The origin of Christian portraits in Ancient and Modern theological controversies

Abstract

The icon painters have always held that their art has descended through generations from St. Luke and St. Nicodemus. The Greek, Syriac, Coptic and Latin literary sources make up a random selection of passages which refer to icons. They come mostly from documents of the Council of Nicea (787). Elliger’s (1930) and Koch’s (1917) studies have strongly influenced the discussions on icons over the past hundred years. At the same time the massive accumulation of archaeological evidence has been showing clearly that the individuals, who shared aniconic views, like Clement of Alexandria or Tertullian represented narrow learned circles of theologians. Eusebius’ Letter to Constantia did not emerge among his writings until the 8th century (787). The vestiges of Epiphanius of Salamis’ four writings which are critical of images also emerged during the iconoclast period (G. Ostrogorsky). As if running counter all the discussions on images of Christ engaging the Early Church, the acheiropoietoi showed Christians ‘a true face’ of Jesus, revealed in a miraculous way by the Christ Himself. The literary sources refer to two different traditions of the Edessan acheiropoietos (Acta Thaddaei, Doctrina Addaei), which is documented by the Syriac hymn on the Cathedral Church of Urfa (c.550). The popularity of images in the 4th – 7th century would have been unthinkable without a long, earlier history.