Jesus Dancing together with His Disciples

On the picture above, Jesus is dancing together with Mary and Martha and other women, painted by a Balinese painter I Nyoman Darsane who lives in Den Pasar. According to Darsane, the white divine light is gloriously radiating from Jesus precisely at the moment Jesus is dancing, making a movement with his body. Jesus’ body is moving powerfully and wonderfully in his dance, spreading his divine energy, power and light to the world around him which is dominated by darkness, as well as to his female friends. In the beginning was the divine movement!


Not only Darsane, a number of artists around the world do also imagine Jesus dancing, making a gorgeous movement with his body. The second picture above has been created by the American painter Mark Dukes, depicting Jesus wearing a golden white robe as dancing, with his left foot being lifted up and his right hand holding a long iron stick whose tip forms a cross, and a halo encircling his head. On the picture, the whole body of Jesus is encircled by a mandorla, something like a halo.


The third picture portrays the resurrected Jesus as bopping, with his right hand uplifted and his left hand holding a stick which has a cross-shaped head. His two insteps still marked by the wounds are treading on a globe, and a colorful long shawl coiling around his hip and buttocks, naked body and his two hands. Apparently he is celebrating his victory over death by dancing and waving his stole.


On the fourth painting above, created by Lindena Robb, Sydney, Australia, a naked-to-the-waist Jesus is joyfully and happily dancing, and a number of smiling women behold him possibly with sexual desire in their hearts. The blue sky adds a feeling of excitement upon all those present.

Is the dancing Jesus not a Christian Jesus? Oh course not! That Jesus is dancing, is a legitimate Christian imagination. There is a second-century holy Christian document, titled The Acts of John, that relates Jesus dancing together with his disciples. This is a Christian roman which has been influenced by the theology of the Johannine community. This Christian apocryphal document contains largely a Valentinian Gnostic theology which is elaborated most obviously in chapters 94-102.

In chapters 94-96 of this document we read that at the Last Supper before the crucifixion Jesus says to his disciples, “Before they hand me over to them, let us sing a hymn to the Father, and then we together should face what will happen before us.” Jesus then asks his disciples to stand up in a circle and hold each other’s hands, himself standing at the center of the circle. Soon Jesus and his disciples dance powerfully. When Jesus has sung one part of the hymn, his disciples while dancing respond with the word “Amen!” Their dance and the hymn they sing together are called the Round Dance of the Cross. The hymn that Jesus sings and the antiphonal response of his disciples, all the way down the line, are the following.

Glory to you, Father.
Amen.
Glory to you, Word.
Glory to you, Grace.
Amen.

Glory to you, Spirit.
Glory to you, Holy One.
Glory to your glory.
Amen.

We praise you, Father.
We thank you, Light, in whom no darkness lives.
Amen.

I declare why we offer thanks:
I will be saved and I will save.
Amen.

I will be released and I will release.
Amen.
I will be wounded and I will wound.
Amen.
I will be born and I will bear.
Amen.
I will eat and I will be eaten.
Amen.
I will hear and I will be heard.
Amen.
I will be in mind, I, pure mind.
Amen.
I will be washed and I will wash.
Amen.

Grace dances.
I will play the flute.
Dance, everyone.
Amen.
I will weep.
Lament, everyone.
Amen.
A realm of eight sings with us.
Amen.
The twelfth number dances above.
Amen.
The whole universe joins in dancing.
Amen.
If you do not dance
you do not know what is.
Amen.
I will run away and I will remain.
Amen.
I will adorn and I will be adorned.
Amen.
I will be united and I will unite.
Amen.
I am homeless and I have homes.
Amen.
I have no place and I have places.
Amen.
I have no temple and I have temples.
Amen.
I am a lamp to you who see me.
Amen.
I am a mirror to you who recognize me.
Amen.
I am a door to you who knock on me.
Amen.
I am a way to you, passerby.
Amen.

