Nudity in Art by Christians

I had a thought this morning and I called my best friend Tristan to help me think through it and discuss. I hope that this is the beginning of an online discussion with people that have something to add.

So the thought was this: Is nudity in Christian Art something that honors God, His will, and His desires?

So here's what Tristan and I came up with:

NO. An all around No. I tried to play devil's advocate, but came to a conclusion that I could find no reason why having nudity in Christian art is fully okay with God.

I will state my reason as to why my final answer is "no" and then go over why I disagreed and threw out any of my attempts to say that having nudity in Christian art is okay with God.

I do not think that nudity in Christian art is okay because it takes something that is sacred and that is supposed to be found only within a marriage and exposes it to the world and, therefore, distorting something sacred and holy into something that is less than holy and sacred.

I think that the biggest reason that we could come up with in order to back up our claim is seen in Adam and Eve. We believe that they were arguably and possibly the most physically beautiful human beings in the history of humanity. At first, Adam and Eve, "were both naked, and they felt no shame" Genesis 2:25. However, when they sinned, they covered themselves up because they did feel shame (Genesis 3:7). Who were they covering themselves from? There were no other human beings on the planet and they were also married. And, they weren't covering themselves up from God because God had not yet entered the picture. So, within their marriage, they felt shame for their nakedness.

Another reason to back my claim is that while the body is a beautiful thing, that beauty is supposed to stay and be seen within a marriage only. There is an inner sanctity that the LORD makes within marriage and nakedness that is supposed to be in that marriage only. In the whole Bible I cannot find a passage that talks about nakedness being okay unless it is in the context of being in Heaven or between a wife and spouse or between the LORD and His church/people.

Another reason that I think that naked art is that Paul says that he will not do anything that causes another to stumble even if what he is doing is okay. I am referring to 1 Corinthinas 8 and I feel that I need to place the following verses of chapter 8 here because they are so important to see:

9 Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. 10 For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? 11So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. 12 When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

Verse 9 states that we must be careful that our freedom does not cause anyone to sin. So, even if was okay to have naked human being in art, which I think is not, we must be careful that it does not cause a weaker brother to sin. And Paul goes on to say in verse 13 that he will never eat meat if it causes other people to sin. So I would apply his reasoning to art and say that Paul would not paint naked people in art if it caused other people to sin. I think that it is a very reasonable assumption to assume that if anyone has art, whether photography or a painting or anything, that has human nakedness, that it would cause a brother or sister that is weaker than us at some level to sin in their minds. This, I think, applies specifically to men that are watching a naked female in a painting or a photograph or other like forms of art that depict a human being naked in a realistic manner.

This brings me to my another: pornography. There is a line that divides "naked pictures that are regarded to as art" from "pornography." I need to try to define it in context of everything that I have previously written above. If any art that has humans being naked is not okay according to God and any of this art that has naked humans can cause another fellow sister or brother to sin mentally, physically, emotionally or in any other way, then I would say that any and all piece of art that shows nakedness can be regarded to as pornography. I think that there are pictures out there that contain naked people and are placed in an art book and most people would regard that as art. But if that same picture is placed on a web site that is for pornography, then it becomes pornography. Then that leads me to ask: where is that line? Is this picture called pornography because it's on the pornography web site or because the picture is pornography.

I went to dictionary.com and this is their definition of pornography:

Sexually explicit pictures, writing, or other material whose primary purpose is to cause sexual arousal.

Then I think of what SEXUALLY EXPLICIT mean and "sexually"is pertaining to sex, while explicit means "clear." So sexually explicit means that "it's pretty clear that it's about sex." So, another way of writing the dictionary.com definition is to write it like this:

Pictures, writing, or other material that are clearly sexual in nature whose primary purpose is to cause sexual arousal.

So I guess maybe art in which the artist did not mean to have it be sexually arousing cannot be called pornography. But, if that same piece or art is placed on a web site that is for pornography, then the piece of art does indeed become pornography since it is being used to sexually arouse someone. This, I feel, confirms my previous statement that any art that has a naked human being can be a tripping rock that causes a fellow Christian to fall.

My last point is this: culture. I think that everything that I have stated is subject to culture. There are very few cultures, mainly in Africa, that walk around without any clothing; let us call this culture 'Culture A.' So, if that same culture was to draw a portrait of their own, then I think that it is okay since they are used to seeing each other like that and none of them are caused to sin. I think that this point does not come into conflict with my first point that states that nakedness is supposed to remain only within the marriage only if Culture A has a culture that has an understanding that nakedness is wrong. But, as I stated previously in this paragraph, there are cultures like Culture A that see nakedness and do not see sin or commit sin.

Well, I've talked a lot. And I would REALLY appreciate the comments of my friends, colleagues, and others in this subject. Above all, I want to honor God and that is why I am writing this.