Seeing and Being Seen

A holy icon is an image. That's what the word icon means - image. And an image is something that you see. Today, Philip says to Nathanael, "Come and see" (John 1:46).

Come and see what? Well, come and see something good. Nathanael had asked, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Instead of answering this dismissive question, Philip says patiently, "Come and see." We know that the answer is yes.

Actually, Philip had already told Nathanael how good Jesus of Nazareth is. He is, says Philip, "him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote" (1:45). Now, from this alone, it's clear that Philip regards Jesus as someone good. He'd already answered the question before it was asked. It's just that Nathanael couldn't believe that anyone good could come from so backwater a place as Nazareth.

It bears thinking about the goodness of the Lord Jesus here for a moment. Again, Philip describes him as the one of whom Moses and the prophets wrote. Of whom did Moses and the prophets write? It's pretty clear that Philip likely has in mind here the coming Messiah – the Christ – the savior of Israel. And Jesus is that – that and more. Of course, Moses and the prophets also wrote about the Lord our God – more so even than they did about the coming Messiah. And Jesus of Nazareth is also this. He is someone good out of Nazareth. He is goodness himself. He is God out of Nazareth.

So, when Philip tells Nathanael to come and see, he may not fully understand himself, but he is telling Nathanael to come and see the Lord – to lay his eyes on God himself, on the image of the Father, Jesus Christ.  As Jesus says, "He who has seen me has seen the Father" (14:9). Now this is indeed a holy icon. 

But this is not the only image of God in this story.

After Nathanael comes and sees the Lord Jesus, Jesus says to him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you" (1:48). So, not only does Nathanael see Jesus but Jesus also sees Nathanael.

Let's consider for a moment a possible meaning of where Jesus sees him – under the fig tree. Fig trees appear elsewhere in scripture. 

After eating the forbidden fruit from the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil, Adam and Eve hid themselves – covered themselves in their shame – with fig leaves (Gen 3:7). It's possible – and some have supposed – that the forbidden fruit itself was a fig, thus making the fig leaves quite handy after the Fall. It was also a fig tree that Jesus cursed for bearing no fruit (Mark 11:1-14). Therefore, some of the fathers suggest that this fig tree that Nathanael was under may represent a curse or sin or death.

Yet, when Jesus sees Nathanael, he says nothing condemnatory, but rather, "Behold, a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile!" (John 1:47). This is high praise for someone under the fig tree in his sins who was moments ago expressing doubt about the goodness of Jesus.

But it is true, what Jesus says about Nathanael. “It is guile to say one thing and think another. So, if there is no guile in Nathanael, it is because, if he sinned, he confessed his sin; whereas if a man, being a sinner, pretends to be righteous, there is guile in his mouth" (Augustine). It's pretty clear that if Nathanael had a thought, it came out of his mouth. There was all honesty and no deception in him. This, then, is the source of the Lord's praise of him: that he was honest and confessed his sins.

This places him in stark contrast to that other man under a fig tree – Adam, who tried to hide his sins, blaming Eve for them, and covering his shame with fig leaves. Yet this association between Nathanael and Adam brings to my mind something they have in common, as well as this distinction between them. And that is that the Lord went looking for them. At least that's how I see it.

Jesus goes to Galilee to find Philip. Philip doesn't seek and find Jesus. Jesus seeks and finds Philip and says to him "Follow me," which Philip does. Then, Philip seeks and finds Nathanael. I think this is the work of the Lord. I think it is really the Lord who finds Nathanael, through Philip. I think that's clear in the way that the Lord is with Nathanael spiritually under the fig tree before Philip calls him. He sees him and so he is with him seeking him and finding him through Philip.

This reminds me of when God went looking for Adam in the garden in the cool of the day, calling out to him, "Where are you?" (Gen 3:8-9). From the very beginning, God seeks us and finds us. We do not choose him. He chooses us (John 15:16).

Why? What does he see in us? I believe this, too, is there from the beginning. As I said, Jesus isn't the only image of God in this story. Image has more than one sense. Adam is made in the image of God. And Nathanael. And each of us. God sees in us his own image. That’s how he sees us – as we really are. We are images of God – altogether lovable. God made us in his own image. God is an image maker – the creator of his own image. God is an iconographer and we are his icons.

It is good to be seen by God as an image of God. What could be better than that? Nathaniel believed and saw Jesus to be the Son of God and king of Israel because Jesus saw him under the fig tree (John 1:50). That's how great it is to be seen by the Lord! It's enough to give us faith – especially to know that the Lord sees us as his own image, as revealed from the beginning. Well, Jesus says to Nathanael, "You shall see greater things than these." It will be even better, he says, to see "heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the son of man" (1:51).

This is a reference to the ladder seen by Jacob in a dream in Bethel – the ladder that connects heaven and earth (Gen 28:12). And Jesus identifies himself with that ladder. He is the connection between heaven and earth – because he alone is God and man – creator and creation – being and the image of being.

We who are creatures and finite and circumscribable need Jesus. Only in Jesus can we connect humanly to God because only Jesus is both human and God. No one has ever seen God. But we have seen that the Father has sent his Son into the world (1 John 4:12, 14). Jesus Christ – God in his humanity – we humans can now see. Only now can we paint a picture – a holy image – an icon of the Lord. To deny it is to deny that he is really man, which is to deny us of our salvation. Let none deny it, but venerate the holy images of God all around us, in wood and paint, in fresco and mosaic, and in our neighbors. 

