Golden or Dark?

A Note on Φ

My brothers, I implore you by god’s mercy to offer your very selves to him; a living sacrifice
dedicated and fit for his acceptance, the worship offered by mind and heart. Adapt yourselves no
longer to the pattern of this present world, but let your minds be remade and your whole nature
thus transformed. Then you will be able to discern the will of God, and to know what is good,
acceptable and perfect. (Rom 12:1-2)

‘Evil, as such is misshapen...Nevertheless since from evil comes good, it is therefore well said
that it contributes to good and hence it is said to be beautiful within the order of things. Thus it
is not called beautiful in an absolute sense, but beautiful within the order; in fact it would be
preferable to say: “The order itself is beautiful” ’
(Alexander of Hales, Summa Halesiana, II, 13th century)

Whenever one mentions the idea of ‘sacred proportion’ many people, if they aware of nothing
else, will mention the Golden Section (also known as the Golden Mean, or Golden Ratio). My
feeling is that its importance in the Western tradition has been exaggerated by modern writers.
The Golden Mean is calculated from the ratio of the lengths between adjacent and
alternate tips of a five-pointed star to the length of the side of the regular pentagon that contains
it 1: ½(1+√5) or, less precisely, 1:1.618. Euclid, the ancient Greek, defined it in his Elements as
the ‘extreme and mean’ ratio – a line divided in such a way that the smaller is to the greater as
the greater is to the whole. It has been represented in the modern era by the symbol, Φ.
So, although we can be certain that it was known to the Greeks and thereafter at the
very least, to anyone who was aware of Euclid’s geometry, I am not aware of any manuscript
written by any architects and artists working prior to the Renaissance, which describes its use. It
does not, for example, appear as one of the proportions recommended by Vitruvius. Neither am I
aware of any Christian interpretation of the symbolism of Φ although we have many
interpretations of other numbers, ratios and proportions from figures such as Augustine,
Boethius, Aquinas and Bonaventure. If it was part of the Christian lexicon of significant
proportionality, one would expect to see some reference to it. It was not, to my knowledge
referred to in any of the surviving manuscripts of the gothic masons. It does not appear in
Boethius’s list of 10 fundamental beautiful proportions and St Augustine does not mention it, for
example, in De Musica. The Pythagorean philosophy, which is the major source of traditional
sacred number in the West, had a dislike of any proportions that could not be expressed using
whole numbers, and did not give any great consideration to Euclid’s ratio; and there is no
scriptural basis for its use.
Wherever a pentagonal geometry is used, Φ, for example in gothic cathedrals, it can be
discerned because it can be derived from the ratio of fundamental dimensions of a pentagonal
star, so it incidental to process. But it’s appearance here is likely to be incidental to the choice of
five-fold symmetry rather than a deliberate desire to manifest Φ.
It was not until the 16th century (Luca Pacioli, Venice, 1509) that it was first called
‘Golden’ or ‘Divine’, and even then its importance since seems to have been exaggerated by

© David Clayton, 2010

modern commentators. Pacioli himself, for example, did not propose its use in art or architecture,
advocating instead the Vitruvian system based upon the Pythagorean philosophy. Since then, we
can be certain that some artists were aware of it because they refer to it in writing (e.g. Durer,
Leonardo, della Francesca) and although they did make use of number and proportion, very often
the use of other systems is more apparent than the use of Φ. There is no written evidence from
Leonardo himself, for example, that he used Φ in his paintings (aside from his illustrations for
Pacioli’s book!). This is a view expressed by the respected art historian Rudolph Wittkower who
refers to the idea that the Golden Section was used in the Renaissance as ‘an old and
continuously repeated myth’1.
For example, although Honour and Fleming remark that della Francesca discussed the
Golden Section in his mathematical works2, but it does not appear in their analysis of any
painting, for example his Baptism of Christ. Their analysis corresponds more the traditional
Pythagorean musical harmony system: ‘the Baptism seems to have been geometrically based on
a grid of three equidistant horizontals and four verticals, against which the slightest movements
vibrate like the gently struck strings of a musical instrument.’3
The greatest interest in the Φ seems to have been in the late 19th and 20th centuries
through to the present day. The architect, Le Corbusier, for example, used it. His work does not
encourage me to consider using it as a basis of design, and according to Mario Livio, even
modern psychological research seems to indicate that the human mind has a greater attraction to
the traditional Pythagorean ratios, such as 2:1, than Φ 4.
Most of the evidence produced to support of the idea that the Golden Ratio was used
consists of modern geometric analysis of buildings, often done on photographs of the building in
question. The reliability of conclusions drawn from such measurements, without other supportive
evidence, is in my opinion, low. Any human process introduces random error and this includes
the design and construction of building, as well as error in the geometric analysis after the fact.
The construction lines placed over the photograph, from which the supporting measurements are
taken, are very often placed on the photograph in such a way that one could use a similar method
to deduce whatever one wanted. The width of the drawn grid lines placed on the photograph of
the building, for example, would introduce an error range that would not allow for reliable
analysis to be produced. This does not invalidate the analysis altogether, however one would be
more inclined to accept it if it was supported by further other evidence that the artist knew about
and attached importance to the ratio.
The standard way of reducing random error, when considering proportions in the
natural world, for example the ratio of lengths of human finger segments, is to take a large
statistical sampling of finger measurements, typically a thousand. However, as there can only
ever be one Chartres Cathedral, therefore we are dealing with a sample of one when studying it!
The likelihood of the readings taken indicating that the builder intended to build with the Golden
Mean is reduced still further, when one considers another ratio that we know was used, 1 : 1.6,
which is numerically only 1% smaller than the Golden Mean (if taken to be 1.168). 1:1.6 is
referred to by Vitruvius, in the form 10:16; it is also one of the 10 fundamental proportionalities

