Images of God the Father

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From the link Mystophilus posted to John of Damascas:

“Of old, God the incorporeal and uncircumscribed was never depicted. Now, however, when God is seen clothed in flesh, and conversing with men, I make an image of the God whom I see”

i.e. an image of CHRIST

But as you say, Mystophilus, he does (sort of) “collapse a discrimination” between the two:
“For the Son is the natural image of the Father, unchangeable, in everything like to the Father, except that He is begotten, and that He is not the Father. The Father begets, being unbegotten. The Son is begotten, and is not the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the image of the Son. For no one can say the Lord Jesus, except in the Holy Spirit. (I Cor. 12.3) Through the Holy Spirit we know Christ, the Son of God and God, and in the Son we look upon the Father.” fordham.edu/halsall/basis/johndamascus-images.html

I think its important that he says “in the Son we look upon the Father.” But never can we directly look upon the Father, for “you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live” (Exodus 33:20)

So I’m still convinced that paint or something should be sploshed all over the cieling of the Sistine Chapel, and all those great works of the Renaissance. Boy that would get some folks worked up. But I think it would please the Eastern Orthodox.

I also found this, at the Vatican website, from a homily of John Paul II:
“…With great daring he [Michelangelo] even transferred this visible and corporal beauty to the Creator himself. We are probably witnesses to an extraordinary piece of artistic audacity, since it is impossible to impose the likeness proper to man on the invisible God. Would this not be blasphemy? It is difficult however, not to recognize in the visible and humanized Creator, God clad in infinite majesty. Indeed, as far as the image with its intrinsic limits permits, everything which could be expre been expressed here.”
vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/homilies/1994/documents/hf_jp-ii_hom_19940408_restauri-sistina_en.html

I guess if the Pope has OKed it, I should probably give this one a rest, but its interesting to note that he asks the question: “would this not be blasphemy”? I would say yes.
 
Robert1333 said:
But the Father of Jesus in heaven has always been “eternal, immortal, INVISIBLE” (1 Tim 1:17). Not only does it seem wrong to me then to make an image of Him, but it is unnecessary, because we can make an image of Jesus, the perfect Image of God. )
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But also Jesus Christ, God the Son, also has been “Eternal, immortal, INVISIBLE”. He has always existed and is no less than the Father. To argue the image making thing by placing Father and Son as distinct to image making makes no sense at all since the Father and the Son are equal.
Robert1333 said:
“The OT prohibitions were because the Israelites lived surrounded by idolaters. Sacrifice to idols was an everyday part of life. If one were to make an image to represent the LORD, then it wouldn’t be long before that image would be worshipped as God.” -kleary

And we don’t live surrounded by idolaters? Now that, thankfully, there aren’t any more of those bad-guys around anymore, we can paint God everywhere!

Isn’t it nice and convenient to be able to look up at the Sistine Chapel and see a little, roly-poly god there, with a cute frowning brow, rather than live with fear and trembling before the Invisible Almighty?

Mystophilus posted a link to the Second Council of Nicaea, which, in response to Iconoclasm, permits veneration of images, but not necessarily of God the Father. “If anyone does not confess that Christ our God can be represented in his humanity, let him be anathema.” (Christ, the anointed one, can be represented, but not his Father, the anointer)
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I did not say that quote. Your reply however I find troubling and definitely leaning toward the Iconoclast heresy.

“IDOLATRY”, what the Commandment forbids is DIFFERENT in today’s society than it was when the Ten Commandments were written.
It is not over depicting God the Father as a wise old man, God the Son or God the Holy Spirit as a dove. It is concerning PAGANISM and the worship of MATTER. This is clearly seen by people carrying lucky pieces, a rabbit’s foot, astrology, crystal balls.

I did not read the decrees of the Council to see if they forbade depictions of a human concept of God the Father but I am sure they did NOT state anything against depicting God the Father in a painting such as in the Sistine Chapel. To go so far as to say what you said above is going way overboard of human reason. Maybe Michelangelo should have made Him look more angry when he created man- that would have told a better story???:confused:
 
LilyM said:
Why not? God the Father has given us a living image of himself - his son Jesus.

