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Ok all, here we go. The long awaited for follow up to my essay entitled "What do Icons Mean." This is the rough version of the essay, once the final edit is completed I will submit it for publication and will post it on my webpage. I am posting it in several parts because it is too large to put in one post. Enjoy!
Why are Orthodox Churches Full of Icons?
My first experience in an Orthodox Church was visiting a Russian Chapel in Darmstadt, Germany. It was a small Orthodox chapel, which had been built by the Czar of Russia for his daughter, who married the Grand Duke of Hessen. I was struck with awe at the fact the small church was full of iconography and there was a wall separating the church from the altar. I asked the priest how the people attending liturgy in the church could know what was going on if this wall was in front of the altar and his response was they can hear the prayers being offered. About a year and a half after this first experience I was in the process of converting from Roman Catholicism to Orthodoxy, which included a year long stop in the Byzantine Catholic Church. I took my Roman Catholic parents to visit a Byzantine Catholic Church in Columbus, Ohio, and they asked the same question I asked while visiting Germany years earlier: What was that wall of icons doing in front of the altar and why was the church so full of icons? The answer to the question at first appears simple but is actually quite full of tradition, history and scripture. Back in Darmstadt, I had failed to realize that the wall of icons was just as much an integral part of worship as the Liturgy performed behind it.
The development of iconography and of the style of the Orthodox Church has gone hand in hand with the development of Orthodoxy itself. The churches existing before the Edict of Milan, the Roman declaration that legalized Christianity, were very simple and had very simple iconography. This was a historical necessity as these churches were simple and hidden to avoid persecution. Catacomb churches show primitive, yet intricate iconography, as is the case with the cave
churches in the Goreme Valley in Cappadocia. Another early church, St. Serge Church in Maaloula, Syria, which dates from the early fourth century, has a solid wall with a simple open door in the place where the iconostasis would later develop. By the time of the Iconoclast Heresy in the eighth and ninth centuries, there already existed Orthodox churches full of beautiful iconography.
To the non-Orthodox Christian the presence of the iconostasis seems foreign and obtrusive. However, it strengthens the communion of saints, gives call to worshippers to contemplate the eternal, and
solidly demarcates the sacred space of the altar from the rest of the church. The iconostasis does this in a way that invites and yet firmly reminds us of the reverence needed for holy things and holy spaces. The
reverence for sacred space has been lost in Western Christianity with devastating consequences for those who are not Orthodox.
After the Orthodox victory over iconoclasm, the iconostasis began its centuries-long development. As the faithful brought their own icons to hang on the wall or lattice screen that separated the sanctuary
from the rest of the church, they would gradually fill the wall, row by row. Slowly, the rows of icons took on an organized form, giving meaning to the place of each icon on the iconstasis. It is not until the middle ages in Russia that we find the completed development of the iconostasis in its classical form. From there it slowly spread to the rest of the Orthodox world. Historically, the placing of icons in the sacred spaces of churches is a movement that was begun and continued by the Orthodox faithful, not something forced on the faithful by the Church. Indeed, the placing of sacred images in sacred spaces dates back to the Old Testament.
Though the presence of images in sacred spaces dates back to the Old Testament, the veneration of icons was not always easily accepted by all Christians. By the eighth century, an iconoclast controversy began, which would plague the church for the better part of a century. The iconoclasts opposed the use of holy images based, in part, on the second commandment, but also on the belief that the spiritual is far superior to the material, and therefore a material image couldnt possibly be sacred. There were many powerful influences on the iconoclasts, including the Moslems and a number of the Byzantine Emperors. Orthodoxy tends to not define dogmas until it becomes absolutely necessary for the good of the Church to do so. As a result, the responses to iconoclasm were not yet fully developed at the time of the iconoclast outbreak. It took the writings of St. John of Damascus, St. Theodore Studite and an ecumenical council, to solve the problem. In fact, it took two councils to resolve the controversy as the first council agreed with the iconoclasts. Several decades later a second, true council was called to refute the first council. It was
only after the second council that iconoclasm began to wane.
