[Pyro7480]

I agree with your assessments. I talked to some traditionalist friends of mine last Friday, and they didn't like that scene either. I agreed with their arguement that the culture of His time would have probably frowned on such an action. However, I thought the scene, overall, showed His submission to Mary.

[Romulus]

Though I was initially uneasy with the scene because of its "apocryphal" nature, I like its inconography. The Asperges I have already mentioned (did your trad friends really not get this?) More than this, I like the whole idea of the table imagery, which is so rich, on so many levels. The table signifies the altar -- and Who plops Himself down upon it, of his own free will? And still more: being a carpenter, it's Jesus's craft to make things from wood. He avails himself of a thing that's supposedly known, a tree, with a finite life and meaning, and he transfigures it into something else, ordering its "woodness" to a new and permanent life, informed with meaning. "Resurrected" as Table, the wood is saved from fire or corruption, and acquires a new life. It is a scene that keeps on giving, the longer you look.