Why are we so drawn to what’s beautiful? Why do we, as humans, and especially women, long to be beautiful?
We run after beauty: beautiful clothes, beautiful music, beautiful homes, beautiful people. We run after art, after unspoiled nature, after beautiful words in poetry or books. Why?
We try to become beautiful: lotions, creams, cosmetics, diets, injections, dyes, surgery, orthodontics. We try to flatter: the perfect clothes, the perfect hair. Why?
The short answer I’ve heard: Because God made us that way.
Which raises the deeper question: Why?
Why did God make us to be drawn to beauty? Why not just make us indifferent to beauty?
To answer that we’re going to have to dive into both theology and philosophy.
To start with, beauty is real. If something is not real, it can’t possibly be beautiful; it has no attributes. By the same token, a non-real thing cannot be ugly either; it simply is not. God is real, and is the Source of all reality. Therefore (beauty being real and thus contained in “reality”), God is the Source of all beauty.
To come at this from another perspective, beauty is truthful. Conversely, truth is beautiful. God is the Source of all truth, for He Himself is Truth. Therefore, the Source of all beauty is God.
One more philosophical angle: the right, or what we might call justice or ethics, is beautiful. God is the Ultimate Judge and the Source of all that is right and just and ethical. Therefore, God is the Source of all beauty.
And now to my main theological argument: Love is beautiful. According to I John 4, all love is of God. In fact, God is love. He is the Source of all love. Therefore, the Source of all beauty is God.
One could substitute any of the following into the above paragraphs, with the same result:
- Kindness
- Nobility
- Purity
- Grace
So, back to our deep question: Why would God make us to run after beauty?
From what we’ve just said, that God is the Source of all beauty, it would seem we could also say that all beauty would also point back to God. If we chase beauty, we will begin to discover more and more of God, and more and more of His nature, just as you might learn more of me by witnessing my works and recognising in them an expression of my personhood.
Since God wants us to draw close to Him, it makes perfect sense that He should make us to desire beauty as a reflection of Himself.
All this to answer our question: Why do we desire beauty?
Answer: Because God made us that way.
