Acts of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, Nicaea II (787)
The Sixth Session
Opening of the Sixth Session
In The Name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, our True God. In the reign of our most pious and Christ loving Sovereigns Constantine and Irene his mother, in the eighth year of their consulship, on the third of the nones of October (October 5), of the eleventh indiction, the holy Ecumenical Council assembled by the grace of God, and by the decree of the same divinely-protected Sovereigns in the splendid city of Nice metropolis of the Eparchy of Bithynia — that is, Peter the Arch-presbyter and Peter Monk and Abbot of St. Sabbas at Rome Legates of Adrian most holy Pope of Old Rome; Tarasius Patriarch of Constantinople — that is, New Rome; John and Thomas Vicars and Legates of the Apostolic Sees of the Eastern Dioceses; together with the Bishops, the Archimandrites, Abbots, and all the fulness of the Monastic Order, held their Session before the most holy pulpit of the most holy Church of St. Sophia, in the presence of Petronas and John officers of the Imperial household. And after that the Holy Gospels had been set in the midst,
Leontius the most noble Secretary rose up and said: “Your holy and blessed Council is aware how that in our former Session we took into consideration various passages from the impious heretics, who had accused the holy and immaculate Church of Christians on account of her usage in the setting up of holy images. To-day we have brought hither the written blasphemy of the Christianity-detractors itself — I mean the absurd, easily-confuted, self-confuted, definition of their false Conventicle — a definition in every respect concordant with the impious sentiments of other God-hated heretics. And further, we have also here with us a most elaborate and irrefragable confutation of the same, with which the Holy Spirit has favoured us; for it required that we should triumph over it with sound argument, and rend it in pieces with most powerfully convincing replies, both of which we now submit to your good pleasure.”
The Holy Council said: “Let it be read.”
John Deacon and Chancellor of the Great Church of Constantinople read as follows:
The Refutation of the Patched-up and Falsely So-Called Definition of the Disorderly Assembled Crew of the Christianity-Detractors
Section the First
“It is ever a grateful thing to the devil, the hater of mankind, to separate from God, man, who was created in the image of God, and to ensnare him with multifarious deceits; and in no respect is he more earnest than in contending against religion, and in unsettling and disturbing the peace of the Church; which he hath manifested in our days also by means of a certain assembly, at which they who were present became the framers of the ‘Definition’ laid before you, and falsely assumed to themselves the title of the ‘Seventh Council.’ For, having laid hold on the common and universal aversion to idols and used it as a bait to cover their hook, they covertly introduced their own abomination against pictures and images, and thus ensnared the more unwary. Wherefore, they recalled a word long since obsolete and forgotten — I mean ‘Idolatry’ (from which they who worship the devil and his apostate crew by means of demoniacal images, and thus ‘served the creature more than the Creator’ — Romans i. 25 — were justly named ‘Idolaters’); and this they endeavoured to affix to those who have been made the ‘royal priesthood, the holy nation’ (1 Peter ii. 9) — to those ‘who have put on Christ,’ and by His grace have been rescued from idols and have been preserved from their error. Oh, would that their words, like an untimely birth, had perished as soon as they came into being! as being sure to generate pollutions in the Church! But, forasmuch as their absurdities have been cherished by certain — even though they have not reached a full growth — it becomes a duty incumbent on us to slay them with the sword of the Spirit. But may Christ our true God, ‘who enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world’ (John i. 9), be our leader — He who alone is the Mind of those who think piously and of that which is thought of by them the Word of those who speak and of that which is spoken, who is and who is made all things to all, who hath given us to know the word of instruction when it is necessary for us to speak, for the manifestation of His word enlightens and gives understanding to babes — that the falsehood may be driven away, and truth, shining brightly and clearly, may find admission to the hearts of all; which the champions of religion having embraced, recalling to mind the words of the divine Apostle, ‘Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel’ (1 Cor. ix . 16), feel themselves bound to protect and defend, and to rebuke falsehood, and to strike it down by stones from the sling of the Spirit.
“Wherefore, advancing with the Scripture, with the fathers aided by deep research and sound argument, to combat these vain babblings, we shall, like Phineas, with the javelin of the Spirit, by one stroke of confutation, pierce through with ease the squadrons of those who have been leagued together in behalf of this impiety; and by proof most evident we shall make known to all the falsity of their tongues, as having been lifted up against the ‘knowledge of the only begotten Son of God’ (2 Cor. x. 5) and of His Church, and having spoken injuriously against the great mystery of His incarnation. And then, with ‘the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God’ (Ephesians vi. 17), ‘having burst their bonds asunder, and having cast away the yoke’ (Psalm ii. 3) of their ignorance, we shall lay open all the pretexts of their perfidy. ‘For the Lord hath laughed them to scorn: He hath had them in derision’ (Ibid. 4), and ‘He shall speak unto them in His wrath’ (Ibid. 5), saving, ‘Depart from me, I know you not’ (Matthew vii. 23). Concerning whom He hath spoken by the Prophet Jeremiah, ‘These have prophesied lies in my name, for I sent them not, neither have I commanded them; they have spoken false visions, prophecies, and divinations, the inventions of their own hearts. Wherefore they shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem,’ (Jeremiah xiv. 14,16) — that is, of the Catholic Church, and they shall be trampled under foot of all those who piously confess to the Lord. For a man’s own lips shall be a snare unto him, and he shall be taken in the words of his own mouth, and the recompence of his lips shall be given to him, the rebuke of his impiety: for He saith, ‘I will reprove thee, and set before thy face the things which thou hast done’ (Psalm l. 21).
“Thus much by way of preface: nor will we lengthen our discussion by any further introduction, but entering on our proposed course we shall commence our work of refutation with the very title. For in what other mode can we display how weak and full of calumny their vain argumentation is than by meeting them at every point with convincing refutation inspired by wisdom from a higher source, ever preserving to ourselves one unfailing principle — to allow of no innovation being admitted amongst us in any matters relative to religion, but on the contrary to yield implicit obedience to the doctrine of the Apostles and Fathers, and to the traditions of the Church. And we exhort all persons who may hereafter meet with this our treatise to read it with great care, and not in a cursory manner; that, having fully and clearly comprehended how complete and satisfactory this refutation is, they may ascribe the victory to the Church of God.”
They make their commencement as follows:
Gregory Bishop of Neocaesarea reads:
“The Definition of The Holy Great And Ecumenical Seventh Council.”
Epiphanius the Deacon of the Great Church of Constantinople reads the Refutation:
“Commencing with falsehood, by falsehood supported throughout the whole of their innovating argumentation, in falsehood these Christianity-detractors have brought their labours to a close. How can it be holy, not in the least comprehending what holiness is, being as it is accursed, profane, and execrable? For they who were assembled therein, to use the Prophet’s language, ‘made no difference between the holy and the profane’ (Ezekiel xliv. 33); for they gave the name of idol equally to the image of God the Word who was incarnate, even our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and to the image of Satan. Again, how could that be Great or Ecumenical, which the Presidents of other Churches have never received or assented to; but which, on the contrary, they have anathematized? It had not as its fellow helper the then Pope of Rome, or his conclave: neither was it authorized by his Legate, nor by Encyclic Epistle from him, as the custom is in Councils. Neither do we find that the Patriarchs of the East, of Antioch, Alexandria, and the holy City, did at all consent thereto, nor any of their great doctors or high-priests. Verily their word was a smoke full of darkness, blinding the eyes of the simple, and not ‘a candle set on a candlestick, that it may give light to all that are in the house;’ for it was spoken in secret — privately, and not upon the high mountains of Orthodoxy: neither ‘did their voice go forth into all lands’ as did that of the Apostles, nor ‘their words unto the ends of the world’ as did those of those six holy Ecumenical Councils. Again, how can it be the Seventh, since it has no agreement with the six holy Ecumenic Councils which were before it? For anything which is accounted as seventh ought always to be of the same nature with the rest of the things with which it is numbered; and, if it has nothing in common with them, neither ought it to be numbered with them. Just as if any one should set in a row six golden coins, and then to these should and one of brass: he could not style it the seventh on account of the difference of the materials; for gold is valuable and of great worth, while brass is vile and of little account in comparison. Thus, in like manner, this Synod, having no gold or worth in its decrees, but being in every way counterfeit, adulterated, and full of deadly poison, can never be accounted worthy to be numbered with the six most holy Councils, resplendent as they are with the golden words of the Spirit. Having, however, the pride of him who said, ‘I will set my throne above the clouds’ (Isaiah xiv. 13), it sends forth such sounds as these.”
Gregory of Neocaesarea reads:
“The Holy Great Ecumenical Council, which by the Grace of God and the most pious sanction of our God- owned and Orthodox Sovereigns, Constantine and Leo, has been called together in this Heaven defended and Royal City, in the venerable Church of our holy immaculate Lady Mary the Mother of God, ever a Virgin, which is named Blachernae, has defined that which is here subjoined.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Had this assembly of theirs been summoned by divine grace, it would have been adorned with words spoken according to the grace of God, and it would moreover have been made resplendent with truth; since grace is evermore united with truth, they are fellow labourers — they dwell together. To this John, the great chief of theology, is witness, saying, ‘Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ’ (John i. 17). But as they have deserted the truth, in which the writer of the Proverbs glories, saying, ‘My throat shall sing aloud in the truth’ (Proverbs viii. 7), and having embraced false hood, it is evident that they have fallen from grace also: wherefore neither have ‘their words been seasoned with the divine salt’ (Col. iv. 6), ‘that they may give grace to those that hear’ (Eph. iv. 29). But as to the fact of their being assembled in the venerable church of our Lady the Mother of God it is not to be wondered at; neither will this give any colour to their proceedings, even as it availed not Annas and Caiaphas, and that Jewish synod which plotted against Christ, that their illegal consultation against Him was held in the temple. Yea, they seem to be the more worthy of condemnation on this very account, because that in places so holy they should frame decrees unholy and hateful to God. Oh, would that, as they have in their commencement made use of the paternal voice of the hierophant Dionysius, they had preserved inviolate those traditions which he in common with the rest of the holy fathers held; but they had nothing of this kind in them, as in the subsequent discussion will more fully appear. Inconsistently enough with themselves, like wolves in sheep’s clothing, they made their preface from his theology, speaking as follows:
Gregory reads:
“The cause and consummation of all things is God, who, having of His own goodness made all things to exist, from things which were not before, determined that they should be directed in a beautiful and regular order; so that, according to the grace of the perfection which had been given to them, they might preserve the continuance of their true position, not perverted, not drawn aside, to deviations either on this side or the other.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Truly every creature which is formed by God, and hath received hypostatic power from non-existence to come into existence, being still moved and directed by the same ordinance, knows how to observe the will of the Creator, as being under His providential care, and this whether they be animate or inanimate. These men, however, have dared to anathematize the tradition which was given to us by Christ in His holy Church, for the remembrance of His saving dispensation: not knowing, that of the things which are in Her, none are there without Him; and thus they are proved more senseless than stones, more irrational than the brutes! Nor is this all; but imagining that they speak to the purpose in giving vent to vain words and foolish doctrines, they falsely assert that the holy Church of God has been adorned with idols; and, making lies their confidence, they say to her, ‘we wish not to know thy ways’ (Job xxi. 14), nor do we choose to follow the tradition which was from the beginning. Verily, they shall hear from Christ, who laid her foundations, ‘I know you not’ (Matt. vii. 23) . But now they make pretenses of a triumph over the devil, speaking thus.”
Gregory reads:
“But because he who, on account of his former splendour was called Lucifer and had his proper station near to God — did in his pride exalt himself against his Maker, and thenceforth with all his apostate crew did become darkness, and by his own act and deed having fallen from the exceeding glorious light-giving kingdom of God more resplendent than light itself, being convicted as the author, contriver, and teacher of all evil, was for ever stripped of all his glory — he therefore, not enduring to behold man created by God, brought in his stead into possession of that glory in which he once had a place, poured out upon him all his malice, and by deceit caused him to be banished from the glory and brightness of God, having seduced him to worship the creature more than the Creator.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Had their words been directed against that idolatry and creature worship denounced and abominated by holy Apostles who were endued with power from on high, by sacred Prophets who spake as inspired by the Holy Ghost, and, lastly, by those who followed them, our divinely-inspired fathers, it had been well for them to have committed their discussion to writing, for then all the guardians of the Church would have agreed with them. But since, disregarding this, they came forward in defence of falsehood, and under pretense of triumphing over the devil, the father of lies, they were in truth only sharpening their tongues against the immaculate Church, and since, like vintners, ‘they have mixed their wine with water’ (Isai. i. 22), and have not hesitated ‘to make their neighbours drink their deadly poison’ (Hab. ii. 15), justly shall they hear the voice of God as it were specially directed against them, by the mouth of David the sacred Psalmist, ‘Why do you teach my judgments, and take my covenant into your mouth? Whereas ye have hated instruction and have cast my words behind your backs’ (Psalm l. 16, 17): thus appointing them their portion with those who adulterate the doctrine of truth, but hypocritically pretending to truth they say.”
Gregory reads:
“But God, his Maker, not enduring to behold this work of His own hands involved in utter ruin, after that efforts had been made for his salvation by means of the Law and the Prophets, and it was found that he was not by these enabled to attain his primitive glory, was pleased to send His own Son, the Word, into the world in the last days fore-ordained by Himself. He, by the good will of the Father, and the co-operation of the Life-giving co-equal Spirit, having dwelt in the Virgin’s womb, did of her holy and immaculate flesh, in His own per son or hypostasis, take flesh consubstantial with ours, and by means of a reasonable and intellectual soul having constructed and fashioned the same, He was born of her in a way surpassing all word and thought: He having voluntarily endured the cross, and submitted to death, rose again on the third day from the dead, and accomplished the whole economy of our salvation.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Divine Scripture declares, in its account of the formation of the world, that God said, ‘Let us make man in our image after our likeness’ (Gen. i. 26): great indeed was the dignity, that one born of earth should be honoured with the image of God. But because man fell by deceit, and did not preserve the dignity of his first formation, the human race lapsed into idolatry. God, therefore, and the Word of the Father, who became without change of nature perfect Man, having recovered him from the fall and delivered him from the errors of idolatry, reconstructed him for immortality, and bestowed on him the gift which is without repentance. This gift was more God-like than the former, the reconstruction exceeded the original formation, and the benefit is eternal. They, however, not caring how they bedim the greatness of these gifts, shamelessly assert that a new idolatry has been brought in by the making of images, and they as boastfully vaunt a new redemption wrought out by themselves. Piecing out this expression of their sentiments with words of various kinds, they condemn the Church of God as being in error: they make their discourse smoother than oil, and intersperse some passages of Scripture; but their words are deceitful, a piercing dart is under their lips. For they speak the words of peace, having hatred in their hearts, when they add as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“He rescued us from the destructive doctrine of devils — that is, from the error and worship of idols — and delivered to us the worship which is in spirit and in truth.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Against your will, most worthy Sirs, are ye constrained to acknowledge the truth. For all the sacred company of the apostles, and the holy multitude of the fathers, declare that the Word, the Son of the Father, came among men to deliver us from the errors of idolatry. We have, moreover, the words of the Prophets proclaimed long before, which thus cry aloud, ‘Behold the days come, saith the Lord, in which I will wipe away the names of the idols from off the face of the earth, neither shall they be remembered any more’ (Zech. xiii. 2). And so it is that even ye are constrained to confess that Christ our God hath delivered us from the errors of idolatry. Now, if He hath delivered us, how can they who believe in Him again become idolators? Cease your absurd prating. Hath God incarnate redeemed us, and shall we again be enslaved? Shall we again fall under the power of Him who hath tyrannized over us in times past? Hear ye the divine Scripture declaring, His kingdom is an eternal kingdom, and His dominion from generation to generation. The Lord shall reign for ever and ever. Thy God, O Zion, is from generation to generation’ (Psalm clxv. 13; cxlvi. 10). And God is not like the kings of this world, who at one time are victorious and at another are vanquished, but His victory remaineth forever. ‘For God is not man that He should be suspended, nor as the Son of man does He suffer threats’ (Numb. xxiii. 19; sec. lxx.): with this also the Apostle agrees, when he declares ‘That the gifts and calling of God are without repentance’ (Rom. xi. 29). These things, they say, thinking thus to set themselves off; but now, in manifest contradiction to themselves, they add.”
Gregory reads:
“And when with His assumed body He had ascended to heaven, He left behind Him His holy Disciples and Apostles as teachers of this His saving faith. These having adorned our Church as His bride, with the various resplendent doctrines of piety, have rendered her most beautiful and glorious, and as it were clothed and decorated with a robe fringed with gold: the beauty of which our illustrious fathers and doctors and the six holy Ecumenical Councils, having received into their care, have preserved without any diminution.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Ignorant and undiscerning, the underhand plotters of this new-fangled innovation did not perceive the drift of their own surreptitious exposition; for, wishing to disguise their real sentiments under a veil of craft, through heedlessness they have made themselves truly ridiculous. For they say many and great things in praise of ecclesiastical order, and, whether they will or not, are constrained to confess that the six holy Ecumenical Councils have preserved it entire; thus in words at least they take the garb of religion, while in their hearts they do wickedly: with their lips they honour her, while in their hearts they depart from her; for they refuse to receive the tradition which has been held throughout all preceding ages by so many holy men. O, would that they had shown some reverence both for the multitude of the present generation of Christians, and, indeed, of all the Chris tians who have existed from the first preaching of the Gospel, before that they had thus cast out and denounced the illustration thereof by means of images. Now, from the time of the convocation of the sixth holy Ecumenical Council to that in which they were convened against holy images, there was not more than seventy years. That it was not during this period that the usage of pictures and images was delivered to the Church is evident to all: it must therefore have originated previous to that event. Indeed, to speak the truth, they came in with the preaching of the Apostles, as we learn from seeing the holy churches which have been built up in every place; and, as our holy fathers have testified, and as historians relate, whose writings are with us, even to this present time. In the year of the world five thousand five hundred and one, Christ our God having come amongst men, and having dwelt amongst them for thirty-three years and almost five months, and having accomplished the great and saving mystery of our redemption, went back again to heaven, ascending evidently thither, whence He had descended, having given charge to His Apostles to teach all things which were appointed them to teach. From this time, to the reign of Constantine the first Christian Emperor, elapsed about three hundred years, before whom none but heathens ruled, during which period the greater part of Christians, having fought the good fight and boldly protested against idolatry, obtained the Martyr’s crown. In his days, the Christian public, inspired with godly zeal, raised many temples, some in the name of Christ and others in honour of the Saints; and in these they depicted both the things relative to the incarnate dispensation of our God, and also the combats and conflicts of the Martyrs. Others again, wishing ever to have about them the memorial of some much beloved Martyr or of Christ Himself, would have their images delineated on their garments. And, moreover, these images were wrought on the sacred vestments and on precious stones, both by our holy fathers and other religious men, and in these they offered the unbloody sacrifice: and from their time to the present all these things have been manifestly proved to continue, and they shall continue for ever.
“Again: when from time to time certain Heretics sprang up full of gall and bitterness against the Church, and when, for the subversion of the same, the six holy Ecumenical Councils were convened in succession by the good will of God, these confirmed and established all that had been delivered to the Catholic Church, whether written or unwritten, from the most ancient periods, among which things was the setting up of holy images. This was especially the case with the sixth holy Ecumenical Council: for, after its decision had been pronounced against those who maintained the one will in Christ our God, and, indeed, after that Constantine, then Emperor, by whose order, under the good providence of God, the Council had been assembled had departed this life, and his son Justinian had assumed the government, that the same fathers who had been assembled therein, met together again under the divine approbation after a lapse of four or five years, and then they issued forth one hundred and two canons for the better regulation of the affairs of the Church; in which canons we find the following regulation about holy images in the eighty-second: ‘In certain sacred pictures, the Lamb, as pointed out by the finger of the forerunner (John the Baptist) is represented which was a type of grace, and under the law prefigured the True Lamb, Christ our God. But while we duly value the ancient types and shadows, as types and prefigurations of the truth, we value more highly the grace and truth itself, receiving the same as the completion of the law. In order therefore, that the perfect image may be presented to the contemplation of all, we decree that in all pictures from hence forth, the figure of our Lord Jesus Christ, the true Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world (John i. 29), should be pourtrayed in His human form, instead of the Lamb as heretofore; that we being stirred up by the sight thereof, may be led to meditate upon the depth of the humiliation of God the Word, and to the remembrance of His conversation in the flesh; and of His passion, and of His saving death, and of the redemption thereby accomplished in behalf of the world.’ Whence we may all see and understand that, both before these holy Councils and after these holy Councils, the delineating of images has been handed down to the Church equally with the publication of the Gospels. For, as from reading, we receive the report thereof in our ears and thus transmit it to our minds, so when we look on the representative picture with our eyes we are in like manner enlightened as to our understanding; and thus, by two different modes mutually illustrative of each other — I mean the reading of the word and the looking on pictures — we attain to the same knowledge by bringing to our minds events which have taken place. Hence, we find the co-operation of these two leading senses united together in the Song of Songs spoken of thus — ‘Shew me thy face, and make me to hear thy voice, for thy voice is pleasant, and thy face is beautiful’ (Sol. Song ii. 14); concordantly with which we may say with the Psalmist — ‘As we have heard so have we seen’ (Psalm xlviii. 8). Since, therefore, these things are so, it is not unsuitable to declare of those who prated against holy images. ‘Each one hath spoken vanity to his neighbour: their deceitful lips have spoken evil in their double heart’ (Psalm xii. 2): from which may we be delivered by the grace of Christ our Saviour the true God.”
Section the Second
Epiphanius reads:
“Forgetful of the promise made to the Church by the Lord, who cannot lie, ‘that the gates of hell shall not prevail against her,’ with open and unabashed front, and with a mouth filled with contradictory dogmas, they carry on their warfare against her; and thus, having stolen their words from the fathers and setting them forth as their own, they speak as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“Again: the above-mentioned author of evil, not enduring to behold such comeliness, never ceased, at various times and by various modes of sinful machination, to endeavour to bring mankind into subjection to himself by his stratagems; wherefore, under the guise of Christianity, he secretly introduced idolatry, having persuaded by his sophistries all who would pay any regard to them not to cease from the creature, but still to worship, still to adore it, and to consider that which is made, as God, if it be called by the name of Christ.”
