Idols/Icons

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When Protestants pull up the old line that veneration of sacred icons is the same as idol worship, I always respond with, “Idols are anything that takes God’s place. Sacred icons are merely representations of God or Holy People. We’re not worshipping the icons themselves, we’re worshipping what they represent.”

But then I thought of something. This verse:

Exodus 32:8
They have turned aside from the way I pointed out to them, making for themselves a molten calf and worshipping it, sacrificing to it and crying out, “This is your God, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!”

The footnote in my Bible about this says:

“From this it is clear that the golden calf was intended as an image, not of a flase god, but of the Lord himself, his strength being symbolized by the strength of a young bull. **The Israelites, however, had been forbidden to represent the Lord under any visible form **cf Ex 20, 4.” [Bold mine]

My Bible, the New American Bible, is Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat, so the translation is valid. My question is, by making images of the Lord, even sacred images that we’re worshipping as the Lord and not as the images themselves, doesn’t Exodus imply that this is not allowed? The Israelites worshipped the golden calf as a representation of the Lord, and yet it still was a sin.

I’m curious to hear responses.
 
The Israelites were still worshipping the “image itself” as God. We do not worship the statue or the image. Iconography or statues are not an end, they are instruments to help us focus on a reality beyond the icon/statue.

See the Catechism on holy images. See also veneration of images, especially the end of paragraph 2132 which reads:*Religious worship is not directed to images in themselves, considered as mere things, but under their distinctive aspect as images leading us on to God incarnate. The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is.*The Israelites violated this. They thought they had captured the divine in the image itself.

And approaching it at another angle, the footnote is correct: The Israelites were told not to do that. The Incarnation also demonstrated the validity of depicting God because Jesus said “He who has seen me has seen the Father.” See the “holy images” link above, paragraph 1159.
 
And yet, the idol makers of Ephesus didn’t think to start making statues of Paul, Peter, Stephen, even Jesus! Instead, they caused a riot (read Acts 19). You might argue that it was because of their devotion to Artemis (or Diana, depending on your translation), but consider verses 24-25 (For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen. These he gathered together, with the workmen of like occupation, and said, “Men, you know that** from this business we have our wealth**.” RSV emphasis mine). Seems clear to me that their “devotion” was motivated by money. Add to that the fact that we don’t have any statues of any of the Apostles (other than the pagan statues that were renamed after Christianity became the official religion of the empire).

I am aware that the Catholic Church teaches that they do NOT worship saints; They “venerate” them. While I am not as well versed in this as I would like to be, the Greek word for “worship” has 2 different translations in Latin - latria and dulia. Latria is worship given to God alone. Dulia is what is given to saints (hyper-dulia to Mary, but that’s an entire topic in itself). Dulia is also what would be offered to a king, governor, master, etc… What distinguishes the two is the context. Is your “vereation” of images and icons similar to the “veneration” you would offer to, say, President Obama? Would you light candles before the President? Kneel? Pray a rosary? Or wouldn’t these types of “veneration” be what might be offered to God?

I am reminded of a story of a lady from up north. She was spending some time in South Texas. Like most tourists to the area, she went with friends over to Mexico to eat and shop. On the way back, she saw a drty, wet, sickly-looking thing and felt very sorry for the little dog. She convinced her friends to help her smuggle it across the border. She got it home, bathed it, fed it and let it sleep with her. The next day she took it to the vet to get checked. The vet asked her where she got it. Of course, she didn’t want to say, but finally admitted that she found the poor little dog in Mexico. The vet then told her it was not a dog. It was a Mexican River Rat. The point is, you can call it whatever you like, that doesn’t chenge the fact of what it is.
 
Marc_Anthony said:
When Protestants pull up the old line that veneration of sacred icons is the same as idol worship, I always respond with, “Idols are anything that takes God’s place. Sacred icons are merely representations of God or Holy People. We’re not worshipping the icons themselves, we’re worshipping what they represent.”

But then I thought of something. This verse:

Exodus 32:8
They have turned aside from the way I pointed out to them, making for themselves a molten calf and worshipping it, sacrificing to it and crying out, “This is your God, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!”

The footnote in my Bible about this says:

“From this it is clear that the golden calf was intended as an image, not of a flase god, but of the Lord himself, his strength being symbolized by the strength of a young bull. **The Israelites, however, had been forbidden to represent the Lord under any visible form **cf Ex 20, 4.” [Bold mine]

My Bible, the New American Bible, is Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat, so the translation is valid. My question is, by making images of the Lord, even sacred images that we’re worshipping as the Lord and not as the images themselves, doesn’t Exodus imply that this is not allowed? The Israelites worshipped the golden calf as a representation of the Lord, and yet it still was a sin.

