As we saw in our former post (read here), Protestants iconoclasts agree with the apocryphal book of Wisdom and with Chrysostom regarding the nature and history of the use of images in worship. Making idols (even of mere departed saints, family members, kings, or other humans) is the beginning of spiritual fornication. These images are a corruption of life. They arose from weakness of soul. They are a senseless custom. The honor paid to images eventually leads to worshipping the dearly departed as a god, though the departed are but dead men, yet ceremonies (like kissing, bowing the knee, incense, etc.) are eventually offered. These acts of religious honor and respect are referred to as ungodly custom, spiritual whoredom, and a senseless custom.
AGAINST HERESIES AND HEATHENISM
In Book 1, Chapter 25, Section 6 of Irenaeus’ Against Heresies, he describes as heretics those that possess and honor images:
“They style themselves Gnostics. They also possess images, some of them painted, and others formed from different kinds of material; while they maintain that a likeness of Christ was made by Pilate at that time when Jesus lived among them. They crown these images, and set them up along with the images of the philosophers of the world that is to say, with the images of Pythagoras, and Plato, and Aristotle, and the rest. They have also other modes of honoring these images, after the same manner of the Gentiles.”
Note that for Irenaeus (and for all true Christians), possessing and honoring images are absurd and wicked actions, and are suitable to Gentiles. Those who possess or honor images, even of supposed images of Christ are like these Gnostics.
Theophilus of Antioch gives a reiteration of the Second Commandment as forbidding the making of images, and condemns idols or likenesses in the strongest of terms, as any iconoclast would do. Note that he makes no apology or reference to any kind of “Christian use of images,” because such a thing did not exist in his day. Later, as heretics spread their poisonous doctrines, especially through the monks, more and more abuses and anti-Christian adoptions of Judaism and heathenism were made by false teachers in the church.
The religious use of images was a heresy against which the early fathers preached and wrote:
“Why should I further recount the multitude of animals worshipped by the Egyptians, both reptiles, and cattle, and wild beasts, and birds and riverfishes; and even wash-pots and disgraceful noises? But if you cite the Greeks and the other nations, they worship stones and wood, and other kinds of material substances, — the images, as we have just been saying, of dead men.”
To Autolycus, Book 1, Chapter 10.
“And, for the rest, would that in a kindly spirit you would investigate divine things — I mean the things that are spoken by the prophets — in order that, by comparing what is said by us with the utterances of the others, you may be able to discover the truth. We have shown from their own histories, which they have compiled, that the names of those who are called gods, are found to be the names of men who lived among them, as we have shown above. And to this day their images [eikones] are daily fashioned, idols [eidola], ‘the works of men’s hands.’ And these the mass of foolish men serve, whilst they reject the maker and fashioner of all things and the nourisher of all breath of life, giving credit to vain doctrines through the deceitfulness of the senseless tradition received from their fathers. But God at least, the Father and Creator of the universe did not abandon mankind, but gave a law, and sent holy prophets to declare and teach the race of men, that each one of us might awake and understand that there is one God. And they also taught us to refrain from unlawful idolatry, and adultery, and murder, fornication, theft, avarice, false swearing, wrath, and every incontinence and uncleanness; and that whatever a man would not wish to be done to himself, he should not do to another; and thus he who acts righteously shall escape the eternal punishments, and be thought worthy of the eternal life from God.”
To Autolycus, Book 2, Chapter 34.
Note that for Theophilus, in order to be saved, you must obey the 10 Commandments, including (perhaps especially) the Second Commandment respecting the not making or offering religious gestures or service to such images. Those that make graven images and use religious service to those dearly departed are a mass of foolish men, who have been deceived by senseless tradition handed down from their fathers. Such are all who worship the works of men’s hands, according to Theophilus. The holy prophets of the Old Testament (Moses, Isaiah, etc.) taught Christian doctrine regarding our attitude and religious practices concerning images of men used in religious service.