Epiphanius reads:
“They who wage war against the spiritual Jerusalem — that is, the Catholic Church — are in a manner prefigured by those who once fought against the earthly Jerusalem, for they would fain use the language of the fathers in the same way that Rabshakeh made use of the Hebrew language against Israel — that is, they would set the language of the fathers and the doctrine of the Church in array against the fathers and against the Catholic Church; but ‘by their fruits shall ye know them’ (Matt. vii . 20), saith the Lord. For ‘they are like unto whited sepulchres which outwardly appear beautiful to men’ (Matt. xxiii. 27) that is, these Christianity-detractors are as it were concealed under expressions used by the fathers, ‘while inwardly they are full of bones and all impurity’ — that is, of dead and putrefying dogmas. But we will break, up their tomb and unveil all their impurities: we will show how they pervert, according to their own lusts, that which our holy fathers have delivered to the Church; and, while they use the very same words, craftily give to them a different sense: and that in this way these men have applied to the formation of holy images that which our fathers brought forward against the Arians. Thus, the venerable Gregory Bishop of the Church of Nyssa, in his ‘Epitaph on the holy Basil,’ his brother, both in the flesh and in the spirit, has urged against the Arians that very passage which these men have applied to images. This we may easily see if we consider the beginning of this same paragraph, which is as follows — ‘No one can be altogether ignorant as to the reason of the manifestation of our great master at this particular period. For, when the madness of men after their idols was wellnigh extinguished by the preaching of the Gospel; and throughout the world all such like vain superstitions were at the very verge of destruction from the proclamation of the doctrines of true piety; so that the great master of human error, pressed on all sides by the name of Christ, was driven from the face of the earth: the invertor of evil, to evil only wise, never desisted from any wicked artifice whereby he might again through deceit bring the world under subjection to himself. Wherefore, under the guise of Christianity, he secretly introduced idolatry, having persuaded by his sophistries those who would pay any regard to them not to cease from the creature, but to worship and to adore it, and to reverence that which is made as God if it be but called by the name of Son. Now, if any creature sprung from things which did not exist and did not in its own proper nature participate with Deity, no respect ought to be paid to it; but they, having given the name of Christ to a creature, did both worship it and serve it, and on it they placed their hopes of salvation and from it awaited the judgment to come it And thus the Arch-apostate having infused all his impieties into the minds of men well fitted to fall in with them — I mean Arius, Aetius, Eunomius, and Eudoxius, and many more besides — by means of these brought back again idolatry, now on the decline, under the garb of Christianity, as I said before. And this disease of worshipping the creature more than the Creator so prevailed that, by the aid of the then Emperors, this deceit had the mastery, and all the most illustrious kingdoms were overwhelmed with the same malady. When, therefore, almost all men had passed over to the dominant opinion, then was the great Basil manifested, as Elijah to Ahab, who, coming to the aid of the Priesthood now in a manner fallen, made, by the grace which dwelt within him, the word of the faith which was like the dying taper to shine forth in its former splendour.’ You may now see how the case really stands: the whole scope of the argument of the father is directed against the Ariomanites; for he declares that Saint Basil was raised up at the very time when Arius, Eunomius, Eudoxius, Macedonius, and all their Semiarian and Anomoean crew, who affirmed that the Son and the Word of our God was a creature, flourished. These, therefore, worshipping a creature as God, were by him and by the whole Church called idolators, for they declare that which they worship to be made of nothing even as all other creatures. But, with respect to holy images, Christians never called them gods, nor have they ever worshipped them as gods; neither have they set their hopes upon them or expected from them the future judgment: and if for the sake of memorial or record they retain them, or if out of regard to their prototype they embrace them and pay them the worship of honour (τιμητικῶν προστέκυνησαν), they have never served them with λατρεια (ἐλάτρευσαν) or ascribed divine honours to them — away with the calumny! Nor have they ever done this to anything whatever that was accounted amongst creatures. Now, the Arians, though they accounted the Son and Word of God to be a creature, gloried in expecting from Him their hopes of salvation, and in asserting that the future judgment should be administered by Him: wherefore, the inspired father confuting them, says they worship it — that is, the creature — they serve it, they place on it their hopes of salvation; from it they expect the judgment. Wherefore, the patrons of this innovation are proved to be adulterators of the truth, and, according to the Prophet, vintners mixing wine with water. Nor is this all; but they are also found to be absolute falsifiers of the traditions of the fathers; for, whereas the father said, ‘If called by the name of Son,’ they wishing to adapt the phrase to the case of images, instead of by the name of Son, have falsely inserted ‘by the name of Christ.’ For it is evident that, when he says ‘by the name of Son,’ that he means to speak of the Arians who blasphemed the eternal, uncreated, and divine generation of the Son; wherefore he also gives the names of the great leaders of that heresy, saying, ‘I mean Arius, Eunomius, Eudoxius and Aetius.’ But these men, by the substitution of the word Christ instead of Son, have endeavoured to make the blasphemy applicable to the formation of images. Hereby they are proved evidently to be both falsifiers and mendacious, and to be introducers of that which is unlawful.”
Gregory reads:
“Wherefore, as of old, Jesus the Author and Finisher of our salvation sent forth His Disciples and Apostles in the power of the most Holy Spirit for the destruction of idols throughout the world, so also now hath He stirred up our faithful Sovereigns, His servants, and of like spirit with the Apostles, endued with wisdom by the power of the same Holy Ghost, for our confirmation and instruction — for the demolition of the strongholds of Satan, exalted against the knowledge of God and the utter confutation of all devilish wiles and errors .”
Epiphanius reads:
“Who ever reached such a height of impiety before? What more outrageous than this impiety? O, their shameless, their abominable blasphemy! O, the hidden artifice, the multifold craftiness! Truly they have been instructed in devilish wiles when they speak thus, and have the unparalleled audacity to call that vision and sight which so clearly and evidently lead us to glorify God, by which also we contemplate the depth of the humility of God the Word, and recall to mind His conversation in the flesh, His passion, and His life-giving death — strongholds of Satan exalted against the knowledge of God. ‘Verily, they have bent their bow to shoot out bitter words that they may privily wound the upright in heart’ (Psalm lxiv. 3). Since they have confessed that, for the overthrow of idols, holy Disciples have been sent forth endued with power from on high, the Holy Ghost having descended upon them, surely they ought not to speak of others also being stirred up, after that their tradition and doctrine had maintained its ground for near eight hundred years, and our holy fathers had confirmed and established the same as a safe anchor! Once entirely redeemed by Christ from idols, we can never be obnoxious to censure on account of idols now, unless they dare to say that a transformation has taken place in the Church; and that other rules and ordinances have been delivered to her, urging against us unreasonable charges full of contradiction. And, whereas these worthy persons have been pleased to speak thus, as formerly, Jesus the Author and Finisher of our salvation, they ought in all consistency to add, ‘Everything which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away’ (Heb. vii. 13). ‘The doctrine of the Apostles is now grown old, and we are selected to raise a new doctrine in place thereof.’ For Moses and Aaron were priests; but when grace came in their stead the Apostle declared that ‘another priest was raised up’ (Heb. vii. 15): wherefore these ought in consistency to bring in a greater grace still exceeding that of the Apostles. But they add this also, ‘for our confirmation and instruction.’ Now, as they of that Synod were Bishops and had with them the perfection of the Apostolic order, they ought to have confirmed others, and not to have been confirmed by others, and this the more especially when they would reject the doctrine and tradition of the Apostles and Fathers. Whence it is evident that they were not partakers of their doctrine and instruction, because they walk not according to their tradition: and it is of them also that David speaks, saying, ‘The Lord shall destroy the deceitful lips and the tongue that speaketh proud things’ (Psalm xii. 3). Let the Psalmist David say for us, or rather let us say with him in truth, ‘The sword of the enemy hath failed forever, and thou hast destroyed their cities’ (Psalm ix. 6). At what time, then, did the sword of the enemy fail in his cities — that is, his stronghold? Was it not at the incarnation of Christ? Concerning whom it is written that ‘He shall divide the spoil with the strong’ (Isaiah liii. 10)? Surely, it was not of their pseudo-Synod and the factions connected with it that, by means of it, the sword of the enemy failed for ever! And if for ever, and in every way, the sword of the enemy failed for ever and the cities of iniquity have been destroyed, how is it that these men should prate about their being rebuilt and renewed? Is it that they may ascribe the destruction of them to themselves, and declare that the redemption of the human race is their work? Thus derogating from the great mystery of our redemption, the dispensation of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is God over all, blessed for evermore. Now, with gross flattery to the reigning power, they add:”
Gregory reads:
“Who stirred up by the divine zeal which was in them, and not enduring to behold the Church of God made a prey through the deceit of devils”
Epiphanius reads:
“They who talk thus could not know the promises which the Catholic Church has received from Christ who founded her, nor do they confess that the human race has been saved by the redemption which is in Christ Jesus our Lord; for those whom Christ has redeemed, they, as it were, sell back again to the devil, and those whom He hath quickened by His own death they destroy with the deleterious poison of their own lips and plunge them into the infernal lake. Let them listen to the Canticles singing plainly of the Church as in the person of Christ — ‘Thou art all fair my beloved, and there is no fault with thee’ (Sol. Song iv. 7). Behold how they hear that She is all fair and that she is beloved of Christ, and that there is no fault in her; and, besides, it is said by Isaiah — ‘I have engraven thy walls in my hand, and thou art continually in my sight’ (Isaiah xlix. 7), How can She who hath received such promises become a prey from the hostile power of devils? And as according to the Apostle, Christ is the Head, who can make a spoil of Her? Hath He presented Her unto Himself ‘not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing’ (Ephes. v. 23), and can She again be defiled? What a supposition! It is evident that the denial of His dispensation is involved in such an assertion! Their aim has been to bring to nought the Church of Christ: wherefore the Lord shall bring them to nought, and they shall be set at nought and anathematised by all who are born in her; but she hath ever remained undespoiled, unshaken, and immoveable. They, however, having filled their mouth with flattery, now proceed with much boasting to give an account of the great things which they have accomplished.”
Gregory reads:
“— have therefore called together the whole sacerdotal company of God-beloved Bishops, that, being assembled synodically and having made scriptural inquisition concerning this seductive art of image making, which has turned aside the minds of men from that exalted worship which is suitable to the divine nature to a groveling and material worship of creatures, they might, under the direction of God, decide as it seemed right to them, knowing that it was written in the Prophet — The Priest’s lips shall keep knowledge, and they shall seek the law at his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts’” (Malachi ii. 7).
Epiphanius reads:
“Forgetful, as it appears, of the birth of God the Word from the Virgin and of the great and saving mystery which He having dwelt in the flesh hath bestowed upon us, who hath delivered us from error of idols and the insane worship of them, they would fain attribute this work of salvation to themselves. But while they thus glorify themselves they are ingloriously trampled under foot by the Church. To such Christ our God speaks most opportunely by His Prophet — ‘The priests have disregarded my law — they have profaned my holy things — they have not separated between the holy and the profane — they have not separated between the clean and the unclean’ (Ezek. xxii. 26). Thus they have made no distinction between the image of Christ and His Saints, and the images of devils, giving them one and the same name of idols, thus calumniating the Church which Christ our God purchased with His own blood. Wherefore, they have decried this publication of the Gospel as ‘that deceitful art of image-making,’ which the faithful, who look not on that which is seen so much as on that which is signified thereby, speak of and name, as venerable and holy. For when they hear with the ear, they say, ‘Glory be to thee, O Lord,’ and when they see with the eye they unite in the same doxology. For by both we are led to remember His conversation amongst men, and whatever, narration teaches by writing, the same also does painting make equally plain to us.
“But now let us advert to the remainder of their shameless and bombastic pratings; for they add, ‘which has turned aside the minds of men from that exalted worship so suitable to the divine nature to a groveling and material worship of creatures.’ O the stark madness! Having their tongue as a sharp sword whetted with lies, they give out that the immaculate faith of us Christians has been exchanged for a veneration of images, and they speak calumniously in styling this a ‘groveling and material worship of creatures’ (κτισματολατρείαν). No Christian under heaven ever served (ἐλάτρευσεν) any image. This is a heathen fiction — a devilish invention — a device of Satanic cunning! This was destroyed by the sojourning of Christ amongst us. Worship is now in spirit and in truth: nevertheless, the Church hath in store many things which are offered to God for a memorial of Himself and of His Saints, amongst the rest is the making of images. But now see how they convict themselves, saving, ‘That they should decide as it might appear good to them.’ Surely, they never adverted to the word written from the mouth of the Lord, ‘He who speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory’ (John vii. 18). Now, they themselves bear witness that they speak of themselves, and not from the Holy Spirit. Who, then, would give any heed to them except such as are in like manner destitute of the Holy Spirit? But now, not glorying in the Lord but in their own tongues, they add.”
Gregory reads:
“Our holy Synod, therefore, which has been assembled together to the number of Three Hundred and Thirty-Eight Bishops, following the usual synodical regulations, joyfully receives and heartily proclaims the decrees and traditions which former Councils, having firmly established, have transmitted to us to hold in like manner.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Having got together a goodly crowd, they make a great parade with their vaunted numbers, and bringing up their motley crew against the Church, they have given unbounded license to their tongues, babbling forth that which they ought not, until they reached the very summit of iniquity; and thus, like to the people of the Hebrews, ‘they were increased and became vile’ (Exodus i. 7). But the Lord was not well pleased with them, and why? Because, having put themselves out of the pale of the Church, ‘they wandered in the desert in a dry place’ (Psalm cvii. 4), not having that spiritual wine ‘which maketh glad the heart of man’ (Psalm civ. 15.) But, again, they say the same things concerning themselves, and pretending in word to follow synodical regulations while in works they deny them. They thus enumerate the six Ecumenical Synods in the following manner.”
Gregory reads:
“And, first of all, was the holy great and Ecumenical Council assembled at Nice under Constantine, that great Emperor of holy memory, which deposed the most impious Arius from the sacerdotal rank — because that he had taught that the uncreated Son of God, consubstantial with the Father and the Holy Ghost, and in all respects equal in glory and honour with them, was a creature — which also framed the divinely — dictated symbol of our saving faith; and, after that, the Council of one hundred and thirty holy fathers, who were assembled in the royal city under Theodosius the Great, which condemned Macedonius, the enemy of the Holy Ghost, for having blasphemed the immaculate and uncreated Spirit, and for having impiously taught that he was not consubstantial with the Father and the Son; which also made more full and clear the symbol of our saving faith, having therein defined that the Holy and Almighty Spirit was God.”
Epiphanius reads:
“These two holy Ecumenical Councils the impious Nestorius and his heretical partizans received; and, like him, their own tumultuary Conventicle has, while admitting former Councils, introduced a new heresy, from which its partizans have received the name of Christianity-detractors from the holy Catholic Church of God. And really they are just like to foolish men who, when the sun shines, say to each other, ‘By the brightness of the sun the stars are hidden,’ or ‘It is day and not night;’ so idly do they declaim about things evident and well known to all, adding as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“After these was the Council of two hundred holy fathers, the first of Ephesus, assembled under Theodosius the younger, which condemned the Jewish-minded man-worshipping Nestorius for having declared that Christ the Word of God subsisted apart, and that Christ who was born of a woman was another person: thus making God the Word to exist apart and by Himself, and the man Christ to exist by Himself; and thence dogmatising that there were two hypostases in the one Christ, and denying the hypostatical union, according to which He is worshipped not as one person with another; but, as being considered one Jesus Christ the only Begotten, He is honoured together with His own body with one worship.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Eutyches, Dioscorus, and the other Confusionists (συγχυτικοὶ) received this Council, but still they have been accounted heretics because they introduced another heresy; and, therefore, these men also shall be numbered together with them, because of the new fangled innovations which they have brought into the Catholic Church. And just as children in a sportive manner say and do amongst their fellows what has been said and done by their fathers, so do these men affect to bring forward and commit to writing in a didactic manner that which is very well known to all the world, and thus become a laughing-stock to all. But continuing the same empty verbiage they add.”
Gregory reads:
“Then follows the illustrious and far-famed Council which met at Chalcedon under the God-beloved Emperor Marcian, which anathematised Dioscorus and the unhappy Eutyches, who taught that Christ who, with His flesh, is one and the same Lord, after the complete hypostatic union, did no longer subsist in two natures; but that of the two natures an union was effected whereby one nature mixed and compounded of the two was produced.
“In addition to these was the Council of one hundred and sixty four holy fathers which was convened at Constantinople under Justinian of sacred memory, which condemned Origen surnamed Adamantius, Evagrius and Didymus, together with their Pagan writings; Theodore Bishop of Mopsuestia, and Diodorus the preceptor of Nestorius; Severus, Peter, Zooras, with their impious opinions; and the epistle said to be written by Ibas to Maris the Persian, and which confirmed the pious decrees of the holy great fourth Council.”
Epiphanius reads:
“These holy Ecumenical Councils and those which preceded, Sergius of Constantinople, Cyrus of Alexandria, Honorius of Rome, and their Monothelite party, received; but, nevertheless, they have been anathematised as heretics by the Catholic Church, as having brawled out vain things in the Church by their heresy: so these men, though they receive these same holy Synods, yet, on account of their peculiar heresy, have they been cast out of the Church. Indeed, all they say about them is vain, idle, and unworthy of any notice; for though they style these Councils holy yet do they oppose and controvert them. Now, if they have done this in ignorance it proves their want of discipline and of sense; but, if consciously, it argues impiety and conscience altogether perverted. Either let them point out to us one Council in opposition to another, unless it be of the number of those which having no part in the Catholic Church have been anathematised by her, like their own; or let them follow those which are holy and approved, and what these permitted to be in the Church let them receive. Had they admitted images they would have acted in accordance with the Catholic Church, since these have been admitted in the six holy Ecumenical Councils; but, as they follow not the Catholic Church, let no one give any heed to those who turn aside from her godly traditions.”
Gregory reads:
“In like manner, also in the times of the pious Emperor Constantine, a Council of one hundred and seventy holy fathers was assembled in this royal city, which anathematised and denounced Theodore of Pharan, Cyrus of Alexandria, Honorius of Rome, Sergius, Paul, Pyrrhus, and Peter, successively Patriarchs of Constantinople; Macarius of Antioch, and his disciple Stephen; for having taught that there was but one will and operation in the two natures of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Epiphanius reads:
“To this trifling we make no further answer, having sufficiently replied to it before. But, again, with artful intention they bring, before our notice these holy Councils in the following manner.”
Gregory reads:
“These six holy Ecumenical Councils, piously, and as it pleased God, having expounded the dogmas of the immaculate faith of us Christians, and being under the influence of the Spirit of the God delivered Gospels, have handed down this to us that in one Christ our Lord and God is one Person in two natures, in two wills and operations, and have taught that the miracles and the sufferings were of one and the same person.”
Epiphanius reads:
“O, the conceit, the insufferable arrogance, of these men! — who, as if the Church were unlearned and had no acquaintance with holy doctrines, must needs undertake to instruct her! Whereas she has been declared to be full of all wisdom, as with the great voice of the Spirit, the divine Apostle her mystical instructor cries aloud saying — ‘That to the principalities and powers might be made known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God’ (Ephes. iii. 10). They have not determined wisely but very dangerously, when they brought forward for discussion points which need no enquiry; for the Church hath received and set her seal to these doctrines as a safe anchor, and stands in no need of their sanction. But our fathers, together with these sacred dogmas, received also holy images, counted them worthy of a certain reverence and worship, set them up in the venerable temples which were built by them, and, indeed, had them painted in every convenient place and embraced them. These men, on the other hand, have dared to exalt themselves above all that holy company, and have set up a throne in opposition to theirs, like to the devil the father of lies, lifting up their heads on high, and these holy things they have polluted and insulted, and even cast them into the fire. O the atrocity! O the audacious madness! Let their mischievous imagination perish: may the Lord save His people from their deadly impieties. Henceforth may all obey the Catholic Church — may they receive all pictures, whether of evangelical narration or of the conflicts of the Martyrs — and may they embrace them even as the holy Church of God has received from the beginning. Still with the same artifice they continue their idle pratings.”
Gregory reads:
“Into which things we, having by the assistance of the Holy Ghost, examined and enquired with much care and thought, have found that the unlawful art of the painter blasphemes against this important doctrine of our salvation — that is, the dispensation of Christ and also that it subverts these same six holy Ecumenical divinely assembled Councils.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Their care and their thought has been for evil; for as Absalom cared much and thought deeply when plotting with Ahithophel against his own father, so have these men plotted against the holy fathers. And as Ahab seemed to himself to be under the divine guidance when he received the predictions of the false prophets, and was disappointed in his expectation, so it is with them. The writer of Proverbs has said, ‘There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof is the way of death’ (Prov. xiv. 12), which end will be their own, since overcome with the desire of pleasing men; and, speaking from their own belly, they conceive those ways of theirs to be right, which will bring all who give heed to them to the lake of hell. For how does the making of images blaspheme against this most important mystery (as they call it) of the dispensation of Christ; or in what way is the art of the painter subversive of the doctrine of the six holy Ecumenical Councils? Or how is it contrary to their meaning that images have been set up in churches, when the very fathers themselves, who thus magisterially and spontaneously unfolded the mystery of our salvation, caused representations of it to be made in holy temples, employing for this purpose the art of the painter? It cannot be as they affirm; for which of our sacred fathers has ever proved that he considered the art of the painter as unlawful in respect of the important doctrine of our salvation — that is, the dispensation of Christ? For that which any one admits, He will not readily censure. So it seems they would make vain assertions easily enough, but were not so well able to prove them! Or it may be they supposed that no one would ever know how deceitfully they had dealt with the truth. All mechanical arts whatever, which tend to draw us aside from observance of the commands of God, are to be denounced as evil; but others not of this nature, which are found useful for this present life, and have nothing evil connected with them, were never rejected and cast away by our holy fathers. And thus, the art of the painter, if any one use it for base purposes, must be considered as noxious and hateful, as if any one should paint licentious or indecent scenes, the feats of dancers, or of the race course; and if there are anything similar to these to be produced by this art, such use of it may well be censured as base. But if, in order to represent the lives of holy men, the combats of the Martyrs, their recorded sufferings — if to depict the mystery of the dispensation of the great God and our Saviour we then make use of the painter’s art, we shall be most amply justified in doing so. Just as when any painter depicts a cross, no one who thinks aright will reject this painted cross, or divest it of divine grace, because that it be the work of some painter. And so again must we argue in respect of books — if any one write base or vile things in books, such must be considered as abominable and to be rejected and unfit for Christian ears; but if they contain divinely inspired words and words which tend to piety, they are to be recommended and received and are worthy of the Church of God. In the same manner as we have said already, ought we to reason concerning the images of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Saints. If any one makes a harp or pipes, the work is base; but, if he be a maker of sacred vessels, his work is to be approved. No one who judges aright will censure any art if it be found useful in respect of anything necessary for the present life. We must, therefore, always consider the end and manner in which the perfection of any art consists: if it tends to promote religion it is to be received — if for any vile purpose, it is to be hated and abhorred. But they adhering to their calumnious strain speak as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“That it establishes Nestorius, who divided the one Son and Word of God who was incarnate for us into two Sons.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Again, as we have said before, they only assert — they do not prove. How does he who paints an image of Christ establish Nestorius? Nestorius brings in two sons — one the Word of the Father, the other the Son of the Virgin; but true Christians confess one and the same Son to be both Christ and Lord, and when they paint His image in the fashion in which ‘the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us’ — that is, as perfect man — they do very right. For God the Word who dwelt among us was circumscribed in the flesh, and never did any one attempt to depict His deity; for He says, ‘No man hath seen God at any time.’ He is as God uncircumscribed, invisible, incomprehensible, but he is circumscribed as to His manhood. We know that Christ is both of two natures and in two natures without division — that is, the divine and the human — and that the one which is uncircumscribed and the one which is circumscribed are seen in one Christ. Moreover, a picture is not like to its prototype in essence, but only in name and in the fashion of the depicted members. When any one makes the picture even of a man he does not attempt to represent his soul in his drawing, and between the human soul and the divine nature how vast the difference — the one uncreated, the Creator of all, and without time — the other created, made in time, made by the former! And would any one in his senses, if he saw the picture of a man, argue that the painter had made a separation of the man from his soul? For not only is the picture of a man without a soul but without the essence of body — that is, flesh, muscles, nerves, bones, and the elementary parts, blood, phlegm, chyle, and gall, to introduce which into a picture is impossible: and indeed, if they were found, then we must say it was the man himself and not his image. This present vain speculation must have its part with the rest of their crudities. That which follows is perfectly ridiculous.”
Gregory reads:
“And in like manner Arius, Dioscorus, Eutyches, and Severus, who taught the confusion and mixture of the two natures of the one Christ.”
