www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Roman Catholic devotion to ikons

On another thread Dr. John gave an example of liturgical icon abuse at a Roman Catholic parish. Roman Catholics have for centuries used icons in their churches and homes. What are some of these icons ? How are they used ? I can think of a few. The most famous is the 15th century Greek ikon Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Her cultus has only become widespread during the last 150 years. Another Greek icon is the Black Madonna called the Queen of Poland. I cannot recall the Polish name ? The original 17th century Carpatho-Rusyn ikon the Weeping Theotokos of Mariapocs can be venerated at the Cathedral of St. Stephen in Vienna. On another thread Byzantino has referred to the 16th century icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Can you think of any others.

>>>On another thread Dr. John gave an example of liturgical icon abuse at a Roman Catholic parish. Roman Catholics have for centuries used
icons in their churches and homes. What are some of these icons ? How are they used ? I can think of a few. The most famous is the 15th
century Greek ikon Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Her cultus has only become widespread during the last 150 years. Another Greek icon is the
Black Madonna called the Queen of Poland. I cannot recall the Polish name ? The original 17th century Carpatho-Rusyn ikon the Weeping
Theotokos of Mariapocs can be venerated at the Cathedral of St. Stephen in Vienna. On another thread Byzantino has referred to the 16th
century icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Can you think of any others.<<<

Use of sacred images is not limited to either East or West. While it is true that the liturgical art of the West has tended towards the 3-dimensional, and became increasingly naturalistic in style over the centuries, this is a product of historic circumstance rather then theological differences. If one goes to some of the older churches and basilicas in Rome, such as Sta. Prassaeda, Sta. Pudentiana, St. John Lateran, and Sta. Maria Maggiori, one can see truly exquisite Byzantine mosaic icons, some of which predate the iconoclasm. Many of them are significantly more natualistic in execution than the hieratic iconographic style that developed in the East after the iconoclasm (the same naturalism is found in the icons of St. Catherine's Monastary in Sinai).

Conversely, before the iconoclasm, Eastern Christianity had a thriving tradition of 3-dimensional liturgical art. However, being more difficult to hide, most of the statues were destroyed by the iconoclasts, and only a few miniature examples and bas-relief triptyches remain.

Where the West and the East differ on images, I think, has to do with the extent to which they internalized the decrees of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, which condemned iconoclasm. The West saw the issue mainly in utilitarian terms: images were essential for catechizing an illiterate population. In contrast, the East, following John Damascene and Theodore Studites, saw the iconoclasm as a major Christological crisis, opening the door to docetical heresies (the direction taken by some of the Protestant denominations shows how correct they were). Therefore, the iconoclasm was far more traumatic to the East than to the West, where the heresy passed in only a very muted form (Charlemagne was at least a semi-iconoclast, but he was also practical enough to let the Church lead in this matter).

As a result, the Eastern Churches of the Byzantine rite codified the use of images in liturgical worship far more stringently than did the Western Church. The use of the iconostasis, the positioning of the icons, the use of particular icons at particular times--all are covered in the canons and the liturgical books. As a result of the iconoclasm, the integration of text, movement, architecture, and interior decoration if much tighter than it is in the West (one reason why the architectural and decorative abominations of the post-Concilliar Western Church are impossible in the Byzantine Churches).

Those who follow the trends of iconography can follow the rise and decline of Western influences on the Eastern Churches through the incorporation of Western artistic styles and motifs into icons, and their eventual rejection and the rediscovery of classical iconography.

Conversely, one can see in Western religious art a movement away from the hieratical towards the secular and humanistic after contact between East and West was irreparably severed in the early 15th century. It is noteworthy that, having allowed the personality of the artist to totally dominate the subject and style of art--making it primarily a form of "individual expression", a manifestation of the "artistic genius", iconography, in which the personality of the artist is submerged and subordinated to the subject and the iconographical canon, is increasing in popularity among Western Christians. Even if they do not understand the intricacies of iconography, or the place of icons in Byzantine worship, they do instinctively feel that icons are windows into a different world, manifestations of a transcendant reality that cannot be accessed through Western, humanistic artistic forms.

Stuart K.

Wow, you've said things that are interesting. Hummm.

I'm a bit embarrassed to ask you this, what heresies are you talking about? What does the word "iconoclasm" mean? Forgive my ignorance.

