The Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror, with signs and wonders – Deuteronomy 26:8
This week we saw the commemoration of St. Anthony the Great, or St. Anthony of Egypt, one of the most important figures of early Christian monasticism. Today’s reflection will be examining Salvador Dali’s Temptation of St. Anthony (1946). Paintings depicting St. Anthony’s temptation in the desert have existed for many centuries, and its origins lie in the Life of Anthony composed by St. Athanasius of Alexandria in the mid-4th century, not long after St. Anthony’s death. In it, St. Athanasius describes not only the spiritual and ascetic journey which St. Anthony embarked upon in his life, but also his various conflicts with the devil and his demons. It was this image of St. Anthony that many Renaissance and modern artists chose to place on canvases. However, is Dali’s ‘horror’ truly beautiful? Does a near-contemporary, almost postmodernist, artist deserve a place alongside artists previously featured, with their classical stylings and soft edges?
Although Spanish artist Salvador Dali is best known for his surrealist works, his painting of St. Anthony’s temptation in such an unreal way is not without precedent. Many artists from the Renaissance and early modern period have depicted St. Anthony being assailed by various demonic beings, surrounded by hellish imagery. One seminal example of this is Hieronymus Bosch’s Temptation of St. Anthony (1501), a painting which has influenced almost every depiction of the event ever since. In Bosch’s artwork, one can see various chaotic and nonsensical scenes and vignettes occurring, as a nonplussed St. Anthony sits in the corner, dressed in a black cloak, watching the events unfold.
In contrast to this, then, is Dali’s very dramatic scene, where St. Anthony kneels, naked, with only a cross made out of sticks to defend himself against the oncoming surrealist assault. Despite the sparse layout of the image in comparison to paintings such as Bosch’s, there are many small details which only become apparent on closer inspection. The horse and elephants on spindly legs represent the major temptations St. Anthony faced. The horse is the temptation of power and worldly respect, given the prominence of horses among imperial figures in the Roman world. Behind this, an elephant sports a platform holding up a figure of a naked woman, symbolic of the temptation to lust. Next is the elephant with a bejeweled obelisk, perhaps symbolic of the pursuit of wealth and worldly goods. The last two elephants in the foreground support a small Roman skyline; columned and adorned buildings, with a female torso appearing in a doorway. This may be representative of St. Anthony’s temptation to return to the world, to return to regular society after his escape into the Egyptian desert. Various small details in the painting include a skull is placed at St. Anthony’s feet, a momento mori encouragement for him to fight against the temptations, and stick figures on the ground, seemingly other attacks on another desert monk. Finally, a glimpse of azure buildings can be seen through the clouds, perhaps representative of the heavenly city which St. Anthony fought to attain.
With all this symbolic meaning extrapolated, there remains the question of whether this work has aesthetic value. While Dali and his contemporaries broke from previous artists in various respects, it is clear that Dali in this work, and in many of his other creations, was greatly indebted to the Renaissance masters. It is interesting to note that Dali’s artwork is perhaps one of the least surreal depictions of the temptation of St. Anthony, especially when compared to the aforementioned Bosch, and van Craesbeek’s Temptation (1650).
One key point of interest in the image is the fact that the horse appears to be reeling back from St. Anthony’s empowered pose. This serves as a lesson in how St. Anthony defended himself from temptation, and how we can as well. St. Anthony always clung to God, his one support, “his mind filled with Christ and the nobility inspired by Him, and considering the spirituality of the soul, quenched the coal of the other's deceit” (Life of Anthony, 5). However, if you were to interpret the horse as about to crush the poor St. Anthony under its hooves, we should remember the words of Scripture: We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies (1 Cor 4:8-10).
St. Anthony the Great, pray for us.
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