Epiphanius reads:
“O, what vain assertions! — what old wives’ fables! — that concealed artifice! It seems quite a point with them to waste time in such absurdities. Was it that they did not know the contrariety of these heresies which they have here enumerated, or that they took pleasure in talking absurdly? The heresies of Arius, Dioscorus, and Eutyches, are both opposed to Nestorius and to each other, though all equally tending to impiety. Arius, having taught that the eternal and uncreate Word of God and the Father came into existence from nothing, added another heresy to his former impiety, declaring that Christ had no reasonable soul, but that the Deity was in the place of a soul, to which also he ascribed suffering. Dioscorus and Eutyches, in opposition to Nestorius, who had declared that there were two natures in Christ, were led no less vainly to confound the natures and to assert that but one remained, and wandering far from the royal road which turns neither to the right hand nor to the left they have turned aside from the doctrine of the Apostles and Fathers. Now what agreement, what communion, can there be between the Church and Arius, Dioscorus, and Eutyches, because of her illustrative pictures? Verily their words are vain and corruptible, utterly diverse from that command of the Apostle which enjoins us — ‘Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt’ (Col. iv. 6). They are such as the much afflicted Job abominated, saying — ‘Can bread be eaten without salt, or is there any savour in vain words’ (Job vi. 6)? It is evident, therefore, that in vain and to no purpose do they calumniate the Church of God, at one time affirming that, because she has images of the humanity of the Lord, she is like to the impious Nestorius, who divided the persons — at another, to Eutyches and Dioscorus the accursed Confusionists — heresies which it is manifest have been proved to be opposed to each other and both in opposition to the Church. For if we grant that (as they say) the Church has followed Nestorius, then they are false in asserting that she agrees with Eutyches and Dioscorus. If, on the other hand, we allow that She coincides with Eutyches and Dioscorus, even here we shall be able to prove them false; for, as we have already shown, Eutyches and Nestorius were opposed to each other in their impieties. And thus their argumentation is proved equally vain and superfluous.”
Section the Third
Epiphanius reads:
“Since they have sown among thorns and scattered abroad seed utterly diverse from that of the Apostles, and reap the harvest of the tares of heresy, the Lord by His prophet cries out against them, ‘Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard; they have defiled my inheritance; for thus they speak’” (Jer. x. 12).
Gregory reads:
“We have thought it right, therefore, in this our present definition clearly to point out the error of those who make and those who worship such things. All our God-fearing fathers, together with the holy Ecumenical Councils, have thus delivered to us our pure, undefiled, and heavenly faith and confession, that no one may imagine any kind of division or confusion whatever in that union which, beyond all imagination and conception, is unspeakable and incomprehensible — that is, of the two natures in the one hypostasis of person most strictly proved to be but one.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Verily, these pretended wise men have clearly pointed out their own error. For whereas, all our holy fathers who were assembled in the six holy Ecumenical Councils set up venerable representative pictures in holy temples, and had them besides in other suitable places, and received and approved them, they, on the contrary, have abominated them, and, from certain fallacious sophistries of their own, have declared that such things are an error, and pretend that there is another idolatry besides the worship of demons. And, whereas, the two things are absolutely opposed to each other, they have made no distinction between them. For the things which are prepared for the glory of Christ our God, and the remembrance of His conversation in the flesh — and the things made for the remembrance and glory of devils by certain Jews and Heathens — have but one and the same appellation in their mouths, and they have not been ashamed to commit the same to writing, mingling together that which should be kept separate and framing pretexts for sin. Wherefore, they murmur out their frivolities about the confusion and the division — against the theological knowledge of the Catholic Church, and prate thus saying, ‘that we ought not to imagine any kind of division in the hypostatical union of God the Word in the flesh.’ Now, one might think that they had never read the fathers at all, or that they read them in a cursory manner, not with any attention; for Gregory the Divine demolishes their vain theory at once, saying, ‘Since the notions are divided in conception, the names are divided together with them.’ And all our holy fathers, not admitting the confusion, did declare that the natures were separable in thought by way of distinction though not of division. Whence it is evident that in this respect, either that the right knowledge of their doctrine was unknown to them, or that they bring a false charge against our holy fathers in asserting that they say that there was no kind of division whatever in the union of the two natures of the dispensation which is in Christ. Nestorius did actually divide the natures, saying that the Word of God was one, and that He who was of the Virgin was another, and that God was apart and man apart. But the Catholic Church, confessing a union without confusion, in thought alone, without division divides the natures and acknowledges Emmanuel after the union to be one and the same. But they, breathing out their sneers through their nostrils, add:”
Gregory reads:
“What senseless invention of the foolish artist is this, who, for wretched filthy lucre, makes what ought not to be made? — that is, who fashions with profane hands the things which are to be believed on with the heart, confessed with the mouth” (Rom. x. 9).
Epiphanius reads:
“— It is stark madness to say and think thus! Neither is it the part of any man in his senses in this way to accuse the guiltless! Oh, what invention of vain words is this, thus to imagine such futilities against things hallowed by the Church! If the painter who makes images of our Lord in His human form, or of His Saints, is said to do so for vile lucre, equally may they also who transcribe the Gospels be accused! And we are at liberty to call those who make a picture of a cross foolish artists, and to affirm that they do this for vile lucre! What, then, shall the carpenter who fashions a cross be styled a foolish carpenter? Shall the stonemason who polishes or fabricates a holy table be called a foolish stonemason? And the goldsmith, the silversmith, the weaver, must they be treated in the same way? Why, at that rate, according to their sophistries, we must part with every art, every invention, given us by God, whether for His glory or for our benefit! Since, then, they have attained to such an excess of ignorance and perversity, let them listen to the words of holy Scripture and of our holy fathers spoken in praise of the wisdom implanted in our nature by the all-bountiful Deity who created us. Thus Job, when speaking of God, says, ‘Who gave to women the art of spinning’ (Job. xxxvii. 26)? Holy Scripture declares also that wisdom was given by God to Bezalel for every art of the workman; for it speaks thus — ‘And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Behold, I have called by name Bezalel, the son of Uri, the son of Or, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workman ship to devise cunning works, to work in gold, and in silver, and brass, in cutting of stones to set them, and in carving of timber to work in all manner of workmanship. And I have given him Eliab the son of Ahisamach of the tribe of Dan, and in every wise hearted person have I given understanding, and they shall do all things whatsoever I have commanded thee’ (Exod. xxxi. 2, 3). In accordance with which that eminent theologian Gregory says, ‘And the Lord descended and directed them, and the spirit of knowledge filled Bezalel the artificer of the tabernacle.’ Wherefore, they who decry and condemn the arts which have been given by God to men are, and are said to be, of the heresy of those who despise God, adding, as it is written, ‘sin to sin.’ But they who are not bastards but legitimate offspring of the white robe spouse of Christ — that is, the Catholic Church, which has neither spot or wrinkle or any such thing — who offer their reasonable sacrifice and worship (λατρεια) to God alone when, by the sense of vision, they contemplate the venerable images of Christ, or of our very and true mistress the holy Mother of God, or of the holy Angels and of all the Saints, are sanctified thereby, and learn to fashion their own soul after the remembrance they have of them; and with the heart they believe in one God, ‘for righteousness and with the mouth they confess unto salvation’ — in the same way also that, when they hear the Gospel, it fills the mind of those that hear with truth and grace, and with the heart they understand the sense of the words which have been written. But what now is it that these vain glorious men have to say?”
Gregory reads:
“Such a man makes an image and calls it Christ: now the name Christ signifies both God and Man — therefore it is the image of God and Man; and accordingly it follows that, according to the working of his vain imagination, he has either circumscribed, within the limits of created flesh, the uncircumscribed nature of God, or confounded the unconfused union, and thus has fallen into the heresy of the confusion. Consequently, two blasphemies are hereby applied to God — the circumscription and the confusion: in the same blasphemies is the worshipper also involved. Woe to both equally, for they have erred alike with Arius, Dioscorus, Eutyches, and the Acephali.”
Epiphanius reads:
“The formation of images is no invention of the painter, but the approved ordinance and tradition of the Catholic Church. According to the divine Basil, reverence is due to antiquity; and both the antiquity of the practice bears witness in its favour and the doctrine of our inspired fathers. For when they saw these in venerable temples they joyfully received them, and also when they themselves built venerable temples they set up images there, where also they offered to God the Lord of all, their pious vows and the unbloody sacrifice. Verily, to them belongs the invention and tradition, not to the painter: the workmanship alone is the painter’s — the peculiar application belongs to the fathers who raised these edifices.
“The name Christ is significative of the Deity and the Humanity — the two perfect natures of the Saviour. Christians, however, have been taught to paint His image after that nature which is visible, not after that which is invisible, for that cannot be circumscribed, for ‘no man hath seen God at any time’ (John i. 18), as we have heard from the Gospel. Christ, therefore, being depicted in His human nature, it is evident that, as truth has proved, so Christians confess that the image which is seen participates with the prototype in name only, and not in essence; but they being utterly darkened in mind affirm that there is no difference between the image and the prototype, and that identity of essence is found in diversity of essences. Who will not laugh at their ignorance? Or, rather, who will not weep over such impiety? ‘Given over to a reprobate mind, they speak that which is not convenient’ (Rom. i. 18); murmuring out that the holy Church of God lies open to the charge of ‘confusion,’ and of attaching to Deity ‘a form of circumscription,’ because of her formation of images; then adding sin to sin they issue out their ‘woes’ also; but ‘their labour shall fall upon their own Leads’ (Psalm vii. 16). For if he who cursed ancient Israel was accursed, and he who blessed him was blessed, how much more shall he be filled with the curse who curses new Israel, who contemplates God with the mind (Num. xxiv. 9). Who will not abominate them for saying, ‘That she hath erred with Arius, Dioscorus, Eutyches, and the Acephali: whereas, these very men are the main support of their own odious heresy! For, in the sequel, Eusebius Pamphilus is brought forward by them as a witness, who is noted throughout the whole Catholic Church as a patron of the heresy of Arius; which heresy is to be found in all his writings and treatises, in which he teaches thus — ‘That the Son is to be worshipped in the second place;’ that ‘he is the servant of the Father, and occupies a rank inferior to Him;’ dissenting from the glory of the homoousion (consubstantiality), and affirming a change of the holy flesh of our Lord into the nature of Deity. From such sentiments he enforced ‘the confusion,’ and would allow of no image, as neither would any other of the hateful crew of the Ariomaniacs: for they maintained that our Lord took flesh without any reasonable soul, and that the Godhead was to Him in the place of a soul, that they might attribute suffering to it, as Gregory the theologian testifies; and thus, as Theopaschites, they admit no image. Moreover, the Confusionist Severus, would not admit any image of Christ our God in the church, as most historians tell us. That they should presume to say that the Catholic Church, because she has received pictures and images, has followed Arius, Dioscorus, Eutyches, and the heretic Acephali, is truly astonishing! — thus belching away, and pouring forth into the air nothing else but blasphemous absurdities from their unbridled tongues. Let them, therefore, hear the truth: the divine nature, as we have said, is beyond all circumscription; but the human nature is circumscribed. No man who judges aright, when he asserts that the human nature is circumscribed, would circumscribe with this, that which cannot be circumscribed. Now, the Lord, inasmuch as He was very Man, when he was in Galilee He was not in Judea: this He Himself makes evident when He says, ‘Let us go into Judea again’ (John xi. 7-15); and also when discoursing with His disciples about Lazarus, he added, ‘I am glad for your sakes that I was not there;’ but at the same time, inasmuch as He was God also He was in all places of His dominion at once, being in all respects uncircumscribed. How, then, dare they, in their vain discourse, vent themselves in such in temperate absurdities as the following — ‘He, according to his vain fancy, has circumscribed, within the limits of created flesh, the uncircumscribed nature of the Godhead’? If, when lying wrapped in swaddling clothes in the manger, the nature of the Godhead was circumscribed in the humanity, then His uncircumscribed nature may be circumscribed in the painted image. In like manner, if on the cross the nature of the Godhead was circumscribed within that of the manhood, then also His uncircumscribed Deity may be circumscribed in the painted image; but if, on the one hand, this was not the case, neither can it be in the other. Well would it have been for them had they been acquainted with the words of the God-fearing Dionysius as found in his discourse on the Hierarchy — ‘The resemblance of effects to their causes is not absolutely complete; for though the effects have an impress corresponding to their causes, yet the causes themselves are superior to the effects caused by them, and they are more important in proportion to the ratio of their own original.’ Thus have we proved, even to the meanest capacity, that their patchwork argumentation is but an attempt to bring in new-fangled innovation, and that its real aim is directed against the Church and not against the painter; but, persisting in impudence, they add as follows”
Gregory reads:
“Condemned by all who judge aright, for having endeavoured to depict the incomprehensible and uncircumscribed nature of Christ, they immediately take refuge under another defence of evil contrivance, saying, we paint only the image of that flesh which we have seen and have handled, in which He Himself dwelt amongst us, which is the impious invention of frenzied Nestorianism.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Still continuing the same artifices, these forgers of lies against the truth have fallen into the most shameless contradiction, but quite consistently with themselves — they have fallen into the snare of blasphemy. First, having in words of folly brought accusations against Christians, about the incomprehensible and uncircumscribed nature of Christ, saying that they would circumscribe the same, they next craftily assume another false guise, saying, ‘That we paint only the image of that flesh which we have seen and which we have handled, and in which He was conversant among us,’ that in this way they may bring the Church under the imputation of the blasphemies of Nestorian impiety; wherefore they add, ‘which is the impious invention of frenzied Nestorianism.’ Wherefore, let them hear the truth, Christians, knowing that Christ our Lord is Emmanuel, depict Him in that form in which the Word was made the flesh, thus repelling far from them absurd charges of various kinds, receiving with simplicity of heart all that has been delivered to them in the Church; and when they behold any pictures they consider only that which is represented in them: for when they look upon a picture of the Virgin, who brought forth, and the Angels standing around with the shepherds, they are led to reflect on God becoming Man and being born for our salvation; and they confess, saying, He who was without flesh has taken flesh upon Him, the Word has been made into substance, the uncreate has been created, the impalpable has been handled; and they confess one and the same to be both perfect in Deity and perfect in humanity, truly God and truly Man. But it has been already stated, about the accursed heresy of Nestorius, that the painting of images give no countenance to that: sufficient was said then on that point, and, if need be, it may be repeated; but, conceiting themselves to understand something, they add.”
Gregory reads:
“This ought also to be considered, that if according to the Orthodox fathers, where is the flesh there is the flesh of God the Word, admitting not even the idea of division, but altogether assumed into the divine nature, and entirely deified — and that it cannot be severed or made to have a separate existence by those who impiously endeavour to do thus — thus is it also in respect of his holy soul. For as the Deity, in His own peculiar Person, assumed the nature of the flesh, the soul acted as mediator between the Godhead and the grossness of the flesh; and as, where is the flesh there is the flesh of God the Word, so, where is the soul there is the soul of God the Word and both together, the soul being no less taken into the Godhead than the body, and from these the Godhead is inseparable. For even in that disunion of soul and body, which took place at his voluntary passion, where the soul of Christ was there was the Godhead — where the body of Christ was there was His Godhead.”
Epiphanius reads:
“When they who would subvert the Catholic Church are about to handle some impious dogmas, they take as their preface certain points allowed by all that by the allowed excellence which is found in these they may obtain credit for the rest. So these men, having laid down certain things, well enough mix up pebbles with their jewels; and, quickly returning to their own vomit, talk of Christ being divided and made to have a separate existence by those who admit of holy pictures and images. And they speak calumniously when they say, ‘Not admitting the idea of division;’ for, as it appears, the voice of the fathers was unknown to them, since all clearly teach a division in thought, as was said before, though not according to the blasphemous assertion of Nestorius: in fact, there is, therefore, no ground for the charge of division, disunion, or separation; or, again, on the other hand, of confusion, as they have so often falsely asserted, because we make the image of our Lord as He became perfect Man. The image is one thing and the prototype another; and no one in his senses expects to find in an image the peculiar properties of the prototype. For in the image right reason discerns only a community in name, and not in essence with him of whom it is the image. This we have often said before, compelled by their cavilings. For they, in default of any just charge against the Catholic Church, repeat the same things about the same over again, brawling out vanities — providing abundant absurdities for all who will hear them. And they have made themselves a laughing-stock to all, one time talking of the division, at another of the con fusion. With a tongue ever ready to speak amiss, they add as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“If, therefore, even in the passion the Godhead remained inseparable from these, how foolish and devoid of reason are they who would separate the flesh now united to the Godhead and deified, and thence endeavour to depict the image, as it were, of mere man? In doing this, they have fallen into another abyss of iniquity; for, having separated the flesh from the Godhead, and made it to have an existence apart from it, and having introduced another person in the flesh, of whom they affirm they can depict the image, it is evident that they thus add a fourth person to the Trinity. And, further, that they paint that which was taken into God as without God — from all which it may be concluded, concerning those who think that images of Christ may be painted, either that they consider the divine nature as circumscribed and confused with the flesh, or that the body of Christ may be without God and divided from Him, and that a person subsisting apart in the flesh must be granted, thus assimilating themselves to the Nestorian theomachy. Let those who have fallen into such blasphemy and impiety be ashamed and blush! — let those who make, those who desire, those who worship, that which is made and falsely called by them ‘the image of Christ,’ cease to do so any longer! So may the division of Nestorius and the confusion of Arius, Dioscorus, Eutyches, and Severus, alike cease from the midst of us — evils diametrically opposed, but equally effective of impiety.”
Epiphanius reads:
“These promoters of the Christianity-detracting heresy never hold to one path, as is the custom with the Orthodox, who, in respect of sacred doctrines, adhere to the royal way only and never turn aside to the right hand or to the left. These men, on the other hand, perverting the right ways of the Lord, collect together the most contradictory opinions, puffed up in their own minds and imagining that they know all things! But let them hear Isaiah boldly declaring, ‘Woe to them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight.’ Thus, they pretend those things to be confessed by Christians which are not so much as named by them; and then, reasoning sophistically, they accuse the Church and advance against her with insults, and reproaches, and impieties besides. For, whatever Diodorus, Theodore of Mopsuestia and Nestorius, or Eutyches, Dioscorus, and Severus, may have advanced when raging against the truth, they ascribe to the Catholic Church; and, complicating evil with evil, they give it out that she is defiled with these impious heresies, holding forth words full of absurdity and folly. As vintners, they mix their wine with water — that is, truth with error, and infuse the gall of bitterness through the whole. Now, the heresy of Dioscorus and Eutyches is (as we have said before) opposed to that of Nestorius; and that opposite heresies should be united in the same opinion and profession, is an impossibility, just as it is impossible that we should see the same material at one and the same time to be white and black, or warm and cold; and, again, do we ever find heat in snow or cold in the fire?
“But we have yet a stronger proof of their drunken stolidities: these ready slanderers affirm that the image and the prototype are the same thing; and on this they ground their charge of division and confusion against those who depict the histories of the Gospel. Now, in respect of the Eutychians — that is, those who affirm the one nature in the hypostatic union of Christ and hence teach the confusion — their perversion of the truth consists in this, that they define nature and hypostasis to be the same thing which we the sons of the Catholic Church know to be different things. For hypostasis we affirm to be essence with certain peculiarities from the word ‘υφεστάναι’ (to subsist in another). Nature (φυσις) is that which is self-subsisting, not needing any other thing for its existence, and is derived from the word ‘πεφυκέναι’ (to be). In the same manner these men assert that Christ and the image of Christ are not in essence diverse the one from the other; since, had they been aware of this difference, they had never uttered such prodigious vanities. For it must be plain to all that the image is one thing and the prototype another — this endued with life, that devoid of it. Inasmuch, therefore, as they have prated about the circumscription of the divine nature in a picture, it is evident they have turned away from right reason, being given over to a reprobate mind. Peter and Paul are seen in their images, but their souls are not present in them; and, even if the body itself of Peter were present, his soul could not be seen: and because it cannot be seen, will any of those who follow the truth declare that the flesh of Peter is any otherwise separated from his soul except, it may be, in imagination? How much more must this be the case between the uncircumscribed nature of God, the Word, and the circumscribed body which was assumed by Him? For neither when wearied with His journey He sat on the well and asked of the woman of Samaria water to drink, nor when the Jews would have stoned Him, must it be supposed in the one case that the Godhead was weary, or, in the other, that it was in danger of being stoned. Away with such blasphemies! Such are the complicated perversities which the loud-talking folly of the Christianity-detractors in their desire to asperse images and pictures have brought forward. Nor is this all; but, with unrestrained tongues, they must add others besides: wherefore, adding sin to sin, they have absurdly spoken of ‘the union of a fourth person to the holy Trinity.’ But they who have been born in the Catholic Church as dear children, admitting everything relative to the dispensation of our Lord Jesus Christ, and abominating Arius, Nestorius, and Apollinarius and their followers, Eutyches and Dioscorus, receive also venerable images, knowing them to be images and nothing more, and, as such, having the name of the prototype only and not the essence. But they, sidling along like a crab, strike out into a new path of blasphemy, saying:”
Gregory reads:
“Let them rejoice and be glad — let them speak with all confidence — who, with hearts most sincere, make desire, and venerate the true image of Christ, offering it up for the salvation of soul and body, which He, our Priest and God, who took our nature wholly upon Him did, at the time of His voluntary passion, deliver to His Priests as a most emphatic type and memorial of Himself. For, when He was about to be given up to His ever-memorable and life-giving death He took bread and blessed it; and when He had given thanks He brake it, and dividing it to them. He said, Take, eat, for the remission of sins: this is my body. In like manner, having given the cup, He said, This is my blood: this do in remembrance of me; thus showing that no other form or type from things under heaven was selected by Him as being fitted to represent the image of His incarnation. See, then, in this the image of His life-giving body made in a manner honourable and becoming to Himself. For what did the all-wise Deity intend by this? — nothing else than plainly and evidently to display to us, men, the mystery which was accomplished by His dispensation. For as that which He took of us was only the material of human essence, perfect, in deed, in all respects, yet not formed with the image of any actual person, lest there should be an addition of that person to the Godhead, so He commanded select materials — that is, the substance of bread — to be offered as His image, and that not wrought into the form of man, lest any occasion might be given thereby to the introduction of idolatry. As, therefore, the body of Christ, which is by nature holy, as being deified, so it is evident also concerning that body which is His by adoption — that is, His image — that it is holy as being deified by the grace of sanctification. This, therefore (as we have said), our Master Christ plainly intended that, as He had deified the nature which He had assumed with that peculiar natural sanctification which arose from the union itself, so was He pleased that the bread of the eucharist, as being the true image of His natural flesh, being sanctified by the coming of the Holy Spirit, should become a divine body, in which the Priest mediates, making by an offering that which was common consecrate to sacred use. Lastly: as the animate and intelligent flesh of the Lord which was by nature anointed with the Holy Spirit as to the Deity, so in like manner the God-delivering image of His flesh, the divine bread, together with the cup of the life-giving blood from His side, is replete with the Holy Ghost. This, therefore, has been proved to be the true image of the incarnate dispensation of Christ our God, as was said before, which He, the true Giver of life and the Framer of our nature, with His own voice delivered to us.”