For this reason, if you look at many paintings of the Trinity, Father and Son are shown looking more or less the same, the father being older, grey-haired and more heavily bearded. In fact some Trinity paintings show three young men, all looking identical, to represent the Trinity.
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Yes the image of Jesus but not a elderly man with a two foot long grey beard. Jesus was not that Image. We have no image of the Father except for the image of Christ Himself who said, " He who sees Me see the Father". Too much of a stretch to illustrate the Father as some elderly long bearded grandfather.
 
kleary said:
Maybe Michelangelo should have made Him look more angry when he created man- that would have told a better story???:confused:
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No, Michelangelo shouldn’t have tried to have depicted him in the first place! He’s undepictable!

And yes you’re right, the decrees at 2nd Nicaea never forbade images of God the Father, but I think only because no one had dared to venture that they were permissible in the first place. :tsktsk:
 
I think the problem, as others have said, is that in the setting of the Ten Commandments idolatry was all around. The same, we do not see now, everyone it seems wants to be scientific, materialistic and detached from anything supernatural; but not so in ancient times when local cultures expressed their loyalty to local gods. Sacrifices were made to the different gods for every imaginable reason and there was a real rivalry between the different local gods. Our god gave us rain this year - and what did yours do…huh? 😉 As cultures grew in power they assimilated all around them, often demanding allegiance to the new and more powerful god which gave them their apparent success.
But today, no-one treats a painting as a god, there are no sacrifices to the painting, no consulting the painting to determine the future, nor are there any rival god paintings leading a people to conquer the lesser painted gods.
Painting and art, in the Christian era at least, has an objective, at times utilitarian, and detached purpose. It was viewed as an easily accessible, high impact common language. It served for many at times in Church history as a tool for learning the Faith.
My view, is that art is a language, like Latin or English. People may speak a story like a robot, or they can put a musical lilt in their voice which adds another dimension to the story for the hearers. That extra something is another language. And just so visual art is another language, it communicates things difficult to express in written or musical form. All of these different types of languages carry the message through their own various portals into the one common mind, where the language is read and the message received.
The problems with communicating God the Father through visual or musical language are similar to the problems that written language experiences and are compounded by other types of problems not directly associated with the media itself.

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k222/dodo123_01/a2.gifhttp://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k222/dodo123_01/a1.gifhttp://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k...photobucket.com/albums/k222/dodo123_01/a4.jpg
All the above are real languages - communicating something, or some aspect of the subject.
 
The same message again - different languages.

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Robert1333 said:
So I’m still convinced that paint or something should be sploshed all over the cieling of the Sistine Chapel, and all those great works of the Renaissance. Boy that would get some folks worked up.
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Indeed: I would be one of the first in line to protest! To deprive others of the opportunity to appreciate great works of art is an act of terrible selfishness. To deprive others permanently, to steal such an opportunity not only from one’s own generation but from all generations to come, as the Taliban did when they vandalised the 2000-year-old statues at Bamiyan, is an act of infamy. :mad:

I do not think that you would really wish to be a tyrant who imposes his opinions upon the rest of humanity throughout the rest of history.
[Sistine Chapel] I guess if the Pope has OKed it, I should probably give this one a rest, but its interesting to note that he asks the question: “would this not be blasphemy”? I would say yes.
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Even to use the term “God” might be similarly described. Words are signs, and are not the things which they signify (thank you, de Saussure). “God” is as imperfect, as flawed, and as presumptuous a representation of That One as is the painted pattern on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Neither is capable of truly representing what it attempts to represent, but nor is any other word. Both are as liable to lead the audience into a mistaken apprehension of the nature of the signified.

Words are like road signs: they point us in the direction of a thing. As long as all travellers finally reach appoximately the same destination, everything is fine, and none of us expects the sign to actually be the destination.
 
I’d like to point out respectfully, Mystophilus, that though you appear to consider my position on images of God the Father as extreme as that of the Taliban, it is a belief which is shared by no small number of people, most especially by the Eastern Orthodox church.

Here are a few extracts from Orthodox websites I found, just with a google search, which, though they hold a rich tradition of iconography, especially reject the practice of portraying the Father. As Catholics dialogue with the Orthodox church, I think this is an important point where they could be listening.

