The Michelangelo code

Did anyone else watch the program on Channel 4 (UK TV) tonight about this? it was really interesting, here is what the program was about;

Arguably the world's most famous work of art, millions of people visit it every year. Until now however nobody has been able to explain exactly what the Sistine Chapel's ceiling is actually trying to tell us. Though important and timely the film (airing as it does to celebrate the 500th birthday of the work) it is also the product of the detective work and obsessive scholarship by art critic Waldemar Januszczak which spans the last 30 years. During this time he has been trying to unlock the secrets of Sistine Chapel's complex pictorial codes and sumptuous iconography.

This major voyage of discovery traverses both centuries and nations, taking Waldemar from Texas to Jerusalem, from Portugal to Bologna, as he solves the vital clues which reveal for the first time the crucial answers to one of the world's most enduring art mysteries. Much of the inspiration for the Sistine Chapel finds its roots in antiquity but interestingly the scripture which inspired its birth, still finds powerful resonances in our recent history. Tracing strong and direct scriptural links between Michelangelo's masterwork and one David Koresh (cult leader of the Branch Davidians) Waldemar shows quite how powerful and pervasive these myths and prophecies remain.

www.channel4.com...

Basically, the Sistine Chapel's painting done by Michelangelo was a code about the "End Of Days", stating we were believed to be in those days and the Chapel was built to represent the old theory of the world we live in. Very completed stuff, im currently doing some research into it.

Cracking the lost code

WHEN an eminent art critic makes a TV programme about one of the acknowledged wonders of European art, Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling, promising to explain its true meaning, and the documentary opens with newsreel footage of the FBI’s botched raid on the Branch Davidian sect at Waco, Texas in 1993, in which 80 people died, you might be excused for wondering just what is going on?

Think Sistine ceiling, after all, and as like as not you’ll visualise the famous, not-quite-touching hands of God and Adam, outstretched in the divine act of creation - possibly, as Waldemar Januszczak puts it, the most famous fingers in art. But the whole import of that fantastically painted ceiling, believes the Sunday Times art critic, is not about creation but about ultimate destruction. Januszczak has spent the past two decades decoding Michelangelo’s spectacular artistry and his theory says much, not only about Renaissance religious thinking, but also about the dangers of religious iconoclasts and fanatical self-belief. For, he argues, both the hugely powerful popes who built and decorated the Sistine Chapel, and David Koresh, leader of the Branch Davidian sect, believed they were, in effect, new Messiahs and harbingers of the world’s end.

Januszczak’s theory is expounded in a Channel 4 documentary, The Michelangelo Code, to be shown on 21 May. "Basically I’m saying two things," he says. "One is that we’ve been going, in our millions, into the Sistine Chapel for 500 years and we’ve misunderstood it all that time. The second is that it was actually produced for very dark and weird reasons."

entertainment.scotsman.com...

I'll post more information, when i find it

This is very interesting keep up with posting information.

Wow... very interesting!

I had no idea that there is more to it then meets the eye...

An interesting idea, but what would motivate michelangelo to paint it as such?? What purpose would it serve, moreso than the generally accepted interpretation. Also, I am unclear, is there anything to support it besides an interpretation of the symbols and motifs?? That can be a very subjective thing. Interesting tho.

I'd like to have a look at this in depth but, two things jump immediately to mind:
1) End of Days themes are not unique to any time period in the last 2,500+ years; I view it as arrogance that almost every generation or two thinks that THEY are living in the "end times" and will be witnesses to the big event.

2) Michelangelo lived and worked during a period in which you basically had to paint liturgical/religious art to survive. For the most part, it had to follow the Christian doctrine of the day (usually enforced by the Roman Church) or you'd never get paid or, worse, you could get excommunicated and possibly imprisoned. (This isn't theology as much as Art History 101.)

So, as I read these sites, I'll be keeping these things in mind.

What connects the massacre of the Branch Davidians in Waco in 1993 with the birth of printing and Michelangelo and Jerusalem and the Sistine Chapel and that angry minor prophet who wrote book 38 of the Old Testament, Zechariah? It is not, I admit, the sort of question one asks oneself merrily every day. But it is what I forced myself to keep asking as I poked about for the best part of 20 years in the nether regions of civilisation, round and round the houses, in and out of libraries, through Rome, Jerusalem, Bethlehem and a place in Portugal called Evora, seeking to crack the lost code of the Sistine Chapel.

entertainment.timesonline.co.uk...

im going to see if this program is repeated because its very interesting. This secret is more complicated than the Da Vinci Code because the Waco event ties in with it, plus the bible, a rich family, but its so complicated to understand. There is nothing on the internet about this, which is sad. Im going to see if i can get more information from Channel four about this.

This is related to a conspiracy or scandal how, infinite?
Let me know before I move it.



seekerof

did he have a time machine, or did he use ninja magic to see into the future?

Originally posted by Seekerof
This is related to a conspiracy or scandal how, infinite?
Let me know before I move it.

seekerof

*breaks into a cold sweat*

Erm....well....you know...it has...erm...lots to do with it.

Not much of a conspiracy, more of a secret

It is a mystery, a code, a misunderstood message of one of the most famous art works, a new perspective on one of the most famous artists of all time and a new perspective on popes and religious rules of that time.

I don't think it belongs in theological discussion on existance of Jesus a.k.a. Religion on BTS

I was going to watch it but I got the time wrong! There better be a re-run......

Originally posted by Atomix
I was going to watch it but I got the time wrong!

There better be a re-run......

It was amazing,
really interesting stuff was brought up, im trying to get more information from Channel Four about it

I missed the start unfortunatly, it was complicated enough without trying to catch up and make sense of it all. I will check out some of the links you have posted infinite, thanks.
It was interesting to see and hear from some of the people involved in WACO near the end.

The theology behind it was really complicated.
I found it very interesting, but yet complicated at the same time, it was interesting to hear how WACO was connected to it. Im trying to find a website, so i can give more information to the members here, but i cant find jack

Take a looksie..

mv.vatican.va...


Al la paintings!!


Very cool website.. lets you zoom in REAL close to the actual pictures using a magnifying glass..

[edit on 5/22/2005 by QuietSoul]

Originally posted by Lysergic
did he have a time machine, or did he use ninja magic to see into the future?

Neither is necessary, since the past and future can only exist simultaneously with the present, as is explained in the thread about "Time...the 4th dimension." Countless people somehow get glimpses into these other two time realities and are able to see things from the distant past and the future. I don't know why or how, but I know what I have seen, which convinced me that the present is all there is...past and future being alongside it, not ahead or behind it.

Originally posted by QuietSoul
Take a looksie..

mv.vatican.va...


Al la paintings!!


Very cool website.. lets you zoom in REAL close to the actual pictures using a magnifying glass..

[edit on 5/22/2005 by QuietSoul]

thank you for that,
illl check it out now

quote:
Cracking the lost code
Think Sistine ceiling, after all, and as like as not you’ll visualise the famous, not-quite-touching hands of God and Adam, outstretched in the divine act of creation - possibly, as Waldemar Januszczak puts it, the most famous fingers in art.

I love this picture. I like to call it "Adam, Pull my finger.

im not sure if they are going to repeat it,

i doubt they will, which is sad 'cause it was an interesting show