Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 7.djvu/691

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Y^aks sawth^'^^' ^egrad ^^^" idolatrous. The ship only in yT® '^"'"^ '^/"oo- "" (which meant wor- trans/ated ao' .®®"se of .erence ami veneration) poitiage dueJ^^i'" ^'^'^ un^*o°d it as meaning the

ICONOGRAPHY

'"ti'gnation t ° '-^ *« Go, Lastly, there was their press Irene tlf ^'"^t y,g itical conduct of the Em- tion of CharJp ^'^''^ of f,'tion that led to the corona-

°' a rivai pm„'?''^°^ at .ome and the establishment

°/eeks. d.-s^^P"?

tffeJoonocfasts ^,fej«Vv« and C the'^pstii.;. -.;'*■ IfXdhey refuse

press Irene ,1?^'"st the ritical conduct of the Em- t, — - 'We Stat- --■■ ■ • • ■ 'agn,

nffk-"*s'iken7'M'^'"*P''°" °^ everything done by "' tile connoU u *"eir ustoms, led to the rejection

be noted that t^"^ ^^^^ ^rai tish Church. But it should nlJat, the Frant.^if u^JF^^'V'" °f *''" council did not mean 1 Charlemagne sided with sed to accept the Nicene Council iifi?y efjifally rejected the Iconoclast synod of 754. They had holy images and kept them; but they thought that the Fathers of Nica;a had gone too far, had encouraged what would be real idolatry.

The answer to the decrees of the Second Council of Nicaea sent in this faulty translation by Adrian I was a refutation in eiglity-five chapters brought to the pope in 790 by a Frankish abbot, Angilbert. This refutation, later expanded, and fortified with quota- tions from the Fathers and other arguments, became the famous "Libri Carolini" or "Capitulare de Imag- inibus" in which Charlemagne is represented as de- claring his convictions (first published at Paris by Jean du Tillet, Bishop of St-Brieux, 1549, in P. L., XCVIII, 990-1248). The authenticity of this work, some time disputed, is now established (Hefele, "Con- ciliengeschiohte". III, 694-717). In it the bishops reject the synods both of 7S7 and of 754. They admit that pictures of saints should be kept as ornaments in churches and — as well as relics and the saints them- selves — should receive a certain proper veneration (opportuna veneratio) ; but they declare that God only can receive adoration (meaning adoralio, TrpoaKvvqjii)-^ pictures are in themselves indifferent, have no neces- sary connexion with the Faith, are in any case inferior to relics, the Cross, and the Bible. The pope, in 794, answered these eighty-five chapters liy a long exposi- tion and defence of the cult of images (" Hadriani ep. ad Carol. Reg." in Jaffe, "Regesta", n. 24S;3; Mansi, XIII, 759-810; P. L., XCVIII, 1247-92), in which he mentions, among other points, that twelve Frank- ish bishops were present at, and had agreed to, the Roman synod of 7.31. Before the letter arrived the Frankish bishops held the Synod of Frankfort (794) in the presence of two papal legates, Theophylactus and Stephen, who do not seem to have done anything to clear up the misunderstanding. This synod for- mally condemns the Second Council of Nicaea, show- ing, at the same time, that it altogether misunder- stands the decision of Nica!a. The essence of the decree at Frankfort is its second canon: "A question has been brought forward concerning the new synod of the Greeks which they held at Constantinople [the Franks do not even know where the synod they con- demn was held] in connexion with the adoration of images, in which synod it was written that those who do not give service and adoration to pictures of saints just as much as to the Divine Trinity are to be anathe- matized. But our most holy Fathers, whose names are above, refusing this adoration and service despise and condemn [that synod]" (Mansi, XIII, 909). Charlemagne sent these Acts to Rome and demanded the condemnation of Irene and Constantine VI. The pope of course refused to do so, and matters remained for a time as they were, the Second Council of Nicaea being rejected in the Frankish kingdom.

