About the Picture

Images of religious figures have recently raised eyebrows. The old man’s image on this website is not the most controversial one, but we got some feedback too - about the quality.  Most people say it’s not sharp - go figure. The most explicit comment yet noted that it is ‘not a quality photo’. The face looked ‘strained’, the smile ‘caught in between’. Not too far from the truth. But that the ‘photo takes away from the naturalness of the man’, that it is a ‘thwarted representation, not appreciative and disrespectful’ – that’s strong tobacco.

We decided the photo had to go. As an epilog here its story:

In February 2005 Sun Myung Moon hosted a dinner on the occasion of his birthday. The first 60 minutes or so were taken up by a soccer game displayed on a huge screen just opposite his dinner table. One team had a player named ‘Moon’, this was obviously important. The food was better than the game – prepared by Lotte hotel and catered by Lotte personel. The Moon team won, it tied in the last minute. (Though Moon does sponsor a Korean soccer team, I think here was no relationship other than the name.)

After the soccer game ended, Moon began to walk around the dinner tables. It’s really interesting to watch what happens when the old man mingles in the crowd. It doesn’t happen often. Outsiders probably won’t be able to relate to this. Not really. But there is this sensation of divine presence one a very personal, down to earth level. Insiders may also experience differently. Certainly there is always tremendous show of respect, obedience. Chung Hwan Kwak, on the other hand, seems to let go, relax, completely. During sing-a-song sessions on Moon’s recent world tour he seemed to enjoy profoundly the personal interactions between Moon and the members. I always sense what I call ‘divine normalcy’, seeing the only normal person walking on earth, relating the highest levels of spirit to the level of common other mortals. Something like that.

Enough of this. While Moon was walking among the crowd he stumbled, almost fell at one table. He turned around, bowed down and began to talk with a person sitting on that table. I suspect he stumbled over his foot. He was leaning with one hand on the table and the two were talking for about 5 minutes. Moon’s face was dead serious, but not in a negative way. Finally he rose up and smiled briefly. Then walked on. The smile is on the photo. The photo wasn’t clear so I blurred it a bit more to make it look intentional. That’s all.

The next day he appointed the person who apparently made him stumble to a high level administrative position. He asked him to give a speech or testimony about his life in the movement. It didn’t impress me a bit. I have my own ideas about what happened. May be time will tell.

I was advised to find a photo of a ‘decent resolution, with humaneness in its quality, yet not aggrandizing’. Not aggrandizing – right. That rules this one out. Forget also this one, though the hats are kind of cool. This is the first runner up.

The winner you see from now on in the upper right corner on every page. Judging by the hat it was probably taken in Switzerland. If anybody has a better idea, the address: moonblog@foreignlands.org will accept suggestions as jpg-, gif-, tiff-files or whatever.
 

Copyright © Cultural Communications, foreignlands.org, 2005. All rights reserved.

the old picture

and the winner is ...

the old man