"Протоиерей Иоанн Мейендорф. Byzantine Theology " - читать интересную книгу автора

in this way the humiliation of God the Word.6

Germanus thus became the first witness of Orthodoxy against iconoclasm
in Byzantium. After his resignation under imperial pressure, the defence of
images was taken over by the lonely and geographically remote voice of John
of Damascus.
Living and writing in the relative security assured to the Christian
ghettos of the Middle East by the Arab conquerors, this humble monk of the
Monastery of St. Sabbas in Palestine succeeded by his three famous treatises
for the defence of the images in uniting Orthodox opinion in the Byzantine
world. His first treatise begins with the reaffirmation of the
Christological argument: "I represent God, the Invisible One, not as
invisible, but insofar as He has become visible for us by participation in
flesh and blood."7 John's main emphasis is on the change, which occurred in
the relationship between God and the visible world when He became a Man. By
His own will, God became visible by assuming a material existence and giving
to the matter a new function and dignity.

In former times, God without body or form could in no way be
represented. But today since God has appeared in the flesh and lived among
men, I can represent what is visible in God [to horaton tеu theеu]. I do not
venerate any matter, but I venerate the creator of a matter, who became the
matter for my sake, who assumed life in the flesh, and who through the
matter accomplished my salvation.8

In addition to this central argument, John insists on secondary and
less decisive issues. The Old Testament, for example, was not totally
iconoclastic but used images, especially in temple worship, which Christians
are entitled to interpret as pre-figurations of Christ. John also denounced
the iconoclasts' identification of the image with the prototype, the idea
that an icon "is God." On this point the Neo-Platonic and Origenist
traditions, which were also used by the iconoclasts supported the side of
the Orthodox, only the Son and the Spirit are "natural images" of the Father
and therefore consubstantial with Him. But other images of God are
essentially different from their model and therefore not "idols."
This discussion on the nature of the image, which provided the basis
for the very important definition of the cult of images, was adopted by the
Seventh Ecumenical Council in 787. The image, icon, since it is distinct
from the divine model, can be the object only of a relative veneration or
honour, not of worship, which is reserved for God alone.9 This authoritative
statement by an ecumenical council clearly excludes the worship of images
often attributed to Byzantine Christianity.
The misunderstanding of this point is a very old one and partly the
result of difficulties in translation. The Greek proskynests ("veneration")
was already translated as adoration in the Latin version of the Conciliar
Acts used by Charlemagne in his famous Libri Carolini, which rejected the
council. And later, even Thomas Aquinas - who, of course, accepted Nicaea
II - admitted a "relative adoration" (latrid) of the images, a position,
which gave the Greeks an opportunity of accusing the Latins of idolatry at
the Council of Hagia Sophia in 1450.10