For God so loved the world

Cranach painted this panel in Wittenberg in 1529, close to Luther. A tree, bare on one side and green on the other, divides it. On the side of the law, death and the devil drive a man towards the fire. On the side of grace, John the Baptist points the same man to the Crucified. Believing, here, is looking where the finger points. The serpent on the pole is in the picture as well.

The subject was developed in Wittenberg in the late 1520s, in close exchange between Cranach and Luther. The six text panels at the bottom give the Bible passages for each scene, most of them from Paul's letter to the Romans. Cranach's workshop repeated the composition many times, as panel and as woodcut.