Note also that for Theophilus, unlike later apologists for icons, the incarnation of the Son of God altered nothing regarding the moral duty of man with respect to graven images, the works of men’s hands. Though the mass of foolish men followed these senseless traditions of the heathen, yet God graciously gave us the Old Testament Scriptures through Moses, Isaiah, and other prophets of the Living God to teach us the truth. Theophilus argues from the specific nature of man as created in God’s image, including the Second Commandment’s prohibition of religious gestures to things produced by man’s hands. The nature of God HIMSELF, as reflected in the Second Commandment (as in all precepts of the Decalogue), can never be abrogated, modified, or slackened by the work of redemption through the incarnation of the Son of God.
What is also of interest is Theophilus’s usage of various terms that later iconodules would seek to distinguish (though these terms are synonyms) such as icon and idol, “And to this day their images [eikones] are daily fashioned, idols [eidola], ‘the works of men’s hands.’” The key point is that anything manufactured, whatever one wishes to call it, is in fact an idol, and falls under the divine condemnation as a violation of the moral law, the Ten Commandments.
Epiphanius’s actions, as recorded in Jerome’s Epistles are well known, and indicate the attitude of the Church Fathers, and of Christians generally in his day, down to Jerome’s, and it bears no resemblance at all to any who would use images with some kind of religious honor:
“When I accompanied you to the holy place called Bethel, there to join you in celebrating the Collect, after the use of the Church, I came to a villa called Anablatha and, as I was passing, saw a lamp burning there. Asking what place it was, and learning it to be a church, I went in to pray, and found there a curtain hanging on the doors of the said church, dyed and embroidered. It bore an image either of Christ or of one of the saints; I do not rightly remember whose the image was. Seeing this, and being loth that an image of a man should be hung up in Christ’s church contrary to the teaching of the Scriptures, I tore it asunder and advised the custodians of the place to use it as a winding sheet for some poor person. They, however, murmured, and said that if I made up my mind to tear it, it was only fair that I should give them another curtain in its place. As soon as I heard this, I promised that I would give one, and said that I would send it at once. Since then there has been some little delay, due to the fact that I have been seeking a curtain of the best quality to give to them instead of the former one, and thought it right to send to Cyprus for one. I have now sent the best that I could find, and I beg that you will order the presbyter of the place to take the curtain which I have sent from the hands of the Reader, and that you will afterwards give directions that curtains of the other sort — opposed as they are to our religion — shall not be hung up in any church of Christ. A than of your uprightness should be careful to remove an occasion of offense unworthy alike of the Church of Christ and of those Christians who are committed to your charge,”
Jerome, Epistle 51, Section 9.
Note that for the fathers, the possession, painting, forming, crowning, setting up, or honoring of images, whether of Jesus Christ, one of the saints, or Greek heroes, was the manner of the Gentiles. Professed Christians who make, possess, and honor images of Christ Jesus are akin to the Gnostics. As Epiphanius stated, images are not to be hung up in Christian places of worship, since such senseless customs are contrary to the teaching of the Scriptures, opposed to our religion, and are an occasion of offense and scandal to both the Church as a whole and to those Christians committed to episcopal oversight. As a sidelight, for Epiphanius, as for other Fathers, our religion is formed by the teaching of the Scriptures.
In Epiphanius’ Panarion, or catalogue of early church errors, Against Heresies, he goes into extensive detail to the rising leaven of the heathen and Gnostics in the religious honoring of images, especially of the holy Virgin:
“And yet the men who are worshiped [proskunomenoi] have died, and their images [agalmata], which have never lived, are introduced for worship [proskuneita]—and since they’ve never lived they can’t be called dead either! And with adulterous intent they have rebelled against the one and only God, like a common whore who has been excited to the wickedness of many relations and rejected the temperate course of lawful marriage to one husband.”
