Iconoclasm as the Gateway Drug to Heresy (Part II)

Iconoclasm as the Gateway Drug to Idolatry

Iconoclasm is dangerous for another reason. I remember when I was in the church of Christ, I was listened to a lot of Christian talk radio. One program I listened to made me think about how easy it is to make an idol of God. It is impossible to know everything about God, but we do know what God has revealed to us about Himself. When we have a scewed view of who God is, we have created a god of own making and likeness which is no god at all. This is where iconography comes in. Icons are not simply pictures, they tell stories. They are not painted, they are written (Orthodoxy refers to writing icons, not painting icons). Everything is significant and has a teaching moment within them. What is being taught are the doctrines of the Church. That is why, in an icon, realism is not the focus. For instance, a forehead may be large, fingers may be extended, clothing of different colors, the absense of shadows, baby Jesus with a middle aged man's face, etc. All are significant and make a theological point.

This is why icons are important and help keep the faithful focussed on Truth. Icons bring the faithful to a reverence, awe, and a reflection of Truth. Iconographers are discouraged from any artistic endeavors when writing icons and approach it as a good scholor would approach the Scriptures, with prayer, fasting, and study of the Tradition. Therefore, icons are much like Scripture, in that they are the plumline for us to understand and keep us in the knowledge of who God is.

I have heard that a monk once said (and I paraphrase and forget who said it) that if God did not want us to know him through images but through our thoughts, then He would have revealed Himself in our thoughts and not in the flesh. Images effect us and can drive us to toward either sin or sanctification. 

"I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter. I will not cease from honoring that matter which works for my salvation. I venerate it, though not as God."

- St. John of Damascus

So how can iconoclast be more suseptible to idolatry than Iconophiles: Because Iconoclasts have no reference but their minds and thoughts of who God is. This requires a new thought of God everytime one thinks about God. This engages the iconoclast's in the possibility of making God in their own image at any given point. Whereas, those who support and venerate icons have an image of God that has been past down from generation to generation (Tradition says St Luke was the first to write an icon). Icons teach the faith. If icons are absent, it is harder to keep the Tradition firm. Ideas about God within Christian circles abound, and these from faithful good intentioned Sola Scriptura Christians. (Sola Scriptura is another subject, but I do want to point out that all heretics have used the Bible to back their heresy)

I hope you enjoy reading this, and I welcome comments!

Peace

For Everything, Turn, Turn, Turn...

 

Life is a series of cycles. I wake up, go to work, come home, eat dinner, watch a show with my wife, go to bed, wake up, and do it all again the next day, the next day, the next day, etc. Then, there is the weekly cycle marked by the weekends, and the monthly cycle, and yearly, and so on. What a meaningless mess this seems... 

Until, Christ comes and sanctifies time. Yes, life is a series of cycles, and there is no escaping it. But what I have learned in the Orthodox faith is that time does not need to be meaningless. There are cycles in life and these cycles have been hollowed by Christ.

The Church has a series of cycles. These cycles, past down from generation to generation and inspired by the Spirit have sanctified time and makes life meaningful.

The Church gives us praying cycles for each day. These are morning prayers, mid-day prayers, and evening prayers. There are also times of prayer in the night, but I have not excelled in the ascetic practice (and not sure if I will). This originated from the Jewish custom of praying at certain hours during the day. Handed down from the Apostles, who watched and learned how to pray from Jesus, the Church through the Trinity has hollowed the days with these prayer cycles. It would be beneficial to read these prayers, memorize them, and practice them in your private prayer closet. Yes, they may seem scripted and wrote, but it should be part of us, as natural to you as it is to brush your teeth each morning and evening, a prayer should be on our lips at least three times a day. Though St. Paul would say to pray without ceasing (1Thess 5:17; Eph 6:18). The Holy Church has offered a prayer for that as well. The "Jesus Prayer" - "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner" of which can be on your lips at all points of the day. The Church also offers The Hours or Daily Cycle.

