Jesus Did Not Have Hair Like This?
"The early Christian evangelist Paul wrote, “Doth not even nature itself teach you that if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?" Paul may never have seen Jesus in the flesh, but he would have known the popular hairdos of the time...
"The classic image of a bearded, long-haired Jesus emerged as the favorite in the sixth century... The New Testament offers virtually no physical description of [Jesus]...
"There are two possible explanations for why the bearded, long-haired Jesus eventually won out. Some think the depictions were based on the iconography of Roman gods...
"Art historian Herbert Kessler of Johns Hopkins offers a more specific explanation. Pagan gods who were associated with water, like Neptune, often had long-flowing hair that merged with the water itself in statues and paintings...
Read The Jesus Hairstyle, by Brian Palmer at Slate
(Photograph by iStockphoto)
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