If you follow my dance,
see yourself in me when I speak.
If you have seen what I do,
keep quiet about my mysteries.
You who dance, consider what I do.
Yours is the human passion I am to suffer.
You could never understand what you suffer
unless I the word was sent to you by the Father.

You who have seen
what I do have seen me suffering,
and when you saw it,
you did not stand still but were utterly moved.

You were moved to wisdom,
and you have my help.
Rest in me.

Who I am you will know when I go.
What I am seen to be now I am not.
What I am you will see when you come.

If you knew how to suffer
you would be able not to suffer.
Learn how to suffer
and you will be able not to suffer.

What you do not know I shall teach you.
I am your God, not the traitor’s.
I wish holy souls to be in harmony with me.
Know the word of wisdom.

Say again with me,
Glory to you, Father.
Glory to you, Word.
Glory to you, Spirit.
Amen.

If you wish to know what I was,
I ridiculed everything with the word,
and I was not ridiculed at all.

I jumped for joy.
Understand everything,
and when you have understood, declare,
Glory to you, Father.
Amen.

Unfortunately, this apocryphal Acts of John was declared in the fifth century by pope Great Leo (in office from September 24, 440 through November 10, 461) as a misleading document. The pope stated officially that this document “contains a heated bed which makes people go astray, and therefore should not only be prohibited but also be got rid of altogether and be burnt by fire.”

However, the Acts of John testifies to the fact that Christianity has an exceptional text in which Jesus and his disciples are depicted as dancing and singing. Their dance and the responsorial hymn they sang unite them with the cosmos, unite Jesus and his disciples so that he is in them and they in him. And through their mystical union established by the great and powerful (and perhaps ecstatic) dance, Jesus’ disciples are sanctified and receive the strength and power they need to bear their own suffering and to know the way to conquer their anguish and plight.

Actually, in many traditional religions all over the world, past and present, the holy figures of these religions, not only Jesus, are portrayed as employing dances as the media to radiate and disseminate the divine power, wave and energy to believers and the whole world alike; and their dances symbolize the energetic divine movement which becomes the foundation of all creation. A very old religion of the world, Hinduism, which is far older than Christianity, knows such intellectual tradition and artistic expressions.

Shiva nataraj, the dancing king

The fifth and sixth images above portray the Hindu God Shiva as dancing in the special position in which he is known as the Nataraj, meaning the Dancing King. This dancing pose together with all arty accessories which he holds and exists together with him is replete with symbolic cosmic meanings. In short, the Nataraj dance symbolizes the cycle of the cosmic creation and annihilation as well as the rhythmic cycle of birth, death and rebirth as human and non-human phenomenal daily experiences which flow out from the God Shiva. Clearly, the Nataraj dance is an artistic allegory which refers to the five principles of the eternal cosmic energy in the whole universe which operates in all matter, from sub-atomic particles to the limitless and huge cosmos: creation, destruction, preservation, salvation and illusion.

 Shiva and Parvati dancing together erotically

The seventh picture above depicts the God Shiva as dancing together with the Hindu Goddess Parvati, the second wife of the former. Parvati is the highest Mother Goddess in Hindu religion from whom all Hindu goddesses were born and fill the universe. In an intimate and harmonious erotic and mystical dance, Shiva and Parvati are united to make the whole universe balanced and alive.

Perhaps Christians are tempted to imagine Jesus Christ as dancing with his female partner in the same manner as Shiva and Parvati’s dancing. Who is the woman with whom Jesus can dance intimately and harmoniously to radiate and to flow his creative energy for his church and the world? Is it possible that the dancing partner of Jesus is Mary Magdalene, the woman he loves very much? The answer is of course dependent on your creative and artistic imagination. Imagination is virtue; the sky is the limit. So, let us imagine, and celebrate the faith in Jesus through dance. Dance and follow and catch and absorb the powerful energy of the dancing man Jesus!

by Ioanes Rakhmat