There is a weekly cycle in the Orthodox faith. Every day of the week has a meaning and serves as icons of Holy Week. In particular, Saturday is Great Vespers where the "service" is dark, somber, and reflective. This is to commemorate the night that Christ was in the tomb and is the end of the 7th day, the Holy Sabbath. Sundays, of course commemorate the Holy Resurrection of Christ and is considered the 8th day of the week, the Eternal Day. The Liturgy is well lit and is the day the faithful enter into the Kingdom of God on Earth in the Divine Liturgy.

Among these cycles are the festive cycles throughout the year. The Advent (or little lent) of the Nativity of our Lord (Christmas) and the Feast of all feasts, Pascha (Easter). These two great feasts are like book ends that hold the other feasts together. The year is full of feasts that point us to Christ. There is a commemoration every day. There are several saints each day that remind us that the saints are the icons of Christ. Here is a list of the Major Feasts in the Orthodox Church:

MAJOR FEASTS OF THE CHURCH
September 8	The Nativity of Mary the Theotokos
September 14	The Exaltation of the Cross
November 21	The Presentation of the Theotokos to the Temple
December 25	The Nativity of Christ
January 6	The Epiphany: The Baptism of Christ
February 2	The Meeting of Christ in the Temple
March 25	The Annunciation
August 6	The Transfiguration of Christ
August 15	The Dormition of the Theotokos
According to the Spring equinox and the Jewish Passover
Palm Sunday	The Entry into Jerusalem
PASCHA	CHRIST’S RESURRECTION
Ascension	The Ascension of Christ
Pentecost	The Descent of the Holy Spirit

Christ has redeemed the day, the week, the month, the year. The only way we can find meaning in our seemingly mundane life is to enter into the liturgical life of the Church and participate with Christians around the world in the glorification of Christ. Otherwise, what are we doing with our time?

Iconoclasm as the Gateway Drug to Heresy

The Indepictable Became Depictable

Icons are by far one of the hardest hurdles for protestants who become Orthodox to overcome. I know it was difficult for me to go from no images whatsoever to images of Christ, the Theotokos, and Saints and Angels. I was taught and I observed a surface reading of the Second Commandment "Thou shall not make engraven images" (Exodus 20:4) and so images were not an option in my initial Christian experience, even though in the same book of the Bible, God commands the making of Cherubim, a bronze serpent, among other things. Not to mention, God was indepictable because He had not revealed Himself in a form as to not be depictable at the time. But of course, when Christ comes, He is the express image of God (Heb 1:3). My surface reading of the seemingly Scriptural prohibition was challenged when I was on my journey toward Orthodoxy. To get a great exposition and well done researched article on the subject of the history, use, and necessity of Holy Icons, check out this article.

But, primarily I would like to focus on an interesting danger that the article points out. As Christians, it is dangerous and walking a fine line to assert that images are forbidden. In doing so, it is a statement that God cannot be depicted. Imagine you are Marty McFly and could travel back to time of Christ. Lets say you took with you a camera. Would you be able to take a photo of Jesus? Or would He be like a vampire, who when taking His picture He would not appear in the photo? 

If you say that Jesus was so much God and only appeared as a man and that we cannot depict Him, then you are stating an ancient heresy called Docetism. This ancient heresy says that Jesus only appeared to be human but was in actuality not human. It was an emphasis on Christ's divinity, but a de-emphasis on His humanity. 

I think it is fair to assert that if we had a photo of Jesus, we would all make copies and disperse it among us all to have in our homes and churches. It is also safe to assert that we would respect this image, venerate ( doulia - not worship, latreia) the image, much like a soldier in war with an image of his wife and kids, kissing it at night before he goes to sleep.

Veneration of icons is not idolatry. There are many arguments as to why this is true (i.e. doulia vs latreia), but if I believe that I am not worshiping (latreia) the wood and paint on the icons, then I am not! It doesn't matter what anyone "thinks" I am doing. 

