St Peter's Parish News
Thursday 1 January 1970
Light of the World window
The Light of the World window in St Peter’s (next to the pulpit) bears two symbolic representations of Christ – “I am the good shepherd” (John 10) and “I am the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14 and John 8:12). Both are popular Victorian images of Jesus, the latter based on the famous Pre-Raphaelite paintings by William Holman Hunt The Light of the World (versions are found in St Paul’s Cathedral, Manchester Art Gallery and Keble College Chapel, Oxford). In this allegory of Jesus seeking entry into the closed heart of the believer, Christ carries a lantern as he knocks on a long-unopened door which is overgrown with weeds – also a reference to Revelation 3:20: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock”.
The window was designed by one of the leading Gothic Revival stained-glass manufacturers, Heaton & Butler, and was installed in 1877 in memory of the publisher William Longman who lived at Ashylns. You can see Longman’s grave in Rectory Lane Cemetery, behind the Rex Cinema. William was a member of the Longman publishing family; their emblem of a sailing ship has appeared on millions of textbooks, and this is why a sailing ship features in one of the upper lights of this window, a little piece of publishing history right here in Berkhamsted.
www.rectorylanecemetery.org.uk 