Holy Dirt

Twelve hundred and thirty years ago, our fathers gathered in the town of Nicaea for what would become the seventh ecumenical council (Nicaea II), which is especially remembered for its defense of the holy icons against the iconoclasts – or image-breakers.

There are those even today who will not kiss and venerate the holy icons saying, "Well, they're just wood and paint," or, even more scandalously, some fail to “distinguish the holy from the profane” and they assert “that the icons of our Lord and of his saints [are] no different from the wooden images of satanic idols.”[1] To these, I say, remember what the seventh ecumenical council teaches us.

It is amazing to me that, though twelve hundred and thirty years have passed since this council, we still hear iconoclastic statements exactly like this. Iconoclasm is alive and well among us – not only among Protestants and Muslims but even among some Catholics who refuse to venerate the icons and strip the churches of their holy images. So, let us listen again to the teachings of the fathers of this council. 

The more frequently [we see] the images of our Lord, God and Savior, Jesus Christ, and of our Lady without blemish, the holy Theotokos, and of the revered angels, and of any of the saintly holy men…, the more [we] are… drawn to remember and long for those who serve as models [that is, the prototypes – the holy ones themselves], and to pay these images the tribute of salutation and respectful veneration. Certainly this is not the full adoration… which is properly paid only to the divine nature, but… people are drawn to honor these images with the offering of incense and lights, as was piously established by ancient custom. [Remember, already twelve hundred and thirty years ago, the veneration of icons was ancient in the churches. This goes back to the beginning of Christianity.] Indeed, the honor given to the icon passes to the prototype; and those who venerate the image, venerate the person represented in that image.[2]

So, rather than being iconoclasts, let us be iconodules. Let us venerate the holy images and let those of us who are able make many more holy images, even as there are some in the world trying to diminish their importance or even destroy them.

Now, I don't know how many of you have tried to make an icon with the traditional medium of egg tempera. It's a rewarding experience and can be a prayerful experience and I do recommend it. There's a kind of intimacy you can gain with the saint that you are painting, which comes simply from spending so much time before the image as you help to deepen and clarify it with layer after layer of the translucent medium.

To work with egg tempera you must mix the pigment with the emulsion – which is egg yolk – while you are painting. This is because the emulsion does not keep and so the paint will spoil if you don't use it the same day you make it. Anyway, working this way rather than with premixed liquid paints allows you to better see, touch, and smell the material you are working with. And it becomes clear that, for the most part, pigment is dirt. It is various kinds of earth. In fact, some of the pigments even have names like "pale green earth" for example.

photo from Linda Paul

So, when we paint an icon, we are making an image of a holy person out of dirt, out of dust, out of the ground, out of earth. How fitting! Remember, it is of this that we are actually made.

The holy images are made from earth – which is also what you and I and our loved ones are made of. The council says that the holy images may be “painted or made of mosaic or of other suitable material,”[3] but all of this has the same source: the earth. And that’s what I’d like to focus on. 

My name is mud. Or, anyway, that's what Adam might have said. The name Adam in Hebrew most literally means “dust man.” Or sometimes you see him called clay or earth or mud. Because it is of this that we are made. We will all “return to the ground, for out of it [we] were taken; [we] are dust, and to dust [we] shall return” (Gen 3:19).

In his parable of the sower, our Lord teaches us in his parable about different kinds of ground (Luke 8:5-15). And he's talking about us – about different kinds of people. We different kinds of people are really different kinds of dirt, see? But you can do a lot with dirt. Remember the holy icons. This dirt that we are, like the holy icons, can become worthy of veneration - because we all receive the seed of the word in us. The spermatikos logos, as St. Justin Martyr puts it.

This is a familiar image. Remember again Adam. Adam – and, in Adam, all humanity – is earth with God breathed in. "The Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being" (Gen 2:7). The word of God speaks the earth into human life. So: earth + the word of God = human life. We see this in the account of the creation of humans in Genesis. And we see it again today in the parable of the sower as Jesus tells it. Only now the word is depicted as a seed in the earth.

Whether or not this seed takes root in us, gives life to us, depends on our receptiveness to it.  We must be like the good soil and hold the seed of the word of God "in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance." Humility is clearly part of being like good soil.

Humility is honest and good. Humility is truth. And, the truth is, we are dust. 

Remembering this – being mindful of our earthiness – is humility. The word itself contains this meaning. It comes from the Latin humilis, which literally means “on the ground,” from humus, meaning “earth.”  Another word likely comes from the same root as humus: human.  So, again, this is what we really are and humility lies in embracing that truth. To be humble is to be a human aware of your own humanness – which is really your own creatureliness. We, like all the earth, are created by our creator and exist in that relationship to him. We are not the creator. We do not author our own reality, whatever the world may say to the contrary. The humble know this.

The grace of recognizing our lowliness, earthiness, and creatureliness – the grace of humility – lifts us up from earth to heaven and helps us to grow in ever greater union with our creator.

All this talk of humans being made of dirt may have given you the impression that I am down on humans. But nothing could be further from the truth. Remember where we began - with the holy icons, themselves also made of earth. But these we kiss and venerate and love, just as we do the holy relics of our saints. We do not treat them with contempt, but with veneration. This has everything to do with the seed of the word planted in the earth of the human.

