What are our standards by which we judge whether or not something or someone is beautiful? The answer to this question, at least the one that our culture would suggest, is a bit troubling. Let us take the beauty of a woman as an illustration.
By what standards do we use to determine whether a particular woman is beautiful? Is it as simple as her waist size, cup size, and the color of her hair? In fact, these days it is difficult to find a woman that does not have highlights in her hair--usually in the form of blond highlights. I do not raise this to chastise such women, but to ask the question of why does a woman feel compelled to die her hair an unnatural color in order to feel beautiful? And why do men find unnatural hair color attractive?
I see the hair dying phenomena stemming from a much deeper problem--our standards of beauty. Women feel compelled to conform themselves to an image of beauty that is unnatural and, in most cases, simply unattainable. Men are not much better, as we have adopted these standards of beauty and, as a consequence, we expect our wives to look as such or we are more attracted to women that do.
So, then, what is true beauty? In terms of physical characteristics, true beauty passes on a parallel track with design. That is, God created men and women with varying shapes, sizes, and figures--and he did so for a particular purpose. To assert that one must attain an artificial color by means of tanning or an artificial hair style by means of dying is a distortion of beauty as God intended it--true beauty. To adopt such standards is a tragedy, both for ourselves and our loved ones that we are holding to such standards.
Physical characteristics aside, the most important aspect of a beautiful woman is a sincere heart for the Lord. By this I mean that there is something about a woman truly loving God and desiring to serve Him that is simply beautiful. It cannot be matched by any other characteristic.
Perhaps we should revisit our assumptions and pre-suppositions concerning what makes a thing (or person) beautiful, all the while seeking to recognize the design that permeates the world we live in.
Soli Deo Gloria.
1 comment:
There was an article in Time Magazine recently that debated on whether or not women should die their hair when there are signs of grey. The majority of women(most of whome where in politics or movies)felt like they had to die their hair in order to be taken seriously. They felt like when there were signs of grey others did not take them as serious or label them as a has been. Perhaps this is a play on their insecurities. Unfortunatly there is desire to look young for eternity. Women, and some men, will pay whatever it takes to look younger. Die, lotions, surgery, they all promise to be the fountain of youth. Why do we buy into the lie. We all know that we will get old. It is inevitable. What is so bad about getting old?
Post a Comment