Why are Orthodox Churches Full of Icons?
My first experience in an Orthodox Church was visiting a Russian Chapel in Darmstadt, Germany. It was a small Orthodox chapel, which had been built by the Czar of Russia for his daughter, who married the Grand Duke of Hessen. I was struck with awe at the fact the small church was full of iconography and there was a wall separating the church from the altar. I asked the priest how the people attending liturgy in the church could know what was going on if this wall was in front of the altar and his response was they can hear the prayers being offered. About a year and a half after this first experience I was in the process of converting from Roman Catholicism to Orthodoxy, which included a year long stop in the Byzantine Catholic Church. I took my Roman Catholic parents to visit a Byzantine Catholic Church in Columbus, Ohio, and they asked the same question I asked while visiting Germany years earlier: What was that wall of icons doing in front of the altar and why was the church so full of icons? The answer to the question at first appears simple but is actually quite full of tradition, history and scripture. Back in Darmstadt, I had failed to realize that the wall of icons was just as much an integral part of worship as the Liturgy performed behind it.
The development of iconography and of the style of the Orthodox Church has gone hand in hand with the development of Orthodoxy itself. The churches existing before the Edict of Milan, the Roman declaration that legalized Christianity, were very simple and had very simple iconography. This was a historical necessity as these churches were simple and hidden to avoid persecution. Catacomb churches show primitive, yet intricate iconography, as is the case with the cave
churches in the Goreme Valley in Cappadocia. Another early church, St. Serge Church in Maaloula, Syria, which dates from the early fourth century, has a solid wall with a simple open door in the place where the iconostasis would later develop. By the time of the Iconoclast Heresy in the eighth and ninth centuries, there already existed Orthodox churches full of beautiful iconography.
To the non-Orthodox Christian the presence of the iconostasis seems foreign and obtrusive. However, it strengthens the communion of saints, gives call to worshippers to contemplate the eternal, and
solidly demarcates the sacred space of the altar from the rest of the church. The iconostasis does this in a way that invites and yet firmly reminds us of the reverence needed for holy things and holy spaces. The
reverence for sacred space has been lost in Western Christianity with devastating consequences for those who are not Orthodox.
After the Orthodox victory over iconoclasm, the iconostasis began its centuries-long development. As the faithful brought their own icons to hang on the wall or lattice screen that separated the sanctuary
from the rest of the church, they would gradually fill the wall, row by row. Slowly, the rows of icons took on an organized form, giving meaning to the place of each icon on the iconstasis. It is not until the middle ages in Russia that we find the completed development of the iconostasis in its classical form. From there it slowly spread to the rest of the Orthodox world. Historically, the placing of icons in the sacred spaces of churches is a movement that was begun and continued by the Orthodox faithful, not something forced on the faithful by the Church. Indeed, the placing of sacred images in sacred spaces dates back to the Old Testament.
Though the presence of images in sacred spaces dates back to the Old Testament, the veneration of icons was not always easily accepted by all Christians. By the eighth century, an iconoclast controversy began, which would plague the church for the better part of a century. The iconoclasts opposed the use of holy images based, in part, on the second commandment, but also on the belief that the spiritual is far superior to the material, and therefore a material image couldnt possibly be sacred. There were many powerful influences on the iconoclasts, including the Moslems and a number of the Byzantine Emperors. Orthodoxy tends to not define dogmas until it becomes absolutely necessary for the good of the Church to do so. As a result, the responses to iconoclasm were not yet fully developed at the time of the iconoclast outbreak. It took the writings of St. John of Damascus, St. Theodore Studite and an ecumenical council, to solve the problem. In fact, it took two councils to resolve the controversy as the first council agreed with the iconoclasts. Several decades later a second, true council was called to refute the first council. It was
only after the second council that iconoclasm began to wane.