These heretics introduced men for proskuneisis, later defended by the Second Council of Nicea. Heresy became law, it would appear. Further, the absurdity of such proskuneisis is pointed out with reference to the nature of an image, never having lived, and so the dead images are set forth to be religiously honored by living men in a massive inversion of the order of nature, a kind of spiritual prostitution. This use of proskuneisis of images is a rebellion against the one and only God, a spiritual whoredom, like common whoredom. Not only is the Second Council of Nicea absurd to promote dead things to living men, but it is like a massive brothel of spiritual whoredom, according to the teachings of the early church.
“Yes, of course Mary’s body was holy, but she was not God. Yes, the Virgin was indeed a virgin and honored [tetimaemenae] as such, but she was not given us to worship [proskuneisin]; she worships [proskunousa] Him who, though born of her flesh, has come from heaven, from the bosom of his Father. And the Gospel therefore protects us by telling us so on the occasion when the Lord himself said, ‘Woman, what is between me and thee? Mine hour is not yet come.’ For to make sure that no one would suppose, because of the words, ‘What is between me and thee?’ that the holy Virgin is anything more than a woman, he called her ‘Woman’ as if by prophecy, because of the schisms and sects [haireseoes] that were to appear on earth. Otherwise some might stumble into the nonsense of the sect [haireseoes] from excessive awe of the saint.”
Epiphanius, Against Heresies or Panarion, 4.6.
Imagine if Epiphanius lived to see the day when heresies and schisms anathematized the teaching of the Scriptures and doctrines and practices contrary to our religion! When heretics would teach men to pray prayers invoking the holy Virgin, going to a “higher degree of worship” to her than even that afforded to images! The holy Gospels protect the faithful from such schisms and heresies by showing that Mary, though honored as a holy Virgin, yet was not given us to offer religious bowing or honor to her, but merely to honor her role as the God-bearer, no more. Otherwise, she has her place among the rest of the saints, to be honored by imitation of their graces, but never to offer religious proskuneisis to them. Mary worships God, therefore Mary, as our fellow-servant, is not to be worshiped, as the angel informed John when he offered proskuneisis to him:
“And I John saw these things, and heard them. And when I had heard and seen, I fell down to worship [proskunaesai] before the feet of the angel which shewed me these things. Then saith he unto me, See thou do it not: for I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book: worship [proskunaeson] God,” Revelation 22:8-9.
Mary, like the angel, would tell her Gnostic-like, heretical devotees the same thing: worship God. And the holy Gospel prophesied as much in the rebuke that our Lord’s to Mary. And Mary worships her son alone, and so should we.
Epiphanius’s attack on heresies continues:
“Again, where has this coiled serpent come from? How are its crooked counsels renewed? Mary should be honored [En timae esto], but the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit should be worshiped [proskuneistho]; no one should worship [proskuneito] Mary. There is no commandment to offer [prostetaktai] the Eucharist [tah mustaereeon] even to a man, as though to God, let alone to a woman; not even angels are allowed such glory [doxologian].”
Epiphanius, Against Heresies or Panarion, 7.5.
Note that Epiphanius, as all the earlier fathers, did not allow for proskuneisis to any creature, not to saints, images of Christ, images of Mary, not even to angels. Mary, saints, and angels may be given honor for the blessings or positions bestowed upon them by God, and may be honored with the same kind of honor as parents are to be honored with. But none may be given cultic or religious gestures, especially to their images and supposed memorials.
“But again, these women are ‘renewing the position for Fortune and preparing the table for the demon [toe daimonee] (Isa. 65:11) and not for God, as the scripture says. And they drink impious drinks as the word of God says, ‘And the women grind flour, and their sons gather wood to make cakes for the host of heaven.’ (Jer. 7:18) Such women should be silenced by Jeremiah, and not frighten the world. They must not say, ‘We honour [Teemoemen] the queen of heaven [taen basileesan tou uranou]’ (Jer. 51:18).”
Thus, honoring an image with bread and wine under the title the queen of heaven was considered by Epiphanius to be heresy, idolatry, and preparing a table for devils. Even though the idolaters use a lesser word “honor,” or the Greek verb “Teemoemen,” yet because Mary is honored by these heretics under a heavenly title, this honor is demonic, flat idolatry, schismatic impiety.
