: Law and Grace, woodcut. Cranach, c. 1530
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS Macintosh", "Image DateTime": "2006:02:09 18:10:11", "Image ExifOffset": "164", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "302", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10730", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1322", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "957"}