John Chrysostom on the origin of idolatry in honoring the dearly departed:
“We will examine, if you please, whence idolatry took its rise. A certain wise man (Wisd. 14:16) tells us, that a certain rich man afflicted with untimely mourning for his son, and having no consolation for his sorrow, consoled his passion in this way: having made a lifeless image of the dead, and constantly gazing at it, he seemed through the image to have his departed one still; whilst certain flatterers, ‘whose God was their belly’ (Philippians 3:19), treating the image with reverence in order to do him honor, carried on the custom into idolatry. So then it took its rise from weakness of soul, from a senseless custom, from extravagance.”
John Chrysostom, Homily 18 on Ephesians 5:14.
Chrysostom is referring to Wisdom 14:16, and here’s the context:
“For the devising of idols was the beginning of spiritual fornication, and the invention of them the corruption of life. 13 For neither were they from the beginning, neither shall they be for ever. 14 For by the vain glory of men they entered into the world, and therefore shall they come shortly to an end. 15 For a father afflicted with untimely mourning, when he hath made an image [eikona, an icon or image] of his child soon taken away, now honoured him [entimaesen, any sort of honor] as a god, which was then a dead man, and delivered to those that were under him ceremonies and sacrifices. 16 Thus in process of time an ungodly custom grown strong was kept as a law, and graven images were worshipped [timan, any sort of honor] by the commandments of kings,” Wisdom 14:12-16.
Protestants and all iconoclasts agree with Wisdom and with Chrysostom. 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. It leads to eventually honoring 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, senseless custom.
The word for “honor” used in Wisdom 14:15 means, according to Friberg’s Lexicon “as ascribing worth to someone honor, revere, respect”. It is the type of honor that a person shows to his father and mother:
Matthew 15:4: “For God commanded, saying, Honour [Tima, any sort of honor] thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.”
Therefore, all honors offered to images are forms of spiritual fornication, according to Wisdom, and this sentence is approved of by Chrysostom, and by all iconoclasts.
Augustine agrees that the making of images of dearly departed was the beginning of this deception, favored by the folly of the fallen nature of man. This madness of image making, then image honoring led inevitably to offering divine honors (incense, kissing, bowing, prayers):
“This deception was favored by the folly of the human heart, especially when regret for the dead led to the making of likenesses, and so to the use of images. By the increase of this homage, divine honors came to be paid to the dead as dwelling in heaven, [such honors as are now given to the icons of saints!] while devils took their place on earth as the objects of worship, and required that their deluded and degraded votaries should present sacrifices to them.”
Augustine, Reply to Faustus the Manichaean, Book 22, Section 17.
Chrysostom also compares the civil custom of making images of kings with true Christian iconography (restoring the image of God in man), which has nothing to do with the making of any kind of physical, material, or visible icons or images:
“For if men for making statues and painting portraits of kings enjoy so great honor, shall not we who adorn the image of the King of kings, (for man is the image of God,) receive ten thousand blessings, if we effect a true likeness? For the likeness is in this, in the virtue of the soul, when we train our children to be good, to be meek, to be forgiving, (because all these are attributes of God,) to be beneficent, to be humane; when we train them to regard the present world as nothing.”
John Chrysostom, Homily 21 on Ephesians 6:4.
Thus for Chrysostom, the true image to be formed is not an external painting or statue, like the vanity of the heathens impelled them to do for their kings, but in the “virtue of the soul,” in which the image of God consists. The true image to be made is not of paint or marble, but of goodness, meekness, forgiveness, and to regard the present world (including paint and marble!) as nothing.
Chrysostom likewise cites that images were used by many to evoke demons (as Augustine pointed out above), in rebuking the opulence of many in his day, even in their homes:
“Again, how is it when we erect splendid and spacious mansions, decorated with columns, marbles, porticos, arcades, and in every possible way, setting images and statues everywhere? Many indeed even call demons out of these, i.e. the images, but let us omit the examination of those points.”
