The divine beauty is not set forth either in form or comeliness of design or colouring, but is contemplated in speechless blessedness, according to its virtue. So do painters [pg 42] transfer human forms to canvas through certain colours, laying on suitable and harmonious tints to the picture, so as to transfer the beauty of the original to the likeness.
Commentary.—You see that the divine beauty is not set forth in form or shape, and on this account it cannot be conveyed by an image (οὑκ εἰκονίξεται): it is the human form which is transferred to canvas by the artist’s brush. If, therefore, the Son of God became man, taking the form of a servant, and appearing in man’s nature, a perfect man, why should His image not be made? If, in common parlance, the king’s image is called the king, and the honour shown to the image redounds to the original, as holy Basil says, why should the image not be honoured and worshipped, not as God, but as the image of God Incarnate?
The same, from his Sermon at Constantinople on the Godhead of the Son and of the Spirit, and on Abraham.
Then the father proceeds to bind his son. I have often seen paintings of this touching scene, and could not look at it with dry eyes, art setting it forth so vividly. Isaac is lying [pg 43] before the altar, his legs bound, his hands tied behind his back. The father approaching the victim, clasping his hair with the left hand, stoops over the face so piteously turned towards him, and holds in his right hand the sword, ready to strike. Already the point of the sword is on the body when the divine voice is heard, forbidding the consummation.
Leo,[12] Bishop of Neapolis in Cyprus. From his book against the Jews, on the Adoration of the Cross, and the Statues of the Saints, and on Relics.
If you, O Jew, reproach me saying that I adore the wood of the Cross as God, why do you not reproach Jacob, who worshipped on the point of his staff (ἐπὶ τό ἄκρον τῆς ρἁβδου)? Now it is evident that he was not worshipping wood. So with us; we are worshipping Christ through the Cross, not the wood of the Cross.
Commentary.—If we adore the Cross, made of whatever wood it may be, how shall we not adore the image of the Crucified?
[pg 44]
From the same.
Abraham worshipped the impious men who sold him the cave, and bent his knee to the ground, yet did not worship them as gods. Jacob praised Pharao, an impious idolator, yet not as God, and he fell down at the feet of Esau, yet did not worship him as God. And again, How does God order us to worship the earth and mountains? ‘Exalt the Lord your God and worship Him upon His holy mountain, and adore His footstool,’ that is, the earth. For heaven is My throne, He says, and the earth My footstool. How was it that Moses worshipped Jothor, an idolator, and Daniel, Nabuchodonosor? How can you reproach me because I honour those who honour God and show Him service? Tell me, is it not fitting to worship the saints, rather than to throw stones at them as you do? Is it not right to worship them, rather than to attack them, and to fling your benefactors into the mire? If you loved God, you would be ready to honour His servants also. And if the bones of the just are unclean, why were the bones of Jacob and [pg 45] Joseph brought with all honour from Egypt? How was it that a dead man arose again on touching the bones of Eliseus? If God works wonders through bones, it is evident that He can work them through images, and stones, and many other things, as in the case of Eliseus, who gave his staff to his servant, saying, ‘With this go and raise from the dead the son of the Sunamitess.’ With his staff Moses chastised Pharao, parted the waters, struck the rock, and drew forth the stream. And Solomon said, ‘Blessed is the wood by which justice cometh.’ Eliseus took iron out of the Jordan with a piece of wood. And again, the wood is the wood of life, and the wood of Sabec, that is, of remission. Moses humbled the serpent with wood and saved the people. The blossoming rod in the tabernacle confirmed the priesthood of Aaron. Perhaps, O Jew, you will tell me that God prescribed to Moses beforehand all the things of the testimony in the tabernacle. Now, I say to you that Solomon made a great variety of things in the temple in carvings and sculpture, which God had not ordered him to do. Nor did the tabernacle of the testimony contain [pg 46] them, nor the temple which God showed to Ezechiel, nor was Solomon to be blamed in this. He had had these sculptured images made for the glory of God as we do. You, too, had many and varied images and signs in the Old Testament to serve as a reminder of God, if you had not lost them through ingratitude. For instance, the rod of Moses, the tablets of the law, the burning bush, the rock giving forth water, the ark containing the manna, the altar set on fire from above (πυρενθεον), the lamina bearing the divine name, the ephod, the tabernacle overshadowed by God. If you had prepared all these things by day and by night, saying, ‘Glory be to Thee, O Almighty God, who hast done wonders in Israel through all these things’; if through all these ordinances of the law, carried out of old, you had fallen on your knees to adore God, you would see that worship is given to Him by images.