medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
thanks John.
John McChesney-Young <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> St. John of Damascus based part of his argument in favor of the
veneration of images (The Orthodox Faith 4:16):
> http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF2-09/Npnf2-09-31.htm#P4068_1986418
"Moreover we worship even the image of the precious and life-giving Cross,
although made of another tree, not honouring the tree (God forbid) but the
image as a symbol of Christ....It behoves us, then, to worship the sign of
Christ. For wherever the sign may be, there also will He be. But it does not
behove us to worship the material of which the image of the Cross is composed,
even though it be gold or precious stones, after it is destroyed, if that
should happen."
and Chapter XVI, "Concerning Images" :
" For as Basil, that much-versed expounder of divine things, says, the honour
given to the image passes over to the prototype248 . Now a prototype is that
which is imaged, from which the derivative is obtained."
"...and the honour rendered to the image passes over to the prototype. (note6:
Basil, in 40 Mart: also De Spir. Sancto, ch. 27)"
he then tells the story of King Abgar & the Shroud image :
"A certain tale, too, is told, how that when Augarus was king over the city of
the Edessenes, he sent a portrait painter to paint a likeness of the Lord, and
when the painter could not paint because of the brightness that shone from His
countenance, the Lord Himself put a garment over His own divine and
life-giving face and impressed on it an image of Himself and sent this to
Augarus, to satisfy thus his desire."
> on a passage in St. Basil's treatise on the Holy Spirit (18):
> http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF2-08/Npnf2-08-06.htm#P1123_256929
"47. And when, by means of the power that enlightens us, we fix our eyes on
the beauty of the image of the invisible God, and through the image are led up
to the supreme beauty of the spectacle of the archetype, then, I ween, is with
us inseparably the Spirit of knowledge, in Himself bestowing on them time love
the vision of the truth the power of beholding the Image, not making the
exhibition from without, but in Himself leading on to the full knowledge."
> The sovereignty and authority over us is one, and so the doxology
ascribed by us is not plural but one; because the honour paid to the
image passes on to the prototype. Now what in the one case the image
is by reason of imitation, that in the other case the Son is by
nature; and as in works of art the likeness is dependent on the form,
so in the case or the divine and uncompounded nature the union
consists in the communion of the Godhead.
(end quote)
"...as in works of art the likeness is dependent on the form..."
which one of those words don't i understand?
what is the word being translated as "form" here, and what does it mean,
specifically?
>There may be other pre-Nicaea II expressions of the idea that are
more clearly related to icons, but none of my icon books are
convenient right now and I'll leave the pursuit of others to someone
else.
me, too.
the literature on the question is quite vast, of course, and i'm just looking
for one of those _pons asinorum_ thingies.
c
"Lots of useless other data points just enlarge the consciousness of the
agrieved showing how particular the pain is."
--Burma Shave
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