why do pictures of jesus always depict him as white european surely he was an arab?

Answer 1

So many people said that he was a Jew not an Arab but an Arab is from Arabia and a Jew is a follower of the Jewish religion so technically a Jew could be born in an Arabian state. But Jesus was from Nazareth, one person depicted that as looking like they are from Ethiopia but Ethiopia has a strong Arabic influence as well as white and black influence but it seems like you could have a better idea if you could really find out what a person from Nazareth looked like. You would think that if he did not look like a typical person from Nazareth that someone would of said something in their writings. I do think it is very odd that with such a well documented occurrence as Jesus Christ that there are no pictures or sketches, one would think there would be A LOT! I would say there are many interest groups that would insure that the real pictures of Christ were never exposed if the pictures depicted Jesus with a skin tone or ethnic hue that might have been in conflict with their own beliefs or agenda.

Answer 2

The pictures of Jesus were modeled after the Shroud of Turin and the viel of Veronica. Early Greek images of Jesus depicted him with a beard a long nose and deep set eyes. Romans depicted him in short hair and clean shaven, after their culture.

I've seen black, blonde, chinese, and latino versions of Jesus.
Artists have license to make the image after their culture, so sure, it would make sense that Jesus would look european if european artists painted him.

By the way, Jesus was a Jew, not arab.

Answer 3

Not only that but he looked middle eastern with a little black in him like Egyptians or some of those Arabs that look like they could be puerto rican and have some black somewhere in their blood line. I guess the answer to your question is because people have egos and are full of themselves. The guy was right about him looking Ethiopian as the have skin like bronze or brass and hair like wool. They are actually a different race of blacks then the West Africans who made up the slave trade. The problem is there has been so much mixing of races over the past 2000 years that it's very hard to tell what someone's race is anymore. You might mix a West African with an Irish person, and a Indian from India and they might come out looking Ethiopian.

Answer 4

Some do and some don't. The photo's I have , display the look of a Middle East . Jesus was from the Middle East. He was not an Arab, Jesus was a Jewish person. A light tint of tan, some people refer to the Olive colored skin.

Answer 5

The same problem exists for history. It's always the victor that writes the books.

As a brown-eyed person, in art class we did a drawing of Mary. I gave her brown eyes and my blue-eyed teacher gave me a hard time and a B for clearly A work. Since it was my work, my interpretation, I claimed the right to do it as I saw it without penalty for her beliefs. Then I had to explain this to the blue-eyed principal. Frankly he thought he could command how I though. Wrong. I took the B. . .because it had taken too long to do. Yea right! It was good enough to be entered into an art contest without my permission and win. It was never returned. After high school I contacted her and asked for it back. She told me it had been thrown away. What a sleez!

Everyone knows the truth whether they will discuss it or not. Always question and stick to your beliefs.

Answer 6

The ancestry of Jesus is well laid out in the Bible. He was of Jewish(early Semitic) decent. He did however have a few ancestors that were Gentiles from north of Israel..
As most of you know that are students of the Apocrypha, plus other apocryptical writings, and assorted auxiliary contemporary writing--over and over they state that Jesus of Nazareth was a RED HEAD!
He spoke Aramaic as a first language, knew Hebrew, and Egyptian(maybe even Greek).
He also live in Caperneum down by the Galilean Sea, on the left side of Main Street. That local dialect was very strong called "Sino-Chaldean"; that is why in Jerusalem they could pick out his Disciples by their country-folk talk.
He was a RED HEADed Jewish person--who resurrected is alive and the Savior of the World!

Answer 7

Actually, Jesus is a Jew, not an Arab. Anyway, this question has been asked and disussed inside and outside yahoo for a really long time. It's just that European artist depict Him that way, because that is what they imagine.

Answer 8

Because most of the paintings were painted by white Europeans. But He was no Arab. He was a Jew.

Answer 9

I'm tying desperately to visualize Jesus as an Arab. Wow.

Answer 10

Most artists paint images that they are familiar with. The classical Europeans artists used models, often people in their towns...they didn't have a lot of access to Middle Eastern models.