Triumph of Orthodoxy

In modern American culture, an "iconoclast" is someone who is celebrated as a "creative visionary," an innovator, a hero, a trailblazer; someone whose boldness and foresight we are to admire and emulate.

But, in Christianity an iconoclast is a heretic.

A controversy arose in the eighth century regarding the question of whether or not imagery was appropriate in Christian worship. Those who opposed the use of religious images were known as iconoclasts, which means "image smashers." This controvery stirred up so much trouble that the Church convened a council of bishops to settle the matter. They determined that the use of images is not only acceptable but necessary because, for one thing, it affirms the Incarnation.* They also anathematized those who reject the use of religious imagery. That is, they condemned their teaching as heresy.**

(Like other major heresies of the early Church, iconoclasm once again reared its head during the Protestant Reformation.)

The Church celebrates and reaffirms its use of holy images on the first Sunday of Lent (tomorrow), which is known as the Sunday of the Triumph of Orthodoxy.

The following video, which I boosted from the Pious Fabrications blog, provides a brief examination of holy icons and their use within the Orthodox devotional life.



For further reading:
Sunday of Orthodoxy (OrthodoxWiki)
Sunday of Orthodoxy (Antiochian Archdiocese)
The Sunday of Orthodoxy and the Current State of Affairs
Sunday of Orthodoxy (Glory to God for All Things blog)
Sermon on the Sunday of Orthodoxy (Abp Averky)
Sermon on the Sunday of Orthodoxy (Schmemann)
What is Orthodoxy? (orrologian blog)

* "...we keep unchanged all the ecclesiastical traditions handed down to us, whether in writing or verbally, one of which is the making of pictorial representations, agreeable to the history of the preaching of the Gospel, a tradition useful in many respects, but especially in this, that so the incarnation of the Word of God is shown forth as real and not merely phantastic, for these have mutual indications and without doubt have also mutual significations.

"We, therefore, following the royal pathway and the divinely inspired authority of our Holy Fathers and the traditions of the Catholic Church (for, as we all know, the Holy Spirit indwells her), define with all certitude and accuracy that just as the figure of the precious and life-giving Cross, so also the venerable and holy images, as well in painting and mosaic as of other fit materials, should be set forth in the holy churches of God, and on the sacred vessels and on the vestments and on hangings and in pictures both in houses and by the wayside, to wit, the figure of our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ, of our spotless Lady, the Mother of God, of the honourable Angels, of all Saints and of all pious people. For by so much more frequently as they are seen in artistic representation, by so much more readily are men lifted up to the memory of their prototypes, and to a longing after them; and to these should be given due salutation and honourable reverence (ἀσπασμὸν καὶ τιμητικὴν προσκύνησιν), not indeed that true worship of faith (λατρείαν) which pertains alone to the divine nature; but to these, as to the figure of the precious and life-giving Cross and to the Book of the Gospels and to the other holy objects, incense and lights may be offered according to ancient pious custom. For the honour which is paid to the image passes on to that which the image represents, and he who reveres the image reveres in it the subject represented."

** "Those, therefore who dare to think or teach otherwise, or as wicked heretics to spurn the traditions of the Church and to invent some novelty, or else to reject some of those things which the Church hath received (e.g., the Book of the Gospels, or the image of the cross, or the pictorial icons, or the holy reliques of a martyr), or evilly and sharply to devise anything subversive of the lawful traditions of the Catholic Church or to turn to common uses the sacred vessels or the venerable monasteries, if they be Bishops or Clerics, we command that they be deposed; if religious or laics, that they be cut off from communion.

"This is the faith of the Apostles, this is the faith of the orthodox, this is the faith which hath made firm the whole world. Believing in one God, to be celebrated in Trinity, we salute the honourable images! Those who do not so hold, let them be anathema. Those who do not thus think, let them be driven far away from the Church. For we follow the most ancient legislation of the Catholic Church. We keep the laws of the Fathers. We anathematize those who add anything to or take anything away from the Catholic Church. We anathematize the introduced novelty of the revilers of Christians. We salute the venerable images. We place under anathema those who do not do this. Anathema to them who presume to apply to the venerable images the things said in Holy Scripture about idols. Anathema to those who do not salute the holy and venerable images. Anathema to those who call the sacred images idols. Anathema to those who say that Christians resort to the sacred images as to gods. Anathema to those who say that any other delivered us from idols except Christ our God. Anathema to those who dare to say that at any time the Catholic Church received idols." (The Decree of the Holy, Great, Ecumenical Synod, the Second of Nicaea)