ICON

ICON. The holy icons touch on central issues of Orthodox theology (q.v.) and worship, and the phenomenon of the icon as a distinctive form of Christian art (q.v.) is perhaps the most widely known and appreciated aspect of Orthodox Holy Tradition. Guests in Orthodox households will invariably note the “beautiful corner” (a corner in one of the main rooms featuring a collection of icons and usually a vigil lamp or candle), bookstores display collections of Russian or Greek icons, and the casual visitor to an Orthodox church is normally struck by the wall of images separating the altar area from the nave, the iconostasis (q.v.), punctuated by two large central gates, the Royal Doors, and two side doors, which themselves bear images. A large painting or mosaic of Christ the “All-Ruler” (Pantocrator) is often staring down from the church’s central dome, and dozens-or hundreds-of other pictures around the walls of the church portray important events in the life of Christ together with the saints and prophets. All the images are painted in roughly the same distinctive style. This distinctiveness and the multitude of images-the latter being the simple sense of the Greek word, eikon-is not the product of a wildly decorative urge. It is instead the fruit of a long theological reflection unique in the Christian world.

From 731 until 843 the emperors of Byzantium (q.v.) led a movement to remove images from the churches of the Empire. In response to this imperially sponsored iconoclasm (literally, “image smashing”), Joh n of Damascus, Germanos of Constantinople, and Theodore of Studion (qq.v.), who led the iconodule (or iconophile) movement, advanced powerful and ultimately convincing theological arguments in favor of the images. Against the imperial contention that the worship of images was simply idolatry, these writers replied that, while worship belonged indeed to God alone, veneration of the images was nonetheless called for and distinctive. The prayer (q.v.) of the devout is addressed to its object through or by means of the image. In answer to the iconoclasts’ frequent citation of the Decalogue’s commandment against images, they replied that God (q.v.) in the Old Testament could not be portrayed. But because in Christ God’s eternal Word had taken on the permanent “vesture” of humanity, it would be a denial of the Incarnation to refuse the possibility-and even the obligation-of Christ’s portrayal in images as well as in the words of Scripture and the liturgy (qq.v.).

Christian art thus became a necessary theological and sacramental endeavor. Precisely as symbols or types, the sacred images constituted a conjoining of the human and divine spheres, and served as indicators and vehicles of the Kingdom of God, of the creation transfigured and renewed in Christ. The arguments advanced by the 8th c. and 9th c. defenders of icons were taken over from earlier Church Fathers who had written on the Scriptures and the sacraments (qq.v.), and were now deployed in favor of the images. The sacred writings had long been spoken of as a network of types, as pointers and connections, indicating and to some degree actually incarnating the presence of the Word made flesh in Jesus. This language of scriptural typology was joined in the iconophile movement to the symbolism of earlier sacramental discourse. Symbol signifies, literally, the conjunction of different things (from sym-ballo, “to throw or put together”). Thus the Eucharist (q.v.) was freely described in earlier patristic literature as a “symbol.” The same language, but now with “symbol” specifically ruled out as adequate to the Eucharist, was applied to the sacred images. The sum of these arguments was officially sanctioned by the Seventh Ecumenical Council (q.v.) at Nicaea in 787, and this Council was definitively recognized by the permanent restoration of the icons in 843 following a second series of iconoclast emperors.

It should be pointed out that iconoclastic emperors frequently promoted the cult of the emperor, with its corresponding iconography of the emperor on banners and coins, but excluded any religious representations. Parallels to this attitude can be drawn with Lenin’s use of his own iconography or with classical American Protestantism’s use of the picture of U.S. presidents on banners and money-both to the exclusion of religious iconography. The general question is not whether iconography is appropriate, for every culture has its icons. (We know from archaeology that even Judaism was not strictly iconoclastic; and the Old Testament speaks of representations of Cherubim and Seraphim, as well.) The real question is whether a culture’s iconography adequately represents its belief system. In this sense the issue is not one restricted historically to the Church in the East, but is the perennial biblical question put to the people of God: Who is your King?

All this theory had a decisive effect on the actual making of sacred images. Christian art became strictly regulated. The distinctive style of Byzantine icons, marked by such characteristics as inverted perspective, elongated figures, lack of chiaroscuro, as well as their fabrication in a context of prayer and fasting (qq.v.), are the deliberate result of the theological arguments advanced on their behalf. As sacramentals and “theology in color,” icons are not mere ornaments. Neither are they simply and purely instructional, nor are they optional in the construction and elaboration of an Orthodox church. Rather, they are seen as necessary adjuncts and expressions of the Church at worship, as representing-or better, making present-the whole “company of Heaven.” The assemblage of imagery is intended to “symbolize” the reality of the Church as the new creation, the meeting place of Heaven and earth.

A further consequence of the iconoclast controversy was the compilation of manuals of iconography, precise instructions as to the shape, distinctive features and colors, of Christ and the saints. From the late Byzantine era (q.v.) to Muscovite Russia these manuals proliferate. At its best, therefore, Byzantine sacred art is done under circumstances that recall the great poets’ work with the sonnet form. The form is fixed and the genius of the artist required to work within it. Masterpieces unquestionably resulted, for example, the anonymous artist’s portrayal of the Resurrection in the famous image at Chora in Constantinople, or the works of Theophanes the Greek and Andrei Rublev in 14th c. and 15th c. Russia. While the art of the icon declined under the influence of religious art coming from Western Europe, influenced by the Italian Renaissance from the 18th c. to the early 20th c., significant calls for the renewal of tradition (led in Russia by Prince E. Trubetskoy and in Greece by Photius Kontoglu) have contributed much to the recovery of the sacred art in this century. In many respects iconographic art may be viewed as a kind of summary or distillation of Orthodox theology and spiritual experience.

A word is in order regarding purported American iconoclasm-purported because it is difficult to claim that a people who watches an average of four hours of television a day is iconoclastic. American religious iconoclasm comes from the Protestant Reformation’s desire, exclusive of Luther, to return to the practice of the “Early Church,” which practice was naively identified with the Judaism of the 16th c. and 17th c. (Not only had Judaism undergone its own particular development as a religion, but recent archaeology has taught us that synagogues contained their own iconography-probably through the advent of Islam [q.v.] when Jewish iconography seems to have ceased. Thus, it may be speculated that American Protestant iconoclasm is a result of the influence of the Moslem invasions, mediated by Medieval Judaism.) The question remains whether America’s religious iconography will ever adequately represent the culture’s beliefs.