It is God that makes us holy and breathes life into us. It is his presence in the earth of our bodies that makes our bodies worthy of veneration. In the icons, this is well represented by the halo. The flesh is painted with common earth. But the halo is made of gold and represents the grace surrounding the holy men and women of God. It is grace that makes anyone holy and nothing else. Just to recognize humbly that you are soil will make you better soil to receive the seed of the word of God in you. Be of honest and good heart – be humble – remember who you are and who is God – and that will give life to you and make you whole and holy.

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[1] Norman P. Tanner, ed., “Nicaea II,” in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils (London: Sheed & Ward, 1990), 1:134.

[2] Ibid, 136.

[3] Ibid, 136. 

Love the Stranger as Yourself

The Hospitality of Abraham,
Constantinople, late 14th century

A lawyer – that is, a scholar of Torah – asks Jesus what he has to do to live forever (Luke 10:25). Life forever is what Jesus offers, so how do we get it? It's a fair question. Well Jesus says to the man, you already know. Really he says, “What does it say in the law?” (Luke 10:26). You already know Torah and the Torah comes from the Father. The law is to be believed. The answer is already there. And, indeed, the lawyer does know. And he quotes to Jesus the greatest commandment: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10:27; Deut 6:5; Lev 19:18).

I love this. In another place, another lawyer – to test Jesus – asks him, “What is the greatest commandment?” And Jesus gives him the answer (Matt 22:35-40). He was asking Jesus to test him – to see if he knew his Torah – to see if he was really up to snuff. Because if he was who he said he was, then this is something he should know. This is something that the Pharisees and scholars of the law knew, which is made clear today when the roles are reversed and it is Jesus asking the question and the lawyer answering. Of course, Jesus does know what the Pharisees and lawyers already know. But he also knows more than they do.

Then, desiring to justify himself, the lawyer says to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?" (Luke 10:29). This is something that Jesus knows but the lawyer doesn’t – and it’s something we also forget. He knows who our neighbors are. And he tells the parable of the Good Samaritan to illustrate the point – that our neighbors are not to only those of our own people, or our own country, or political party, or our own religion – that our neighbors include foreigners and heretics and heterodox and our enemies and – to me this is in a way even more startling – strangers. Strangers are our neighbors. 

Today, many in this country are looking at their neighbors, most of whom are strangers, as enemies because of how they voted. As Brother Isaac said recently, “Politics divide. Love in Christ unites!” He advises us, and I think we should listen:

Do something kind for a stranger today.

If you are happy about the results of the election, do something kind for a stranger today.

If you are sad or angry about the result of the election, do something kind for a stranger today.

If you are ambivalent about the result of the election, do something kind for a stranger today.

Our lens is always the Empty Tomb![1]

Love of strangers is a path to healing and even resurrection. The way to eternal life is love of God and neighbor. And Jesus reveals to us today that strangers are our neighbors. Love them.

“Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong.” Everything love is not sounds like a description of our political landscape, doesn’t it? “But love rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends” (1 Cor 13:4-8).

The Good Samaritan loved his neighbor and he was a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers (Luke 10:36-37). Even though the man was probably a Jew coming from Jerusalem – and Samaritans and Jews were at enmity with one another for both religious and ethnic reasons (Luke 10:30). And furthermore, the man was a stranger to him. It seems they never spoke – before, during, or after. But the Samaritan had compassion on him (Luke 10:33). And he loved him.

It's clear how much he loved him by the extent of inconvenience to which he was willing to subject himself for him. The Samaritan was on his own journey, but he leaves behind his own priorities to seek the good of the other even at significant personal expense of both time and money, tending the man's wounds with oil and wine and bandages, carrying him on his own beast to an inn, and paying the innkeeper two day's wages to see to the man's care (Luke 10:33-35). All this for a stranger.

When we are busy and distracted with pressing concerns, it can be easy to justify ourselves, as the lawyer did, telling ourselves that “we gave at the office” or that we will help a stranger next time, but this time we’re too busy with “matters of consequence.”[2] Well, bear in mind whose voice is actually justifying our neglect. Metropolitan Kallistos teaches us a way to distinguish between the voice of the devil and the voice of the Lord: the devil always says, “yesterday” or “tomorrow,” but the Holy Spirit always says “today.”[3]

Pious Christians laudably expend much energy in avoiding sin and not giving into temptation. Unfortunately, the habit of not giving into impulses sometimes seems to get transferred to good desires too. If you’re tempted to give, go ahead and give into it. Never resist the urge to give. Don’t avoid the eyes of strangers for fear that you’ll be tempted to give them something. Be as reckless with your kindness as you are neptic with your anger. Love both those that make you angry and those that inspire you to give – both your enemies and strangers. 

An enemy is often someone we already have strong feelings about – so they’re often on our minds – while strangers are people we're often hardly aware of. Many of us often make small decisions to avoid being troubled by strangers. A decision to look the other way as we pass them on the street. Especially if it's apparent that they're going to ask us for something – probably money – probably for drugs.