>>>I'm a bit embarrassed to ask you this, what heresies are you talking about? What does the word "iconoclasm" mean? Forgive my ignorance.<<<

The Iconoclasm was a period in Byzantine Church history that lasted from about 730 to 832, during which the Byzantine emperors, supported by compliant hierarchs, attempted to suppress the use of all sacred imagery in liturgy and prayer. This included all depictions of Christ, the Theotokos, the saints, and biblical scenes. Statuary and icons were taken down, and many were destroyed or broken (hence the word "iconoclasm", or "breaking of the images").

The rationale for this action was a string of Byzantine defeats at the hands of the Moslems, which was attributed to Christian violation of the second commandment. More pragmatically, many of the Antatolian peasants who provided the backbone of the Byzantine Army had been heavily influenced not only by the Moslems, but by Judaizing sects within Christianity, both of which opposed images. To placate the Army and perhaps open an avenue for negotiations with the Moslems, the Emperors Leo III, Constantine V and Leo IV had the icons removed from the churches and destroyed. Hierarchs who objected were deposed and replaced by more subservient bishops.

They were opposed in this by the monastics, the secular parish clergy, and the bulk of the laity. Two voices stand out among the "iconophile" opposition: St. John of Damascus, and St. Theodore the Studite. They saw the conflict not as merely concerning aesthetics or the didactic value of icons, but rather as an assault on the orthodox understanding of Christ himself.

Their reasoning was as follows: No one has seen God the Father, who is utterly transcendant and beyond human comprehension. But in Christ, the Word of God became incarnate, took on real flesh, and was fully human. Being fully God, He was a perfect image of the Father; being fully human, he was also a perfect image of man. Having taken on material existance, Christ could be seen, touched, and depicted in painting and statuary. Likewise, the saints had had a material existance, and could likewise be depicted. The danger of iconoclasm was that in denying that one could make images of Christ, one took the first step on the slope to denying the material reality of the incarnation. The Father cannot be depicted, because He is not really "in" our world; if Jesus cannot be depicted, it implies that He is not "in" our world, either--which is a denial of the Gospel. This played into the hands of the docetist heretics, who claimed that Christ was not really human, but only "seemed" or "appeared" to be human, thus He did not suffer in the flesh, did not die, and was not resurrected. You can see where that leads (Unitarianism?). Likewise, if one cannot depict the saints and biblical scenes, it denies the historicity of the Bible, reduces it to the status of religious myth, and opens the door to "Higher Criticism" (Bultmann and Crossan, anyone?). It also denigrates the reality of the communion of saints, for if we believe in the life eternal, we must also believe that we are united in Christ not only with those who live in the flesh, but also those who have died in the flesh and await resurrection. From there, it is a short step to denying the efficacy of prayers for the dead. By extension, every sacrament is also a "true image" that participates in the reality of that which it represents. Iconoclasm opens the door to the deconstruction of anamnesis and the reduction of sacraments to mere "memorials". The mysterion that binds Christianity together would be shattered irrevocably.

Thus, from the Byzantine perspective, the stakes in the iconoclasm were cosmic in proportion. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of monks, priests, and ordinary people were martyred defending the icons, until in the year 787, the Empress Irene convoked what is now considered the Seventh Ecumenical Council at Nicaea, where iconoclam was condemned and the theological principles underlying the use of icons were defined. However, Irene was overthrown, and there followed another period of official iconoclasm (mainly to placate the Army), which was only half-heartedly enforced. Finally, in 843, another Empress, Theodora, ordered the icons restored, the iconoclasts removed from office, and iconophiles installed in their places. This event is still celebrated in the Byzantine Churches to this day, on the first Sunday in Lent, as the "Sunday of the Triumph of Orthodoxy" (Byzantine Catholics, with their typical reticence about the "O" word, often call this "Icon Sunday"). The celebration is marked by the blessing of all the icons in the church, together with those the people bring from their homes; often there is a procession of icons around the Church as well. Finally, in many parishes, there is a reading of the Synodicon, or list of heresies condemned by the Seventh Council and subsequent synods. At present most Eastern Catholics skip over this part, which is a pity.

