Old Testament paintings

Images of holy people and of stories from the Gospels were the object of veneration that the Reformation was intended to ban. Biblical heroes for which no cult existed were found in the Jewish Bible. The patriarchs Abraham and Joseph, Samson the judge, King David, Queen Esther, the pious old and young Tobit: this cast of characters provided Rembrandt with material for moral dramas throughout his life.

Rembrandt started to paint Old Testament stories and figures shortly after he had set up as an independent artist in Leiden in 1625. His early work shows the powerful influence of his master's, Pieter Lastman's, broad, colourful style.

Late in the 1640s Rembrandt began to watch Jews more carefully, and to characterize them more deeply than before. Rembrandt had the opportunity to study the Jewish population of Amsterdam. From the time he purchased his large house in the Sint-Anthonisbreestraat (later the Jodenbreestraat) in 1639 until he was forced to sell it in 1658 he lived on the edge of the largest Jewish community in Holland. To Rembrandt the Jews were the people of the Bible, and with his deepening realism he wanted to become more authentic in his biblical representations.