The Iconography of the Giving of the Law: A Semiotic Overview

Abstract

Biblical passages that narrate how the Tables of the Law were transmitted from God to the people of Israel have been the object of many interpretations, both in Jewish commentaries, Christian exegeses, and secular analyses. A semiotic ambiguity characterizes these passages: on the one hand, Moses is described as the one who transmits to the people of Israel a normative message written directly by God; on the other hand, he is described as the one who transcribes for the people of Israel a normative message that God has transmitted to him orally. Interpretations emphasize either the former or the latter version, with important consequences for the way in which the semiotic status of the Tables of Law is imagined: sculpted directly by God or carved by human hand, a written message from God or a “divine dictation” from God to Moses. Furthermore, Christian interpretations of such ambiguity play a fundamental role in the way Christianity proposes itself as an alternative to Judaism: a religion where the Law is written on hearts versus a religion where the Law is written on stone.

From the first centuries CE on, both Jewish and Christian images have represented the Biblical passages mentioned above, but it would be superficial to consider these visual representations as mere illustrations of the Biblical text and its commentaries. On the contrary, in many cases images too work as commentaries, proposing their own interpretation about the semiotic status of the Law. For once, it is not verbal language that develops a metadiscourse on images, but images that embody a visual metalanguage on words (although this visual metadiscourse, in turn, needs the verbal metadiscourse of semiotics in order to be analyzed and interpreted). The chapter proposes a survey of these visual commentaries on the key Biblical episode of the Giving of the Law, from the frescos on the walls of the synagogue of Dura-Europos to Chagall.