Chrysostom, Homily 10 on Philippians 3:1-3.
Lactantius goes further, giving a thorough treatment of the origins, nature, and foolishness of making or offering religious gestures to images as part of his Divine Institutes. What is significant is that were the views of John of Damascus or the Second Council of Nicea the ordinary current of patristic faith and practice, there is no doubt that the early fathers would have been morally and logically required to made extensive apologetics for the “Christian use of images,” or would have illustrated the distinction between heathen use of images and the Christian use. But they do no such thing. Rather, their expositions, condemnations, lampoonings, or iconology is nothing short of damning them as heathen superstition, as senseless, as vain, as demonic, and badges of heathenism, and sharing nothing in common with a spiritual religion. As we shall see in our next installment, God willing, the Gnostics were the first formal group of supposed Christians to use images, make them, and honor them, both of Christ and of others.
“Afterwards the kings themselves, since they were beloved by those whose life they had civilized, after their death left regret of themselves. Therefore men formed images of them, that they might derive some consolation from the contemplation of their likenesses; and proceeding further through love of their worth, they began to reverence the memory of the deceased, that they might appear to be grateful for their services, and might attract their successors to a desire of ruling well.”
Lactantius, Divine Institutes, Book 1, Chapter 15.
On the origin of such vain usages, Athanasius comments in his apology Against the Heathen, citing the same text in Wisdom 14 regarding the history and variety of idolatry (Part 1, Section 11).
He traces the downward gradations of idolatry from the works of God (sun, moon, stars) to the ether, to man upon the earth:
“For hiding, by the complications of bodily lusts, the mirror which, as it were, is in her, by which alone she had the power of seeing the Image of the Father, she no longer sees what a soul ought to behold, but is carried about by everything, and only sees the things which come under the senses.”
Athanasius, Against the Heathen, Part 1, Section 9.
“But just as they who have fallen first creep in the slime like land-snails, so the most impious of mankind, having fallen lower and lower from the idea of God, then set up as gods men, and the forms of men, some still living, others even after their death.”
Athanasius, Against the Heathen, Part 1, Section 9.
Thus, heathenism is characterized by reference to material objects being used as objects of religious worship, or such objects as fall under bodily passion. Images are such creatures. The saints, after their death, are deified, given divine honors, such as bowing, incense, and prayer. Whatever a man worships by religious gestures is his god. You will note that throughout the early fathers, as with Athanasius, to set up a religious image is ALWAYS condemned as making men (or other creatures) into gods, whether they are yet alive or dearly departed. There is no place in their writings for the religious use of images, except in heathenism.
The testimony of Sibyl was brought in as proof of the vanity of images of dead men as a species of heathenism by Justin Martyr:
“There is one only unbegotten God, Omnipotent, invisible, most high, All-seeing, but Himself seen by no flesh…. But we have strayed from the Immortal’s ways, And worship with a dull and senseless mind Idols, the workmanship of our own hands, And images and figures of dead men,”
Justin Martyr, Hortatory Address To The Greeks, Chapter 16. The word for “worship” [gerairomen] simply means to “honor, reward with a gift.” The simplest honor to images and figures of dead men, represents a dull and senseless mind, since it is hand-made, and therefore unworthy to be honored in any way, being mere human production.
In summary, the early fathers of the church considered the use of images in worship to be rooted in heathenism, in a father’s untimely mourning for a lost child, in figures of dead men being given honors such as bowing, incense, kissing (things done to Baal in the Old Testament, things prohibited by the 10 Commandments). The vices of foolishness, weakness of soul, deceit, covetousness, and other dark features of human nature impelled this “honor” to eventually degrade to divine honors of worship.
For the early fathers, this heathen root quickly spread to demonic seduction. Christians, as we shall see in a later post, basically understood that where an image is, there is no true God, only demons. Where an image is, there is no holiness, only corruption. Where an image is, there is no religion.
