Collection Publications: Reflections of the Passion (2001-216)

Put on trial before the Jewish high priest Caiaphas, Christ responds to a direct question that he is, indeed, the Messiah and son of God. Caiaphas tears his robes to show his outrage at this blasphemy. Here Christ directly confronts those who will put him to death, a theme more frequently treated in depictions of his trial before Pontius Pilate (see the painting by a follower of Hieronymus Bosch [y711]). There the unbelief of Christ's tormentors is underlined by their coarse ugliness; in Trevisani's work, the heresy and sin of the high priest and his associates are suggested by the monkey, a familiar symbol of vice and paganism.