I have never come across a person stripped and beaten on the road left for dead. It's an extreme example that Jesus gives us. He likes those. I have often come upon someone with a need that I recognize. If somebody's coming up to you asking for money, let me tell you, they are in need. There's a probability that they're not in need of that which they seek. But they are in need. And to turn away from that need is unloving of the stranger. And Jesus reveals to us today is that the stranger is our neighbor.

If you have ever turned away from a person in need because you were in a hurry to get to your job or to some other obligation or pleasure – and I confess that I have – ask yourself, how would you have responded to their need if they were a loved one? Would you have turned from them if it was your son or your daughter or your husband or your wife? Would you have turned away from them if you loved them?

Jesus reveals to us today that the stranger is our neighbor. And the greatest commandment tells us to love our neighbor.

Maybe you shouldn’t always give people what they are asking for. Many people argue that persuasively, though at the same time don’t forget that Jesus says to “give to everyone who begs from you” (Luke 6:30).

Give to everyone who begs from you. Maybe don’t give everyone money, but give to them what they do need. Give your shirt also to the one who takes your coat (Luke 6:29). Give drink to the thirsty, food to the hungry, shelter to the homeless, coats to the freezing, kindness and patience to strangers. And give love to all your neighbors, whether or not they’re from your neighborhood.

Even if your church’s neighborhood is not your neighborhood, the strangers who live all around it are still your neighbors. Even if your job is far from home, all those around you at work are your neighbors, even if they voted the other way. If you go out to eat, your servers and the jerks in the parking lot are all your neighbors. Jesus has revealed to us that our neighbors are not only our own people, but everyone – not only нас, but all. 

Loving our neighbors is part of loving God. Our Holy Father John Chrysostom, whose feast is today, is often quoted as saying that if you cannot find Christ in the beggar at the church door, you will not find him in the chalice.

And that extends also to everyone you meet, I believe. The image of God is in every person and that image is wholly lovable, however obscured it may be. Everyone wants to be loved by all, no matter what they say defensively, because they have been hurt.

Wanting to be loved is not a weakness. Even God wants to be loved and God is not weak. God wants to be loved and he takes the guise of the stranger. As you love strangers, that is how you love God. Remember when three strangers came to Abraham and how he ran out to meet them and bowed before them, washed their feet, and fed them bread cakes and milk and curds, and killed for them the choice calf (Gen 18:2-7). Only after did he realize he was showing hospitality to angels and to God himself. These three – men or angels – are our image of the Trinity, famously painted by Rublev. And at first they were strangers.

God, the only true Lover of us all, alone fully deserves love. But we are made in His image, and as such we also desire to love and to be loved by all, even strangers. Do unto strangers as you would have them do unto you. Love strangers as you would have them love you. Love the stranger as yourself.

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[1] Br. Isaac Hughey’s Facebook Page. Accessed November 9^th, 2016. 

[2] Antoine de Saint Exupéry, The Little Prince, chapters 7 and 13.

[3] Bishop Kallistos of Diokleia (Ware), Discovering the Inner Kingdom, (Oakwood Publications, 1997), 9. 

To take up a cross

On Mark 8:34-9:1

We know – most of us – what happened on the cross.

For example, just last week, I asked my five year old nephew what happened on the cross and first he said, "You mean the cross on top of the church?" And I said, "No, I’m asking about the reason we put a cross on top of the church. I mean, what happened on the real cross? Do you know?" And he said, "They nailed Jesus to it."

That is indeed the awful and awesome truth – that Jesus, our Savior and the Savior of the world, hung upon the cross and there he died for us and for our salvation. “[He] ascended the cross in [his] human nature, to deliver from the enemy’s bondage those whom [he] created,” as we pray quietly before the Divine Liturgy. The one who is life himself – the way the truth and the life (John 14:6) – died. Life died – life entered into death – so that, though we die, in him, we may live (John 11:25) – and live forever.

We know this – most of us. We have the inestimable benefit of living in a post-resurrectional cosmos. We know and partake of the life that comes after the cross and through it. The cross for us has rightly been bejeweled. The cross for us is the tree of life. For us it no longer symbolizes death and ignominy, but life and glory. “The King of Glory” we write on icons of the cross. And now, if we glory, let us glory “in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to [us], and [we] to the world,” as Paul writes to the Galatians (6:14).

“We bow to your cross, O Lord, and we glorify your holy resurrection!” We will sing this for the last time tomorrow, on the leave-taking of the exaltation of the holy cross. 

This action is itself a beautiful image of death and resurrection. We bow or prostrate as we sing of the cross. Our bodies are lowered to the ground as they will be in death. Then, we stand upright again as we sing of resurrection, as we will stand up again from our graves when the Son of man “comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels” (Mark 8:38).

So when Jesus says today, ""If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (Mark 8:34), all of this imagery should come to our minds, given the benefit of our vantage point.

But what can Jesus' disciples and the multitude have thought when he preached this to them? This is the first time that Jesus directly mentions the cross. This is the case in the gospels Matthew, Mark, and Luke. This is the first time Jesus uses the word “cross,” and he’s not talking just about his own cross, but about the crosses of those who would be his followers – about our crosses. Isn’t that something?

Now Jesus had just foretold his own death and resurrection, so I suppose we could presume that he also described how he would die, but the gospel doesn’t tell us that. Regardless, how confounding the idea of taking up a cross must have sounded to those who first heard it! In a way we have an advantage over these first hearers, but in a way they have an advantage over us.