During the second Iconoclast persecution, in 824, the Emperor Michael II wrote to Louis the Pious the letter which, besides demanding that the Byzantine monks who had escaped to the West should be handed over to him, entered into the whole question of image- worship at length and contained vehement accusa- tions against its defenders. Part of the letter is quoted VII.— 40

in Leclercq-Hefele, "Histoire des conciles", III, 1, p. 612. Louis begged the pope (Eugene II, 824-27) to receive a document to be drawn up by the Frankish bishops in which texts of the Fathers bearing on the subject should be collected. Eugene agreed, and the bishops met in 825 at Paris. This meeting followed the example of the Synod of Frankfort exactly. The bishops try to propose a middle way, but decidedly lean towards the Iconoclasts. They produce some texts against these, many more against image-wor- ship. Pictures may be tolerated only as mere orna- ments. Adrian I is blamed for his assent to Nicaea II. Two bishops, Jeremias of Sens and Jonas of Orleans, are sent to Rome with this document; they are espe- cially warned to treat the pope with every possible reverence and humility, and to efface any passages that might offend him. Louis, also, wrote to the pope, protesting that he only proposed to help him with some useful quotations in his discussions with the Byzantine Court; that he had no idea of dictating to the Holy See (Hefele, 1. c). Nothing is known of Eugene's answer, or of the further developments of this incident. The correspondence about images con- tinued for some time between the Holy See and the Frankish Church; gradually the decrees of the Second Council of Nicaea were accepted throughout the West- ern Empire. Pope John VIII (872-82) sent a better translation of the Acts of the council, which helped very much to remove misunderstanding.

There are a few more isolated cases of Iconoclasra in the West. Claudius, Bishop of Turin (d. 840), in 824 destroyed all pictures and crosses in his diocese, forbade pilgrimages, recourse to intercession of saints, veneration of relics, even lighted candles, except for practical purposes. Many bishops of the empire and a Frankish abbot, Theodomir, wrote against him (P. L., CV); he was condemned bj a local synod. (See " Claudii Taurin. De cultu imaginum " in the Cologne "Bibl. Patrum", IX, 2.) Agobard of Lyons at the same time thought that no external signs of reverence should be paid to images; but he had few followers. Walafrid Strabo ("De eccles. rerum exordiis et incre- mentis" in P. L., CXIV, 916-66) and Hincmar of Reims (" Opusc. c. Hincmarum Lauden.", xx, in P. L., CXXVI) defended the Catholic practice and contrib- uted to put an end to the exceptional principles of Frankish bishops. But as late as the eleventh cen- tury Bishop Jocelin of Bordeaux still had Iconoclast ideas, for which he was severely reprimanded by Pope Alexander II.

The Acts of the various synods are in Mansi, Sacrorvm Con- ciliorum nova et amplissima collectio, XII, XIII (Florence, 1766): Hefele, Conciliengeschichte, \l\ (2nd ed., Freiburg iin Br., 1877), .366-490, 678-717; Fr. tr., edited with v.iluable notes by Leclercq, Histoire des Conciles, III (Paris, 1909), 1: Ale.x- ANDER, De IcoriQclastaTuin hoETesi dissertatio in Zaccaria, The- saurus Iheolonifp, IV (1762), 64-83:_ Maimbourg, Histoire de I'heresie des Iconoclnstes (2 vols., Paris, 16S3): Sp.\nheim, His- toria imaginum reslituta (Antwerp. 1686): Schlosser, Ge- schichte der bildrrslurmenden /Catser (Frankfort, 1812); AIarx, Der Bitderstreitdcrhyzantinisehen Kaiser (Trier, 1839): Sen war z- LOSE, Der Bildcrstreit. Ein Kampf der grieehischen Kirche um ihre Eigenart u. ihre Freiheit (Gotha. 1890) (the best short his- tory of Iconoclasm): Beurlier, Les vestiges du culte imperial a Byzance et la querelle des leonoclastes in the Congres scientifique des Cathol.. II (1891). 167-180: Harnack, Lehrbueh der Dog- mengeschiclile. II (4th ed., Tubingen. 1909). 478-490: Burt, A History of the Later Roman Empire. II (London, 1889, 428-438; Brehier, La querelle des images (Paris, 1904),

Adri.^n Foktescub.

Iconography, Christian, is the science of the de- scription, history, and interpretation of the traditional representations of God, the saints, and other sacred subjects in art. Almost from the beginning the Church has employed the arts as potent means of in- struction and edification. In the first centuries the walls of the catacombs were decorated with paintings and mosaics (see Catacombs), and in all later times churches have lent their walls, ceilings, and windows, as well as their altars, furniture, and liturgical vessels and books, to be adorned with scenes from the Old and the