Epiphanius reads:
“The whole of this passage now before us makes it manifest that, when men once turn aside from the truth, they are brought, under the guidance of error, into many most dangerous absurdities: which, indeed, has been the experience of the patrons of this innovation; for, having deserted the truth in respect of the formation of images, they have fallen into another extremity of outrageous madness. They have, indeed, delivered, as from a Delphic Tripod, their perverse and destructive dogmas; but let them listen to the words of the proverb, ‘A man’s lips shall be a snare to him, and he shall be taken in the words of his mouth’ (Proverbs vi. 2); for they have heaped together ‘wood, hay, and stubble, whose end is to be burned.’ For none of those trumpets of the Spirit, the holy Apostles — none of our venerable Fathers ever styled the unbloody sacrifice made in remembrance of the passion of our God, and of His whole dispensation, ‘the image of His body;’ for they have not received of the Lord to speak or confess in this manner. But let them listen to Him speaking in the Gospels, ‘If ye eat not the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood’ (John vi. 53), ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven: and, ‘He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me and I in him’ (ibid. 56). And again, ‘Jesus took bread and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to His disciples and said, Take, eat, this is my body. And He took the cup and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it, for this is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many, for the remission of sins’ (Matthew xxvi. 26-28). Now, He did not say, Take and eat the image of my body. Moreover, Paul the divine Apostle, having drawn from the sacred words of the Lord , said , ‘For I have received of the Lord that which I also delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which He was betrayed, took bread, and when He had given thanks He brake it, and said, Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me. After the same manner He took the cup when He had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show forth the Lord’s death until He come.’ This, therefore, clearly proved that neither our Lord, nor His Apostles, nor our Fathers, have ever styled the unbloody sacrifice offered up by the priests an image, but very body, and very blood. It is, indeed, true that it seemed good to some of the fathers that before the completion of the sanctification they might be called ‘Antitypes,’ among whom were Eustathius the undaunted champion of the Orthodox faith and the subverter of the Arian fatuity, and Basil the destroyer of the same superstition, who on a polished base set up every Orthodox dogma under the sun. For, speaking from one and the same spirit, the former, when interpreting the words of Solomon in the Proverbs, ‘Eat my bread and drink my wine which I have mingled for you,’ speaks thus, ‘By the wine and bread he points out the antitypes of the bodily members of Christ:’ the other, having drawn from the same source, as all who minister in the sacred priesthood well know, thus expresses himself in the prayer of the divine oblation, ‘We approach with confidence the sacred altar, and there offering up the antitypes of the holy body and blood of thy Christ, we entreat of thee, we supplicate thee:’ and the sequel makes the mind of the father yet more plain — that before the sanctification they have been called ‘Antitypes,’ but that after the sanctification they are called, and are, and are believed to be indeed and in truth, ‘the body and blood of Christ.’ But these brave men, in their desire to do away with the contemplation of venerable images, have brought forward another image, which is no image at all, but body and blood. Involved in wickedness and deceit, and misled by their own artful subtleties, they have affirmed this divine oblation to be made by adoption: but, as to say this is stark madness, so to call the body and blood of Christ an image partakes of no less insanity, and implies impiety arising from entire want of discipline. But, for awhile leaving their lies, they bring forward a fragment of truth, saying that it is ‘a divine body;’ but if it be ‘the image of a body,’ it cannot be admitted to be ‘a divine body’ at the same time. As they themselves are carried up hither and thither, that which they have muttered amongst each other can have no weight or authority: for, just as the diseased eye cannot see clearly, so they, having distracted and made turbid their own minds with the confusion of wicked reasonings, experience the same thing; and like mad men, who imagine all things different from what they really are, they style the holy offering of the sacred body of Christ at one time an image, at another His body by adoption. This has befallen them, as we said before, from their desire to take away the sight of sacred pictures from the churches, and because they took pleasure in the demolition of ecclesiastical traditions.”
Section the Fourth
Epiphanius reads:
“Again, holding to the same calumnies, they move their tongues, having sharpened them to the injury of the Church of God.”
Gregory reads:
“The abomination of images falsely named has not its origin from any tradition of Christ, or of His Apostles, or of the Fathers; neither has it any holy prayer for its consecration, that by this it may be separated from common to holy purposes: but it remains common and without honour, in the same state as it was when the painter finished it.”
Epiphanius reads: “Having a tongue full of vauntings, they cease not to aggravate evil, being destitute of the fear of God. Imagining vain things with the most intemperate audacity, they have affirmed images made in the name of Christ to be an abomination and falsely named! Had they ventured to be thus free in speaking of the Royal images they would most likely have paid the penalty with their lives, a doom which they will most certainly meet if there be any retribution for evil words and deeds. Among the many other things handed down to us without being written, the making of images has been most widely diffused from the very preaching of the Apostles. As a proof there is the history of the woman with the bloody flux attested by so many historians — namely, how she set up an image of our Lord and of herself touching the hem of His garment: as, moreover, the Gospel teaches that she obtained a cure, and that between her and the image, of the Lord a certain herb sprang up from the feet of the image, a remedy for every disease! But very many of our Fathers have delivered to us in writing how these have been commonly used among Christians. Basil the Great, whose doctrine has sounded to the ends of the earth, has made mention of them in divers of his discourses; Gregory Bishop of Nyssa, brother to the former both in flesh and spirit, has spoken of them in his discourses upon Abraham; Gregory surnamed the Theologian also, in the verses which he composed, among which is one on the praises of virtue. John also, who had a mouth more precious than gold, in his epitaph on Meletius Bishop of Antioch, and in his discourse entitled, ‘That there is one Lawgiver in the Old and New Testaments:’ Cyril, the subverter of Nestorius, in his first epistle to Acacius Bishop of Scythopolis, Anastasius of Theopolis, Sophronius, Maximus. But why make mention of these by name? All our holy fathers admitted the making of images, and they speak falsehoods in affirming as they do that ‘it is not the tradition of the fathers.’ Aye, and it was most fitting that it should be so: for if they had not given us the Gospel to read, neither would they have made pictures of it; but if they did the one the other must follow. For the representation of the painter is consequent upon the narration of the Gospel; and this again follows on pictorial representation; and both are excellent and precious, unambiguously illustrative and mutually confirmatory of each other. For if we say the sun is upon the earth no doubt but it is day, and equally if we say it is daytime no doubt the sun has risen upon the earth: and in like manner if we see in a picture the Angel preaching the Gospel to the Virgin, the evangelical narrative comes immediately to our remembrance which declares that ‘The Angel Gabriel was sent by God to a Virgin, and when he came in unto her he said, Hail thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women:’ so when we have heard from the Gospel of the mystery transacted between the Virgin and the Angel, we lay it up in our memory, and then when we see it represented in pictures we understand that which was done more clearly. Now, turning off to a new path of ignorance, they say as follows.”
Gregory reads in repetition:
“Neither has it any holy prayer for its consecration, that thereby it may be separated from common to holy purposes; but it remains common and without honour, in the same state that it was when the painter finished it.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Now let them listen to the truth. Many of those things counted sacred amongst us admit of no sacred prayer, since, from their very name, they are full of sanctification and grace: wherefore we honour and embrace them as being venerable in themselves. Thus the form of the life-giving cross is counted holy without any sacred prayer of consecration, and we are content from this type to receive sanctification, and by the worship we do to it, and by making the sign of it in our foreheads, and by doing the same with our fingers in the air, we hope to drive away demons; and thus in like manner in respect of images, by the signification of the name, we are led to the honour of the prototype, and, embracing them, and giving them the worship of honour, we become partakers of sanctification; even as also we kiss and in the same way embrace the various other sacred vessels which we have amongst us, hoping thereby to partake of some sanctification from them: wherefore they ought to prate that the cross and other sacred vessels remain common and without honour, just as when the artificer, the painter, or weaver, finished them; for they have no sacred prayer for their consecration, or they must receive venerable images as holy, sacred, and precious; but now, desirous of sowing more of their tares, as if from Satanic inspiration, they add.”
Gregory reads:
“But if any of those who had hitherto been involved in this heresy should confess that in what we had said, in respect of the abolition of images which bear the name of Christ, we had spoken rightly and piously, because of the indivisibility and the unconfused union of the two natures in one Person; but should be at a loss to understand why we forbad the images of the immaculate, exceedingly glorious, and very Mother of God, or of the Prophets, Apostles, and Martyrs, since they have but a human nature, and are not of two natures — the God head and the Manhood-in one person, as in the one Christ.”
Epiphanius reads:
“None of those who have been brought up in the Catholic Church would ever imagine or confess that they had determined rightly or piously anything concerning this innovation: on the contrary, all the chief Priests, and other Priests of the East and West, North and South, have given up to anathema all who hold such opinions. True, indeed, they have perverted, and cut off from the body of the Church, some small portion of the neighbouring parishes, either ignorant of or despising the word of the Lord, which declares, ‘Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he be cast into the sea’ (Matt. xviii.) But as they have shown no reverence for Him, being outrageous against His image, so neither have they any regard for His Saints, but have sharpened their tongues against them, also speaking thus.”
Gregory reads:
“But should we be at a loss to know why we forbad the images of immaculate, exceedingly glorious, and very Mother of God, of the Prophets, Apostles, and Martyrs, since they have but the human nature only, and are not of two natures — the Godhead and the Manhood: to such it may be replied that, if the former be taken away, there can be no need of the latter.”
Epiphanius reads:
“But, in respect of the former, they have not subverted the use of that, either by the Apostles or the Gospels, by the Scriptures, by the Fathers, or by sound argument, or, in short, at all piously; but, speaking from their own belly, they have set themselves in opposition to the Church of God. Neither have they a word of truth or piety to advance against the images of our immaculate Lady the Mother of God, or of the Saints, as, according to the ability which God giveth, we have proved. For we, having drawn from the sources of the holy fathers, have said already that the honour done to the image passes on to the prototype; and, again, that he who beholds an image beholds the King in it, so he who worships an image worships the King in it, for His figure and shape is in the image; and thus he who insults the image of the King is justly exposed to punishment as having actually injured the King Himself; and this, though an image be nothing more than wood and colours mixed and compounded with wax , in the same manner he who dishonours the image of any one insults the person who is the prototype thereof; and the very nature of things teaches us that if the image be insulted the prototype is equally disgraced. This all men know, and they know further that these men are in arms against the fathers, in opposition to the Church, and in direct contradiction to the very nature of things.”
Gregory reads:
“But we will now add somewhat for the subversion of these also. Since the Catholic faith of us Christians holds a middle course between Judaism and Heathenism, and does not participate in the sacred rites of either the one or the other, it treads the new path of piety and mysterious discipline received from God; and, while on the one hand it admits not the bloody sacrifices and holocausts of Judaism, on the other it abominates not only the sacrifices of Heathenism, but their whole system of idol-formation and idol-worship together. For of this shameless invention Heathenism has been the originator and inventor, since not having the hope of the resurrection it has devised this absurdity worthy of itself, that in this illusory mode it might seem to make those things to be present which are not present. If, then, no strange thing shall be in Her, let this art also be put away from the Church of Christ as being a strange thing and the invention of men under the influence of Satan.”
Epiphanius reads:
“This record of their immeasurably absurd jargon, most plentifully furnished with prating garrulities, is not more shameless than it is ridiculous. In their past speculations they were brought by their sophisms amongst precipices and crags, but now they have plunged into the lake of hell, exhibiting, as they have done, the Church as holding a middle course between Judaism and Heathenism. In strange opposition to themselves, they next add that she participates in the sacred rites of neither the one or the other. Either their first proposition is false or their second is false — in fact, they give the lie to themselves, for falsehood is not only opposed to the truth but even to itself, according to David, the sacred Psalmist, who says, ‘Iniquity hath deceived itself’ (Psalm xxvii. 12) Basil Bishop of the Caesareaus, whose voice went forth into all the world, in the beginning of his treatise against Sabellius, speaks thus — ‘Judaism opposes Heathenism, and both are opposed to Christianity;’ but they, looking on themselves as far wiser than the fathers, hare represented Christianity as holding a middle course between these two contraries — namely Judaism which leads to contracted views of Deity, and Heathenism which brings in many deities. Gregory, surnamed ‘the Theologian,’ when setting both the one and the other aside, speaks thus — ‘When I say of God, I mean the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the Godhead not being extended beyond these, that we may not bring in a crowd of deities, nor being defined within this number, lest we should determine a poverty of deity, avoiding alike the monarchy of the Jews and the polytheism of the Heathen, for the evil in both is equal though found in opposing extremes!’
“The sacrifices of the Old Testament, of which the people of Israel were partakers, were a tradition from God, while those of the Heathens were derived from devils; wherefore, they have confounded and coupled together rites delivered by God and devilish ordinances in the same way that before they declared the image of Christ to be an idol equally with the images of devils. Let them, therefore, accuse Abel, Noah, and Abraham, on account of the sacrifices of living animals which they offered to God — yea, let them accuse Moses, Samuel, and David, and the rest of the Patriarchs, for that they offered up strange and Gentile sacrifices to God, although Scripture expressly declares, concerning their sacrifice, ‘The Lord smelled a sweet savour’ (Gen. xviii. 21). Would that they had acknowledged the truth that the things that are offered to God are acceptable to Him, for it is written, ‘They sacrificed unto the Lord God’ (Deut. xxxii. 17). But the things which are offered to devils are execrable and abominable; for, saith the Scripture, ‘They sacrificed to devils and not to God’ (1 Cor. x. 20). From us and by us is the good or evil, and not in the subject. ‘For (saith the Apostle) is the idol any thing? — or is that which is offered to idols any thing? But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to devils and not to God.’ But now egregiously mistaken, interweaving calumny and falsehood, they deliberate and add as follows.”
Gregory reads:
“Let, therefore, every mouth cease any more to utter unjust and contemptuous speeches against this opinion and decision which by us has been received from God. The Saints who have pleased God and who have been honoured by Him with the grace of sanctity live ever with God, although they are removed from us. He, therefore, who, by an art dead and hateful, and which never can confer life, would endeavour to raise them up among us again, is thereby proved to be a blasphemer.”
Epiphanius reads:
“By what they have now said they have proved themselves to be strangers and aliens from the peace of God which the Lord hath left to those who believe in Him in sincerity and without deceit, saying, ‘Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you’ (John xiv. 27). For how can they have peace when the Catholic Church, holding to and confirmed by her traditions, is decided against their opinions and decision? They who, under the influence of divine zeal, are ever more concordant with the fathers and with the tradition of ecclesiastical order, flee from and avoid those who maintain the contrary as enemies. These therefore, the true worshippers, who serve God in spirit and in truth, and have pictorial representations only for the sake of illustration and memorial, and in spite of their opinion and decree which was never received by God, do embrace and salute them — being armed with the breastplate of truth — will never cease to pierce with the sword of the Spirit, as having cut themselves off from the whole body of the Church. The Saints who pleased God in former ages have left written records of their lives for our profit and salvation, and also have, by pictorial re presentations, handed down the deeds which they wrought in the Church for the awakening of our minds by remembrance and to excite us to follow their manner of life. Thus, St. Basil, in his panegyric on the forty holy Martyrs, says, ‘Come, let us by our commemoration set them, as it were, in the midst of us, and exhibit them for the common good of all now present, displaying, as in a picture, the glorious deeds of these men. For the feats of war have been often set forth both by the historian and by the painter — the one adorning them in the beauties of language, the other by the powers of the pencil; and both the one and the other have excited many to deeds of bravery. For what the discourse of the historian presents to our ears, that the silent picture displays by imitation.’ But now, with craft and praise commingled, they continue.”
Gregory reads:
“How, then, shall any one dare to pourtray with this vain heathen art the ever-to-be-praised Mother of God, whom the fulness of the Godhead overshadowed — by whom the unapproachable light shone upon us — who is more exalted than the heavens — more holy than the cherubin. Again: who will not blush to depict by this same Gentile contrivance those who hereafter shall reign together with Christ — who shall be assessors together with Him — who shall judge the world — who shall be conformed to His glory? — ‘of whom (as say the oracles) the world was not worthy’ (Heb. xi. 38). It is not lawful for Christians who have the hope of the resurrection to make use of the customs of the Gentiles who worship devils, or to insult in inglorious and life less material those who shall hereafter shine in such glory. We receive not the proofs of our faith from aliens; for, when the devils called Jesus the Son of God. He rebuked them, not choosing to have the testimony of evil spirits” (Mark i. 25; Luke iv. 41).
Epiphanius reads:
“In order to entrap the simple into agreement with their vanities, they commence with panegyrics. They, however, who have the wisdom of the serpent, and instead of his craft the innocence of the dove, are accustomed to honour in discourses and in panegyrics the undefiled, immaculate, the true and rightful Mother of God, and the Saints, and by means of books to call their virtues to mind — and they further are accustomed, by means of pictorial representations, to make known their conflicts and their fortitude, to magnify them with highest honour, and to recognize them, according to the divine Apostle, ‘as having departed, as being with Christ’ (Philip. i. 23), and as making intercession for us; and this, while they offer their sincere and unfeigned faith and the worship which is in sincerity and truth, to God alone, and not to any creature under heaven whatever. Why should they calumniate truth by assuming matter to be a base thing? It behoved them rather to avoid the evil and choose the good. They should have remembered concerning the sacrifices of old, which, when offered to God, are commended in Scripture, but when offered to devils, though the material were just the same, are accounted full of all pollution. But they, taking only the material into consideration, accuse the Church of having symbols of heathen invention. But, since matter may be applied to the most opposite purposes, it is not to be denounced as evil, nor is its utility to be despised. For, if this their way of reasoning and arguing be admitted, all that is consecrated to God among themselves must be renounced — that is, the holy garments and consecrated vessels; for the Gentiles made their idols of silver and gold, and offered libations of wine, and they among the Hebrews who would bring in idolatry, offered cakes of barley to the Host of heaven. It is evident, therefore, that they slander the Catholic Church. The Gentiles praise their God and Demons in books of history! And shall we not praise our God or His Saints in books of history, lest we be as the Gentiles or lest we receive testimony from aliens? Oh! perversion — oh! madness! Verily, because we are men endued with senses, therefore we use sensible objects for our instruction, and for the remembrance of every divine and pious tradition. But now, as adulterators of the truth, perverting the ways and the thoughts of God, they say”
Gregory reads:
“In addition to this our carefully examined and well considered decision, we have brought forward, both from the divinely-inspired Scripture and our accredited fathers, plain testimonies consentient with us and corroborative of our pious design; which he who has any acquaintance with them will not controvert, and but let him who is ignorant learn and retain them as being from God. Our first testimony shall be from the mouth of the Lord Himself, saying, ‘God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth’ (John iv. 24). Again, — ‘No man hath seen God any time’ (ibid. i. 18): ‘Ye have neither heard His voice, nor seen His shape’ (ibid. v. 37). Again, He declares them ‘blessed who had not seen, and yet have believed’ (ibid. xx. 29).
Epiphanius reads:
“When any undertake to pervert right doctrines according to their own fancies let no one be surprised if they make use of the words of Scripture; for every Heresiarch has gathered from the divinely-inspired Scripture some occasion for their peculiar error, perverting by their own misinterpretation that which was rightly spoken by the Holy Spirit. Of this Peter, the chief trumpet of the Apostles, spoke beforehand, saying, ‘Which things the unlearned and unstable wrest according to their own lusts’ (2 Peter iii. 16). And truly it is the great characteristic of Heresiarchs to pervert the knowledge of divine and true doctrines according to their own lusts. Thus, while the fathers universally held these words, ‘The Lord created me in the beginning of His ways among His works’ (Proverbs viii. 22), to relate to the dispensation of the humanity of Christ, Arius, Eunomius, and their party, applied it to the divine generation which was from above, and thus turned aside from the paths of knowledge. Again, Apollinarius, misunderstanding the words of the Gospel, No man hath ascended up into heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man which is in heaven’ (John iii. 13), fell into the absurdity of supposing that God the Word descended from heaven with that flesh which He had even when in heaven, co-eternal and consubstantial with Himself. He brought forward also these words of the Apostle, ‘The second Man, the Lord from heaven’ (1 Cor. xv. 47). Thus was he deceived by his peculiar notions. It is therefore no wonder if the Heresiarchs of this empty absurdity should also bring forward passages from the divine Scripture, since they have learned this way of attack from the same teachers. Thus, words spoken of the invisible incomprehensible Godhead they have applied to the incarnate dispensation of our Lord and Saviour, one of the holy Trinity. For what man of common sense is there who does not know that this, ‘No man hath seen God at any time’ (John i. 18), is written concerning the divine nature; and that if any imagine this, ‘Ye have not heard His voice nor seen His shape’ (ibid. v. 37), to apply to the humanity, he subverts the whole Gospel, For how shall we understand this, ‘The Lord spake to His disciples,’ and ‘the Lord spake to the Jews who came to Him,’ and ‘the Lord said, Woe unto you, Pharisees,’ and ‘the Lord opened His mouth and taught them?’ — evidently as pointing out His humanity: while this, ‘Ye have not heard His voice nor seen His shape,’ must be understood of the divine essence. Inasmuch as God the Word became perfect man, as we said before, ‘We have both heard His voice and seen His shape:’ and this even after the resurrection; for He was handled, and being seen of His disciples spake to them concerning the kingdom. But further, they have made the divine service (λατρείαν), and worship which Christians with true and sincere faith have in themselves, to be the same thing with relative and honorary worship. In these two points lies their perversion, whence they are, and are denominated ‘Christianity-slanderers:’ for they declare that Christians offer to holy and venerable images the worship and service due to God only, and that they circumscribe the uncircumscribable nature of the Godhead. O, the perversity, the stolidity, and everything else that is absurd! Their arguments have no foundation, but are made up of reproach and calumny! For Christians have neither offered up at any time the worship which is in spirit and in truth to images nor the sacred type of the cross, nor have they ever made any image of the nature which is invisible and incomprehensible; but, inasmuch as the Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us, they made the picture or image of His incarnate dispensation. Knowing, indeed, that ‘God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth,’ they offer the worship and service of faith to that God alone who is above all, and who is celebrated in a Trinity of Persons; while, out of desire and affection for their prototypes, they embrace and offer the worship of honour to the sacred type of the cross and to venerable images. Their sophistical arguments have therefore been proved by the truth to be vain, void, and worthless. In like manner in what follows, having meditated things beside the truth, they say”
Gregory reads:
“And in the Old Testament He saith to Moses and the people, ‘Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of any thing that is in the heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth’ (Exodus xx. 4; Deut. v. 8) For in the mount from the midst of the fire ye have heard the voice of words: ye saw no likeness, only ye heard a voice’” (Deut. iv. 12).
Epiphanius reads:
“Hence, forsooth, taking occasion for their impiety, they would with their sophisms scare Christians as though they were children — as if, because they had the illustration of pictures for the remembrance of Christ and His Saints, they were in danger of relapsing into idolatry! And these worthy men, intending all iniquity by their harangues, take refuge in this, ‘Thou shalt make no manner of similitude;’ and thus holding the truth in unrighteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness,’ they train themselves in impiety; and, vaunting themselves in the emptiness of falsehood, they have become aliens to the truth. With theatrical pomp they right solemnly set themselves to adapt to the general assembly of the Christians, the words of the law given of old to the people of Israel, who had served the golden calf and had too much acquaintance with Egyptian abominations; and in doing this they are taken in the words of their own lips. Would they had reflected that it was when God was about to bring His people into the land of promise, because that there dwelt therein nations which served idols, and worshipped demons, and the sun, the moon, the stars, and other created things — yea, even birds, beasts, and creeping things, and not the living and the true God — that He gave this command, ‘Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or under the earth:’ and He added also, in order to exclude idolatry, ‘Thou shalt not worship them, nor serve them.’ But when Moses, His faithful servant, by the command of God, made the tabernacle of the testimony in order to shew how all things serve Him, he made of gold palpable figures of Cherubim in the form of men, antitypes of intellectual beings, to overshadow the mercy-seat, which mercy-seat [ἱλαστήριον] prefigured Christ, For He is the propitiation [ἱλασμός] for our sins’ (John ii. 2), as saith the Apostle. Therefore, in two different ways he would lead them to the knowledge of God, first saying, ‘Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve,’ then making the molten Cherubim of gold overshadowing the mercy-seat — that is, worshipping it — thus, by sight: as well as by hearing, leading them to worship the Lord their God and to serve Him only. But they, with minds replete with perversity, now bring forward certain words of the Apostles also.”
Gregory reads:
“‘And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of sinful men, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator’ (Rom. i. 23-25). And again, ‘If we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more’ (2 Cor. v. 16); ‘we walk by faith and not by sight’ (ibid. 7). And as the same declares most convincingly, ‘So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God’” (Rom. 1. 17).