In fact, the early Father’s use of the world group for images reflects the New Testament’s usage. The only groups in the New Testament using icons, or other man-made objects for worship are Jews, heathens, and devotees of the Man of Sin and Anti-Christ. In the New Testament, as in the early Fathers, there are NO MATERIAL CHRISTIAN IMAGES. The same goes for altars, expiatory sacrifices, and liturgical priesthoods: Judaism, heathenism, or anti-Christianism possess such “elements of the world.” Christ is our Great High Priest, He was the Altar, He was the Sacrifice, offered once for all to make eternal redemption; Jews, heathens, and the Man of Sin’s kingdom lacking Christ as Prophet, Priest, and King grovel in bondage, and so need such elements of the world.
What Epiphanius says is perfectly consistent with what Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Chrysostom, Lactantius, Theophilus, and Athanasius said on religious images: they are species of heathenism, and the honor rendered to them is departure from the apostolic tradition. Further, it is lawless and forbidden by the Second Commandment. It is contrary to man’s specific nature, God’s specific nature, the moral law, and common sense. It is senseless, rooted in human weakness, deceitful, vain, and handed down by mere lawless tradition.
Athanasius refers to acts that ought only be given to God as being given to women by idolaters:
“For even women, whom it is not safe to admit to deliberation about public affairs, they worship [thraeskeuousi] and serve [sebousin] with the honor [timae] due to God, such as those enjoined by Theseus as above stated, and among the Egyptians His and the Maid and the Younger one, and among others Aphrodite.”
Note that for Athanasius, as for Scripture before him, honor due to God includes worship and service. Honor in worship is only due to God. Athanasius is not referring to mere civil honor, as to a king or to parents, but religious honor, using the verbs thraeskeuousi and sebousin. The former verb thraeskeuousi refers to what Friberg’s Lexicon calls: “religion, religious service or worship… especially as expressed in a system of external observances.” It includes the rites and religion of the sect of the Pharisees (Acts 26:5), to the offering of religious service to angels (Colossians 2:18), and to pure religion before God (James 1:26-27).
The latter verb sebousin refers to things like the vain man-made doctrines and commandments for worship such as washing the hands prior to eating (Matthew 15:9).
Friberg refers to this latter term as meaning “the worship of a deity worship, venerate, adore.”
In Part 13 of Contra Gentes, Athanasius presents arguments devastating to both heathens and Christianized heathens, as all who use images in religion are. For example, he presents elaborate and forceful arguments as to why man-made material objects cannot be used in religious worship:
“Again, in worshipping [proskunountes] things of wood and stone, they do not see that, while they tread under foot and burn what is in no way different, they call portions of these materials gods. And what they made use of a little while ago, they carve and worship in their folly, not seeing, nor at all considering that they are worshipping, not gods, but the carver’s art.”
This first verb proskunountes is the same verb commanded of supposed Christians in the Second Council at Nicea, in favor of the worshipping of what is made by man’s hands. The Latin translation in Migne is “adorant,” to adore. This verb includes all bowing, falling down, or other self-humbling religious rites. It is used as a parallel for religious “service” or latreia in Matthew 4:9-10.
When Second Nicea orders proskuneia, it ran afoul of both Athanasius and the unique prerogatives of the living God to exclusively receive such worship. It is flat idolatry. God alone is the object of proskuneia (never creatures, much less images!), and also of latreia. The false wisdom of seeking to justify the religious veneration offered to images by distinguishing types of proskuneia into this or that sort is vain. Virtually every time proskuneia is offered in the NT, it is religious worship (to Christ, to the King in the parable of the unforgiving servant, representing Christ, to false gods like Remphan, Cornelius’s heathen worship rebuked by Peter, anti-Christian worship of material objects, worship of the image of the beast, John’s idolatrous worship of the angel, which was rebuked). The sole exception is the false Jews from the synagogue of Satan being made to worship before the saints of the living God. All worship to religious objects is either of the true God, or of false gods (images and figures made by men’s hands).
