Cervantes and Velazquez, without abandoning the basic democratic human values inherent in primitive Christianity, like Menippus and Aesop, abhorred the notion, found in classical mythology and Christianity, of intermingling the human with the divine. If anything, extending Cervantes' lead, Velazquez, too, in his religious paintings, seems to be saying that - if the point is to be considered at all - the human IS the divine.