Epiphanius reads:
“To say the truth, it is they that are like the Heathen who changed the glory of God and serve the creature more than the Creator, who thus change and pervert the Apostle’s words after their own lusts. For every one knows chat the Apostle is deriding the Gentiles when he says, ‘They changed the glory of God into the likeness of corruptible man;’ for he adds further, ‘and of birds, and beasts, and creeping things;’ but in their craft they would not allow the whole passage to appear, that in this way they might seduce the more simple to imagine that the Apostle was directing his discourse against the pictures and images used in the Church. Now, it is these words which follow which make the meaning of the passage clear; for he had made mention of birds, and beasts, and creeping things; and that so they served the creature more than the Creator. They who have any acquaintance with history are well aware that the Egyptians of old worshipped oxen and other four-footed creatures; also various kinds of birds, flies, and wasps, and creatures yet more vile than these; and that the Persians worshipped the sun and fire: the Greeks beside these worshipped every creature, as also did certain of the Hebrews, as we learn from the books of Kings and the writings of the Prophets. But now let them declare to us when it was that the nations became vain and that their foolish heart was darkened — was it before or after that they had believed? No doubt it was before they believed, for that is clear enough. But if they say in reply that the Heathen after they have believed have served the creature and idols, then I say that, according to them, the predictions spoken by the Prophets concerning the Church to take place after the dispensation of Christ our God are devoid of truth. For it is written, ‘Jerusalem shall be holy, and strangers shall no longer pass through her’ (Joel iii. 17); and ‘My mercy I will not separate from her, neither will I profane my covenant, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips’ (Psalm lxxxix. 33, 34). But if it were altogether before the coming of Christ that men separated themselves from the knowledge of God and, having served Satan, were delivered over to a reprobate mind, it is in vain now to bring these words forward as a charge against Christians. Against these the Prophet Isaiah cries out aloud, saying, ‘Woe to those who write wickedness, for writing they write wickedness’ (Isaiah x. 1); for, having craftily and perversely laid hold of the words of Scripture and of the Apostles, they have endeavoured to subvert the great mystery of our salvation — namely, the dispensation of Christ our God by which we were delivered from idolatry, in order, to transfer this glory to themselves! No Christian would ever believe them; for we all confess that Christ our true God, by His dwelling amongst us in the flesh, delivered us from idolatrous error and all Pagan worship; and if any agree not in this confession they have no calling from Him. To them might the Apostle say, ‘What hast thou which thou hast not received?’ If, then, they have received this redemption, they ought to confess it and to allow of images, by which the glory of the Church is presented to our age and which imprint on our minds evangelical transactions, ministering to the remembrance and illustration of the history of the Gospel, as we have often said before. And since they have brought forward these words of the Apostle, saying, ‘If we have known Christ after the flesh, yet hence forward know we Him no more,’ and ‘We walk by faith and not by sight,’ let us bring forward also our illustrious Doctors as interpreters thereof. John was endowed with doctrine more precious than that of gold and precious stones in his interpretation of this passage of the Apostle, ‘Henceforth know we no man after the flesh, and if we have known Christ after the flesh, yet henceforth know we Him no more,’ speaks thus, We know none of the faithful after the flesh: how is this, if they are yet in flesh? Because their carnal life is at an end, and we have been born again from nature by the Spirit, and we are acquainted with another citizenship and conversation, another life and disposition, even that which is heavenly’ (Hom. xi. on 2 Cor.) And, again, of this itself, he shows Christ to be the Author: wherefore he adds, ‘If we have known Christ after the flesh, yet henceforth know we Him no more.’ What, then, tell me, hath He lain aside His body? And is He now without the body? Away with the notion! For even now He is in the flesh. ‘For this Jesus who was taken up from us into heaven shall come again in like manner’ (Acts i. 11). In like manner? How? In the flesh with the body. Why, then, does he say ‘If we have known Christ after the flesh we shall know Him no more?’ Because that if we have known Christ subject to suffering (παθητὸν) we shall know Him thus no more. In respect of us to be after the flesh is our being in our sins, and not to be after the flesh is not to be in our sins. In respect of Christ to be after the flesh is to be exposed to the sufferings of nature, such as thirst, hunger, weariness, and sleep; for ‘He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth’ (1 Pet. ii. 22). Wherefore also He saith, ‘Which of you convinceth me of sin’ (John viii. 46)? And, again, ‘The Prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in me’ (xiv. 10). For Christ not to be after the flesh means that henceforth He is not free from all such circumstances, and not that He is without body; for with this body, free from suffering, free from corruption, He is coming to judge the world, to which glory we also are tending; ‘for our body shall be made like unto His glorious body’ (Phil. iii. 12).
“Cyril of Alexandria, the champion of our pure faith, when interpreting the same passage, explains it thus: ‘Since the only-begotten Word of God became Man, a second root of our race has appeared, not according to the first from Adam, but, which is to be considered better, we are transformed beyond all comparison in things relating to life; for we are not under death, but under the Word Himself, who giveth life to all; and no one is any longer in the flesh — that is, in carnal weakness, which is destruction. Paul does not affirm this, that Christ was not in the flesh; for though he says ‘that we know no one according to the flesh,’ it is not this that he means, for, otherwise, how could He have died, for this is a weakness belonging to the flesh: What he intends therefore is this: the Word became flesh and died for all, and in this manner we have known Him according to the flesh, but henceforth know we Him no more; for though even now He be in the flesh (for He rose again the third day and ascended into heaven), yet is He now to be considered as superior to the flesh, for He died no more, nor does He endure any infirmity of the flesh, but is above all things as being God, See, therefore, ye of the opposite party, that not only do ye pervert the words of the Apostles, but set yourselves in opposition to the sentiments of the Fathers also. For they, from the above-mentioned words of the Apostles, prove that Christ, after His resurrection, was made free from suffering, and would teach us as being conformed to the body of His glory that we should not walk according to the flesh — that is, that we should not affect the pursuit of carnal pleasures. But ye, not enduring to tread in their steps, as holding opinions directly opposed to the fathers, must needs bring in some novel interpretation, and, walking in untrodden paths, leading yourselves and your followers over precipices and abysses, ye drag them with you down to the lake of hell; but none will give any heed to you, because ye follow not the doctrine of our holy fathers.’
“But with respect to the words, ‘We walk by faith and not by sight,’ the above-mentioned John thus interprets them — ‘But lest any should say, what then? When thou sayest Being at home in the body we are absent from the Lord, Why do you speak thus? Are we banished from Him because we are here? He anticipates the objection by saying, We walk by faith and not by sight. Even here we know Him, but not entirely, as he says elsewhere, Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face.’ (Hom. x, on 2nd Cor.) These are the interpretations of our two inspired fathers. And, moreover, the Apostle himself in other of his writings clearly explains his meaning, as when he says, ‘That which a man sees, why doth he yet hope for it? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it’ (Rom. viii. 24, 25). It is evident that we walk by faith and not by sight; for here, though we see not God, yet do we believe in Him. In like manner, by faith, we say that all His creatures were the work of His hand, even as with the sublime voice of the Spirit the same divine Apostle declares, ‘By faith we understand that the heavens were made by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear’ (Heb. xi. 3); and thus we, contemplating the well-ordered motion of all things, come to the knowledge of that God who hath created all in wisdom. This is, then, the meaning of the words ‘We walk by faith and not by sight,’ and it is not as they would interpret the passage who, from the want of discipline, would pervert the Apostle’s sentiments as if they were against the worship of images. Having heard the doctrines of the fathers, these have we followed, and this present innovation we have abominated, saying, ‘I have hated the assembly of those who do evil, and I will not sit together with the wicked’” (Psalm xxvi. 5).
Section the Fifth
Epiphanius reads:
“That their feet running towards evil have been caught in their own snares, and that none of those brought up in the Church have changed the glory of God for the making of images, or for the worship of any created thing whatever, has been proved already. Let us, then, now proceed to the subversion of the remainder of their arguments, having invincible truth as our ally: for they, not unwilling by every addition to make evil abound, must bring our holy fathers also into the arena, and absurdly represent them as having spoken against the making of venerable images, proceeding thus:”
Gregory reads:
“In a similar way have the disciples and successors of the Apostles, our divinely-speaking fathers, taught. Wherefore he who was illustrious among the champions of the Church, the far-famed Epiphanius Bishop of Cyprus says, ‘Take heed to yourselves and hold fast the traditions which ye have received, and turn neither to the right hand nor to the left:’ after which he adds, ‘In this respect be mindful, my beloved children, not to introduce images into the churches nor into the cemeteries of the Saints; but labour by memory ever to have God dwelling in your hearts. Neither should they be brought into private houses; for it is not lawful for a Christian to wander hither and thither after the sight of the eyes and the vagaries of the imagination.’ And he made also other discourses against the formation of images, which the studious enquirer may easily find on seeking after them.”
Epiphanius reads:
“The studious enquirer into ecclesiastical matters knows this, that he ought not to look on those as brethren who hold sentiments diverse from the Church, and who, wishing to establish their own righteousness and to set themselves in opposition to the righteousness of God, place their confidence in ambiguous and superstitious documents, since they are bastards and not the legitimate offspring of the Church. He therefore will repel such from him, saying, ‘Ye are the seed of Canaan and not of Judah’ (Susanna 56); knowing also the words of the Evangelist, ‘They went out from us, but were not of us; for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us’ (1 John ii. 19). And again that the divine Apostle has said, ‘There shall come after my departure grievous wolves, not sparing the flock, to draw away disciples after them’ (Acts xx. 29-30). And again, ‘Beware lest any despoil you through philosophy and vain deceit’ (Col. ii. 8). And again the same advises, ‘Believe not every spirit’ (1 John iv. 1). It becomes every Christian, therefore, when such supposititious works are read to him, to reject them with the greatest contempt and not to admit them at all. Thus, in some collections of the apostolic epistles is found a forged epistle of the divine Apostle to the Laodiceans, which our fathers rejected as having nothing to do with him. The Manicheans brought forward a Gospel according to St. Thomas, which the Catholic Church religiously rejected as being spurious. Just in the same way we find here a passage attributed to Saint Epiphanius which is none of his: for the same divine father, having made a treatise of eighty chapters, utterly triumphs over every heresy, whether Gentile, Jewish, or such as have sprung up since the establishment of Christianity, and he passes by none: had he therefore considered the making of images to have been against the mind of Christ, he no doubt would have placed that also in his catalogue of heresies. Again, if the Church had ever admitted these extracts here cited against holy images, sure these same venerable images would never have been depicted as they have been, whether for the ornament of churches or our reminiscence. Indeed, the very passages of which the patrons of this vanity speak as an evidence in their favour contain their own confutation. For St. Epiphanius flourished in the time of Theodosius and Arcadius; between that period and the rise of the present heresy is about four hundred years; and no Christian ever admitted these books against images except the false promoters of this late innovation. If therefore, for so long a period they had found no admittance into the Church, neither shall they now be admitted for that they never were admitted before. Another epistle which some of them have brought forward falsely inscribed, as from this same St. Epiphanius Metropolitan of Cyprus to the Emperor Theodosius, having fallen into our hands, we having read the same with great attention and not in a cursory manner found towards the close a sentence of this kind, ‘Having frequently spoken to my fellow labourers about the taking away of images, I could not prevail with them, nor could I obtain any hearing from them on the subject.’ Let us, then, consider who were the venerable doctors and indomitable champions of the Church who lived in the age of our Father Epiphanius here mentioned. Basil, great in work and word, Gregory who is surnamed the Divine, Gregory Primate of Nyssa, who is called by all a father of fathers, John, from whose tongue flowed a stream sweeter than honey, and who was on this account styled Chrysostom, and in addition to these Ambrose, Amphilochius, and Cyril Bishop of Jerusalem. If, therefore, he who wrote this diatribe against holy images declares that he could gain no hearing from any of these holy fathers, his contemporaries, how can it be expected that we of these latter days, so far deficient in word and in knowledge as scarce worthy to be accounted their disciples, should admit these false writings against the Church which these fathers themselves have not admitted? Away with these accursed and audacious comments! These men, in their attack on the Church, seem to want common sense! Let the word spoken by the Apostle ever continue among us who love Christ, ‘Hold fast the traditions which ye have received, and shun profane and vain babblings,’ and we shall then discover passages like these to be both false and spurious.
“The works of our holy father, Epiphanius, as that called ‘Ancyrotos,’ and the rest, have been proclaimed throughout all the world: their voice hath sounded far and wide, and they are to be found in almost every part of the Church: but of those other absurd productions, which they vauntingly set forth against holy images, but two or three copies have ever been heard of in all the world besides those which they have but lately transcribed for themselves. Now, had these ever been known in the Catholic Church as the above-mentioned Ancyrotos of St. Epiphanius, they would have been diffused amongst the Churches even as his works have been diffused: but, as being strange, foreign, and spurious, they never have been received by the Catholic Church or made any appearance there; neither shall they now be received, that so the peace of God may rest on all the Churches, and the tradition which was from the beginning may ever more flourish. Let not those slanderers who calumniate the Orthodox make such proud boasting, as if those who received the ancient order of the Church were in opposition to St. Epiphanius. No, no! — we reject the document; but the holy father we recognise as a teacher of the Catholic Church. For the divine fathers who were assembled in the fourth holy Ecumenical Council held at Chalcedon anathematized the letter said to be written by Ibas Bishop of Edessa to Maris the Persian, as agreeing with Nestorius; and they of the fifth Council did the same: but they did not anathematize Ibas, for it was never sufficiently proved that it was his at all: whence it is evident that they did not level their anathemas at Ibas, but at the letter which was said to be written by him — that is, it was attributed to him, but his it was not. Just in the same manner these false writings against venerable images are by certain set forth as the works of St. Epiphanius; but never — no, never — were they written by him, as we have proved. Again: the disciples of this father built a temple in the island of Cyprus, which they called after his name; and there, among many images which they painted therein, they set up one in the memory of the father himself. Now, had he abominated the use of images for contemplation, would his disciples have made an image of him? Judge, therefore, all ye that hear, and distinguish between truth and falsehood: for these extracts belong not to this father, but are more likely the production of some Manicheans, which we must flee from as filled with gall and bitterness. For they, as well as the Confusionists, never would admit this use of pictures, because they maintained that God the Word did not truly take our nature upon Him, but only the appearance and phantom of a body. And in like manner these, misled by phantoms, mistaking one thing for another, add as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“In like manner Gregory the Divine in his poems remarks, ‘It is disgraceful to have confidence in colours and not in the heart: that which is in colours is easily effaced, but that which is in the depth of the heart the same is dear to me.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Perversely misunderstanding it, they bring forward their next passage from Gregory the Divine. By that father it was written thus: ‘It is a disgrace to have confidence in colours and not in hearts; for they may easily be obliterated, but depth it is which is dear to me.’ By these falsifiers it is written — ‘It is disgraceful to have confidence in colours, and not in the heart; that which is in colours is easily effaced, but that which is in the depth of the heart the same is dear to me.’ They have stopped their ears — their eyes have they closed! — and they are not willing to understand aright in their opposition to ecclesiastical tradition! They have heard with the ear, and have not understood — they have seen, but have not perceived; and, being hardened in heart, they have wrested the doctrines and traditions of the fathers according to their own lusts. For St. Gregory the Divine, in that part of his poetical works whence they have selected this passage, introduces a kind of moral discourse tending to the reforming of our lives, teaching us to abstain from temporal and worldly matters, and from carnal pleasures, and to choose that spiritual life which alone leads to heavenly joys; and that we must not attach ourselves to this world or place confidence on transitory things, and those which abide not, which also he styles colours; but rather to attach ourselves to those things which are spiritual and true, which have their fixation in the heart and abide forever. ‘For, saith he, life flows away apace; our continuance here is but a sojourning; and, as the colour or ink is easily obliterated, or as it is changed by the painter, so is it in this life;’ and as the same declares ‘a kind of cycle of events is ever running its course, sometimes in one way, sometimes in another: every day, every hour, brings its changes with it: all human affairs pass away like a shadow — all the swellings of the power of man are like a bubble easily dispersed. Every man is as grass and all the glory of man as the flower of the grass; but the manifestation of spiritual deeds is immoveable and has its reward in the things which continue.’ Now, had he been speaking against holy images, he would have said, ‘it is a disgrace to put confidence in colours and not in God;’ but whereas, he says, ‘but not in hearts,’ he means that we work the firm and stable works of the kingdom of heaven, and not those of this world, which, being subject to continual alteration and change, afford no such ground of confidence.
“But, again, allegorizing amiss and making all things to suit their own notions, they bring forward in their favour the words of the great Hierophants, Basil and John, as follows”
Gregory reads:
“But John the Chrysostom thus teaches us — ‘We enjoy the presence of the Saints by their writings, thus having the images, not of their bodies, but their souls; for the words they have spoken are the images of their souls.’ And the great Basil observes — ‘The most effectual way to the attainment of that which is fitting to us is diligent application to the inspired Scriptures, for by these are the principles of good actions discovered; and the lives of blessed men being written herein are handed down to us, being, as it were, certain living images of the conversation which is according to God, by their imitation of the works which are according to God.’”
Epiphanius reads:
“— None of those who think aright ever has imagined, nor ever will, that these extracts are at all subversive of the use of holy images. It is evident enough to all that, when we hear of the fortitude of the Saints and their noble deeds, we bless the firmness and magnanimity of their souls; and also that, taking the Scriptures in our hands and there reading the lives of holy men, and no less from looking upon their images as described in pictures, we recall to mind the same godly works — ‘For the same things which history presents to us by means of the ear, the silent picture points out by its imitative powers,’ as the great Basil observes in his ‘Encomium on the Forty Martyrs.’ John Chrysostom also, in his discourse entitled, ‘That there is one Lawgiver of the Old and the New Testaments,’ and ‘On the Garment of the Priest,’ which begins — ‘The Prophets also proclaim the Gospel of the kingdom of Christ’ — after other things continues — ‘I have delighted in the picture drawn in wax for the sake of its piety; for I saw in a picture an Angel dispersing the troops of the Barbarians. I saw also the tribes of the Barbarians trodden under foot, and the words of David verified, Lord, in thy city thou shalt bring their images to nought.’ It is evidently proved that what things these holy fathers have well spoken, they, as separated from that divine company, have wrested from their right meaning. Still they hold on their malicious course, and next they bring forward the words of our holy Father Athanasius against idols for the subversion of images and pictures.”
Gregory reads:
“Again, Athanasius the light of Alexandria writes — How can we but pity those who worship creatures? For they who see pray to those who see not, and they who hear pray to those who hear not: the creature never can be saved by the creature.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Heavens, what madness! Into what novel way of blasphemy have they now turned while intriguing against the truth? The father, indeed, spake these things of idols; but they calumniously assert that Christians, after the acknowledgment of the truth and the pure confession and the divine regeneration, do worship (λατρείειν), besides the one God who is over all, certain created things, and that they are thereby proved to be idolators. Spare thy people, O Lord, and grant that none may be turned aside by their blasphemy. For all we who have been called by thy name confess that Thou hast redeemed us from the errors and deceit of idols! And never have we, who have been accounted worthy of the divine regeneration, turned aside after our acknowledgment of Thee, to offer thy sacred worship to any creature under heaven, but we offer it to Thee our Redeemer alone, and we sing, ‘Beside Thee, O Lord, we know no other God; we call on thy name only’ (Isaiah xxvi. 13). Let Him be our witness, and the armies of the holy Angels, and the sacred assembly of Apostles, Prophets, Martyrs, and inspired Fathers. We have, moreover, for the quickening of our bodily senses to thy glory, and that we may be led to a sense of thy greatness, the type of the life-giving cross, the evangelical histories, and the representations of images, and many other sacred vessels besides; and these we embrace because made in thy name and offered to thee.
“But they who have thus been working out for themselves treasures with the tongue of falsehood, have followed after vanity; for all their empty harangues have come to nought; and, as when the light shines the darkness is dispersed, so when truth appears the falsity of their tongues is cut off by the sword of the Spirit. But now, having laid hold of the remnants of an isolated passage, they bring them forward thus”
Gregory reads:
“To the same purpose speaks Amphilochius Bishop of Iconium — ‘We need not to be anxious about pourtraying the carnal images of the Saints by colours on tablets; for we need not such things as these, but rather to imitate their good deeds by our virtues.’”
Epiphanius reads:
“It is the characteristic of Heretics to bring forward isolated passages in their favour. Now, if any one will carefully examine, he will find that the meaning of the father here was by no means to forbid the formation of holy images; but rather that it is in praise of the courage and firmness of the spiritual disposition of the Saints, and as signifying his preference of the operation of such virtues that the father thus speaks, and further in order to induce us to the imitation of their good conduct. For it is not from any carnal regard that we either set forth their praises in writing or make pictures of them; but, being desirous to have their virtues before us for our imitation, we have their histories recorded in books and their persons set forth by painting: not that they would desire either that their deeds should thus be recorded or their persons thus delineated; but we do this, as we said before, for our own benefit. And thus, not only are the conflicts of the Saints conducive to our salvation, but the description of those conflicts and their being set forth by imitation of painting, as also is the yearly commemoration of them. The whole character of the discourse supports this view; and nothing here said by the father at all tends to the repudiation of images, or, indeed, bring the least charge against them. For though he may say, ‘We need not be careful about painting their carnal images on tablets with colours,’ it is only with reference to their virtues that he thus speaks; for he adds immediately, ‘that we ought to imitate their good conduct by our virtues.’ Now, it ought to be our care to make choice of the virtues of the good, to imitate their deeds, and to emulate their excellence; for, otherwise to be constantly occupied in raising temples to their honour, or in delineating their form in pictures, while we neglect their virtues, is by no means praiseworthy. Nor would any commend that man who, while he daily dedicated images to the praise, made no account of the virtues, of the Saints; or, while busied in the erection of many temples and in providing sacred vessels for them, failed to adorn his own temple with heavenly virtues.
“To persons of this kind God spake by His Prophet Isaiah: ‘When ye bring your offering, your incense is vain; it is an abomination unto me;’ and, ‘When ye stretch out your hands unto me, I will turn away mine eyes from you,’ ‘and when you make many prayers I will not hear; but what is it that ye should do? Wash ye, make you clean: put away the evil of your souls from before mine eyes: cease from your evil works, learn to do well, seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the orphan, avenge the widow (Isaiah i. 13, 15-17). When, therefore, we have ordered these things aright, all our offerings will be acceptable to God, whether they be holy temples, sacred vessels, or venerable pictures. It is, therefore, most suitable that we should so bear the Saints in memory as thereby to be led to imitate their virtues to the utmost of our power. For this is that which confers glory on the Martyr, the influencing of multitudes to virtue, as the great Basil observes in his moral discourses. Endued with these virtues, if any raise temples, make images, or offer sacred things to God, it is an action worthy of commendation, as the word of truth teaches us — ‘These things ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone’ (Matt xxiii. 23).
“For no one can attain to virtue unless he frequent the courts of the Lord, and by means of the reading apprehend the divine oracles, and by vision of pictures be led to the perception of the history and doctrine of the Gospels, and also of the histories and conflicts of the Martyrs. But in every season, in every place, each day and hour, it is a duty ever incumbent upon us to be occupied in doing virtuous deeds: for we ought ever and at all times to be conversant with the sufferings of Christ, and to bear about His dying in our body; and it is profitable to us to be diligent in doing this, for it is this which brings us near to the kingdom of heaven. But to be making many crosses in one apartment, while we despise the commands of Christ and conformity to His sufferings, is very foolish, ‘for without works faith is dead’ (James ii. 20); and the Lord declares in the Gospels: ‘Not every one who saith to me, Lord Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven’ (Matt. vii. 21). In continuance of our present argument we will add another proof to those which we have already advanced. It is not uncommon with those who have made known to us the saving will of God — our holy fathers — to lay very great stress on the observance of the commandments; and thus, when they would draw the attention of the hearer to any particular command on which they intended to dilate, to describe it as of great and supreme importance that, adhering to this as a sure anchor, we should not neglect any of the rest.
