Shrine of the Virgin
Shrine of the Virgin, oak with linen covering, polychromy, gilding, and gesso, German, c. 1300; in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. Closed, this object depicts Mary and the Christ Child; open, it represents the Holy Trinity (sculptures of the Son and the Holy Spirit are now lost).
Incarnation
Jesus Christ
Incarnation, central Christian doctrine that God became flesh, that God assumed a human nature and became a man in the form of Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the second person of the Trinity. Christ was truly God and truly man. The doctrine maintains that the divine and human natures of Jesus do not exist beside one another in an unconnected way but rather are joined in him in a personal unity that has...