In prior posts (here, here, and here), we have reviewed the historical position of the early church fathers concerning the history of idolatry, being rooted in honoring images of the dearly departed, descending from honor to religious gestures, and then to full deification of such dearly departed ancestors. We also looked at the harsh language the fathers used against any material objects, summing up their general opinion in the words of Lactantius that “wherever there is an image, there is no religion.” Whether east or west, north or south, from Tertullian to Augustine to Athanasius to Chrysostom, we saw that the early fathers universally condemned the use of images in worship as superstitious, vain, devilish, foolish, etc.
In the previous installment, we saw how Trinitarian orthodoxy, as represented by Athanasius, Gregory Nyssa, and Gregory Nazianzen condemned proskunesis offered to any creature, especially by the Arians, since they offered proskunesis to Jesus under the notion of a creature. We saw that the distinguishing feature of idolatry is to give proskunesis to a creature, even if done in the name of Christ, and as Gregory Nyssa wrote, “We use this line and rule to arrive at the discernment of the object of worship [proskunoumenou], so as to be convinced that that alone is God which is neither ‘new’ nor ‘alien’. From Athanasius, we saw that “creature does not worship [oo proskuneitai] creature, but servant [doulos] Lord [despotaen], and creature God [Theon].” From Gregory Nazianzen, we learned that there is “one rule of piety [eusebayahs] which we have had proposed to us, which we will teach, that we should worship [proskunein] Father, and Son, and Holy Ghost, one Godhead and Power in three persons, neither honoring anything above[hupersebontes], nor honoring anything below [hupahsebontes]”.
In this installment, we will consider the attack on Christianity made by a Neo-platonic heathen, Celsus, and the response given to this attack by Origen of Alexandria (Contra Celsum), disciple of Clement of Alexandria. Regardless of whether someone may agree or disagree with Origen on other doctrinal points, it is important to note that Origen’s attitude toward images is representative of the entire early Christian church’s position, based off of Scripture: that we may not use images in Christian worship. Those early fathers who stridently condemned Origen as a heretic (as, for example, Epiphanius would later do) never mentioned his iconoclasm, or refusal to use images in Christian worship as one of his errors. Mainly because the fathers all agreed with Origen on this point. In fact, the Cappadocians republished iconoclastic portions of Origen’s writings with approval, since, as we saw in our previous post, they agreed with Origen’s position.
The import of Origen’s apology for Christianity against heathenism is that it demonstrates that the early Christian fathers were aniconoic (of a generally iconoclastic bent) with regard the Christian worship, and that the making and retaining of images for use in worship was considered a part of heathenism, and rejected by Christians due to the law of Moses, and the general teaching of Scripture on the nature of God, the nature of man, etc. Without further ado, here are citations with comments from Origen’s apology for the Christian faith, Against Celsus:
“For these different tribes erected temples and statues to those individuals above enumerated, whereas we have refrained from offering to the Divinity honour [teemaen] by any such means seeing they are adapted rather to demons.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 3, Chapter 34.
Note that to offer honor to statues is adapted rather to demons than to honor the Divinity. Temples and statues are heathen and demonic, rather than Christian.
“‘Insane,’ would be the more appropriate word for those who hasten to temples and worship [proskunountaes] images [agalmaseen] or animals as divinities. And they too are not less insane who think that images, fashioned by men of worthless and sometimes most wicked character, confer any honour [teemaen] upon genuine divinities.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 3, Chapter 76.
Proskunesis to images as to divinities is insane. The art of fashioning images confers no honor upon genuine divinities, especially when done by men of wicked character.
“[W]e, on the other hand, deem those to be “uninstructed” who are not ashamed to address (supplications) [proslalaein] to inanimate objects [ahpsuchois], and to call upon those for health that have no strength, and to ask the dead for life, and to entreat the helpless for assistance. And although some may say that these objects are not gods, but only imitations [meemahtone] and symbols [symbolah] of real divinities, nevertheless these very individuals, in imagining that the hands of low mechanics can frame imitations of divinity, are “uninstructed, and servile, and ignorant;” for we assert that the lowest among us have been set free from this ignorance and want of knowledge, while the most intelligent can understand and grasp the divine hope.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 6, Chapter 14.
The instructed (that is, the Christians) would be ashamed to address inanimate objects or dead men for life. The heathen may object that these images and sacred objects are not gods, but memorials or imitations and symbols of the spiritual substances or divinities beyond them (as John of Damascus would later argue that icons are as windows to the deified saints in heaven!), but Christians consider such trifling sophisms to be ignorance and want of knowledge, from which the lowest among Christians has been set free. Nicea II’s “windows” analogy is a species of Celsus’ nonsensical argument against Christian worship, in other words.
Quoting Celsus: “[Celsus says that Christians] cannot tolerate temples, altars, or images [agalmatah]. In this they are like the Scythians, the nomadic tribes of Libya, the Seres who worship no god, and some other of the most barbarous and impious nations in the world.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 7, Chapter 62
Origen responded: “To this our answer is, that if [these groups] cannot bear the sight of temples, altars, and images [agalmatah], it does not follow because we cannot suffer them any more than they, that the grounds on which we object to them are the same as theirs.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 7, Chapter 63.
