# Is the Virgin Mary a hypocrite? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 17, 2006, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400 "2006-01-17T20:11:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![APB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e8cbc/32.png) [@APB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/APB)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/21 "2006-01-19T11:03:08Z")
Well, I can go one better - the section of the website of the National Gallery of Art (Washington) on [‘Artistic Exchange: Europe and the Islamic World’](http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2004/artexchange/artexchange_ss1.shtm) has other examples, as well as some discussion of the historical context. > [@Johanna](#): > > The coronation mantle of King Roger II of Sicily, if I remember correctly, had an actual Arabic text embroidered on it: _la ilaha illa Allah, Muhammad rasul Allah_ (There is no God but God, Muhammad is God’s messenger), the essential Islamic testament of faith. Actually, although it’s in Kufic script and contains a Hegira date, the text is not obviously religious. The translation offered by the current catalogue of the Vienna Schatzkammer is: > [@](#): > > _This belongs to the articles worked in the Royal workshop, [which has] flourished with fortune and honour, with industry and perfection, with might and merit, with [his] sanction and [his] prosperity, with magnaminity and majesty, with renown and beauty and the fulfilment of desires and hopes and with felicitous days and nights without cease or change, with honour and solicitude, with protection and defence, with success and certainty, with triumph and industry. In the [capital] city of Sicily in the year 528._ But this is still relevant, as the meaning of the text was later forgotten and the mantle associated instead with Charlemagne, thus serving as an example of how Europeans could easily misunderstand the precise significance of such objects. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/22 "2006-01-19T13:54:44Z")
> [@APB](#): > > To reinforce **Johanna** ’s point, the fourteenth-century [‘Cambrai Madonna’](http://www.artlex.com/ArtLex/b/images/byzant_cambrai.madon.lg.jpg), now in the Metropolitan Museum, is another example of one with pseudo-Arabic script. Wow… I had no idea the infant Jesus was so microcephalic. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/23 "2006-01-19T18:07:25Z")
Is it possible that people looking at the pseudo-Islamic script in those paintings (Cambrai Madonna _et al_.) are reading meanings into them that aren’t there? Kind of like the [eggplant](http://www.mcn.org/1/Miracles/Allah2.html) which spells out “Allah exists”? There’s a name for this phenomenon, which is eluding me at the moment. ---
**Author:** ![capybara](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/capybara/32/202_2.png) [@capybara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capybara)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/24 "2006-01-19T19:30:08Z")
Interesting thread. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/25 "2006-01-19T21:33:48Z")
[Pareidolia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia) – that’s the word I was thinking of. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/26 "2006-01-19T21:53:15Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > Wow… I had no idea the infant Jesus was so microcephalic. Zippy the Christ! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/27 "2006-01-19T21:55:34Z")
> [@Gary T](#): > > “God” and “Allah” are names for the same god in English and Arabic, respectively. Nuh-UH! Just ask Jack Chick! [http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0042/0042\_01.asp](http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0042/0042_01.asp) ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2006, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/28 "2006-01-19T21:58:32Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Didn’t Jewish women of that time and place cover their hair? The orthodox still do, for married women at least. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/29 "2006-01-20T17:05:31Z")
> [@Sal Ammoniac](#): > > Is it possible that people looking at the pseudo-Islamic script in those paintings (Cambrai Madonna _et al_.) are reading meanings into them that aren’t there? Kind of like the [eggplant](http://www.mcn.org/1/Miracles/Allah2.html) which spells out “Allah exists”? There’s a name for this phenomenon, which is eluding me at the moment. Pareidolia… I noticed this a few weeks ago on my own body… via a fashion faux pas… In the morning I put on fishnet stockings to go to work. After I was already dressed I realized it was too cold out to go in just fishnets, so instead of changing and getting undressed all over again, I just pulled on a pair of knee socks. These were sheer black socks with a see-through burnout curlicued floral pattern. So I was at work and looked down at my legs. The interference pattern from the superimposition of the two hosiery patterns (fishnet and curlicued floral) resulted in shapes that looked exactly like Arabic calligraphy. I was amazed. It seemed almost like I could read the Arabic text, but there were no actual letters, just their aesthetic impression. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400/30 "2006-01-20T17:07:59Z")
P.S. Someone told me if only I’d eaten LSD for breakfast, I would have been able to really read it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-the-virgin-mary-a-hypocrite/340400.md?page=1)