“Not, on account of the length, to mention every instance, we will here adduce only Asterius, Bishop of Amasea. For, in his sermon on the rich man and Lazarus, delivering his sentiments at large on the duty of taking care of the poor and against the heaping up of riches, he exhorts the rich to be fruitful in almsgiving, and not to affect a splendid and luxurious style of dress; and he introduces a kind of moral address to certain who, while pretending to great religion, were, nevertheless, too eager about the riches of the present life, saying thus: ‘Do not paint Christ on your garments, but rather lay out the amount of such expenses on the poor.’ And then, anxious to cut off all eagerness after wealth, he adds: ‘The one humiliation of His incarnation is sufficient for Him’ — that is, it is not pleasing to Christ our God to display the mysteries of His dispensation by worldly attractions and the workings of avarice. For neither is it pious in itself nor acceptable before Him, for the sake of evangelical reminiscence, to heap up riches for ourselves, and to frame excuses for sin, while we overlook the poor who stand in need of bread, clothing, and lodging: since this is the characteristic of the love of money, not of religion. As, therefore, there is no ‘communion between light and darkness,’ nor ‘any fellowship between righteousness and unrighteousness’ (2 Cor. x. 14), so neither can there be any between the lust of wealth, and wearing of luxurious clothing, and the pictorial representation or historical narration of the Gospels. For while the one conduces to salvation, as clearly teaching the history of the dispensation, the other is denounced as miserable, as being obnoxious to punishment; as James the brother of God declares: Go to, now, ye rich men, weep and howl for the miseries that shall come upon you — your riches are corrupted — your garments are moth-eaten — your gold and silver is cankered, and the rust of them remains for a testimony against you’ (James v. 1-3). Wherefore (as we have said) all things done in the world from love of money come to nought. For a little expense we may secure house, and food, and raiment, with which we should rest content, for whatever is procured for display rather than necessity lays us open to the charge of vain-glory, as the great Basil observes — ‘Let us be content with that which our necessities require, and from our stores let us give to the poor what they need, and hold out our hands to them, that thus we may follow the words of the Lord, which say to us: ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy;’ and again, ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me’ (Matt. v. 7; ibid. xxv. 40).
“But as we have mention of Asterius, come let us now prove from his own words that the tradition of images is the ancient rule and ordinance of the Church Catholic; for he, having contemplated the passion of Euphemia, gives the following glowing description of it
“The narration of the blessed Asterius, Bishop of Amasea, concerning the Martyr Euphemia. Not long since, O men, I had in my hands the great Demosthenes, and was particularly engaged with that oration in which he overwhelms Aeschines with such bitterly sarcastic reflections. Having spent some time in the perusal, and finding my mind confused there with, I felt my need of the relaxation of a walk, so that it might be in some manner released from the oppression. Having left my apartments and spent a little time in the forum, walking there with some that I knew, I withdrew to the house of God to employ part of my leisure in prayer. And when I had finished my devotions, my course led me into one of the porches of the church where I saw a certain picture the sight of which greatly attracted my attention. You would have declared that it was the work of Euphranor himself, or of some other of those ancient painters who raised the art to such a degree of excellence as to make their paintings come but little short of life itself. Give me, if you please, your attention, as now there is some spare time for this narration, and I will describe the picture to you; for we sons of the Muses have resources in no way inferior to those of the painter.
“There was a certain woman an undefiled virgin, who had consecrated her virginity to God, whose name was Euphemia, who, as the faithful at that time were exposed to severe persecution, most cheerfully underwent the perils of death. Her citizens, therefore, partakers of the same faith for which she died, in admiration of the piety and constancy of the virgin, built for her a shrine near to the church. Here they placed her coffin and here they hold a yearly feast to her memory, to the celebration of which a general invitation is given to all, at which time those holy men whose office it is to dispense the mysteries of God are accustomed to speak much to her honour in their discourse, and earnestly to impress on the assembled multitudes how she accomplished the conflicts of her passion. A certain painter piously and to his utmost ability, having depicted all her history on fine linen, placed this sacred spectacle near her shrine; and this masterpiece may be thus described — The judge, seated aloft on his judgment-seat, scowls bitterly and angrily upon the virgin: for art, when it pleases, can rage in lifeless material. Many of the body-guard and soldiers of the Governor stand around, and near are the clerks of the records with their tablets and styles: of which, one having raised his hand from the tablet, is looking sternly on the accused, and having turned his whole person towards her seems in the act of bidding her speak more loudly, lest, not hearing well, he should make an inaccurate and censurable report. There, too, was the virgin standing, clothed in a dark vest and cloak, signifying her philosophy, and, as it might seem to the painter, beautiful in person, but, as it seemed to me, adorned with the inward graces of the soul. And two soldiers were seen conducting her to the Governor, one dragging her before, the other urging her behind. The virgin unites in her deportment both modesty and firmness; for though she looks down upon the ground as blushing to be seen in the presence of men, yet she stands undaunted, not exhibiting the least symptom of fear as to her future sufferings. I have, indeed, admired the works of other painters, and more specially the picture of the tragic scene of the Colchian princess, whose countenance bore the mixed expression of rage and anguish when about to slay her children; for while with one eye she glares only wrath, the other betokens her as hesitating and ready to spare. But now I have transferred all my admiration from that composition to the picture I am describing; and nothing so much pleased me in it as that judicious mixture of colouring by which the painter had so happily described the union of modesty and firmness, passions naturally in opposition to each other. But the painting described yet more. Certain executioners, stripped to their shirts, were now beginning their work; and the one seizes the head of the virgin, and bending it backward towards himself holds it in a posture best fitted to receive the torture which the other was about to inflict: on which the other, standing by, dashes out her teeth. And the hammer and the awl, instruments of torture, appear. My tears on this began to flow, and my feelings put an end to further description; for indeed, so vividly had the artist represented the drops of blood that had you seen it you had declared that they really came from her lips, and yourselves would have gone away in tears. But, again, there was the prison and there was the venerable virgin in her dark robes, alone, raising up her hands to heaven and calling on God for aid in her trial; and to her, while thus engaged in prayer, above her head, appears that sign which Christians are wont to reverence, and of which they make the form a symbol, as I think, of the sufferings that awaited her. Not far distant the painter has as it were kindled a fire, embodying the flame as here and there it blazes forth with strokes of vivid red, and the virgin he has placed in the midst with her hands spread towards heaven. No marks of agony appear on her countenance: on the contrary, those of joy only as now she is about to depart to an incorporeal and happy life. Here the painter stayed his hand, and here I finish my description; but it now remains for you, if you would have the picture more fully presented to you, to go and see it for yourselves, lest we should have fallen short of its merits in our description.”
“Thus far Asterius; and, indeed, on considering the words of Scripture we find that it was from thence the above-mentioned father had learned the things which he affirmed. For when God gave directions to His servant Moses about the tabernacle, having ordered many works of various kinds for the same, He added: ‘Thou shalt make curtains of fine twined linen, of blue and of purple, and cherubim of woven scarlet: thou shalt make them with the work of the weaver’ (Exod. xxvi. 1). Now, this commandment teaches us that in things offered to God no expense need be spared. In respect to the things of men it is not so, for it was said to the people, ‘Thou shalt not wear a garment of divers sorts’ (Deut. xxii. 11); and most clearly does the divine Apostle confirm the same sentiment when he enjoins ‘that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shame-facedness and sobriety, not with broidered hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array, but which becometh women professing godliness with good works’ (1 Tim. ii. 9, 10).
“Knowing, therefore, these things, we, who offer to God alone the worship which is in spirit and in truth, do also salute and embrace all things which are offered and consecrated to Him, whether it be the divine type of the precious cross, or the holy Gospels, or venerable images, or the sacred vessels, as hoping to obtain sanctification from them; and we pay to them the worship of honour: ‘For (says he) worship the footstool of His feet, for it is holy’ (Psalm xcviii. 5). Gregory the Divine, in his sermon on the birth of Christ speaks thus: ‘Honour Bethlehem, worship the manger; for the things which are offered to God are holy by the presence and participation of Himself, as all divine Scripture declares, and the honour of holiness cannot be preserved to that which is sacred otherwise than by our relative worship.’
“But they, still breathing out lies and tacking on something utterly foreign to the Catholic Church, say”
Gregory reads:
“Concordantly with the rest, Theodotus of Ancyra, the fellow combatant with Cyril, thus teaches about the same things. We have been taught to make the figures of the Saints, not in pictures of material colours, but rather by copying their virtues as they stand on record in that which is written of them — thus framing as it were certain living images of them — thus being stirred up to a zeal rivalling theirs. For let those declare who set up forms of this kind what benefit they gain from such things? Or to what spiritual contemplation are they led by remembrance of them? Too evident is it that this device is a vanity and an invention of Satanic cunning.
Epiphanius reads:
“Were Theodotus but alive, with the blessed Susanna, he would cry aloud to God, saying — ‘O eternal God, who knowest the secrets, and knowest all things before they be, thou knowest’ (Susanna 42, 43), that the promoters of this soul-destroying innovation, emulating these elders of the Babylonian confusion, have accused me falsely; for, wishing to set themselves forth as men of consequence and importance, they vociferate certain vanities, but the pen of their writing is manifested to be false, and themselves are found to be adulterators of the truth. For whereas many amongst ourselves have searched and carefully enquired into the works of this same Theodotus concerning this passage, to see if he had written any such words, we could by no means find them anywhere; for never did he say anything of the kind, and it is manifestly proved that the passage belongs not to Theodotus. For the language is full of wrath and bitterness, and the absurd assertion that the invention of venerable images is the invention of Satanic cunning is the audacity of an unrestrained tongue and of impure lips: consequently, this is the private feeling and the invention of the Christianity-detractors, and not the language of Theodotus. And if, as they affirm, they brought forward this testimony from him, they were bound most clearly to point out from which of his works the passage was taken; but, as if conscious of its falsity, they send forth the lie in silence.
“For , having collected together his works — namely , the six books written to Lausus against Nestorius — his exposition of the Creed of the holy Nicene fathers, his discourse on the birth of our Lord, that on the lights, that on Elias and the widow, that on the Saints Peter and John, that on the lame man who sat at the beautiful gate of the temple, that on those who received the talents, and that on the two blind men — we could by no means discover the words which they brought forward. No, nor when the false conventicle had got together its rabble, and inserted it in their lying dissertation, was the passage taken from any works of the Bishop of Ancyra; but from some mendacious extract it made its way like a pestilence, which, indeed, the more simple readily received; but all who had any sense, and were obedient to the truth, ever held it to be false. But, as a prime leader of their pestiferous heresy, they bring forward, lastly, the protector of Arius, the coadjutor of Eusebius Bishop of Nicomedia, Theognius of Nice, and Maris of Chalcedon, the great leader of those who plotted against the holy Council of Nice, saying”
Gregory reads:
“In like manner Eusebius Pamphilus, in answer to Constantia Augusta, who had desired him to send to her an image of Jesus Christ, thus declares himself — “Whereas, you have written to us concerning an image, as it were of Christ, desiring that we should send such an image to you — what, or of what nature, is this image which you style an image of Christ? Is it that true and unchangeable image which bears the peculiar characteristics which are His by nature? Or that which He assumed for our sakes, when He took upon Him the garb of the form of a servant? But, concerning the form of God, I cannot for a moment imagine that you are enquiring for this. Having been instructed by Himself that ‘No man knoweth the Father but the Son, neither does any man know the Son worthily, except the Father who begat Him.’” Again, after other remarks, he continues: “Unquestionably, therefore, you are seeking after ‘the form of the servant,’ and that body of humility with which He was clothed for our sakes; but this we know to be absorbed in the glory of the Godhead, and that His ‘mortality has been swallowed up of life.’” Again, shortly after, he adds: “Who, then, dare undertake to delineate the all-bright and dazzling splendours of dignity and glory, like to this, with dead and inanimate outlines and colouring, when even the inspired disciples on the mount could not endure to gaze upon Him, but fell on their faces, confessing that what they saw was more than they could bear (Matt. xvii. 6)? If even, then His mortal body attained such glory, being transfigured by the indwelling Godhead, what must we say of Him, now that having laid aside all that was mortal, and having purged Himself of all that was corruptible, He has transformed the appearance of the form of a servant into the glory of Lord and God — that is, after His victory over death, after His re-entrance into heaven, His sitting down on the royal throne on the right hand of the Father; and after His resting in the incomprehensible and ineffable bosom of the Father, to whom as He ascended and again returned the heavenly powers glorified, singing aloud: Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come in’” (Psalm xxiv . 9).
Epiphanius reads:
“Well does the word of the Prophet apply to these men, which God spake by the Prophet Jeremiah when rebuking the Jews, ‘They have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and have hewn out to themselves broken cisterns which can hold no water’ (Jerem. ii. 13). For these choice bands of prevaricators, having deserted the doctrine of the accredited fathers, and having addicted themselves to those who have been swept away by the fan of divine judgment from the Lord’s floor — that is, from the Catholic Church — bring them forward for the confirmation of their heresy. For who among the faithful of the Church who has any knowledge of true doctrine is ignorant that Eusebius Pamphilus, being given over to a reprobate mind, was of the same opinion and sentiment with those who follow the superstition of Arius, and that in all his historical works he styles the Son and Word of God a creature, a servant, and to be worshipped as in the second place? But if any would say in justification of him that he subscribed in the Council (of Nice), we grant that he did so; but his writings and all his letters prove that he honoured the truth with his lips only, while his heart was far from it. And if at one time or another, as seasons and opportunities might require, he could alter and change, now favouring the partizans of Arius, now hypocritically pretending to the truth, he is proved to be (as James the brother of God expresses it) ‘a double-minded man, and unstable in all his ways: and let not such an one think that he shall receive anything from the Lord’ (James i. 8, 7; Rom. x. 10). For if with the heart he had believed unto righteousness, and if with the mouth he had confessed the word of truth unto salvation, he would have asked pardon for his writings, and have corrected what was amiss in them, and in like manner he would have apologized for his letters. But never did he do anything of this kind, and he continued to be like the Ethiopian who cannot change his skin.
“Thus, in the interpretation of the words, ‘I said to the Lord, thou art my Lord’ (Psalm xvi. 2), having departed from the knowledge of the truth, he speaks thus — ‘By the laws of Nature, the father of every son is his lord also: wherefore, of the only begotten Son of God — God who begat Him — was in like manner His God, His Lord, and Father.’ Again: in his epistle to Saint Alexander, the instructor of the great Athanasius, of which this is the beginning — ‘With what grief, with what deep anxiety, have I entered on this correspondence with you’ — most manifestly blaspheming, he thus speaks of Arius and his associates, saying — ‘Thy letters calumniate them as saying that the Son was made of that which was not, just as any one of the rest of the creatures. But they showed me the letter which they had laid before thee, in which , having set forth their belief in their own words, they made this confession — namely, that the God of the Law, and the Prophets, and of the New Testament, having begotten the only be gotten Son before eternal ages, by whom He made the worlds and all things else, having begotten Him, not in appearance but in reality, did by His own will constitute (ὑποστήσαντα) Him unchangeable, unalterable, a perfect creature of God, and not as one of the rest of the creatures. If, therefore, this letter of theirs may be depended upon, then the same writing must have been presented to thee, in which they confess “that the Son of God was before eternal ages, by whom also He made the worlds, and that He was an unchangeable and perfect creature of God, and not as one of the rest of the creatures.” But thy epistle accuses them of having said that the Son was made just as one of the rest of the creatures; whereas, their epistle says no such thing, but clearly makes the distinction that He was not made as one of the rest of the creatures. Beware, then, how you give them occasion of censuring and reviling you according to their good pleasure. Again: thou hast charged them with affirming that “He that was (ὁ ὠν) hath begotten Him that was not (τὸν μὴ ὄντα).” Indeed, I wonder who could say anything else. For if He who was be One, it is evident that every thing which is of Him is after Him. But if He who was be not One only, but the Son also be He who was, then, how could (ὁ ὤν) beget Him who was (τὸν ὄντα), for thus there would be two who always were.’ Such was the letter of Eusebius to the venerable Alexander. There are also many other letters of his to this same holy man, in which are found many blasphemous things in favour of Arius and his partizans.
“In like manner, when corresponding with the Bishop Euphrasion, he is no less blasphemous. The epistle commences thus — ‘To my Lord I acknowledge my obligation in all things:’ in the course of which he adds — ‘We affirm that the Son was not co-existent with the Father, but that the Father was pre-existent to the Son. And, moreover, He who understood better than any other — the Son of God Himself — knowing that He was another Person less than the Father and inferior to Him, teacheth us the same most religiously, saying, “My Father is greater than I”’(John xiv. 28). And, after other remarks, he adds — ‘For the Son Himself is God, but not very God’ (ἀληθινός θεός).
“From these letters of his it is proved that he taught the same dogmas with Arius and his party. Moreover, in addition to this apostatical heresy, the inventors of the Arian insanity taught also the one nature in the hypostatical union, and set it forth that our Lord in His salvation-bringing dispensation assumed flesh without a soul, affirming that the Deity did supply both the volitions and movements of the soul in order that, as Gregory the Divine observes, ‘they might ascribe suffering to the Godhead’ (Epist. 1. ad Cledonium). But it is evident that they who ascribe suffering to the Godhead are Theopaschites; and they who had any connection with heresy could never bring themselves to admit the use of images, as we see in the case of the impious Severus, Peter the Fuller, Philoxenus Bishop of Hierapolis, and the rest of their many-headed and no-headed hydra. Eusebius being of this faction, as is proved in his historical writings and his letters as a Theopaschite, rejects the image of Christ: wherefore, he writes to Constantia the wife of Licinius that no such image was found with him; and in his letter he affirms that His incarnate form had been changed into the nature of the Godhead. But none of our holy fathers ever thought or spake in this manner, for this statement is not agreeable to the truth. Let us, then, listen to Athanasius the subverter of the Arian madness, and hear what he affirms in his epistle to Eupsychius Priest of Caesarea; and in like manner let us hear what Cyril says both in his first letter to Succensus Bishop of Diocaesarea and in his discourse against the Synousiastae. For as both had the same earthly, the same heavenly, citizenship, and as both were under the inspiration of the same Spirit, they will be found to speak quite consistently with each other. Athanasius, in the above-mentioned epistle to Eupsychius, of which this is the beginning, ‘On those points in which you considered that we, O most reverend,’ after other remarks, says– ‘The fruit of the sheep is common — that is, the wool, the harvest of their backs, lies open for the general use of all; but, when it has imbibed the die, like to that of the sea, it is called purple, its name answering to its colour, and its use being by way of eminence applied to Kings. Then it is wool and not wool, in nature remaining what it was before, but not its use; for it no longer is common as before on account of the dignity of him who makes use of it. And thus, in like manner, flesh being assumed from a nature common to all, since it has become the clothing of a King, is accounted worthy of the same glory as he who has made use of it, although by nature it is not so accounted. He is, therefore, rightly styled the Lord of Glory even in respect of His manhood, the nature which He assumed admitting the suffering, but the injury passing on to Him who had made use of the flesh as a garment. For as the man who has rent the purple undergoes punishment just as if he had lifted his hand against the King — for though the King has met with no injury, the injury done to the garment is considered to reflect upon him — so though God the Word does not actually suffer, yet the sufferings of the flesh in respect of insult reflect upon Him also; and, therefore, Paul declares his Master Christ to be even as man, the Son of God: and before this Gabriel the Arch angel, announcing the miraculous incarnation to Mary, said, “Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord be with thee. Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bear a Son, and shalt call His name Jesus, and He shall be great and shall be called the Son of the Highest’ (Luke i. 30-31). Jesus, then, is called the Son of God, not from any change of the flesh into the divine nature, but because that in consequence of union with God the Word it receives an homonymous dignity.’
“Cyril, in like manner, in the above-mentioned epistle to Succensus, of which this is the beginning, ‘Having perused the Commonitorium which was sent to me from your holiness;’ after other remarks, thus continues: ‘After the resurrection, the body which had suffered continued the same, except that it was no longer liable to human infirmities, for we affirm that it could no more admit of hunger, or labour, or any thing of this nature, but that from henceforth it is incorruptible. Nor was this all, but that it was also life-giving, for it is the body of life — that is, of the only Begotten, and had been made resplendent with the most God-like glory, and is considered as the body of God. If, therefore, any should call the same divine, as beyond all doubt that which is of man is human, he would not err from right reason. Hence it is, I conceive, that the most wise Paul said, ‘If we have known Christ after the flesh, henceforth know we Him no more’ (2 Cor. v. 16). For the body being, as I said, appropriated to God, must far surpass all things that are human; yet the body, which is from the earth, cannot admit of change into the nature of Deity, for that is impossible; for then we must affirm of Deity as though it were made or as taking something into itself which by nature does not belong to it. Again: it is no less absurd to assert that the body is changed into the nature of the Deity than to assert that the Word is changed into the nature of flesh. For, as the latter is impossible, because that the Divine Nature is inconvertible and unchangeable, not less so is the former; for it is among things inadmissible that any creature should avail to pass into the essence — that is, the nature of Deity — and the flesh is a creature. We affirm, therefore, that the body of Christ is Divine, inasmuch as it is the body of God, and moreover that it is resplendent with ineffable glory, incorruptible, holy, and life-giving; but that it was changed into the nature of Deity: neither have any of the fathers thought or spoken thus, nor are we at all inclined thereto.’
“Again: in his discourse against the Synousiastae, which begins, ‘A long treatise on the doctrines of the truth has lately been composed by us,’ he adds, after other remarks, as follows: ‘If, therefore, His flesh did pass into the nature of Deity and He ceased to be the Son of Man, it is manifest that from henceforth we have lost the glory of the adoption, as not any longer having the “First-born among many brethren” (Rom. viii. 29), as when He was made in our likeness.’ And, shortly after, he continues — ‘What then? — have we unexpectedly lost our hold on the glory which had been bestowed upon us? By no means; for we have never been led by the most ridiculous and absurd inventions of certain to a reprobate mind that we should “think beyond what we ought to think” (Rom. xii. 3). But having received the sacred and divinely-inspired Scriptures as the rule of a right and unperverted faith, we affirm that the only begotten Word of God, who was made the First-born of us men, did never cease to be, and to be called at the same time very God, being God and the Son of Man. But never was He seen to have transformed the flesh which, without conversion or confusion, was united to Him into the nature of Deity; but He may with more reason be said to have made it resplendent with His own glory and to have fulfilled it with dignity suitable to Deity, and thus in due season shall it be made manifest to all who dwell on the whole earth, when He shall again descend from heaven. For when, after having fully accomplished the mystery of the dispensation in the flesh, He went up again into heaven, they who were beholding this event were greatly astonished, for a cloud received Him out of their sight: then one of the holy Angels, as they were lost in wonder, thus addressed them — “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking up to heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye bare seen Him go into heaven” (Acts i. 9, 11). Did they, therefore, to whom this message was sent, behold the Word returning to the Father without flesh? — that is, having put off our likeness, and no longer in a body which might be seen and touched, but rather transformed into a nature which could not be seen or touched? And is there any who would dare to assert this? Then, if “He shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven,” how can it be otherwise than true to say that the Word shall come in the body and not alone and without flesh?’ And, shortly after, he continues — ‘Understand, therefore, that in order before to manifest to them of what kind His appearance would be, at His coming again at the end of the world, He was transfigured. And this form of His transfiguration was not wrought, as the inspired Evangelist declares, by change of form — that is, the putting away of the likeness of Man, but only by an increase of glory; for, says he, “that His face did shine, and did send forth light like to the beams of the sun.”’ Again, after other things, he adds — ‘And the all-wise Paul has written concerning Christ, “Who shall change our vile body that it may be like unto His glorious body.” What will they say to this who affirm that He changed His flesh into the nature of the Word? Will the bodies of Saints, in like manner, be changed into Deity in order that their bodies may be made like unto His glorious body? Is not their frigid argument full of the utmost ignorance? For, if the flesh be altogether changed into the nature of the Godhead, what body will God the Word make use of? — for the Deity is without body, and it is certain that “No man hath seen God at any time”’ (John i. 18). And again, more expressly, as if the inspired father was writing against Eusebius himself, he adds, in the same discourse, ‘Now, there is another argument which is improperly pressed into their service — namely, that the inspired Paul is known to have written thus — “If we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more.” For (say they) if Christ be no more known according to the flesh, it follows that His flesh has been changed into the nature of the Word that He may be known as God. I think one might easily reply to this argument thus — When, therefore, it is said, concerning ourselves, “They that are in the flesh cannot please God; but ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit” (Rom. viii. 8, 9) — did he mean to assert that we were without flesh and blood? Did he make this address to disembodied spirits? And is it not most absurd to think and speak thus? The Apostle uses the word flesh in respect of us to signify the disorderly and ungovernable propensities of the flesh; but, in respect of Christ the Saviour of us all, inasmuch as He was altogether holy and knew no transgression, for He did no sin, we must understand the expression, “according to the flesh” — namely, that He is not, nor ever will again, be subject to the infirmities of the flesh.’