Augustine likewise points out that artists are more worthy of honor than their art, a point that strikes the death blow of any kind of religious honor whatsoever being paid to material objects (as bowing, kissing, incense, etc.):
“Let not our religion be the worship of human works. The workmen are better than their works, yet we must not worship them. Let not our religion be the worship of beasts. The worst men are better than beasts, but we must not worship them. Let not our religion be the worship of dead men. If they lived pious lives [as undoubtedly the saints did!], it must not be supposed that they seek divine honours. They want us to worship him, in whose light they rejoice to have us as sharers in their merit. They are to be honoured by imitation and not adored with religious rites,”
Augustine, Of True Religion, Chapter LV.
Note that religious rites, such as bowing, praying, incense, or other rites of honor given to human works are not part of the true religion, but of false religion. The saints have no desire that we would honor them with religious rites, but rather by imitation of their lives. By cultivating the image of God in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness. If Augustine were of John of Damascus’ opinion, certainly here would have been the perfect place to insert how Christians honor the images of dead saints who lived pious lives by some kind of false wisdom’s terms of dulaea, or proskuneia. Augustine, however, was not of John’s opinion on this topic, he was of ours. He certainly distinguishes the terms dulia from latreia, but never applies any term to the use or honor given to man-made, material objects.
Athanasius goes on to lampoon the foolishness of men that would offer worship to inanimate objects, such as are all icons, paintings, carvings, sculptures, or any other object created by the skill of man, and the materials that we ought to trample under our feet:
“How then can they fail to be judged godless by all, who even by the divine Scripture are accused of impiety? Or how can they be anything but miserable, who are thus openly convicted of worshipping dead things instead of the truth?”
This is the heart and soul of iconoclasm: we ought to piously condemn all divine honors, rites, or ceremonies offered to dead things, all material productions from man’s hands. We are to worship [proskunaesoe] the Lord our God, and Him only are we to serve. He is the truth we are to worship, all else is godless and impious, and leads to misery.
Such are all icons or religious statues or images: dead things; made by the hands of men; made of materials which we tread under our feet.
Lactantius sums up the universal opinion of the early fathers of the church nicely:
“Whoever, therefore, is anxious to observe the obligations to which man is liable, and to maintain a regard for his nature, let him raise himself from the ground, and, with mind lifted up, let him direct his eyes to heaven: let him not seek God under his feet, nor dig up from his footprints an object of veneration, for whatever lies beneath man must necessarily be inferior to man;but let him seek it aloft, let him seek it in the highest place: for nothing can be greater than man, except that which is above man. But God is greater than man: therefore He is above, and not below; nor is He to be sought in the lowest, but rather in the highest region. Wherefore it is undoubted that there is no religion wherever there is an image. For if religion consists of divine things, and there is nothing divine except in heavenly things; it follows that images are without religion, because there can be nothing heavenly in that which is made from the earth,”
Lactantius, Divine Institutes, Book 2, Chapter 19.
Icons and images are made from the earth, stone, clay, lime, paints, etc. They are, therefore, by definition, without religion. They are not heavenly, they are earthly. Their presence removes religion from any assemblies in which they are present.
With all this in mind, it is easy to understand why our Protestant forefathers were iconoclasts with regard to worship. Our iconoclastic, Protestant forefathers insisted that man’s eyes must be raised aloft for religious service, for proskunaea, for doulaea, for prayers, bowing, and all holy rites are to be only done at God’s will, and only directed toward Him, never to His creatures.
Augustine is on point here:
“But they seem to themselves to have a purer religion, who say, I neither worship an idol, nor a devil; but in the bodily image I behold an emblem of that which I am bound to worship… They presume to reply, that they worship not the bodies themselves, but the deities which preside over the government of them. One sentence of the Apostle, therefore, testifieth to their punishment and condemnation; “Who,” he saith, “have changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever.” For in the former part of this sentence he condemned idols; [eikonoi in Romans 1:23, called “the lie” in Romans 1:25] in the latter, the account they give of their idols: for by designating images wrought by an artificer by the names of the works of God’s creation, they change the truth of God into a lie; while, by considering these works themselves as deities, and worshipping them as such, they serve the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever,”
Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 115.