I’m curious to hear responses.
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Icons are not idols, nor are statues of the saints and the Virgin Mary, nor even the Crucifix . We do not worship them. We meditate on them. They are visual aids. They are reminders and they make us mindful of our God.
 
“What distinguishes the two is the context. Is your “veneration” of images and icons similar to the “veneration” you would offer to, say, President Obama? Would you light candles before the President? Kneel? Pray a rosary? Or wouldn’t these types of “veneration” be what might be offered to God?”

Obama is not a holy figure, nor is he in Heaven.

The type of worship we have for God, as you yourself admitted, is not the same as the type we have for the Saints.

Your story about the Mexican river rat is not relevant when this point is considered and accepted.
 
#1.The Egyptians worshiped gods represented by animals(snakes,hippo’s,cattle etc).#2.Baal,an egyptian god was represented by a calf,bull etc.#3.Not all the people who came out of Egypt were devout Jews.These people had been in Egypt for several generations and were not only aware of these gods,but some of them worshipped them.Verse 8(DR)They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them;and they have made to themselves a molten calf,and have adored it,and sacrificing victims to it,have said;These are thy gods,o Israel,that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.
 
wardrandolph said:
#1.The Egyptians worshiped gods represented by animals(snakes,hippo’s,cattle etc).#2.Baal,an egyptian god was represented by a calf,bull etc.#3.Not all the people who came out of Egypt were devout Jews.These people had been in Egypt for several generations and were not only aware of these gods,but some of them worshipped them.Verse 8(DR)They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst show them;and they have made to themselves a molten calf,and have adored it,and sacrificing victims to it,have said;These are thy gods,o Israel,that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.
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Your translation says “gods”, mine says “God”.

My Bible is also Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat as I’m sure yours is.
 
Marc_Anthony said:
Your translation says “gods”, mine says “God”.

My Bible is also Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat as I’m sure yours is.
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I don’t want to hijack this thread as to translations.We are in the USA so the NAB is the Translation in general use.I like the NAB but my personl preferance is the Douay-Rheims Challoner edition with Imprimatur of His Eminence James Cardinal Gibbons.This is the translation I grew up with and I love the litterary style and the old english.Peace,Rocky.
 
Marc_Anthony said:
When Protestants pull up the old line that veneration of sacred icons is the same as idol worship, I always respond with, “Idols are anything that takes God’s place. Sacred icons are merely representations of God or Holy People. We’re not worshipping the icons themselves, we’re worshipping what they represent.”

But then I thought of something. This verse:

Exodus 32:8
They have turned aside from the way I pointed out to them, making for themselves a molten calf and worshipping it, sacrificing to it and crying out, “This is your God, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!”

The footnote in my Bible about this says:

“From this it is clear that the golden calf was intended as an image, not of a flase god, but of the Lord himself, his strength being symbolized by the strength of a young bull. **The Israelites, however, had been forbidden to represent the Lord under any visible form **cf Ex 20, 4.” [Bold mine]

My Bible, the New American Bible, is Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat, so the translation is valid. My question is, by making images of the Lord, even sacred images that we’re worshipping as the Lord and not as the images themselves, doesn’t Exodus imply that this is not allowed? The Israelites worshipped the golden calf as a representation of the Lord, and yet it still was a sin.

I’m curious to hear responses.
Click to expand...
I’m looking at a NAB Bible right now. There is no footnote for Ex 20:4
Copyright is 1987.
Since mine is a Large print edition, page numbers might not corrolate with smaller print versions. Pg # is 77.
 
WatchingMedia said:
I’m looking at a NAB Bible right now. There is no footnote for Ex 20:4
Copyright is 1987.
Since mine is a Large print edition, page numbers might not corrolate with smaller print versions. Pg # is 77.
Click to expand...
No no, cf Ex 20:24 is just a reference IN the footnote to the verse about not representing the Lord in any visible form.

Also, the footnote is not for this exact verse (Ex 32:8). It’s actually the footnote for Ex 32:5, which makes no difference since it refers to the exact same thing anyway. 🤷
 
Cachonga said:
And yet, the idol makers of Ephesus didn’t think to start making statues of Paul, Peter, Stephen, even Jesus!(Why would they? They didn’t believe in them.) Instead, they caused a riot (read Acts 19). You might argue that it was because of their devotion to Artemis (or Diana, depending on your translation), but consider verses 24-25 (For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen. These he gathered together, with the workmen of like occupation, and said, “Men, you know that** from this business we have our wealth**.” RSV emphasis mine). Seems clear to me that their “devotion” was motivated by money. Add to that the fact that we don’t have any statues of any of the Apostles (other than the pagan statues that were renamed after Christianity became the official religion of the empire).