They perhaps could not see the good and beauty of the cross, as well as we. Even though Jesus had just told them that he would rise again from the dead, I imagine that it still would be difficult for them to conceive of this instrument of torture and death (to which Jesus is calling them) as a life-giving thing.

We, on the other hand, knowing the outcome, having read the last page of the story, may fail to see sometimes the suffering and scandal the cross represents as it lies before us on the tetrapod in bright pigments and enwreathed with flowers. We may expect to skip straight to the resurrection and forget about how the way to resurrection is through the cross. We may be tempted to skip straight to the feast of Pascha without first observing the black fast of Good Friday.

But when Jesus told the multitude that, if they were to follow him, they were going to need to follow him to the cross, they’d have had no illusions about what this meant. They knew what crosses were for and they had witnessed crucifixions, which were all too common in that time and place.

To carry a cross is to suffer. To take up a cross, is to accept or even embrace that suffering. Here’s the thing: we all have a cross whether we accept it or not. There’s no escape from suffering in this life. Most of those crucified went to the cross very much against their will. The end of suffering can only be fully realized in the life to come, if we choose to go that way. 

This is our choice, then: to reject the cross and die anyway or to accept the cross with love and, through death, live forever. We can react to suffering as Job’s wife recommends, that is to curse God and die (Job 2:9). Or we can respond to suffering as Job does, not without questioning, but without sin anyway (Job 1:22), and with love anyway (Job 10:12), blessing the name of the Lord anyway (Job 1:21).

Our Lord heals us, but he does not always and immediately take away all our suffering. Everyone here has suffered. Some more than others. And there is nothing just about its distribution. The rain falls on the just and the unjust alike (Matt 5:45), and so does pain afflict us all physically, psychologically, spiritually. And there is no understanding it, as far as I can tell.

Sometimes suffering is the direct result of sin – for example, gluttony, and drunkenness, and violence all result almost immediately in some kind of suffering either for the self or for others. Dying by the sword, Jesus says, results from living by it (Matt 26:52). But then sometimes children as innocent as doves are cut to death this way for no reason. And there is no understanding that, as far as I can tell.

It is possible only by the grace of God for us to be freed from sin, and even then we will not be freed from suffering and affliction and persecution by the evil spirits and by the enemies of God. Jesus was without sin, yet in his great love for us, he suffered greatly. He suffered so that, through suffering, we can be united to him. He has given suffering, which was meaningless, the only meaning that it can have. God, by becoming a man who suffers, has transfigured suffering into grace – into a way of living the life of God.

Because Jesus takes up his cross, we must take up our crosses if we are to follow him – if we are to become like him, which is what it means to be his follower. Our crosses are made up of all our difficulties and all our pain and suffering. And Jesus is present to us in these. By his cross, Jesus has transformed our suffering, as Metropolitan George of Mount Lebanon writes, “into a creative force, a means of drawing near to God, so that we can make it into a ladder by which we climb up to heaven.”

Against Contemporary Iconoclasm

            I think one of the most important defenses of icons in the current culture is the psychological. The creation of images as memorials for absent departed loved ones is a nearly universal human custom. For example, even among many who object to the Catholic and Orthodox use of images in worship, there is often widespread use of photography. I have explained it this way to Protestant objections before. When asked why my church is filled with images of Jesus, his mother, and the saints, I have responded with the question, “Do you have a picture of your mother?” The answer is usually yes. Our culture unquestionably accepts images for this purpose, which is really a way of showing love and respect for those dear to our hearts. As Christians, Jesus, his mother, and the saints should be as dear to our hearts as any members of our family should be, so icons are a fitting way to remember and venerate them. It is a natural human response to look lovingly upon the image that reminds us of the one we love. This is a part of the human nature, just as is the capacity to be represented by an image.

            Furthermore, it is essential to remember that we are not purely spirit, but also body and that God created our bodies and means for us to worship him in and with our bodies as well as with our spirits. There is no better way to worship Christ with our eyes, which he blessed, than to venerate icons – unless it is to see Christ in our neighbors who are also true icons of God.

            In offering this veneration to icons, it is important to distinguish between veneration and worship. We worship God alone. We worship him through the icon, but we do not worship the icon. The icon is an aid in our worship of God and worthy of its own veneration for this reason – for the reason that it points us to God. 

Historical Theological Defense of Icons

Though questions of politics and the locus of Church authority – that is, whether or not the emperor ought to have a deciding voice on doctrinal matters – weigh heavily in the historical dispute over icons, the doctrinal questions themselves are worthy of careful consideration. Furthermore, it is worth bearing in mind that, though it is intuitive to ascribe iconoclastic tendencies among Christians to external Jewish and Muslim influences, iconoclasm historically found as much support from within the Greek Christian tradition as from without it. Nonetheless, the Jewish origin of Christianity and the consequent Christian acceptance of Jewish scriptures certainly gave the iconoclasts the opportunity to point to the all-important prohibition of images found in the Decalogue as a proof-text. Christianity had inherited from Judaism an abhorrence of idolatry – which was shared by iconoclasts and iconodules alike. Earlier iconoclasts particularly focused on their claim that the veneration of icons was idolatrous.

