That Shadowy Middle

In his classic The Return of the Prodigal Son, Henri Nouwen is a master guide at unfolding the profundities of Rembrandt’s famous painting of the lost sons in Luke 15.

Having gazed at the painting for years, and researched Rembrandt’s life, Nouwen is able to point out things that we’d often miss in a first (or second or third, etc.) look. The book sort of feels like a cheat sheet, and Nouwen is very kind to share. One such observation comes in his exegesis of the elder son.  

The man knelt, with his head shaven, is the younger brother returning home. The father leans forward to embrace him with both hands on his back. There are two onlookers in the background, and then the elder son stands off to the far right. 

As Jesus tells the story in Luke 15, the position of the elder son makes sense, even if Jesus doesn’t describe this particular scene. Jesus says that the elder son had come in from the field on the day his brother returned, and as he drew closer to the house he heard the music and dancing of the party his father had thrown (see Luke 15:25). According to the story, then, the elder son wasn’t present for the initial reunion (see Luke 15:20). Rembrandt has taken some creative license here, not to give us an exact scene from Jesus’s story, but to paint its message. 

Notice the elder son is a near spitting image of his father. The father is certainly older, but the elder son shares his beard and has even dressed himself the same. They both have red cloaks, and both are standing, even though the elder son holds his staff with dignity as he looks from a distance. Of all their similarities, the difference of their distance is most important. In fact, notice that this distance is the center of the painting. 

The title of the painting is Return of the Prodigal Son, but the prodigal is not the central focus. The younger son is to the far left just as the older son is to the far right. But directly in the middle is the shadowy space that separates the elder son from his father. The direct middle of this painting, Nouwen says, “creates a tension asking for resolution” (68). 

And you should really see that shadowy middle. Notice that distance. As you look at the painting, the light of the father’s embrace attracts our eyes, but note that we must look to the side. If you could see your eyes while you see the painting, they are gravitating to the left of your head. The second prominent figure, communicated by his standing and the slight light upon him, is the elder son. And to see him your eyes must move in the opposite direction. They slide over to the right of your head. Chances are, you look back and forth, left to right to left and repeat. And all the while as we look at this painting, the center, that shadowy middle, is easily missed.

That is the painting, though. It’s the message.

This tension, as Nouwen calls it, is what we find in the wake of the father’s entreaty. You’ll remember in the story that as the celebration roared on, the elder son refused to attend. He considered it unfair that his father would receive his brother this way after he had wasted his inheritance in rebellious escapades. The elder son, in his unbelieving do-goodism, was angry, as the text says (see Luke 15:28). “But the father came out and entreated him …” (Luke 15:28).

The father pleaded with the elder son to join the party, to enter his joy, because that is the right thing to do (see Luke 15:32). Joy is the fitting response to the miracle of God’s mercy — and Jesus ends the story there. We don’t know if the elder son comes around, just like we’re left with that distance in Rembrandt’s painting. We don’t know what happened to that shadowy middle, but the bigger question is what we do about the shadowy middles in our own lives.

In a sense, everyday we are faced with this. We wake up to a world of brokenness, to one reason after another that seems to justify our anger, to cross our arms in cynicism, to defend ourselves from the sacrifice of love. It can feel like each day starts here, to the right of the painting, but on the other side always stands the joy. Always.

And it is the joy of God’s mercy, new every morning. Brothers and sisters, he pleads for you there. Will you cross that shadowy middle to enter in?