Nothing manufactured is to be adored; nothing may be adored but God. No prayer or religious gestures and honors are to be given to any creature. This is the patristic iconoclasm, and this is the Protestant sort. This is our fathers’ God, and we shall exalt him, AND NO OTHER.
Augustine argues that such images are quite different from the articles we use in the sacraments, made by men’s hands, since such articles are neither images of men, nor do they have eyes, ears, mouths, etc.:
“This is the chief cause of this insane profanity, that the figure resembling the living person, which induces men to worship it, hath more influence in the minds of these miserable persons, than the evident fact that it is not living, so that it ought to be despised by the living,”
Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 115.
Those who offer religious worship to images of living persons are miserable. They are snared. They fall to the error of heathenism.
“The result that ensueth is that described in the next verse: ‘They that make them are like unto them, and so are all such as put their trust in them’ (ver. 8). Let them therefore see with open eyes, and worship with shut and dead understandings, idols that neither see nor live,”
Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 115.
Augustine, as Athanasius, argues that the maker of images should be given higher honors than the images themselves, since the man who makes images is the creator of the image, and the creator is always more honorable than the creation. Moreover, even men bow before icons are more to be honored than the icons. EVEN DOGS, CATS, and MONKEYS are more to be honored than icons or images!
“‘For they have mouths, and speak not: eyes have they, and see not’ (ver. 5). ‘They have ears, and hear not: noses have they, and smell not’ (ver. 6). ‘They have hands, and handle not; feet have they, and walk not; neither cry they through their throat’ (ver. 7). Even their artist therefore surpasseth them, since he had the faculty of molding them by the motion and functions of his limbs: though thou wouldest be ashamed to worship that artist. Even thou surpassest them, though thou hast not made these things, since thou doest what they cannot do. Even a beast doth excel them; for unto this it is added, ‘neither cry they through their throat.’ For after he had said above, ‘they have mouths, and speak not;’ what need was there, after he had enumerated the limbs from head to feet, to repeat what he had said of their crying through their throat; unless, I suppose, because we perceive that what he mentioned of the other members, was common to men and beasts? For they see, and hear, and smell, and walk, and some, apes for instance, handle with hands. But what he had said of the mouth, is peculiar to men: since beasts do not speak. But that no one might refer what hath been said to the works of human members alone, and prefer men only to the gods of the heathen; after all this he added these words, ‘neither cry they through their throat:’ which again is common to men and cattle… How ‘much better then do mice and serpents, and other animals of like sort, judge of the idols of the heathen, so to speak, for they regard not the human figure in them when they see not the human life. For this reason they usually build nests in them, and unless they are deterred by human movements, they seek for themselves no safer habitations. A man then moveth himself, that he may frighten away a living beast from his own god; and yet worshippeth that god who cannot move himself, as if he were powerful, from whom he drove away one better than the object of his worship… Even the dead surpasseth a deity who neither liveth nor hath lived,”
Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 115.
The condemnation of heathen gods applies to all religious icons or images. They have eyes, but cannot see; ears, but they cannot hear; hands, but they cannot handle; nor do they speak through their throats. They resemble the heathen idols in every single way enumerated in Psalm 115, and exposited by Augustine from that Sacred Text.
And if Augustine were of John of Damascus’ later opinion, he blundered beyond measure by failing to ever offer a defense or apology for Christian icons, Christian images, Christian religious gestures offered to such images! Augustine, Chrysostom, Irenaeus, Lactantius, Epiphanius, Athanasius, and many more have NO DEFENSE OR MENTION OF Christian religious images. And the case is fairly simple: it’s because they condemned them all, and the early fathers understood the Scriptures on this point.