Iconoclasts appealed to the authority of scripture and the early church fathers, which railed always and everywhere against the worship of idols. They neglected, however, to account for the images God commanded for use in worship (for example, the golden cherubim over the ark) in the very same books – especially Exodus – that condemned idolatry. This tension between right and wrong use of images exists already in the Old Testament along with the implicit acknowledgement that not all use of images is idolatrous.

Iconoclasts appealed to a particular understanding of the nature of images. Constantine Kopronymos went so far as to call an image homoousios with its subject. Icons, therefore, he considered false images, because a true image of Christ would be God himself, just as Christ, the image of the Father, is one in essence with the Father and is God. In a sense, Constantine V is not against worshipping images, but against worshiping icons, which are not, in his view, true images. Only Christ (and Christ in the Eucharist) is a true image. This is a failure to appreciate what an icon actually is and is not. An icon, as John of Damascus would later assert, is more like a mirror reflection of the one it portrays. It is an imitation. A painting of Christ is an image of Christ, who is an image of the Father. There is more than one sense of image. An icon is like an image of an image. It is not Christ himself, but his reflection. It is obvious that paint on a board is not one in essence with the Father! Iconodules were not suggesting otherwise. They worship God and God alone – God who has become man – man, who by his very nature can be imaged with paint on a board.

Later iconoclasts focused more on the Christological implications of iconography.  They claimed that because Jesus Christ is one person with both a divine and human nature, it is impossible to make an image of him. The divine nature cannot be circumscribed. Divinity is invisible by nature. It could only be, therefore, that an icon portrays only the human nature. This much is true, but the iconoclasts went on to assert that making such an image separates the two natures of Christ. Such an assertion fails to recognize fully the reality of the incarnation. It is, as John of Damascus said, a type of Docetism. Christ was visible to the eyes of his disciples both before and after his resurrection. This visibility, characteristic of human nature, also lends itself naturally to circumscribability. If the iconoclasts were right in thinking that portraying Christ’s image separated his humanity from his divinity, then Christ himself would have made this separation every time he appeared to his disciples in visible flesh. No. Rather, as a person both fully God and fully man, he is fully circumscribable in his human nature. This is the reality of the incarnation – a reality so profound that iconoclasts had difficulty fully accepting it. To deny that an image may be made of Christ is to deny that he is fully man. To deny that this image is worthy of veneration is to deny that his humanity is one with God. 

Iconography of the Devil

Roman Catholic images of Satan often depict him as a horned, muscular, bat-winged man in combat with Michael, whose feast is today  (right).

In many ancient religious traditions, horns were associated with the crescent moon and thus with fertility, night, darkness, death, and the underworld. On the devil, they signify his power, his association with death, and destructive sexuality.

            The bearded muscular figure is consonant with the view found in many religions that the principle force of evil is powerfully masculine (cf. Matt 12:29).

            Wings, which allow creatures to dwell in the air and grant them swiftness, i.e. the ability to be “everywhere in an instant,” signify the spiritual nature of both angels and fallen angels. According to Tertullian, “every spirit is winged.” In later imagery, bat wings serve to distinguish demons from angels.

Perhaps indicating a more dualist perspective, the Western image depicts Satan – though defeated – as well-matched to fight Michael. I believe Eastern iconography better represents the truth (left).

            

While the depiction of Satan in the icon contains some of the same elements – e.g. horns and wings – he is dramatically smaller and no match for his fellow angel Michael. Icons consistently represent demons this way – as tiny black specks, rather like flies (which evokes a name of their master: Beëlzebub). This effectively communicates the ultimate insignificance of evil. 

(I've written about some of this before). 

For the feast of St. Elias (a.k.a. Elijah)

I painted this icon of Elias for my son
a couple of years ago at St. Andrew Rublev
Iconography School in Indianapolis.

I am quite fond of St. Elias. His icon is interesting for a number of reasons. He is usually shown with a red background rather than the usual gold, which represents the fire of the Holy Spirit who spoke through him and of the fiery chariot which took him to heaven. It is also interesting because it is the only icon I have ever seen of a person who has not experienced death. 


Today is the feast of St. Elias, my son's name day, and my sister's birthday. It is a day important to me personally for a number of reasons. 


Six years ago today, my wife was in the hospital. She was pregnant with our son and she was experiencing contractions far too early. I left her side for some time to attend the Divine Liturgy at our parish for this feast day and to pray for her and our son. 


The troparion of the day, which we sang over and over again as the priest blessed our cars, reminded me that John the Baptist had come in the spirit and the power of Elias and that, just as John was the Forerunner of the Lord, so Elias was the second forerunner of the Lord. We had been planning on naming the baby after John but we had not been able to decide on a middle name. I took this as an inspiration and we named our boy John Elias. 


My beloved, still pregnant, safely left the hospital not too long after this. Ultimately, she went into labor a month early. The delivery was as difficult as the pregnancy had been. The doctors threatened an emergency caesarean. There was a great deal of blood. My wife and I prayed the Jesus Prayer together throughout much of the ordeal. As he was being born, John Elias’ head applied pressure just exactly where it was needed to prevent a placental abruption. He was safely, miraculously born. It was the only time in my life I have wept for joy. 

At this same time, my father was sick with colon cancer. We brought John Elias home to meet him. He said to the boy, “you’re coming and I’m going, but there are similarities between us.” He died shortly after. Had John Elias been born when he was due, he’d never have met his grandfather.

