Rembrandt’s Very Human, Very Accurate, Very Jewish (and Very Unclassical) David

Perhaps the most famous sculpture in the world is Michelangelo’s heroic statue of the biblical David (1504). Standing over fourteen feet tall in the Galleria dell’Accademia in the center of Florence, it is surrounded perpetually by hordes of enraptured art lovers and tourists. The nude, Adonis-like youth stands before them, muscled, vigilant, poised, calmly holding a sling over his left shoulder while loosely clenched in his right hand rests the deadly stone that in an instant will be launched at the giant Goliath.

It is a very great masterpiece. Yet this universally admired depiction of one of history’s most famous Jews is not the least bit Jewish.