Dear StuartK,
Can you explain to me why the Roman Catholics use statues rather than icons in their churches? Why do most Roman Catholic churches tend to seem void of icons? Also, do you think that the use of icons rather than statues, in regards to the Orthodox Church, was chosen for fear of Islam? Does the Seventh Ecumenical Council mention the use of statues in the Church? Where are the sources or evidence for the use of statues in the Orthodox Church prior to the iconoclasm controversy?

In Christ
Robert Sweiss

Mr. Sweiss,

This is just a personal opinion, but I think the West prefers statues because of our understanding of the papacy as a third dimension of our Faith. Christ is alive and walking among us in the person of His Vicar, so three-dimensional images of the Holy Family and the Communion of Saints is quite normal for us.

This theory is supported by my observation that RC priests who reject the authority of the Pope, are often the same ones who practice iconoclasm in their parishes. They remove statues and replace them with a stained glass window or an icon or nothing at all. Statues are banished to closets or relocated to obscure school corridors or mysteriously destroyed when sent out for cleaning. Statues too revered to be blatantly removed are placed in the back of the Church, and suffer from neglect as money is never budgeted to restore them.

Wendy


[This message has been edited by Wendy (edited 10-30-1999).]

>>>Can you explain to me why the Roman Catholics use statues rather than

icons in their churches?<<<



Actually, they use both. it is an accident of history that there is no tradition of 3-dimensional liturgical art in the Byzantine Church. Simply put, icons could be hidden, statues could not, and the latter were almost completely destroyed in the iconoclasm. Also, the skills needed to replace the statues were lacking in the Byzantine Empire. Making virtue of necessity, the Byzantine Church developed an entire approach to liturgical art that emphasized the 2-dimensional.



In the West, the use of statuary continued unabated to the modern era. However, the West never did get around to the tight integration of art and aesthetics to theology and liturgy as pertained in the East. Hence, religious art took on a more individualistic and humanistic nature, and the artist became elevated over the art he was to create. I think that this is one reason why modern religious art tends either towards the sentimental and banal on the one hand, or the abstract and overly-intellectual on the other.



>>>Why do most Roman Catholic churches tend to seem void of icons? <<<



This is a very recent phenomenon, limited mainly to RC churches in the English-speaking world, as a reaction to the neo-iconoclasm of the Protestant denominations on the one hand, and the intellectualism of the secularists on the other. In the Middle Ages, the interiors of Western Churches were ablaze in colors and images. Granted, the West never really understood or bought into the Christological arguments of John Damascene or Theodore Studites, but they understood the practical, didactic aspects of images for catechizing a largely illiterate populatce. Later, in the Renaissance, Baroque and Rococco eras, the more hieratic medieval style (which can be considered Western iconography, is replaced by a more naturalistic, humanistic style of religious painting (though I admit, I find even the great masters lacking in real transcendance). Even to this day, in the older churches of Europe, you will find the interiors full of paintings, and even real icons.



>>>Also, do you think that the use of icons rather than statues, in regards

to the Orthodox Church, was chosen for fear of Islam?<<<



No, it was just an accident of history, as I noted above. The statues were shattered, and the skill to replace them was missiong.



>>>Does the Seventh Ecumenical Council mention the use of statues in the

Church? Where are the sources or evidence for the use of statues in the

Orthodox Church prior to the iconoclasm controversy?<<<



So far as I can see, the Seventh Council says ntthing about statues one way or the other. Evidence for the use of statuary in Byzantine Churches can be found in any good book on Byzantine art. though few of the monumental works have survived, there are quite a number of excellent minatures, mainly done in ivory.

A comical situation.

In a New calendar Orthodox Church in the US there are what appears to be 3D icons. On particular is one of St. George on his horse.
When looking at this icon, you see St. George and his horse coming straight at you. In fact what happens is, that when you go to venerate and kiss the icon you end up kissing the horse!!!LOL. That had to be the funniest thing that could be seen in the use of 'modern' iconography!

Timothy, reader

The seventh Ecumenical Council condemned the use of statues in the Church, period!!! Of course, since the RCC is constantly 'revealing' stuff, that could change with them, right?

Dear in Christ Reader Tim,

Before you put that great big "period" on your assertion concerning the Acts of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, will you be kind enough to cite the particular Canon you refer to. I have just pulled down my Rudder and read all 22 Canons of the 7th Council and find no such statement as you purpoet that Council to have made ( condemning statues ). In fact the only reference to the matter of icons is the 7th Canon. And that reference is used to speak about another abuse, ..not using relics in the consecration of a church.