These mercies I attribute, in part, to the intercession of St. Elias and I ask his continued prayers for my family and yours.

This video shows the gradual development of the icon of St. Elias.

Blessed are those like Christ

            In his hymn, “On the birth of our Lord,” the thirty-first of the Hymns of Virginity, St. Ephrem the Syrian, whose feast is today, employs many images to describe poetically the one who surpasses our everyday speech. He describes Christ as atoning Hyssop, Libation, and Lamb (str. 4-5). Christ is the Priest and the Sacrifice (str. 5). He is the Treasurer and the Treasure (str. 2, 7). He is Fountain, Instruction, Remembrance, Trust, Rock, Curdled Milk, and Justifying Wall (str. 7-8). He is the Gate and the Yoke (str. 9, 11). He is represented by the Eucharistic images of the Grape-Cluster of mercy and the Ear of Wheat (str. 13-14). He is the Furnace, the Mirror, and the skilled Sailor (str. 10, 12, 15). It would be easily possible to multiply images of Christ endlessly, and Ephrem has begun to try. “Christ [is]… above every name that is named” (Eph 1:20-21). No single poetic image, however profound, can ever completely contain or express the inexhaustible mystery of Christ. The use of many, therefore, benefits the attempt to grow in understanding.

Icon of St. Ephrem writing

            Each of Ephrem’s images of Christ has in common a salvific character. Characteristically, in this hymn, he presents an image of Christ at the beginning of each strophe and ends each strophe with the exclamation, “Blessed is…” the one who benefits in the way particularly emphasized by this particular image.  In other words, blessed is the one whom Christ saves or blessed is the one who becomes more like Christ. Many of these images emphasize Christ’s redemptive and atoning role. Others, three in particular, especially struck me and seem to emphasize theosis – becoming like Christ – as the means of salvation. These are the Furnace, the Mirror, and the Sailor (str. 10, 12, 15).

Two Icons

These are the first icons my wife and I have made under the instruction of Mother Katherine of St. Andrew Rublev Iconography School. They are also posted at Holy Image. I painted (or wrote, for those who prefer that terminology) the Virgin of Crete and my wife painted the Archangel Gabriel. It strikes me that, when placed side by side, they evoke the Annunciation - a solemn holy day that falls during the Great Fast that we have just begun.

The Maternity of the Holy Anna

Given that yesterday honored the Maternity of the Holy Anna (a.k.a. the Immaculate Conception and the Conception of St. Anna)I think it is appropriate to unveil my new painting here as well as on my studio blog.

My friend David O'Neil, scholar of classical languages, helped me in titling this painting. Our exchange follows.

Dear Dave,

So, Theotokos - a title of Mary - is Greek for "God-bearer" - correct? If I wanted to say "Bearer of the God-bearer" (indicating Mary's mother Ann), what would I say? Theotokostokos?

In Christ,
John

To avoid the neologism, I would rather add a second word. At first I was thinking of something like "tokos tEs theotokou" which would be a simple "bearor of the god-bearer", but 'tokos' doesn't really mean "bearer" by itself, but more like "the giving forth", so that wouldn't work. I kind of like "hE tiktousa tEn theotokon", lit. "the woman bringing forth the God-bearer"). There's precedent for 'hE tiktousa' meaning "mother" and it retains the cognate with 'tokos'. By the way, the capitals represent long vowels.

I don't know if you want something shorter than this. I doubt there's any precedent for the word you suggest, but the Greeks did like to make up big long words like that, and I think it would be understood. I'd take out the first 's', though, just like how the 's' is removed from 'theos' in the original compound--so 'theotokotokos'.

Dave

Dave,

As you can see, desirous of a title rather than a phrase, I went with the neologism. I find the use of a neologism appropriate given that the image is a "neologism" of it's own. Icons are often described as having been "written" rather than "painted." An icon is an image of the invisible Logos. This painting is an innovation and violates all sorts of iconographic canons, therefore it is a "new word."

In Christ,
John

Swaddling Clothes

"And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him up in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn" (Luke 2:7)

swad·dle [swod-l] verb, -dled, -dling, noun
–verb (used with object) 1. to bind (an infant, esp. a newborn infant) with long, narrow strips of cloth to prevent free movement; wrap tightly with clothes.

As a father of small children, I can testify that newborn babies love to be swaddled. I imagine the womb is a tight spot in those last couple of months and swaddling reminds them of home.

A fine example of swaddling is shown in the nativity icon (upper left).

Some have observed that swaddling clothes and death shrouds, as shown in the burial icon (right), have a similar appearance. "And taking him down, he wrapped him in fine linen, and laid him in a sepulchre that was hewed in stone, wherein never yet any man had been laid" (Luke 23:53). The swaddling clothes, then, prefigure the burial shroud; they remind us why He was born.

When my father was dying, he said to my newborn son, "You're coming and I'm going, but there are similarities between us."



Among the aberrations of Western religious art are images of the Infant Jesus like this:

Those are not swaddling clothes. He's gonna have those loose rags off in 30 seconds, then He'll be naked and cold. But, then, Italians have some kind of fascination with naked baby boys, filling their churches with putti masquerading as cherubs. Libera me, Domine.

