Since I spoke of the Cross in places of
worship in my last post, I thought I would get my Bible ready and talk about
two of my favourite things 1) The Holy Bible, and the 2) Seventh Ecumenical
Council. Many Fundamentalist Protestants
would be surprised to find out that we Catholics actually DO have a prohibition
against idolatry in our Bibles "You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in the earth beneath, or that is the
water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the
LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the
children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing
mercy to those who love and keep my commandments". (Exodus 20:4-6). Clearly, this we have. All graven images are AN ABOMINATION UNTO THE LORD. Well, not quite. For instance, few verses later we have a
COMMAND, to make graven images (Exodus 25).
So what, then is, the prohibition?
Given the context, the prohibition seems to be, not so much against
making graven images, but to be worshiping images as though they were
gods. In Exodus 20:3, God clearly
states, "you shall have no other gods before me". We must understand this in context. Remember what happened when the Israelites
were waiting for Moses to come back down from the mountain? They melted down their jewelry and fashioned
a golden calf for the SPECIFIC purpose of worshiping it (Exodus 32). When Moses came back down, he was indignant,
and smashed the tablets. (Exodus 32:19).
I actually remember commenting to an Eastern Orthodox priest professor I
had, that Moses was the only person in history to break all Ten Commandments at
once. Again, the prohibition against
idolatry is not a prohibition against images.
Solomon, whom did commit a great sin and turned from the Lord (1 Kings
11), was not admonished by anyone for using "graven images" in his
construction of the Temple.(1 Kings 7)
God seemed to be quite pleased with Solomon's work, though he did offer
Solomon a stern warning about turning from him (1 Kings 9). So, as you can clearly see, prohibition
against worshiping an image does not necessitate that images be totally
forbidden. Now, what about the Seventh
Ecumenical Council? Let's start with
some background.
There is a movement, that
started in the eighth century, called Iconoclasm. Iconoclasts claimed that veneration of images
in Holy Places was akin to worship of God.
The persecution of those
holding to Christian Orthodoxy began with Emperor Leo III. Leo was suspected of Islamic leanings, but
the history on this is unknown. Leo came
to the conclusion that the images were the main reason that Muslims and Jews
were not becoming Christian. In
comes Pope Gregory II. Now, Gregory did not want a council. He simply wanted the Emperor to stop meddling
in Christian affairs. Gregory declared
himself able to withstand Leo's attacks and claimed that Leo "would not be
welcome in Rome". Actually, the
back and forth between this a little funny.
I side with Gregory, and it is clear that Gregory was not
intimidated. Leo's son, Constantine V,
increased the persecution of the so-called "image worshipers". Constantine tried to summon an Ecumenical
Council, but many of the Bishops, were not having it. They did not not believe Constantine had the
right to call a council.
Now, eventually the
Empress Irene, who was the regent for her son, Constantine VI, worked to undue
the work of the Iconoclasts. The former
Patriarch of Constantinople, Paul IV, retired to a monastery as penance of his
role in the Iconoclast heresy. In 787,
A.D., the last Ecumenical Council that the Eastern Orthodox and the Catholic
Church have in common, this was the ruling
The one who granted us
the light of recognizing him, the one who redeemed us from the darkness of
idolatrous insanity, Christ our God, when he took for his bride his holy
catholic church, having no blemish or wrinkle, promised he would guard her and
assured his holy disciples saying, I am with you every day until the
consummation of this age. This promise however he made not only to them but
also to us, who thanks to them have come to believe in his name. To this
gracious offer some people paid no attention, being hoodwinked by the
treacherous foe they abandoned the true line of reasoning, and setting
themselves against the tradition of the catholic church they faltered in their
grasp of the truth. As the proverbial saying puts it, they turned askew the
axles of their farm carts and gathered no harvest in their hands. Indeed they
had the effrontery to criticise the beauty pleasing to God established in the
holy monuments; they were priests in name, but not in reality. They were those
of whom God calls out by prophecy, Many pastors have destroyed my vine, they
have defiled my portion. For they followed unholy men and trusting to their own
frenzies they calumniated the holy church, which Christ our God has espoused to
himself, and they failed to distinguish the holy from the profane, asserting
that the icons of our Lord and of his saints were no different from the wooden
images of satanic idols.
"Therefore the Lord
God, not bearing that what was subject to him should be destroyed by such a
corruption, has by his good pleasure summoned us together through the divine
diligence and decision of Constantine and Irene, our faithful emperor and
empress, we who are those responsible for the priesthood everywhere, in order
that the divinely inspired tradition of the catholic church should receive
confirmation by a public decree. So having made investigation with all accuracy
and having taken counsel, setting for our aim the truth, we neither diminish
nor augment, but simply guard intact all that pertains to the catholic
church."
So why then, may we have
images? Well, think about what the Bible
said in Deuteronomy 4:15-19. They saw no
image of God, so they were prohibited from making an image of God. But when God became man, these prohibitions
were no longer necessary. As God BECAME
man. (John 1). This is why it is okay to not only have
images in the Church, but to have images of the one who is true man, and true
God, as we know this is not God himself, but just a representation of Jesus in
the flesh, and an artist's idea. We know
the Holy Spirit is God (Acts 2:14-18), yet the Bible itself depicts the Spirit
as "descending like a dove".
If we are forbidden from using visual images, why is this very image
used? (Matthew 3:16, Mark 1:10, Luke
3:22, John 1:32). While the jury is out
on when exactly early Christians started using images in places of worship (for
instance, there is evidence that Christians used images in the 2nd century, but
if I recall correctly, veneration of relics goes back even further. Remember, this is a time when Christians were
persecuted, so to be openly Christian may have meant death)
So what do we make of
this? God, and God alone is to be
adored. But how do we know how God is to
be adored? We know, most fully, through Jesus
Christ, who suffered for us. We know
through the Saints, many of which died for love of him. Veneration of images is not violation of the
First Commandment, but worship of images, is.
The Early Christians often died for not worshiping the emperor. I would gladly die to same way. But to deny Holy Images, I feel, is to deny
the incarnation.
Sources used (May not be
in order)
RSV Catholic Edition
Bible 2nd Edition
New Advent
Ignatius Catholic Study
Bible New Testament, Second Catholic Edition, RSV
PapalEncyclicals.net
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