Now if you are using the "interpretations" of the Canons for the basis of your statement, then I would caution you , and other readers...the comments are NOT the Canons, they are merely comments, interpretations and correlations..they are NOT LAW!

unworthy servant,

+Kyrill

Dear Kyrill,

Canons are NOT "LAWS". There is so much more to Holy Tradition than Canons. Yes? Canons are simply guideposts. The Acts of the Ecumenical Councils are very important as well. It sounds like you have a different understanding than the ORthodox concerning the nature of Canons.

Putting that all aside, I do enjoy reading what you have to say.

God Bless!

Timothy, reader

>>>This is just a personal opinion, but I think the West prefers statues because of our understanding of the papacy as a third dimension of our Faith. Christ is alive and walking among us in the person of His Vicar, so three-dimensional images of the Holy Family and the Communion of Saints is quite normal for us.

Dear Wendy,

Your post is an example of what I call "post hoc mystagogy"; i.e., the superimposition of a mystical meaning over a phenomenon with very mundane origins. In point of fact, the Latin Church used both 2- and 3-dimensional images throughout its history, and statuary cannot said to predominate over painting or mosaic at any particular time. Much of the sculpture that has become stereotypical in Roman Catholic Churches is in fact modeled after Renaissance and Baroque monumental sculpture, which was commissioned by the popes and bishops of that time not for any particular theological reason, but as a means of self-aggrandizement (on my trip to Rome, I was amazed that the name of the pope who sponsored any particular statue--even of Christ and the Virgin--was inscribed in much larger letters than the name of the subject).

The West was able to do this because it never really lost the expertise to execute 3-dimensional artwork. The West did not experience the iconoclasm. And later, by the time the West rediscovered classical sculpture in the 14th century, the Orthodox East was too impoverished to resurrect it. In any case, the spiritual art of the East had already translated itself into an exclusively 2-dimensional media.

>>>This theory is supported by my observation that RC priests who reject the authority of the Pope, are often the same ones who practice iconoclasm in their parishes. They remove statues and replace them with a stained glass window or an icon or nothing at all. Statues are banished to closets or relocated to obscure school corridors or mysteriously destroyed when sent out for cleaning. Statues too revered to be blatantly removed are placed in the back of the Church, and suffer from neglect as money is never budgeted to restore them.<<<

While neo-iconoclasm is a very serious problem throughout Western Christianity, you read far more into it than is really there--and at the same time, far too little. The real issue now, as it was in the 8th century, is Christological: what is the true nature of Christ, and how did that nature exist within the world? Was the incarnation real, or was it an illusion? If Christ is the true image of both man and God, why can we not depict him? If we cannot depict Him because God is absolutely transcendant in all His persons, then how can we deal with Scripture, which is a true image of God in the form of words? You see where this leads.

Papal authority has nothing to do with this, unless it is tangentially; i.e., since the Bishop of Rome represents the infallible teachings of the Church, and the infallible teachings of the Church support the doctrine of the incarnation through the use sacred images, those who wish to deny the images must perforce also deny any higher authority that impedes their objectives.

I might point out that there are plenty of Roman Catholic sects that exalt the use of statues and other images while rejecting the the authority of the pope; e.g., the SSPX and the various sedevacantist groups.

It would thus seem that there is no positive correlation between papal authority and the use of statues at all.

Dear Stuart,

You say to me: �Your post is an example of what I call "post hoc mystagogy"; i.e., the superimposition of a mystical meaning over a phenomenon with very mundane origins.�

I ask you: Do we not impose a mystical meaning over the mundane phenomenon of a man dying 2000 years ago on a cross?

I do not deny that my post may just be silly, and I am not educated enough to debate you coherently, but maybe someone else can defend intelligently an observation of mine concerning this forum. Oftimes, when a poster disagrees with a teaching of the �other side� they will say that said teaching was politically motivated, or the result of some personal vendetta, or do to some other human glitch in the time frame. (The debate on the Filioque is a prime example of this.) This seems to me to be faulty theological reasoning, when we all know that the Holy Spirit blows where He wills. It reminds me of those who said of Jesus:�Can anything good come from Nazareth?� Just because a belief or practice originated in mundane circumstances does not make it false. My goodness! Our God was born in a stable!