Note that Celsus complains about the early Christians’ intolerance to temples, altars, and images. Had the early church been of the erroneous opinions later ages, a defense would have been easily at hand, namely, we DO TOLERATE altars, since we offer the mass upon them. We can suffer images, because they are like windows to the saints in heaven, and that we honor the Lord Jesus by offering proskunesis to their image/windows upon the earth, and that the honor we offer to the icon passes to its prototype, or some other such defense.
But Origen’s response, representative of the universal testimony of the early fathers, is that Christians “cannot bear the sight of temples, altars, and images.” Our grounds for rejecting such heathen customs may be different from “some of the most barbarous and impious nations in the world,” to use Celsus’ phrase, but we still reject images.
Origen continues: “[These groups] agree in this with the Christians and Jews, but they are actuated by very different principles. For none of these former abhor altars and images [agalmatone] on the ground that they are afraid of degrading the worship [thraeskeiahn] of God, and reducing it to the worship of material things wrought by the hands of men… but Jews and Christians [abhor altars and images] because of this, ‘Thou shalt fear [phobaethaesae] the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve [latreuseis]’ (Deuteronomy 6:13), and also because of this, ‘thou shalt not make unto thee any idol [eidoelahn], nor any similitude [homoioemah] of anything which is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, that shalt not bow down thyself [proskunounaesaes] to them, nor serve [latreuseis] them’ (Exodus 20:3-4), and also this ‘the Lord thy God shall thou worship [proskunounaesaes], and him only shalt thou serve [latreuseis]’ (Matthew 4:10), and because of these and many other similar passages, not only do we abhor temples, altars, and images [agalmatone], but are ready to suffer death when it is necessary, rather than debase by any such impiety [paranomaematos] the conception which they have of the Most High God. . . . [I]t is not possible at the same time to know God and to address prayers [euchesthai] to images [agalmaseen].”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 7, Chapter 64-65.
Note that early Christians were haters of images and altars. We will not worship material objects, even if merely as memorials or symbols of deified beings in heaven, dearly departed loved ones, or heroes of former ages (as all the heathen deities were). Note also that the hatred the early Christians bore to images was paralleled by the Jewish hatred of images. It was not a point of distinction between Jews and Christians in Origen’s day, as it would become in later, more corrupt ages of the church.
Origen, as other early fathers, cites the 10 Commandments (Exodus 20:3-4) and the reiteration of its teaching by our Lord (Matthew 4:10) as conclusively determining for Christians why we abhor images, and why we offer them no proskunesis:
Unlike John of Damascus, Origen taught that Matthew 4:10 was teaching the exact same iconoclastic doctrine of Moses that proskunesis may not be offered to icons! John of Damascus used the pretext that proskunesis was commanded, but latreia was EXCLUSIVELY commanded to the true God, thus grounding his pretext upon a passage that logically entails a prohibition of proskunesis to creatures, bowing the knee, as the Septuagint translates Exodus 20:4 and Origen cited it. Origen also (like Athanasius, Gregory Nyssa, and generally among the early Greek fathers) did not distinguish worship into proskunesis and latreia, or as the western sophists would later distinguish doulia from latreia. Rather, as we saw from other Greek fathers, honor (timaeah), bowing (proskunesis), service (latreiah), and idolatry (eidololatreiah) were all used as synonyms, as Origen does with such Greek terms in this passage.
The early Christians had not images in worship, and therefore, had no defense for why OUR images are different from YOURS. Rather, Origen admits the accusation of abhorring, not bearing the sight, not suffering, and not debasing themselves with such impiety. Martyrs would lay down their life before they would bow to an image in Origen’s defense.
“It is not therefore true that we object to building altars, statues [agalmatah], and temples, because we have agreed to make this the badge of a secret and forbidden society; but we do so, because we have learnt from Jesus Christ the true way of serving God, and we shrink from whatever, under a pretence of piety, leads to utter impiety those who abandon the way marked out for us by Jesus Christ.”
Origen, Against Celsus, Book 8, Chapter 20.
Again, Christ’s incarnation, teaching, and way of serving God all teaching the same attitude as concerning statues and images. There was not defense of images based upon a new doctrine, that God incarnate as the image of the invisible God meant that we could make visible representations of the Son of God, or any other created being, for that matter.
In summation, Celsus’ critique of the Christians on the point of images was accurate, since the early church had none. Origen explodes the “windows to heaven” argument of John of Damascus, since the heathen themselves used it in his day. Origen demonstrates that the Old Testament teaching against images was standard Christian doctrine, taught by Moses, taught by Jesus. Origen demonstrates the irrationality and self-serving nature of the later distinction used by iconophiles between proskunesis and latreia. Origen demonstrates that early Christian abhorred, avoided, couldn’t bear the sight of, and condemned the use of images from the teachings of Moses and our Lord Jesus Christ. He goes so far as to say that Christians, instructed by the Lord Jesus in the proper manner of worshipping God, would give up their lives rather than die as martyrs than use images as a pretense of piety.