I am aware that the Catholic Church teaches that they do NOT worship saints; They “venerate” them. While I am not as well versed in this as I would like to be, the Greek word for “worship” has 2 different translations in Latin (this is very inexact) - latria and dulia. Latria is worship given to God alone. Dulia is what is given to saints (hyper-dulia to Mary, but that’s an entire topic in itself). Dulia is also what would be offered to a king, governor, master, etc… What distinguishes the two is the context. Is your “vereation” of images and icons similar to the “veneration” you would offer to, say, President Obama? Would you light candles before the President? Kneel? Pray a rosary? Or wouldn’t these types of “veneration” be what might be offered to God?

I am reminded of a story of a lady from up north. She was spending some time in South Texas. Like most tourists to the area, she went with friends over to Mexico to eat and shop. On the way back, she saw a drty, wet, sickly-looking thing and felt very sorry for the little dog. She convinced her friends to help her smuggle it across the border. She got it home, bathed it, fed it and let it sleep with her. The next day she took it to the vet to get checked. The vet asked her where she got it. Of course, she didn’t want to say, but finally admitted that she found the poor little dog in Mexico. The vet then told her it was not a dog. It was a Mexican River Rat. The point is, you can call it whatever you like, that doesn’t chenge the fact of what it is.
Click to expand...
But distinctions are very important. One lights a candle, not to honor the person whose image it stands before, but to ask that personage to remember the intention for so long as the light burns, hence there are eight day candles and one day candles (or now the hideous electric “candles” that fire codes have imposed).
Kneeling has more than one function. Certainly it is often a posture of adoration, but it is also a posture of importuning, and one would kneel before a king when pleading for a favor (or being knighted), or before a sweetheart when pleading for acceptance of a proposal of marriage. When imploring a saint for his/her prayers, it is a fitting posture.
The Rosary is a series of meditations, petiotions, and praises. I sense an objection to Catholics actually fulfilling the prophecy, “behold, henceforth all generastions shall call me blessed.” (Lk.1:48)
 
I like to say that is a matter of appearances. A non-Catholic who sees someone kneeling in front of a statue of Mary may easily jump to the conclusion that Mary is being worshiped as if she were God. The same thing applies to all sorts of devotions we might perform.

The fact is that we Catholics do not worship idols; it is forbidden in the Commandments. If we “pray” to Mary and the Saints, it is only to ask them to pray for us, as we might ask any other friend to do.

The “friend” part is difficult for many other Christians to understand. I think it’s because, since the conversation is about idols and images, they are thinking of Mary and the Saints as pictures and/or statues. The connection between friends who are real people on earth, and friends who are real people in Heaven is obscured by this.

God bless us all,

Ruthie
 
If God wanted us to avoid making sacred art, including statues and icons, He through the Church would have taught us that the ancient ban on religious art was still in force.

Instead, God through the Church has taught us that sacred art is acceptable and desirable, so long as certain conditions are met, such as not turning the image into a god but remembering that it is there to represent God or something/someone else holy. In fact, nothing recorded in the Bible has any binding force on us unless God through the Church teaches us that it does.

There’s no need to worry 🙂
 
I am supposing He had His own idea of the image or form He would take when the time came, and it was not as a calf.
 
The Phoenician/Middle Eastern god Baal (meaning Lord or Master) was often depicted as a bull or calf, and so were various lordly Egyptian gods. But our Lord isn’t Baal, or any of the other Egyptian gods, so it wasn’t a good move to depict God as a calf. (Bad example of inculturation.)

I’m trying to think of something comparable… say, depicting God/Adonai with a Greek statue of the Phoenician/Middle Eastern god Adonis. Sure, the name is similar; both names mean “Lord”. But there’s a big difference.

Or say somebody decided to decorate a Catholic Church with a depiction of the Holy Ghost, where they actually drew Him as a ghost (like in that humorous Lego Bible). That wouldn’t be funny, in a serious worship context. It would be an insult.

Re: idols and icons

The classic text is St. John of Damascus (aka St John Damascene)'s book On Holy Images. It’s not very long and it’s readily available online. He lived in a Muslim country during a time when the Iconoclasts ruled Constantinople, so he had every reason to go with the flow and condemn icons and statues and all the rest. Instead, he defended them staunchly as an important part of Christianity. Go. Read.
 
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