IMHO, (and I know that�s not worth much) I think this forum would be much better if this practice were banned.

Wendy

Dear Participants,

Please remember to be courteous and show respect for the clergy and monastics that participate here by following the standard practice of both Catholicism and Orthodoxy in addressing clergy and monastics by their proper title. Priests should be addressed as "Father" (or if a monastic, "Hieromonk"), deacons as "Father Deacon", monks as "Brother or Monk", readers as "Reader" and etc. Not to do so is not only impolite, but, given the often times spirited nature of some of these discussions, it almost seems to be a rejection of the office that the person holds. Hence, the priest Kyrill should be addressed as "Father Kyrill" in the same way as the reader Timothy is addressed as "The Reader Timothy".

>>>You say to me: �Your post is an example of what I call "post hoc mystagogy"; i.e., the superimposition of a mystical meaning over a phenomenon with very mundane origins.�

I ask you: Do we not impose a mystical meaning over the mundane phenomenon of a man dying 2000 years ago on a cross?<<<

Dear Wendy,

You are of course perfectly free to make whatever personal interpretation you will, but others have an equal right to point out that your interpretation is not consistent either with the facts or with the Tradition of the Church.

There is a difference, I think, between what might be called true, or primary mystagogy, and the secondary or derivative type. The former is rooted deeply in the fabric of the Church, and above all in the historical reality of the Church. In regard to your reference to Christ, I would point out that we impose NOTHING on the historical reality that in Jerusalem some 2000 years ago, the living incarnation of God was judicially murdered, was buried in a sealed tomb, and rose from the dead three days later. That is an historical reality which is intrinsically imbued with mysteriological significance: man could not in a million years make up a story like that, or impose any other interpretation upon it other than that which it is.

There are other Mysteries of the Church, and elements of the Liturgy, which are likewise endowed with mystical significance of a very fundamental type. One need only look to baptism, chrismation, and the Eucharist for evidence of this. Within the Liturgy, it is relatively easy to compare (as did Fr. Alexander Schmemann in his work, "Introduction to Liturgical Theology) between the early litugical commentators like Maximos Confessor and even Nicholas Cabasilas, and those who came later. The forer stick very close to the principal and most significant meaning of the mysteries and the rituals; the latter fall into the trap of mere (and increasingly baroque and sometimes contradictory) historicism. Usually this means that the explanations of the later commentators are not as satisfactory as those of the Fathers. Moreover, their explanations often show an ignorance of the origins of a practice, and a desire to tie that practice back into the life of the Church. In so doing, they superimpose the quotidian issues confronting the Church of their time over something which is essentially transcendant and timeless.

Now, if we look at your explanation of why the Western Church uses statuary, while the East does not, we see that you have attempted to superimpose upon that historical anomaly a theological/ecclesiological rationale which was not known to any of the Fathers, and which upon closer examination is not consistent with historical fact. Historical fact is that both East and West used statuary in worship. Historical fact is that the iconoclasm caused the destruction of most of those works in the East, and the development of an ideosyncratic, 2-dimensional approach to liturgical art. The papacy never entered into the matter, either at a conscious or unconscious level. When the papacy became a matter of dispute between the Churches, the symbolic meaning of statuary was never raised by either side--even when equally unimportant differences were being marshalled for polemical broadsides.

In your post you were trying to link something the origins of which you apparently didn't know, into an issue which you see as important in the Church today; i.e., the challenge to the authority of the papacy, and the neo-iconoclasm that is part and parcel of modernism. All I did was point out that there is no evidence that this connection was ever recognized by either Church, and that in point of fact, there are people who love liturgical statuary but also reject the authority of the pope, ergo, the explicit connection you were trying to make simply did not exist.

It has nothing to do with you personally, nor am I attempting to deny that the Holy Spirit works in inscrutable ways. But I do insist that the Holy Spirit works in the interests of truth, and that the more we know about objective historical truth, the better we will understand why we have arrived at our current place, and how we can more quickly arrive at our appointed destinations.

In my response to my former post, I only addressed him who signed his name such. In the future it would be helpful if everyone in the clergy would sign accordingly.

In the future I promise never to address any particular person.

Have a pleasant work week.

God Bless!

Timothy, reader