“Plainly, therefore, do we perceive from the God-speaking fathers that the patrons of this vain scoffing have not drawn from the fountains of Israel that they might have eternal life, but they have taken their draught from the waters of evil and sterile fountains; and that, having followed strange guides, they have been led aside to precipices and abysses. Now, they ought as genuine sons of the Church to have brought the great Basil affirming ‘that the honour paid to the type passes on to the prototype;’ and Gregory of Nyssa saying, ‘I have seen the picture of the Passion, but I never could pass by it without tears, so powerfully did this work of art bring the whole history before my eyes;’ or John declaring, ‘I love the picture formed on wax and replete with piety;’ and others who were fellow-companions and teachers of the same doctrines with these.
“But now, so far from correcting their perverted sophistries, they make the evil yet worse by speaking as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“These testimonies from Scripture and from the fathers we have inserted in this our present definition, having chosen but few out of many, lest it should be extended to too great a length; for there being many besides we willingly pass them by on account of the greatness of their number. Being, therefore, firmly built up by means of the above-cited testimonies of the God-inspired and blessed Scriptures and fathers, and having fixed our feet on the rock of divine worship which is in Spirit, we all being invested with the dignity of the Priesthood unanimously and with one voice determine, in the name of the Holy, Super-substantial, and Life-giving Trinity, that every image, of whatever material or colour it be formed by the evil art of the painter, be cast out of the Christian Church as strange and abominable.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Not enduring to submit their necks to the yoke of ecclesiastical tradition, but blinded as to their choice of good and comprehension of the truth, having set at nought all pious tradition, these doughty babblers of this innovation have disdained to drink of the torrent of delight that it might be within them ‘a fountain springing up to everlasting life’ (John iv. 14); but, being watered from broken cisterns, they have sent forth an ill-savoured stock, having for its fruit the gall of bitterness. And now, adding lie to lie, they give it out that ‘there were very many other testimonies which we willingly pass by.’ But we have already made it evident that, in respect of all the passages from accredited fathers which they brought forward to establish their own righteousness, these they understood amiss; but, in respect of passages of an opposite character, that these were not of the Holy Spirit. Wherefore, the blessed David, making melody in the Holy Ghost, thus addresses them, ‘They have spoken evil each one to his neighbour; deceitful lips have spoken evil in a double heart’ (Psalm xii. 2). The undaunted Isaiah also rebukes them, saying, ‘The council of the wicked deviseth wickedness: they know not how to act wisely; for they have darkened their eyes so that they cannot see’ (Isaiah xliv. 18). For abandoning sound definitions and laws, in words they make a pretense to piety, and some affect religiously to say something that, by means of the goodness of these, they may gain some credit for what follows; and thus they commence, ‘In the name of the Holy, Super-substantial, and Life-giving Trinity.’ In their hearts, however, they intend only evil; for, speaking and defining from their own private feelings, they bring forward impiety open and undisguised; and, not bearing in mind the judgment of God, nor reflecting on the word of the Lord which cries aloud, ‘Whoso shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were cast into the sea’ (Matt. xviii. 6); but, like swine trampling on jewels — that is, the traditions of the Church — they have clamorously set forth, ‘That every image, of whatever material composed, should be cast out of the Church as abominable:’ thus ‘taking counsel, but not of the Lord, making covenant, but not by His Spirit’ (Isaiah xxx. 1): thus, like grievous wolves, laying waste the fold of Christ.
“But the brightness of truth and the splendour of light possess a confidence which cannot be shaken. Who knows not that, if an image be dishonoured, the whole dishonour passes on to him of whom it is the image? This, however, is the truth, and the very nature of things teaches this; and to this agree our divine fathers, the holy Basil affirming, ‘That honour done to the image passes on to the prototype;’ and Athanasius, ‘He who reverences the image reverences also the King in it;’ and Chrysostom, ‘Know you not that, if you insult an image, you offer an insult to the dignity of the prototype.’ Now, these our fathers followed the nature of things, but these men are opposed alike to the Church and to truth; for not only are they filled with blasphemy, but their discussion displays the most excessive folly and absurdity. It behoved them to have used the accustomed language of the Church, and not a language discordant from her, and to confirm and diligently to cultivate that ancient tradition which the whole multitude of the faithful have ever held and confessed as being handed down to them by the Apostles and Fathers, and not to bring in an innovation upon, and the taking away of, a custom which has so piously prevailed amongst us. The traditions of the Catholic Church admit neither of addition or diminution. The heaviest doom awaits him who adds or takes away anything; for it is said, ‘Cursed be he that removes the landmarks of his fathers’ (Deut. xxvii.7). But they had no inclination to know the truth: wherefore the words of Wisdom shall be applied to them, ‘He who getteth treasures with a false tongue pursueth vanity and shall fall into the snares of death’” (Prov. xxi. 6).
Section the Sixth
Epiphanius reads:
“I would they have had taken into consideration the word which the Lord said to Peter the chief of the Apostles: ‘Thou art Peter, and on this rock will I build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.’ But having no part with the erection of this building, they bubble out things worthy of derision, defining thus:”
Gregory reads:
“Let no one, whatever be his rank or condition, henceforth presume to follow up so unholy, so impious a pursuit. And whoever, after this time, shall dare to make for himself an image, or to worship it, or to set it up in a church, or in his own house, or in any way to conceal it: if he be Bishop, Priest, or Deacon, let him be deposed, but if Monk or Laic let him be anathematized; and let him be obnoxious to the Imperial laws, as being opposed to the commands of God and hostile to the doctrines of the fathers.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Having slandered the whole Church of God, and not satisfied with this, or as yet satiated with impiety, contrary to all law and justice, they go on to determine that no one after this shall dare to make any image whatever. Now, who that thinks or lives at all religiously can obey laws like these? Since so deeply hath the manifestation of venerable images been grafted into the Church, that from the very first preaching of the Gospel, even to the present time, they have been evermore set up in them; and all reverence ought to be paid to antiquity: for what beside this doth the Apostle command the Thessalonians, saying; ‘Hold fast the traditions which ye have received;’ and again he saith to Timothy and Titus, ‘Avoid profane innovations.’
“All we Christians, as having been born in the Catholic Church, do hold the traditions which we have received, and are confirmed in them: and vain innovations we avoid, in obedience to the divine Apostle.
“Whatever things from time to time it has seemed good to our holy fathers to build upon the foundation of Prophets and Apostles we receive; but all that is of a contrary description we reject as hateful and hostile — namely, all the frivolities of base and impious heresies, amongst which we abominate and utterly execrate this newly-constructed heresy of the Christianity-slanderers as unbridled licentiousness most hateful to God.
“Desirous of extending their iniquity, not only did they sharpen their own tongues for wickedness, but taught the hand of rulers to wrest the laws and to do violence, saying, that ‘All who do not obey them shall be obnoxious to the Imperial laws.’ From this decree evils of every kind were spread throughout the world, and the most unceasing cruelties were exercised by the rulers, their great men, and their heretical Bishops. What tongue can worthily relate the dire tragedy? Whence or how shall I follow out each sad detail? How shall I enumerate the conturbations, the flights, the persecutions, the imprisonment and beating of Monks in the city, their long captivity for many years, the chains which bound their feet, the abstraction of the sacred vessels, the burning of books, the profanation of holy temples, the impious transformation of sacred monasteries into worldly houses of resort? — so that the holy men who dwelt in them, seeing their goods now plundered, went away into barbarous countries: after the manner of the Apostles, accounting it better to live amongst the Heathen than to endure the profane conversation of their own countrymen, acting in obedience to the precept of the divine Apostle, ‘That with such they should not eat.’
“And, what is most dreadful of all, is this impious profanation of holy monasteries, which impiety among certain is kept up most lawlessly, even to the present time, when, instead of sacred hymns and the voice of rejoicing in the tabernacles of the just, is now heard only satanic and impious songs; and instead of the frequent genuflexion, nought but the licentious contortion of the dancer is now to be seen.
“And with this profanation we must enumerate the dangers, the disturbances, the confusion, the cutting out of tongues, the putting out of eyes, the slittings of the nose, the disgraceful banishments which befell these holy men, so that they have been scattered over the face of the earth. Again, the branding of their faces, the burning of their beards, the lawless and compulsory unions of virgins after they have been consecrated to Christ, and, worse than all the rest, the murder of certain. These are the fruits of their wild opposition to the Church: this is manifest insanity and not just judgment; so hath God seen it to be, and from all these long-continued evils He hath at length delivered His Church, to whom be glory. Amen.
“But even by the decrees of their own lawless Council are they convicted as having erred from the truth, while they speak as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“Moreover, we determine this also: that none of those who have the charge of any church or other sacred edifice, shall, under pretext of destroying this error of image-worship, lay hands on any of the sacred vessels consecrated to God, to apply them to other uses, because that they are graven with idolatrous figures.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Words like these are the ejections of mouths that fear not God: for who that hath his mind fixed in the fear of God would presume to style anything that has been dedicated to Him by an appellation which belongs to idols: not even if he were ever so unlearned and ignorant, unless, indeed, he had utterly forgotten the great and saving mystery which God the Word wrought out for us when He dwelt with us in the flesh and liberated us from idolatrous error: for it is well known that the religious among the Gentiles styled their idols ζῶδα. Verily, these are the pratings of those who speak of the earth — these are the words of their belly which, having received garbage for food, sends up ill-savoured vapours to the mind, and hath made them mad, frantic, and most ridiculous, and so they continue.”
Gregory reads:
“Neither on vestments, or veils, or any other thing which has been consecrated to holy purposes, that they be not abused.”
Epiphanius reads:
“First, having calumniated holy images, and having defined that the holy Church of God did very wrong to admit them, and having given them the names of vile and ἔν ζῶδα and idols, they next, as if oblivious of their accursed opinion, determine that such things must remain in the Church of God as having been consecrated to Him. Now, if they have been consecrated for God, how can they at the same time be vile and the production of satanic art?
“It is manifest that their sentence is like that of Caiaphas; for he, in malice, caused Christ to be put to death, while, ignorantly speaking the truth, he confesses Him to be the Saviour of the human race: and these men are exactly like to him. In their malice they revile holy images as an error, and ζῶδα, and base, and the invention of satanic art; but, anointed by the truth, they, against their wills, are forced to confess them to be sacred and offerings made to God, and so fall into the snare of their own perverse trifling; and so, in derision of their followers, they add:”
Gregory reads:
“If any of those who have obtained authority from God would apply to a better use any of the aforesaid vessels, garments, or veils, let him not venture so to do without the advice of the most holy, blessed, and Ecumenical Patriarch, and the permission of our most pious and Christian Sovereigns, lest on any such ground, from such pretenses as these, the devil should humble the Churches of God.
“Moreover, let none of the Nobles, or any of the Laity under their directions, dare on any such grounds to lay hands on sacred edifices or retain them as their booty, as hath been already done by some who have acted disorderly.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Who can but laugh at legislation such as this? Or, rather, who can but mourn over it? Encouraged by their vain words, the many presumed to lay their Briarean hands on the sacred vessels, no doubt following the example of the law-makers themselves: for wickedness is a very slippery thing. For when they saw these most blessed Bishops as they say, but as truth declares these false Bishops, appropriating the silver and gold of the sacred offerings as well as the images which were in mosaics, they did precisely the same things themselves, and transferred them as they pleased to private houses, to the baths, or the theatres; and thus it is, even in their own judgment, things holy have been profaned. But now they add vauntingly:”
Gregory reads:
“Having, therefore, by the grace of God, satisfactorily arranged and determined all these things, we judge it right also in this our Catholic and God-pleasing treatise to lay down the following capitular definitions; for we think that we speak according to the mind of the Apostles, and we believe that we have the Spirit of Christ.
“Wherefore, as of old, they who were agreed in the same faith have spoken the things which were synodically defined by them. So we being agreed in the same faith do in like manner speak: in the first place laying down certain definitions before determined by the fathers, and then ourselves defining certain other things which seem to us consistent with and consequent upon them.”
Epiphanius reads:
“After multifold and varied dotages, in which nothing was so dear as their own wickedness, which is displayed in many sections, they would fain endeavour to assimilate themselves to the Doctors of the Church, and arrogantly equal their own accursed definitions to their sacred declarations, as if they would confound truth with falsehood, or as it were mingle poison with honey. But they who are under the guidance of God’s Spirit can distinguish the better from the worse, and what things are defined piously in the spirit of our holy fathers they receive; but what things are defined perversely as being spoken of themselves they reject. For these prevaricators confess that they know God, and yet from the path which leads to the King’s high road they turn aside. The words of our pure and holy faith they would infect with the poison of their own pravity; and thus they display the same lack of instruction which other Heresiarchs have displayed before them. For they did, indeed, agree in very many respects with the Catholic Church; but, because in one or two particulars they erred, they fell under her anathema, with whom these also must have their portion: notwithstanding they do speak as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 1. — If any one confess not, agreeably to the traditions of the Apostles and Fathers, that in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost is one and the same Godhead, Nature and Essence, Will and Energy, Kingdom and Power, in three Hypostases — that is, in three glorified Persons — let him be anathema.
“Definition 2–If any one confess not, One of this Holy Trinity — that is, the Son and Word of God and the Father our Lord Jesus Christ — to have been before all worlds with the Father in respect of His Godhead; but in these last days that the same Person for our salvation did come down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was born of her in a way surpassing all human conception, let him be anathema.
“Definition 3. — If any one confess not Emmanuel to be God in truth, and, therefore, the holy Virgin to be the Mother of God; for she begat, after the flesh, the Word of God who was made flesh, let him be anathema.
“Definition 4. — If any one confess not that the Word of God the Father was hypostatically united to the flesh, and that Christ was one with His own flesh, and that the same was at the same time God and Man, let him be anathema.
“Definition 5. — If any man confess not the flesh of our Lord to be life-giving and to be one with the Word which was from God the Father, but to be of some other person united with Him in rank and as only having a divine cohabitation; and not rather, as we have said, to be life-giving because One with the Word who giveth life to all, let him be anathema.
“Definition 6. — If any one confess not that in one Christ, our true God, are two natures, two natural wills, and two natural energies existing interchangeably, inseparably, indivisibly, inconfusedly, according to the doctrine of the fathers, let him be anathema.
“Definition 7. — If any one confess not that our Lord Jesus Christ did, after the assumption of the flesh together with a rational and intellectual soul, sit together with God the Father, and that in like manner He will come again in the glory of God the Father to judge both the quick and the dead, no longer flesh nor yet without body, but in that fashion of Godlike body which He alone knoweth; and that He will be seen by those who pierced Him and remain forever God without carnal grossness, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“So far they speak well enough, in exact accordance with the doctrine of the fathers; or rather they would claim their doctrines as their own, in order to gain credit to themselves by them. In that which follows they vomit forth the bitterness of their envenomed tongue and viperous dogmas full of deadly poison.”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 8. — If any one endeavour to set before him the express image (χαρακτῆρα) of God the Word according to His incarnation by means of material colours, and does not with the whole heart worship Him, as seeing Him with the eyes of His understanding more resplendent than the brightness of the sun sitting on the right hand of His Father on the throne of His glory in the highest, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Most paradoxical expositors have they proved themselves to be by this fantastical exposition of theirs.
“The Apostle, indeed, had declared the Son to be the express image of the Father on account of the immutability of essence; but they have made a transfer of this expression to the flesh which was assumed by God the Word in their perverse minds, and from their senseless brains set forth a new exposition, saying, ‘If any endeavour to set before Him the (divine impress) express image of God the Word according to His incarnation by means of material colours.’
“Now, that the flesh which He assumed is of another essence from the nature of God the Word we are well aware, being taught both by the truth itself and by the heads and chiefs of our holy Church, the holy Apostles and inspired Fathers. The divine Apostle Paul, who saw things that may not be uttered, being desirous, as was said before, to declare the consubstantiality of the Lord God the Word with God and the Father, found no other expressions more suitable than to assert that the Son was the ‘express image of the Father’s substance.’
“But they would turn truth into a lie, in order to help forward their empty and sophistical arguments which they would maliciously urge against holy images.
“Whence they fall into declarations of a blasphemous nature; for, being given over to a reprobate mind, they go on to say:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 9. — If any one attempt by material colours in images made after the fashion of a man to circumscribe the uncircumscribable essence and person of God the Word because of His incarnation, and does not theologize that, after His incarnation, He was no less uncircumscribable than before, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“They speak thus because they are incurably diseased concerning the right sense of ecclesiastical tradition, and have imbibed some pestilential malady by which their senses are utterly confused. The wickedness of their deceit they would attach to sound words; and the deception consists in this — they confound the uncircumscribable nature of God the Word with the circumscribable nature of that flesh which He assumed for our sakes. This, indeed, is evident from their own words — ‘After His incarnation it was no less uncircumscribable.’
“Now, whence did these wiseacres gain this frivolous argument? For it is sheer blasphemy to say that Jesus Christ the Lord of all and our true God was, after His incarnation, uncircumscribable. Now, when He said to His disciples, ‘Lazarus our friend sleepeth, and I am glad for your sakes that I was not there,’ the expression, “I was not there, does not this denote circumscription? Certainly it does. But not further to notice that which is said of Him in the Gospels before His passion, let us speak more particularly of that which occurred after the resurrection. Surely, He was not uncircumscribable when He appeared to the women. The manifestation to the two disciples in like manner proves this circumscribability. Again: to be touched by Thomas — to enter while the doors are shut — what is this but circumscription? So ‘to go before the disciples into Galilee, there to be seen of them and to be worshipped by them,’ this also is the same. Again: that He should be taken up into heaven while the disciples are looking upon Him, and that the Angel should stand near and say, “This Jesus who is taken up from you into heaven shall so come again in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven’ — are not these circumstances proofs of circumscription? Certainly they are. And so have our inspired fathers taught.
“It is evident, then, to all who reason aright that, inasmuch as Christ is God and the Word of the Father, He is invisible, uncircumscribable, incomprehensible, and in all parts of His dominion at the same time. But, inasmuch as He took the nature of Man, He became visible and circumscribed, as is proved by His saying to the disciples, ‘I was not there.’ And that may be comprehended as the case of Thomas hath certified us. Into how many sinful errors have these patrons of this soul-destroying deceit of the Christianity-slanderers fallen by means of this one blasphemy of theirs!
“And again they slanderously add:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 10. — If any one endeavour by a picture which he calls Christ to describe the indivisible and hypostatic union of God the Word with the flesh — that is, the one undivided , unconfused, union which springs from the two natures, for by the name ‘Christ’ is understood both God and Man — as thus introducing the monstrous figment of the confusion of the two natures, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“The abomination of lies knows well enough how to unite itself with sound speech. Thus, these men falsely and maliciously represent the making of images and pictures as opposed to the undivided hypostatic union which is in Christ and as bringing in the confusion of the two natures. But the truth of God is not bound.
“Now, the name ‘Christ’ is significative of two natures — the one visible, the other invisible. The holy Church, therefore, as she hath received of the Fathers and the holy Apostles, doth pourtray the form which was visible to men and doth not divide Christ, according to their trifling calumny. The pictured image agrees with its prototype in name only, and not in its definition, as has been said before oftentimes; since it is without soul which, as it is invisible, admits not of representation. Now, if any one would feel it to be impossible to paint the figure of a soul although it be a created thing, how much more impossible must it appear to any one to make a representation perceptible to the senses of the incomprehensible and untraceable Godhead of the only begotten Son, even were he ever so far gone from a right mind. Their pains have fallen on their own heads; and the anathema which they have rashly ventured upon will abide with them forever; but still they go on.”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 11. — If any one shall in his mind divide the flesh which has been united to the essence of God the Word, and having it in his mind thus separated shall endeavour to make an image in representation thereof, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Saint Gregory, who is styled the Divine, speaks thus — ‘Since in our thought the natures may be divided, so in like manner do the names admit of a separate division.’ And most of the fathers have agreed in this opinion, for this indeed seems agreeable to the truth.
“But they, deserting alike the truth and the traditions of the fathers, say, ‘If any man even in thought divide the flesh which has been united to the substance of God the Word.’ In this respect they are proved most clearly not to agree with the fathers; and, further, most evidently they are shown to contend against the truth when talking thus they calumniously assert that the holy Catholic Church holds the same opinions as did Nestorius. But, consistently enough with themselves, they add”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 12. — If any one divide the One Christ into two Persons, placing apart the Son of God, and apart the Son of Mary, and so not confessing Him as One and the same, but allowing only a relative union of the two natures, he therefore ventures to make a representation of the Son of the Virgin as subsisting alone, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Over and over again, repeating the same things about the same, their paltry absurdities become almost innumerable. And now they devise the impious theory of Nestorius, and make that to belong inseparably to the formation of images, thus patching together paradoxical and contradictory argumentations which, as we have often replied to them before, we shall now pass by in silence.
“But now they disgorge the following:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 13. — If any one pourtray the flesh which was made God by union with the divine Word, as thus separating it from the Godhead, which assumed it and made it God, and as making it hereafter devoid of Deity, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Though the Catholic Church doth pourtray Christ in the form of man, yet it doth not, therefore, separate this human form from the Godhead — yea, it doth rather confirm its deification, or, as Gregory the Divine and the truth declare, that it is one with God. And by no means is the flesh of Christ in this way made devoid of Deity, as they, like ignorant and uninstructed barbarians, do vainly talk.
“Just as if any one paints a man, he doth not make the man to have no soul; but he hath a soul as much as before, and it is called his image from its likeness. So, when we make an image of our Lord, we do still confess His flesh to be deified, and the image to be no more than an image displaying the likeness of the prototype from which it hath its name — in which alone it hath any thing in common with the prototype: wherefore, it is venerable and holy, just as, on the other hand, if it had been the picture of a sinful man or devil, it would be sinful and polluted as is its prototype. Wherefore, having laboured in vain, they shall reap a harvest of vanity and receive the anathema from the truth, which certainly they will not escape who dare to speak as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 14. — If any one dare to represent by material colours God the Word, who, being in the form of God, did add to His own substance the form of a servant, and so was made like to us in all things, sin only excepted, as mere man, and so as separate from the inseparable undivided Godhead, as thereby bringing in a quaternity into the ever-blessed and life-giving Trinity, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Oh, their folly and madness! Are they not ashamed thus to heap up anathemas? Like the worm who lives by rolling in the mire, so do they seem to involve themselves in this word as if they could never have enough of it: while they endeavour to bring down curses on the holy Church of God, being most deserving thereof themselves. Now, the Scripture saith, ‘They who bless Her shall be blessed, and they who curse Her shall be cursed’ (Genesis ii. 3). But to imagine Christ as mere man — to separate Him from the Godhead and to bring in a quaternity by means of representative paintings — who can forbear a broad laugh at such jargon; or rather, who could forbear to weep at such blasphemy? For, does any one who makes an image of Christ on that account believe in a quaternity? Does he not rather thereby confess God the Word to be incarnate in truth, and not in appearance only? The insane Nestorius, having asserted that as there were two Natures in Christ so there were two Persons, was justly charged with bringing in a quaternity. But the holy Church of God, rightly confessing one Person in the two natures of Christ, hath been divinely instructed to make representations of Him in pictures for a memorial of His saving dispensation.
