The New York Times recently called it one of the “world’s most beautiful paintings”—at the New York Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.1 The painting is known as the Merode Altarpiece, a 15th-century triptych from Holland that features the Annunciation. Painted by Robert Campin, the altarpiece fleshes out the scene described in Luke 1:26–38: The angel Gabriel visits Mary and informs her that she will give birth to a son, whom she is to call Jesus. Mary accepts his news, saying, “I am the Lord’s servant … May your word to me […]
