I have always been fascinated by the ancient cave paintings of south-western Europe – Lascaux, Chauvet, Altamira – and the varied, sophisticated artistic skill sets they brought into the caves of France and Spain.  The charcoal and ochre panoramas of  horses, aurochs, rhinos, bison, and stags that they drew, painted, carved, and airbrushed onto the walls used perspective....

impressionism, pointillism, and a dynamic realism that would not begin to be equaled again until the renaissance. Picasso once said of the paintings “They invented everything.”  These paintings, which span several thousand years, were painted by men, women, and children without benefit of written language, and with only the most rudimentary tools.

            In a piece entitled “Isn’t it Remarkable,” Robert Benchley recounts looking at a book of reproductions of tomb paintings found in ancient Egypt.  Beneath a painting of a goose the caption read: “Remarkably accurate and artistic painting of a goose from Pharaoh Akhenaten’s palace, drawn 3300 years ago.” His response was “Why is it so remarkable that the people who built the pyramids could draw a goose so that it looked like a goose?”

            Well said.

            We do not know exactly how those caves were so magnificently illustrated, or how those pyramids were so precisely built.  But we know how those ancient artists and architects learned to produce them.  They learned by doing, by imitating a master.  They trained their eyes to see, their hands to manipulate, their muscles to move in patterns followed by the master, and by generations of masters before him.  Repetitive imitation is the university that trained ancient builders and artists.

            It is the key to understanding those works as well.  In Judith Thurman’s recent New Yorker piece on the prehistoric cave paintings (June 23, 2008), she explains that one of the key investigative tools archaeologists are using to understand the paintings is to copy them. A drawing board, a reproduction of the image, and a sheet of clear plastic allow a researcher to trace and retrace a particular image.  The tracings are loaded onto a computer. Repetitive imitation was the method used for training then, and the way we understand now.

            It is the way we still learn nearly everything we need to know, day by day.  Repetitive imitation is the way we mature in the faith.  The command to specifically imitate either Jesus, or the apostles who pattern him is given 11 times in the New Testament (I Cor. 4.16, 11.1; Eph. 5.1; I Thes.1.6, 2.14; II Thes. 3.7,9; Heb. 6.12, 13.7; I Pet. 3.13; 3 Jn. 11).  This goes beyond some vague notion of What Would Jesus Do?  It is about specific mimicry (that is the Greek word used, by the way – to mimic).  Paul, in Philippians 3.9ff says he has given up all things to have a specific experience of Jesus – even unto “the fellowship of his sufferings,” and “being conformed to his death.”

            I’ve often said that a better question to ask than WWJD, is WDJD – What Did Jesus Do.  We can answer that question.  We are told.  The Gospels present the very image of Jesus, who is himself the very image of God (Colossians1.15). Each day of life is a sheet of tracing paper. We see the lines clearly. It’s ours to follow them.  Then, in time, we become transformed (Romans 12.1-2) by the lines from repeated imitation.

            This is how, from the earliest times, we have learned to achieve great things.  It is the only way to be like Jesus.