In honor of the upcoming feast of Lazarus being raised from the dead (known as Lazarus Saturday), I leave you with an early image of Christ raising Lazarus from the dead from the catacombs (2nd to 3rd century AD)

 

Why I Am Orthodox (Part 3.3): Good thing for Heresies!

The First Seven Ecumenical Councils

The church that I became a Christian in taught me "No Creed but Christ", which ironically is a creed. The idea is that Creeds cause division, and this is true. As Christ says, "Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword." (Matt. 10:34). The goal was not to divide though, the goal in creating a creed was to define once and for all what the Church has always believed and to protect the Church from error. As a result, it caused a division between Truth and Error. A far cry from the Ecumenical Movement (and not to be confused with this movement) The Seven Ecumenical Councils are what I would like to focus on.

The Ecumenical Councils were not gathered together to invent doctrine nor to pit one group's truth up against another group's truth. The Councils were gathered because of rising heresies that were up against God's Truth, not man's truth. The bottom line: these were battle fields where God and Satan were at battle and the Spirit of God prevailed in all instances.

Our Lord Jesus made it clear that the Spirit would guide his Church into all Truth (John 16:13-15). The Spirit has guided the people of God, His One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, into all Truth. This means the Church has never fallen into heresy, but heresy has risen up against the Church and has sought to entice Her away from her Bride Groom. This is why the Councils emerged. Not to create its own doctrine, but because heresies arose and needed to be filtered out. This is why I say "good thing for heresies" in the title. Not because I love error, but because error made it possible for the Church to define what the Church has always believed.

What is an Ecumenical Council?

An Ecumenical Council is one where the entire Church is in agreement on a subject that is proclaimed to have been maintained from the beginning. An agreement on Tradition handed down from the Apostles. In other words, its the Church's affirmation of an already believed doctrine that has been held since Christ and His Apostles established the Church. The Orthodox Church recognizes only the first seven councils to be ecumenical and therefore are authoritative in their decrees. These Councils follow the example of the first Council in Acts 15 which dealt with how to manage the growing number of gentiles into the dominantly Jewish Church at the time.

Below is a summary of each of the Seven Ecumenical Councils (Source: Fr. Thomas Hopko's The Orthodox Faith. This is a great read to get a basic understanding of the Orthodox Church. You can read it free here http://oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith. My comments in red which is information gathered from orthodoxwiki.org)

The Seven Ecumenical Councils

Nicea 1	325	Formulated the First Part of the Creed, defining the divinity of the Son of God Why? Arianism: Teaching of Arius that Christ was a created being.
Constantinople I	381	Formulated the Second Part of the Creed, defining the divinity of the Holy Spirit Why? Pneumatomachi (Macedonian) heresie. These were "fighters against the Spirit" denying the divinity of the Spirit and understood Jesus as being of similar substance with the Father, not of the same essense.
Ephesus	431	Defined Christ as the Incarnate Word of God and Mary as Theotokos Why? Nestorianism. Teaching that the human and divine essenses of Christ were seperate and there are two persons in Jesus (divine and human). Nestorius would not say (as the Church had from the beginning) "Theotokos" (Mother of God) to refer to Mary, but Christotokos (Mother of Christ)
Chalcedon	451	Defined Christ as Perfect God and Perfect Man in One Person Why? Monophysitism. Taught by Eutyches, that in Jesus, the human nature was absorbed into the divine nature
Constantinople II	553	Reconfirmed the Doctrines of the Trinity and of Christ Why? Because of the re-emergence of the Arian, Nestorian, and Monophysite heresies.
Constantinople III	680	Affirmed the True Humanity of Jesus by insisting upon the reality of His human will and action Why? Monothelitism ("one will"). Taught that Jesus had two natures but only one will. Orthodox believe that Christ has two wills in conjunction with his two natures.
Nicea II	787	Affirmed the propriety of icons as genuine expressions of the Christian Faith Why? Iconoclasm (the distruction of religious imagery).

I hope this was interesting to you as it is and has been for me. Comments are welcome