“First and foremost, icons are a constant reminder of the incarnation of Christ, that is to say, they remind us that God ‘sent His only begotten Son’ (Bible, John 3:16) to rescue us from our sin and death. We cannot see God the Father or God the Holy Spirit, but, because Christ chose to take on human flesh, we can see Him.”
antiochian.org/icons-eastern-orthodoxy

“Basics of Iconography
…God the Father can not be depicted.”
goholycross.org/studies/studies_icons.html

“The icon is an artistic depiction of Christ, the Mother of God and the Saints. God the Father cannot be painted, because He has never been seen. God the Holy Spirit has appeared as a dove and as “tongues of fire.” He may be shown in this way. God the Son became a man, and He may be painted in His human form.”
ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/reading/ortho_cath.html

Many thanks for all the thoughtful comments on this page! This issue’s been one that’s been resting on my heart. I wish this were something Catholics could agree with the Orthodox on, not to mention Jews, Muslims, and Protestants, whom I would generally expect to share the same reservations.
 
Robert1333 said:
I’d like to point out respectfully, Mystophilus, that though you appear to consider my position on images of God the Father as extreme as that of the Taliban, it is a belief which is shared by no small number of people, most especially by the Eastern Orthodox church.
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I think, my friend, that you might have misunderstood my reaction.

I do not, and would not, object to your views regarding representations of God. My objection was exclusively, and vehemently, to the idea “that paint or something should be sploshed all over the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, and all those great works of the Renaissance”, an act which I do equate with the destruction of the Bamiyan statues.

Being rather pluralist, I will defend your right to believe what you understand to be true, whilst at the same time opposing anyone’s attempt to impose their beliefs on another.

Ειρηνη μετα σου, αδελφε.
Peace be with you, brother.
 
On my point of view. Father have old images in the pictures as a old man with white dress and breed. Because one old man have a lot of wisdom and expriences of the life.
 
Robert1333 said:
I’d like to point out respectfully, Mystophilus, that though you appear to consider my position on images of God the Father as extreme as that of the Taliban, it is a belief which is shared by no small number of people, most especially by the Eastern Orthodox church.

Here are a few extracts from Orthodox websites I found, just with a google search, which, though they hold a rich tradition of iconography, especially reject the practice of portraying the Father. As Catholics dialogue with the Orthodox church, I think this is an important point where they could be listening.

“First and foremost, icons are a constant reminder of the incarnation of Christ, that is to say, they remind us that God ‘sent His only begotten Son’ (Bible, John 3:16) to rescue us from our sin and death. We cannot see God the Father or God the Holy Spirit, but, because Christ chose to take on human flesh, we can see Him.”
antiochian.org/icons-eastern-orthodoxy

“Basics of Iconography
…God the Father can not be depicted.”
goholycross.org/studies/studies_icons.html

“The icon is an artistic depiction of Christ, the Mother of God and the Saints. God the Father cannot be painted, because He has never been seen. God the Holy Spirit has appeared as a dove and as “tongues of fire.” He may be shown in this way. God the Son became a man, and He may be painted in His human form.”
ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/reading/ortho_cath.html

Many thanks for all the thoughtful comments on this page! This issue’s been one that’s been resting on my heart. I wish this were something Catholics could agree with the Orthodox on, not to mention Jews, Muslims, and Protestants, whom I would generally expect to share the same reservations.
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Sorry, but you’re wrong. There are plenty of Orthodox representations of the Trinity. An especially famous one by Andre Rublev portrays them as the three identical looking young men. This and similar icons are discussed and linked to by palamas in post 12 among others.

So, plenty of Orthodox do have and permit depictions of God the Father in their churches and homes.
 
Of course God the Father can’t be properly known nor completely portrayed - neither can the sun, the wind, the ocean, neither can outer space, neither can angels nor heaven (least not until we die), nor the structure of an atom. Yet all these things can be and are portrayed just fine, even if only partially.

Are you saying that unless we can portray something (or someone) completely accurately and in its entirety then we should be forbidden to portray it?? Then why have pictures at all? Why not have life-size completely accurate three-dimensional models of everything?

I fail to see any good reason for not depicting God the Father that can’t be applied to many other things. And I can see a fair few good reasons for portraying him - most especially as a much-needed aid to worship - which apply particularly to God the Father.
 
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