Athanasius concurred:
“So also yourselves, had ye your reasoning power in full strength, would not reduce to matter so great a revelation of the Godhead: but neither would ye have given to the image greater honor than to the man that carved it. For if there be any truth in the plea that, as letters, they indicate the manifestation of God, and are therefore, as indications of God, worthy to be deified, yet far more would it be right to deify the artist who carved and engraved them, as being far more powerful and divine than they, inasmuch as they were cut and fashioned according to his will. If then the letters are worthy of admiration, much more does the writer exceed them in wonder, by reason of his art and the skill of his mind,”
Athanasius, Contra Gentes, Part 21.
For Augustine and Athanasius, the reduction to absurdity amounts to this: those that sculpt, paint, write, or carve, or engage in any other artistic endeavor are FAR MORE worthy of honor than their art. Thus, whatever honor is given to images or icons should logically be given to the makers of such religious art. But, if you won’t honor the artist with religious gestures or respect, then don’t do so to their productions!
The reasoning and spirit of Athanasius the Great, reflecting the teaching of divine Scripture, the Prophets, Moses, our Lord, and Paul, is the same as Theophilus, Wisdom 14, Augustine, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Epiphanius, Lactantius, etc. And that same spirit is the spirit and reasoning of iconoclastic Protestantism.
If anyone teaches that the fathers of the first four or five centuries was of Nicea II’s opinion or of John of Damascus’ opinion, it would be a blatant lie. It would reflect such a heretics desire to see things that are not there. It is a classic case of eisegesis, where the desired outcome is READ INTO a text, rather than taking the author at his word, and extracting the meaning FROM the text, exegesis.
As a general rule, it does not appear that the earlier church fathers were proto-protestants. However, on the matter of the honor to be given to images, they are overwhelmingly and resoundingly in the same line of reasoning as iconoclastic Protestants.
Because Scripture was their rule on this point, they did not make grace (as the incarnation) abolish the spirituality of God, the nature of His worship, and the prohibition against making or bowing to images as some kind of religious honor.
Of interest also is that the Roman Civil Laws of Theodosius and Justinian forbade the making of images of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that anywhere such images were made of found, they were to be erased or destroyed in order to protect our Celestial Religion.
Such a civil law from pious emperors would be seen as godless and impious by John of Damascus. Iconoclastic Protestants agree with Theodosius and Justinian, and the better days of the church rather than the corruptions of John of Damascus and Nicea II.
“NO ONE SHALL BE PERMITTED TO CARVE OR PAINT THE IMAGE OF OUR SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST UPON EARTH, STONE, OR MARBLE.
1. The Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian to Eudoxius, Praetorian Prefect.
As it is Our diligent care to guard in every way the religion of the Celestial Divinity, We specially command that no one shall be permitted to trace, carve, or paint the image of Christ the Saviour either upon the earth, upon stone, or upon marble placed in the earth, but it shall be erased wherever found; and anyone who attempts to violate Our laws in this respect shall be subject to a heavy penalty.”
Images of Jesus were criminal under the Justinian Code, because they violate the religion of our Celestial Divinity. And as Moses taught, images of God are to be destroyed, or erased wherever found. This law was the law of the land when the Second Council of Nicea lawlessly determined to ignore the laws of the land. These are the types of laws that Charlemagne and others rested their case upon.
This law from Theodosius, reiterated by Justinian is the same as the opinion of Epiphanius, Athanasius, Augustine, Chrysostom, Wisdom 14, Lactantius, etc. etc.
My hope is that these quotations and thoughts will stir some up to further research. Especially of use would be reading the various Christian apologists against heathenism, as Athanasius’ Contra Gentes, Epiphanius Against Heresies, and other such writings in which images are ALWAYS condemned by the early fathers, and were seen as irrational, impious, heretical, sectarian, absurd, etc. The early Christians, as contrasted with the heathen, had no temples, altars, or images.
Lord willing, the next installment will continue with early Christian apologies against heathenism by other early church fathers, continuing the witness that the early church fathers were basically in agreement with the non-use of religious images, the precise position of iconoclastic Protestants.
