Zeus vs. Madonna

Last week our son, Elijah (7) was given a drawing assignment: copy Sandro Botticelli’s Madonna of the Pomegranate (c. 1487). Operative word here: ‘copy’. Elijah, however, understood ‘interpret’. And so the heavenly shafts of light illumining Mary’s head were transmogrified into something rather less spiritual.

What could be causing this? Who? None other than All-Angry Zeus, wearing his favorite thunderbolt nightgown.

Joseph himself bolts to the rescue!

What will happen to Madonna and Child? Zooming out to find an answer, we see cranial-clouded Zeus centrally in control.

Mary’s hands flail. Salvation hangs by a thread. But Baby Jesus, some crying he makes. And all Olympus doth at his presence quake.

(Looks like this Christmas I’ve got my work cut out for me: disentangling the biblical-Homeric syncretism of my son’s theology!)