1
Rudolph Wittkower, Architectural Principles in the Age of Humanism, p 152; Academy Editions, London, 1988.
2
It has been suggested that Paciolo plagiarised his work from Piero della Francesca. See Mario Livio, The Golden
Ratio, (pub Review), p128
3
Honour &Fleming, A World History of Art, p440
4
The Golden Ratio, Mario Livio, pub Review

© David Clayton, 2010

of Boethius; and St Augustine gives it an explicitly Christian interpretation, referring to it as the
ideal proportion of Christ, matched by the dimensions of Noah’s Ark.
In the absence of any corroborative evidence, to be certain that a measurement taken to
correspond to Φ and not the ideal human proportion would require us to accept that the combined
error of the gothic designer in his original drawing; the gothic builder in translating the architects
proportions in the design to the final building; and error in making the measurements taken on
the buildings, several centuries of erosion later, was better than ±0.6%. This is not credible.

Why is there a modern interest in the Golden Mean? First there is no doubt that Φ does
appear in the proportionality of the natural world a great deal. Awareness of this has increased as
steadily over the last 500 years scientific research has revealed this more and more. The
Fibonacci series was introduced to Western mathematics in the 13th century. It is a numerical
series in which any term is calculated by adding together two previous terms , for example, 0,1,
2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21...This series will produce a ratio between successive terms that tends to Φ as the
series progresses (although its connection with Φ was not made by Fibonacci himself and was
not observed until much later) . This series was in fact already known, under another name in the
West. The tenth proportional relationship listed by Boethius in his De Arithmetica, called the
‘Fourth of Four’, is that which generates at the start of the series the proportionality 6:10:16 (the
ideal human proportionality of Augustine and Vitruvius). The Fourth of Four is in fact a series of
numbers that can be extended indefinitely. The first three terms, after 1 and 2 are (3, 5 and 8),
which is the same as that commonly associated with human proportionality (6, 10 and 16)
referred to by St Augustine (and Vitruvius). If the series is extended it corresponds to that of
Fibonacci, i.e., 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21..etc. As stated, the ratio between any two numbers in this
series is always close to Φ, and tends towards it as the number of terms tends to infinity.
Some might argue that the ancients used the terms 3, 5, 8 to generate a numerical
approximation to Φ. This does not seem plausible to me, as the same series generates very
quickly much closer approximations that would be just as easy to use if that was the intention.
Also, Φ could be constructed much more precisely geometrically and so if it was the intention of
the ancients to build according to Φ, they would do so using geometry rather than arithmetic.
A reason, I suggest, for the great modern interest is a consequence of the fact that the
idea of the beauty of nature has been exaggerated by the form of paganism that has steadily taken
hold in the West since the Enlightenment. For these moderns, nature – the material universe – is
the ultimate standard of beauty; for the Christian, it is God, to which nature points. The Christian
sees the beauty of the world every bit as much as the neo-pagan and agrees with him that it is
good, but knows also that it is fallen and there is an even greater beauty that is consistent with
the divine order and which leads ultimately to the idea of pure Beauty.
So modern man focuses more on what nature is, than what it ought to be. This is
illustrated by the fact that in the ancient world, the interest in the Fibonacci series, or as they
knew it, the Fourth of Four proportionality, was in the early numbers in the series, whereas the
moderns search for an ideal at its end. The moderns cannot see beyond the proportions of the
fallen world, while the ancients, followed the advice of St Paul who urges us to seek to adapt
ourselves ‘no longer to the pattern of this present world, but let your minds be remade and your
whole nature thus transformed’. Perhaps the Fourth of Four series traces a mathematic path that
leads us from perfection to the Fall?
Given the modern exaggeration of the beauty of nature, it is inevitable, I would say, that
the pagan modern world should attach greater and greater importance to a proportionality that