Racial Iconography

There is an increasingly prevalent opinion among some Christians that images of Jesus Christ ought to look Jewish. After all, he is a Jew. That is what he looks like. Seems reasonable.

He certainly doesn't have blonde hair and blue eyes. It is historically inaccurate to portray him with such features. Some even regard such images of him as racist.

A fewer number, it seems to me, regard as racist images of him with African features (I am more fond of these images myself), but he is not African either.

He is a Middle Eastern Jew of the first century. But is it racist, or otherwise inappropriate, to depict him as though he were a member of another race?

Icons are not images of what people look like. They are not and are not meant to be realistic images - at least not in the sense we tend to think of realism. They portray spiritual and theological realities over physical and historical realities.

an Ethiopian icon of the Baptism of Jesus

This is why, perhaps, iconographers of the Church scarcely hesitated to make images of Jesus, his mother, his apostles, and others appear just as they did. Ethiopian iconographers portrayed him as an Ethiopian. Greek iconographers portrayed him as a Greek. Russian iconographers portrayed him as a Russian. They were communicating a spiritual and theological reality. They were the Body of Christ.

If I am an early Christian Ethiopian and I know that Jesus is my brother and Mary is my mother and I am a member of the Body of Christ, it is meaningful, then, for Jesus and Mary to look like I do. Why should he look like an alien if he and I are one?

One reason we might put forward is that he is an alien to all but Middle Eastern Jews. There is a spiritual and theological reality to be communicated by this fact too: "salvation is from the Jews" (John 4:22) - a too often neglected reality among Christians.

I believe there is something to be learned from every trait of Christ. He is human. He is male. He is Jewish. He lived in the Middle East in the first century. It all matters. Everything about him matters. Each particularity is significant, for he is the Logos, the incarnate Word; his is the flesh of God.

The contemporary situation of the Church is somewhat changed, at least where I live. Members of other races no longer appear alien. We go to elementary school with people of every race and are surrounded by a plurality of races all our lives.

In this situation, when we make an image of Christ for our churches, what racial characteristics ought he be given? Members of any race are liable to behold it, pray before it, contemplate his holy face. It seems to me that, in this situation, it is most sensible to portray him as a Jew.

That being said, there are contexts and subcultures to consider and there can be great meaning in an image of Christ bearing the features of any race. He bore our offenses, after all; surely he can bear our features.

Islam and Iconoclasm

This week we celebrated the feast day of St. John Damascus (Dec. 4th), best known for defending orthodoxy against the iconoclasts. He famously wrote:

“In former times God, who is without form or body, could never be depicted. But now when God is seen in the flesh conversing with humans, I make an image of the God whom I see. I do not worship matter: I worship the Creator of matter who became matter for my sake, who willed to take his abode in matter: who worked out my salvation through matter. Never will I cease honoring the matter which wrought my salvation! I honor it but not as God.”

12th century Sinaitic icon of St. Theodosia,
a Constantinopolitan executed by the iconoclasts
in the 8th century.
from the Monastery of St. Catherine

Less well known is the means by which he was able (without being killed, that is) to defy a heresy so prevalent among Christians that the Eastern Christian Emperor Leo himself forbade the use of icons.

St. John was immune to the persecutions of the iconoclasts because he lived under Muslim rule. That’s right, here is a Christian saint protected… from Christians… by Muslims.

A second defender of orthodox iconography during the time of the iconoclasts is the Monastery of St. Catherine, which preserves to this day many of the oldest icons in existence, most of the rest having been destroyed by the iconoclasts. Here in the Sinai desert, while much of the Christian world was breaking icons and killing those who used them, their veneration continued. This bastion of orthodoxy, too, was under Muslim rule.

From The Monastery of St. Catherine, by Dr. Evangelos Papaioannou:

"According to its tradition, the monks of St. Catherine sent a delegation to Medina, in 625 AD, to ask for Mohammed’s patronage and protection. The request was granted; a copy of the original document… proclaims that the Moslems would defend the monks, who were also exempted from paying taxes. Legend has it that Mohammed visited the Monastery on one of his journeys as a merchant. This may well be so, for the Koran does mention the holy places in Sinai. So, when the peninsula came under the rule of the Arab conquerors in 641 AD, the monks and their Monastery continued to live unmolested and emerged unscathed from the early Arab period."

The later Arab period was not so kind, but that is a different story. The Monastery remained under Muslim rule whilst the iconoclast heresy was prevalent (throughout the 8th and 9th centuries).

The irony of all this is that the heresy of Islam embraces iconoclasm as heartily as any of the iconoclasts (witness the desecration of Hagia Sophia). The Muslims, believing icons to be idolatrous, would have had no sympathy for the beliefs they were inadvertently protecting. But the presence of certain Christians among them was insignificant enough that they saw fit to leave them alone (at least during this time). Its icons of great antiquity (even then) were consequently left unharmed.

I am convinced that our Lord and God does not hesitate to use the adversaries of the Church to shape her and correct her, as with a stone against a blade.

Currently, Islam appears to have lost much of its former tolerance of Christians. I believe God is using Islamic persecution of Christians, as with the previous Islamic protection of Christians, to strengthen the Church. The Catholic and Orthodox Churches are now faced with the need to unite or be overthrown. Unprecedented steps toward that reunion are made daily.