Alfred William Hassam (1842-69) was a painter and stained glass designer who was born in London, the son of a vellum binder. He may have trained at the Central School of Art (later the Royal College of Art) in South Kensington, or one of the other art and design schools supervised by the South Kensington-based Department of Science and Art. In the early 1860s he joined the London stained glass firm of Heaton, Butler and Bayne, where he is thought to have served as assistant to Robert Turnill Bayne. In 1865 he won a prize for his stained glass design for the north staircase of the South Kensington Museum; the V&A collection includes his stained glass panel (V&A 435-1865) which was exhibited at the Museum in 1865. During the late 1860s Hassam exhibited portraits and historical subjects at the Royal Academy and the Royal Society of British Artists. He died in Hastings at the age of 27.

This design depicts two separate iconographical motifs that have been amalgamated by Hassam; Christ as the Good Shepherd, in this rendering sheltering a pilgrim from the winged figure of Satan, and the Temptation of Christ atop a mountain, the third and last temptation described in Matthew 4: 8-10.