© David Clayton, 2010

seems to characterise it. Taking just one example, a book written by Matila Ghyka and published
first in 1947 called The Geometry of Art and Life5 makes a case for Φ as a basis for Egyptian art,
the Greek canon of human proportionality of Polyclitus (which has been lost and for which there
is no contemporary description in existence) and the gothic church builders. The justification
rests for the most part on ‘harmonic’ analyses of paintings and buildings by two people in
particular, a 19th-century German called Adolph Zeysing and work carried out by an American,
Jay Hambidge, published in 1919.
He says: ‘the Golden Section also plays a dominating part in the proportions of the
human body, a fact that was probably [sic] recognised by Greek sculptors, who liked to put into
evidence a parallism between the proportions of the ideal temple and of the human body (cf
Vitruvius) or even to trace a harmonious correspondence between the terms Universe-Temple-
Man. The correlation Universe-Man as macrocosmos-microcosmos was studied later by the
Kabbala as well as the Christian mystics of the Middle Ages, and by later dabblers in black and
white magic’.
I cannot comment at all on his reference to the Kabbala or black and white magic. But
the rest of what he says does not seem correct at all: while Vitruvius did make the connection
between temple and human proportion, he does not mention Φ at all. And for the Christian, their
vision is not limited to ‘Universe-Temple-Man’. Certainly it recognises the ‘parallelism’ between
these three, but then transforms them into a perfected form and relates that to something greater,
the divine order; and as I mentioned I have not found an explicitly Christian interpretation of Φ
and Ghyka does not provide any reference for this claim.

A modern Christian Interpretation of Φ

Does this mean that the Christian should reject the use of Φ? One might be tempted to
say so given the lack of justification in tradition. However, there is a strong argument for the fact
that a genuinely Christian interpretation of Φ should be developed. The representation of the
fallen world does have its place in Christian tradition of figurative art and the steadily increasing
evidence from science that Φ is a significant proportion running through the fallen universe,
makes a strong case for its consideration in the right context.
Considering first its place in art: in the figurative baroque tradition of the 17th century,
there is a language of light and dark. This developed as part of the Catholic counter-Reformation.
The Italian artist Caravaggio is usually credited with the additional development of the use of
light and shadow that developed in the High Renaissance – chiaroscuro – with an additional
spiritual significance. The presence of evil and suffering in a fallen world is represented by the
dark shadows. However, in the baroque system, the truth that God only permits evil to allow a
greater good is communicated through the bright light. It is deliberately painted so that the
overall impression is one of the light – representing the Light, of Christ – ‘overcomes the
darkness’. That is to say that hope in Christ overcomes all suffering and unhappiness.
In the context of this discussion, Φ is a geometric representation of the fallen world.
This means that, if we are to learn a lesson from the baroque Masters, its use should not be in
isolation, but applied in a context that ultimately resolves them into the divine order. These might
be mediated through quadrature, the geometric representation of the path of justification between
two sinful extremes (as described in the chapter on harmonic form). To take a musical analogy,
there is room for chromaticism provided that ultimately the harmony is resolved.

5
Re-published by Dover Press in 1977: The Geometry of Art and Life, by Professor Matila Ghyka.

© David Clayton, 2010

 Change the name!
One thing I would wish to change is the common name for Φ. Although, it might be
seen as an opening step, symbolically, on the path heaven, it indicates in itself, something
substantially less. ‘Golden’ and ‘divine’ are traditional attributes of the redeemed world and so
seem inappropriate names for Φ. I would be more inclined to use a name that attaches it to the
imperfection of this world: perhaps ‘Fallen’ or ‘Dark’ Section might be more appropriate.

© David Clayton, 2010