Into India— Part Five

I am a person who loves art, artisanship, great skill used in the making of beautiful things. And there is plenty of that on display in India. Take for example this small green marble table with inlaid precious stones—cornelian, lapis lazuli, pearl. It took dozens and dozens of hours to make this little table which I bought and had shipped home.

I took the time to do the tour when I was in Agra to see how these tables were made. Here’s two men working hard at carving the stone so precious jewels and stones could be inlaid into it….

Everywhere you look in India, you see beauty juxtaposed with squalor. Its more than a little troubling. Consider the artisanship required to carve this….

Or to make this….

or to carve this out of hard marble…

Or to inlay this into India’s red sandstone….

Or to create these golden hands which hang in the huge Delhi airport…

Or to manicure this garden at the Taj Mahal….

I have long pondered the fact that the Almighty intended for beauty, truth, and love to be found together in this world. And when beauty is found without the other two, there is something incongruous about it. What was it the sage said in Proverbs about a golden ring in the snout of a pig? We live in a fallen and distorted world, but beauty and truth and love were originally meant to be together. We can appreciate each of them separately of course, but when we see something beautiful, or true, or lovely and lovable, it is meant to point beyond itself to the Ultimate One who is Love, Beauty, Truth. Think on these things.