“Desirous of maintaining a fair appearance, they now add a word of truth, thus speaking:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 15. — If any confess not Mary ever a Virgin, rightly and truly Mother of God, to be above every other creature, visible or invisible; and does not with sincere faith entreat her intercession as having confidence before our God who was born of her, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Being well confirmed and established in these points, the Catholic Church needs not to be instructed in them by those who hold not with her in her divine traditions. For, as the Lord, though confessed by devils, did notwithstanding drive them away — and as Paul and his fellow labourer, though by the same they were declared to be ‘servants of the most high God who taught the way of salvation,’ yet did drive them from them — so even, if these men do say some truth, yet by the holy Church of God shall they be cast out. But now, as the dog returns to his vomit again, and as the sow that was washed returns to her wallowing in the mire, so they grunt out as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 16. — If any one spend his labour in setting up the figures of Saints in lifeless and deaf images made of material colours which cannot do any good (for the devising of them is vain and an invention of devilish craft), and hath no care to represent in himself their virtues as he finds them on record in the Scriptures — and so make living images of them, as being thereby excited to zeal similar to theirs, even as our inspired fathers have said let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Our inspired fathers never said nor taught any such thing as this: but these prevaricators would shield themselves under these venerable names, while the whole vain argumentation belongs to themselves. Such trifling pretensions are usual with them, as we shall find in what follows that they style themselves the ‘Seventh General Council.’
“A certain wise man hath said, ‘Let thy neighbour praise thee and not thy own mouth, a stranger and not thy own lips’ (Proverbs xxvii. 2): but these as they are taught by none so are they praised by none, wherefore they must needs praise themselves: and they would fain be called by men ‘rabbi’ ambitiously affecting to be the fathers of the Church. But her they calumniate, saying that she hath deserted Christ our God, and hath been wedded to idolatry. But God hath said to her by His Prophet, ‘I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many nations’ (Isaiah lx. 15); and by the royal Preacher he saith, ‘Thou art all fair: thou art all fair, my neighbour, and there is no fault in thee’ (Cant. iv. 7).
“But consider the folly of those who say that the Church is idolatrous and that of the same they boast to be the teachers. Now, do they mean to confess themselves to be fathers of idolators? But of this idolatrous Church they are teachers, either of some portion or of the whole. Now, if it be of a portion only, then surely they ought to have had respect to the fulness of the Catholic Church. By this they should have been justified, and from this they should have reaped the harvest of the truth; for it was thus our fathers corrected the errors of heretics, and united that which was divided. But, forasmuch as in this tradition the Church shines so glorious — they being separated from her in this, do seem to condemn the whole Church as having erred. And, awful as it is to say it, yet it were censurable to be silent: for, according to them, ‘The true confession in Christ is perished, and destruction hath seized on all.’ Away with such profanities; they are spoken in vain, proclaimed in vain, never shall they maintain their ground, for the painting of venerable images has of old been delivered to the Church, and by her authority has it been introduced into each sacred temple. This our holy fathers, this the whole company of Christians, hath received and handed down to us. But not only have they revolted from the concurrent testimony of all these, but, what is most dreadful and most terrible, the cry of their anathemas hath, after the manner of the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah, waxen great. Wherefore their iniquity is of the deepest dye. Who can tolerate the outbreakings of this insanity — the masqueradings of such assemblages of buffoons? Oh, that they had known the truth! For most plain is it to all who will think religiously, that if on the one hand by the records of the Saints we are reminded of their passion and are stirred up to zeal for the like, so, on the other hand, when we view the same conflicts and passion as set forth by the hand of the painter, we come equally as before to the remembrance of their courage and of their life in God. But now again they think and speak aright, saying:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 17. — If any one confess not that all Saints from the beginning of the world to the present time, whether before the law, under the law, or under the Gospel, have been accepted with God, and to be honourable before Him both in soul and body, and does not entreat their prayers as having boldness to intercede in behalf of the world, according to the traditions of the Church, let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Since they have made mention of the ‘Traditions of the Church,’ they ought to have added, ‘If any one admit not images and pictures let him be anathema.’ For verily this is the general tradition of the Church, and very rightly acknowledged by us in remembrance of their prototypes. But they, having shamelessly rejected this instruction, do in effect say to her, ‘Depart from us, we desire not the knowledge of thy ways.’ Whence also it came to pass that after they had made this definition they rejected ‘the acceptable offering of their intercession,’ blotting it out from their writing; and this all know. And, indeed, this is but the way of all heretics; who, if on one point they disregard the rule of piety or diverge from the right road, fall into many and divers errors.
“Thus the Arians, having said in the first instance that the divine Word is a creature, after this infamous blasphemy of theirs, absurdly declared that He took man’s nature without any soul. And the wretched Eutyches, having taught the one nature in the dispensation of our Lord, was led afterwards to the blasphemous assertion that He took on Him a certain more divine kind of nature not consubstantial with our own. So the patrons of this heresy, emulating these, being ill-satisfied with one innovation, as though in one was not evil enough, have embraced another which was near akin to the former. That which follows, as they wish to be equaled with the holy fathers, they bring forward under the semblance of piety.”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 18. — If any one confess not the resurrection of the dead, the judgment to come, the retribution of each one according to his merits in the righteous balance of the Lord, that neither will there be any end of punishment, nor indeed of the kingdom of heaven — that is, the full enjoyment of God; for the kingdom of heaven is not meat and drink, but righteousness, joy, and peace in the Holy Ghost, as the divine Apostle teaches — let him be anathema.”
Epiphanius reads:
“This is the confession of the patrons of our true faith — the holy Apostles, the divinely-inspired Fathers: this is the confession of the Catholic Church, and not of heretics. That which follows, however, is their own, full of ignorance and absurdity, for thus they bluster:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 19. — If any one receive not this our holy seventh General Council, or endeavours in any way to detract from its authority, or who does not with his whole heart embrace all things that have been defined therein according to the doctrine of the divinely-inspired Scripture, let him be anathema from God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and from the seven General Councils.”
Epiphanius reads:
“The rejection of the truth is the darkening of the mind and understanding. This sentence of theirs has yet more of folly and ignorance than it has of impiety. For, wise only to absurdities, while they style themselves the seventh General Council, actually word their anathema as though there were several other Councils independent of their own, as they say, ‘Let them be anathema from the seven holy General Councils.’ And we can scarcely say whether they are more to be derided for their folly or lamented for their impiety.
“Having left the truth and turned aside from the royal road they have wandered amidst crags and pits and fearful abysses. To them belong the words of the Proverb (ix. 12), ‘They have made their plough to wander from their own fields and have reaped barrenness.’ Wherefore, they who love the truth and seek after righteousness shall cause the arrows they have sharpened and the bows they have bent against the Church to pierce their own hearts; and they shall take up the words which David sang in the Spirit against them, saying, ‘The patrons of this new pravity have opened and dug out a ditch, and have fallen into the midst of it themselves: their mischief shall fall upon their own head and their iniquity shall fall on their own pate.’ For they call bitter sweet and sweet bitter, and put darkness for light and light for darkness as follows:”
Gregory reads:
“Definition 20. — These things having been defined by us after most laborious and diligent investigation, we determine that from henceforth no one shall be allowed to set forth any other faith — that is, to write, compose, or teach any other.
“If, therefore, any one shall presume after this time to set forth any other faith, either themselves openly bringing it forward and teaching it, or putting in the way of those who would return from heresy to the knowledge of the truth, or would introduce any innovating or sophistical caviling of words to the injury of that which here we have determined: if he be a Bishop, let him be deposed from his Bishopric; if a Cleric, let him be deprived of his orders; if a Monk or Laic, let him be anathematised.”
Epiphanius reads:
“Misguided by their utter ignorance of discipline they have stolen these words from our divinely-inspired fathers, and have turned them to their own purpose. But their words are equally vain and foolish and undeserving of reply.”
Gregory reads:
“The most sacred Emperors Constantine and Leo said, ‘Let this holy General Council declare if the definition which has now been read hath been determined upon with the full and entire consent of all the most holy Bishops now present.’
“The Holy Council shouted — ‘We all believe thus — we all think the same thing we all unanimously and freely subscribe — we all spiritually worship a Spiritual Being. This is the faith of the Apostles — this is the faith of the Fathers — this is the faith of the Orthodox. Thus all who serve God worship Him.
“‘Long live our Sovereigns: Lord, grant them a life of holiness: eternal be the memory of Constantine and Leo: ye are the peace of the world: may your faith preserve you: ye do honour Christ and He will preserve you: ye have confirmed Orthodoxy: Lord, grant them a life of holiness. Let all ill-will be banished from their rule: God preserve your power: God grant peace in your reign: your life is the life of the Orthodox: heavenly King, protect the kings of the earth: by you the Ecumenical Church hath obtained peace: ye are the lights of Orthodoxy: Lord, preserve the lights of the world: eternal be the memory of Constantine and Leo. To the new Constantine the most pious of Emperors be many years: Lord preserve him, that was Orthodox from his birth: Lord grant him a religious life: may his reign be free from envy. Many be the years of the most pious Augusta: Lord preserve her piety and Orthodoxy: envy and ill-will be banished from your kingdom: God protect your power: God, give your reign the blessing of peace. Ye have confirmed the inconfusedness of the natures in the dispensation of Christ: ye have more fully established the indivisibility of the two natures: ye have confirmed the doctrine of the six holy General Councils: ye have destroyed all idolatry: ye have vanquished the teachers of such errors: ye have branded with disgrace all who thought otherwise.”
Epiphanius reads:
“In these customary acclamations made to Emperors it would seem as if they were all on fire with love of lying, and under teaching of the devil, when they dared to say, ‘Ye lave destroyed all idolatry.’ O, would our ears were deaf than that we should have heard such soul destroying words as these. For, saith the Proverb (v. 2), ‘Have no connection with an harlot.’
“Desiring to destroy the saving doctrine of our dispensation they have plunged into the very abyss of blasphemy. What, then, can we reply to such grievous ravings — what, but that which was suggested to David by the Holy Spirit, ‘The poison of asps is under their lips: their throat is an open sepulchre. With their tongues they have spoken deceit; but they have fallen by their own counsels,’ being judged by Him who hath delivered us from all idolatrous error — by Christ our God. For He having for our sakes condescended to become Man hath ‘destroyed all idolatry’ (Zech. xii. 2). For, by His Prophet, He saith, ‘Behold the days come when I will take away the names of idols from off all the earth; neither shall there be mention of them anymore.’ Evidently this prophecy speaks of Him only, and not of the power of Kings or Monarchs, as they say. It is the part of apostacy to assign this gift to others. Let Christians cry aloud, as taught by the eloquent Isaiah (lxiii. 9), ‘It was not an Envoy, not an Angel, but the Lord Himself who hath saved us.’ Now, if it be as they say, that a Conventicle of Bishops and Presbyters and the power of Kings hath delivered us from idolatrous errors, then the human race hath been deceived concerning the truth: one having saved it, and another vauntingly ascribing this salvation to themselves; for, whereas it was Christ our God who delivered us from all idolatrous error, they vaunt this redemption to be of themselves. Oh, what arrogance! What vain conceit! Having deserted the truth they have become dark both in mind and understanding; and being immersed in their empty fantasies and vain conceits their flatteries are all tinctured with error. For, putting from them in their acclamations all those praises which rightly and properly belong to Kings, they have applied to them such things as belong only to Christ our God. Now, they ought rather to have praised their courage, their victory over the enemy, the destruction of the barbarians — which have been painted in pictures and on walls for a memorial of the fact and to excite the beholder to similar zeal — their clemency to the vanquished, their councils, their trophies, their earthly pomps, their civil enactments, their political management — these are the praises suited to Kings, and such as lead their subjects to regard and respect them.
“But having their tongues still sharpened, and breathing out rage and slander, they would privily shoot at the upright in heart, speaking thus:”
Gregory in conclusion:
“Ye have utterly destroyed the imagination of the perverse-minded Germanus, George, and Mansur.
“To Germanus the double-minded, the worshipper of wood, anathema.
“Anathema to George, his fellow, who falsified the doctrine of the fathers.
“To Mansur, of evil name and Saracen in heart, anathema. Anathema to Mansur the image-worshipper and writer of falsehoods. Anathema to Mansur who belied Christ and plotted against his Sovereign.
“To Mansur the teacher of impiety, and perverter of the sacred Scripture, Anathema.
“The Trinity hath deposed these three.”
Epiphanius reads:
“To all this we say with the Prophet (Jer. iii. 3): ‘Thou hast an whore’s forehead, acting impudently before all.’ For we know that such persons, bedecking their own vileness and wickedness with a fair appearance, are accustomed to revile those who lived reputably. For piety is an abomination to the sinner; and thus these men, having lips full of deceit, have spoken evil of the just in proud and haughty contempt: but the Lord hid them in ‘the secret of His countenance; from the strife of men He covered them in His tabernacle from the contention of tongues; for they shone like lights in the world, holding forth the word of life’ (Psalm xxxi. 20). Germanus, indeed, was nourished and brought up in sacred learning. Like to Samuel — devoted to God from a child, the equal of the divinely-inspired fathers, whose words demand our attention, being famous throughout the whole world — the praises of God were in his mouth, and a two-edged sword to strike down all who reject ecclesiastical tradition.
“George, also, whose country was Cyprus, who lived according to the Gospel, and who, in close imitation of Christ our God who hath left His own life as our rule, did neither contend nor cry aloud; when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered he threatened not; to him who struck him on the one cheek he turned the other; with him who compelled him to go one mile he would go twain; he bore the yoke in his youth with the Prophet, counting it a good thing to sit alone and to be silent.
“And, lastly, John, who by them has been contemptuously styled Mansur: he, emulating the Evangelist Matthew, left all and followed Christ, counting the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Arabia, and choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of his sin for a season.
“He, therefore, having taken up his own cross and that of Christ and having followed Him, for Christ and the people of Christ in the East, did by Christ sound aloud the trumpet of the Gospel: for he could not endure the innovation which took its rise amongst aliens, nor the lawless intrigues and the frenzied madness which were in arms against the holy Catholic Church of God. Having utterly overthrown the same, by exhortations and by admonitions he laboured to prevent any from being led away with those who work iniquity. Earnestly desirous that the ancient regulations be held firm, and that peaceful order maintained which the Lord gave to His disciples as the distinctive characteristic of those who call upon His name, saying: ‘My peace I give unto you: my peace I leave with you.’ Now, is it against these venerable men, so worthy of the confidence of the Church, that such horrible, such intolerable calumnies and slanders have been raised?
“Surely these wretches knew not their own ignorance when thus disgracefully they made naked their own tongues in styling Germanus the Hierophant, Sacrificer and Priest of Christ, double-minded and worshipper of wood, or, in like manner, reviling George and Mansur. Who amongst the low and vile ever hurled such reproaches before against those of the same faith with himself?
“True, indeed, from Jews, Saracens, and other Infidels, Christians have often had to bear with such reproaches on account of the sacred type of the cross, and of venerable images and of holy things offered to God. But never before did Christian bring such a charge against those who were of the same faith with himself; but the just is obnoxious to the wicked even as the sun to the blear-eyed. But they, having fled from the truth and by ecclesiastical rule being expelled, have been given up to falsehood and calumny; wherefore they could find no better employment than to slander Christians and the Priests of God, as having forsaken the loving and the true God, and having been given over to the loving of images — so, proving themselves mere slanderers and revilers, speaking without judgment, and speaking sinfully. Who, then, that fears the Lord can restrain the loud laugh, or, rather, who would not veil himself in deepest grief, or in the darkness of night, on account of such impiety?
“But since ‘these inventors of evil things’ (as saith the divine Apostle), searching them out, have left behind them their researches — by the which frivolities (as they say) they have not been a little strengthened — we also, having prepared arguments fitted by God’s grace for the entire demolition of the vain reasonings of their knowledge falsely so called, and having set the error of this new pravity on the same ground as the older heresies, have utterly cut them off by the sword of the holy Spirit. Come now, let us now apply ourselves to the instruction of those who hear; for thus saith the Proverb, and to this truth also assents: ‘All things are plain to those who understand, and right to those who seek knowledge’ (Prov. viii. 8).
“The Holy Catholic Church of God, in various ways and in divers manners, endeavours to lead all who are born within her pale to repentance, and to the knowledge and the commandments of God, and endeavours to direct all our senses to the glory of Him who is over all. And by sight, no less than by hearing, she would effect this correction by bringing before the eyes of all who come near that which hath been done.
“Thus when she would deliver any one from covetousness and love of money she points out to him the picture of Matthew, who, from a Publican became an Apostle, and left the madness of avarice to follow Christ; or Zacchaeus, who climbed into a sycamore tree to see Jesus, and who agreed to give half his goods to feed the poor, and if he had obtained anything by false accusation to restore fourfold. And thus the continual contemplation of these pictorial representations becomes a means for the conversion of such an one, and an unfailing monitor to prevent him from turning back again to his own vomit.
“Again, is another entangled in unlawful desires, she sets before him the picture of the chaste Joseph, who, abominating fornication and having vanquished it by his chastity, preserved the same in the manner which the picture represents, of which they become partakers who are lovers thereof; or, at another time, she sets before him the blessed Susanna adorned with chastity, stretching out her hands and invoking help from above, and Daniel sitting as a judge and delivering her out of the hands of the lawless Elders; and the remembrance of the fact arising from pictorial representations becomes the safeguard for a life of chastity.
“Again: she hath often rescued one or another who was wasting his substance in luxuries, clothed in soft raiment and spending in such kind of clothing that which he should bestow upon the poor — who, in fact, was altogether given up to a life of ease and effeminacy — by setting before his eyes Elias clothed in a sheepskin, fed with food just sufficient; or John clothed with camel’s hair, whose meat was locusts and wild honey: he who pointed out Christ with his finger, and did before declare of Him that He should take away the sins of the world.
“And with these she shows also to him Basil the Great and the whole multitude of Monks and Ascetics attenuated and mortified in body. Not to extend our discourse too far, we have brought forward but these few instances, leaving it to our hearers to find out others of the same kind for themselves. For we have, indeed, the whole Gospel history in pictures leading us to the remembrance of God and filling our hearts with joy. For these pictures being before our eyes, the heart of them that fear the Lord is made joyful — their countenance is made bright — despondency is changed into confidence — and they sing with David the Father of God (Psalm lxxvii. 3), ‘I remembered God and rejoiced.’ Again: by these we may at all times be brought to the remembrance of God. For there must be seasons in which the sacred lessons are not recited in the venerable temples. But the pictures there set up never cease to teach us, whether it be evening, morning, or at noonday, the verity of past transactions.
“Let us receive the traditions — let us honour the ancient rule of the Church — let us not be scrupulously inquisitive into so holy, so pious, a practice-let us not intermeddle with the ancient ordinances; for everything which leads to the remembrance of God must be acceptable to Him. They, therefore, who are without this tradition, of which all who are legitimately born in the Catholic Church are partakers, are bastards and not sons. Wherefore, we feel that this setting up of holy images in the Church is good and right, and that by them we are led spiritually to remember their prototypes; and that, therefore, on account of the worthiness of the prototype, we are bound to salute, embrace, and bestow all suitable honour upon the image. If any is pleased to style it ‘salutation’ (ἀσπασμόν), or ‘worship’ (προσκύνησιν), it is the same in effect, unless by chance a person should consider this worship to be worship of the highest kind (τήν κατά λατρείαν προσκύνησιν); for this is quite a different thing, as we have often proved.
“Let him be worthy of this worship who comes thereto; and, if he be not worthy, let him first be purified, and so let him approach the venerable and holy image. Let there be no satanic objection against such worship — no timorous scruples having such evil pretexts as the following — ‘If I go and salute an image, then I am chargeable with having offered to it the worship which is in spirit and in truth.’ Away with such scruples! These are the things which they who fight against God and speak vanity prate about, just like the old serpent. We know how he came to the woman and gently insinuated his lies. What hath God said? ‘Of every tree in the garden ye may freely eat; but of the tree which is in the midst of the garden ye shall not eat of it.’ Just so they deceive the hearts of the weak, telling them that he who worships the image of our Lord, or of our immaculate Lady the true Mother of God, or of the holy Angels, or any of the Saints, offers to it the worship which is in spirit and in truth. Let us not be deceived by any such words: such admonitions and instructions come from the Devil. Gregory the Divine utterly subverts all such fables when he exhorts all thus — ‘Venerate Bethlehem — worship the manger.’ Again: the venerable Maximus, whose praise is in all the Churches, when on one occasion, being in conference with certain persons about ecclesiastical matters, having commanded the divine type of the venerable cross, the holy gospels, and a sacred image to be set before them, together with his friends, he embraced these in confirmation of that which had been spoken. And still more clearly does He that is named from immortality teach the same truths in his epistle to Marcellinus, prefixed by him to his treatise on the interpretation of the Psalms, where he speaks thus — ‘Each one taking up the book of the Psalms, admiring and adoring, reads there the prophecies concerning the Saviour, as also in other Scriptures.’ Do you observe? — the inspired father enjoins us to worship the prophecies of the Saviour. Now, if it be pious to worship these, how much more the fulfilment of those as developed in pictures?
“Now, one of these prophecies is, ‘A virgin shall conceive and bear a son.’ Now, when we see in a picture the fulfilment of this prophecy — that is, the Virgin carrying in her arms the Son whom she hath brought forth — who could refrain from worshipping and saluting it? And who so ill-instructed as to dare to censure such salutation? Let us make ourselves worthy of this worship, lest coming unworthy we meet the same doom as did Uzza. For he, having touched the ark, perished in that very hour because he had approached unworthily. Now, this was adorned with various figures and made of wood, just as are our images.
“With respect to those who think it quite enough to have pictures and images for remembrance only, and not for worship, receiving the one and rejecting the other, they are half wicked and truly false and falsely true, in one way acknowledging the truth, in another despising it. Oh, the madness of such! Wherefore, it is that we, who once were calumniators of the truth, have now become its supporters. Yet, for our past disregard of ecclesiastical tradition, let us entreat earnestly the pardon of our sin.
“In conclusion, let us keep the commandment of ordinances — let us walk according to the word of the Prophet (Mich. vi. 8) — ‘Should he tell thee, O man, what is good and what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justice, to love mercy, and to be ready to go with thy God.’ Wherefore, let us restrain anger — let us keep our tongues from lies, reproaches, and revilings — let us be modest with our eyes — let us restrain our appetites — let us watch with prayer and fasting — let us give thanks to God for all that He has bestowed upon us — let us not accustom our mouths to oaths, but rather listen to Him who said, ‘I say unto you, Swear not at all’ (Matt. v . 34) — let us despise the glory which is of the earth. But, as the greatest of all good things, let us embrace mercy and love, but these, nevertheless, united in the fear of God. For without such fear of God, love is not approved. It was thus Jehoshaphat loved Ahab; but he was thus reproved — ‘Shouldest thou love them that do wickedly? — shouldest thou help them that are hated of the Lord?’ (2 Chron. xix. 2) Let us then do all in the fear of the Lord, seeking the intercession of our immaculate Lady Mary, ever a Virgin, and by nature the Mother of God, and of the holy Angels, and of all Saints, saluting their venerable relics, that we may be partakers of their holiness. So may we be established in every good word and work in Jesus Christ our Lord: to whom be honour, glory, power, and blessing, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and evermore, world without end. Amen.”
Source: Mendham, John, trans. 1850. The Seventh General Council, the Second of Nicaea, Held A.D. 787, in Which the Worship of Images Was Established. London: William Edward Painter. Pages 302-435.