Iconoclasm (Eikonoklasmos,
“Image-breaking”) is the name of the heresy that in the eighth and ninth
centuries disturbed the peace of the Eastern Church, caused the last of the
many breaches with Rome that prepared the way for the schism of Photius, and
was echoed on a smaller scale in the Frankish kingdom in the West. The story in
the East is divided into two separate persecutions of the Catholics, at the end
of each of which stands the figure of an image-worshipping Empress (Irene and
Theodora).
I. THE FIRST ICONOCLAST PERSECUTION
The origin of the
movement against the worship (for the use of this word see IMAGES, VENERATION
OF) of images has been much discussed. It has been represented as an effect of
Moslem influence. To Moslems, any kind of picture, statue, or representation of
the human form is an abominable idol. It is true that, in a sense, the Khalifa
at Damascus began the whole disturbance, and that the Iconoclast emperors were
warmly applauded and encouraged in their campaign by their rivals at Damascus.
On the other hand, it
is not likely that the chief cause of the emperor’s zeal against pictures was
the example of his bitter enemy, the head of the rival religion. A more
probable origin will be found in the opposition to pictures that had existed
for some time among Christians. There seems to have been a dislike of holy
pictures, a suspicion that their use was, or might become, idolatrous among
certain Christians for many centuries before the Iconoclast persecution began
(see IMAGES, VENERATION OF). The Paulicians, as part of their heresy held that
all matter (especially the human body) is bad, that all external religious
forms, sacraments, rites, especially material pictures and relics, should be
abolished. To honour the Cross was especially reprehensible, since Christ had
not really been crucified. Since the seventh century these heretics had been
allowed to have occasional great influence at Constantinople intermittently
with suffering very cruel persecution (see PAULICIANS). But some Catholics, too
shared their dislike of pictures and relics. In the beginning of the eighth
century several bishops, Constantine of Nacolia in Phrygia, Theodosius of
Ephesus, Thomas of Claudiopolis, and others are mentioned as having these
views.
A Nestorian bishop,
Xenaeas of Hierapolis, was a conspicuous forerunner of the Iconoclasts
(Hardouin, IV, 306). It was when this party got the ear of the Emperor Leo III
(the Isaurian, 716-41) that the persecution began. The first act in the story
is a similar persecution in the domain of the Khalifa at Damascus. Yezid I
(680-683) and his successors, especially Yezid II (720-24), thinking, like good
Moslems, that all pictures are idols, tried to prevent their use among even
their Christian subjects. But this Moslem persecution, in itself only one of
many such intermittent annoyances to the Christians of Syria, is unimportant
except as the forerunner of the troubles in the empire. Leo the Isaurian was a
valiant soldier with an autocratic temper. Any movement that excited his
sympathy was sure to be enforced sternly and cruelly. He had already cruelly
persecuted the Jews and Paulicians. He was also suspected of leanings towards
Islam. The Khalifa Omar II (717-20) tried to convert him, without success
except as far as persuading him that pictures are idols. The Christian enemies
of images, notably Constantine of Nacolia, then easily gained his ear. The
emperor came to the conclusion that images were the chief hindrance to the
conversion of Jews and Moslems, the cause of superstition, weakness, and
division in his empire, and opposed to the First Commandment.
The campaign against
images as part of a general reformation of the Church and State [began]. Leo
III’s idea was to purify the Church, centralize it as much as possible under
the Patriarch of Constantinople, and thereby strengthen and centralize the
State of the empire. There was also a strong rationalistic tendency among the
Iconoclast emperors, a reaction against the forms of Byzantine piety that
became more pronounced each century. This rationalism helps to explain their
hatred of monks. Once persuaded, Leo began to enforce his idea ruthlessly.
Constantine of Nacolia came to the capital in the early part of his reign; at
the same time John of Synnada wrote to the patriarch Germanus I (715-30),
warning him that Constantine had made a disturbance among the other bishops of
the province by preaching against the use of holy pictures. Germanus, the first
of the heroes of the image-worshippers (his letters in Hardouin, IV 239-62), then
wrote a defence of the practice of the Church addressed to another Iconoclast,
Thomas of Claudiopolis (l. c. 245-62). But Constantine and Thomas had the
emperor on their side.
In 726, Leo III
published an edict declaring images to be idols, forbidden by Exodus, xx, 4, 5,
and commanding all such images in churches to be destroyed. At once, the
soldiers began to carry out his orders, whereby disturbances were provoked
throughout the empire. There was a famous picture of Christ, called Christos antiphonetes, over the gate of
the palace at Constantinople. The destruction of this picture provoked a
serious riot among the people. Germanus, the patriarch, protested against the
edict and appealed to the pope (729). But the emperor deposed him as a traitor
(730) and had Anastasius (730-54), formerly syncellus of the patriarchal Court,
and a willing instrument of the Government, appointed in his place. The most
steadfast opponents of the Iconoclasts throughout this story were the monks. It
is true that there were some who took the side of the emperor but, as a body,
Eastern monasticism was steadfastly loyal to the old custom of the Church. Leo
therefore joined with his Iconoclasm a fierce persecution of monasteries and
eventually tried to suppress monasticism altogether.
The pope at that time
was Gregory II (713-31). Even before he had received the appeal of Germanus, a
letter came from the emperor commanding him to accept the edict, destroy images
at Rome, and summon a general council to forbid their use. Gregory answered, in
727, by a long defence of the pictures. He explains the difference between them
and idols, with some surprise that Leo does not already understand it. He
describes the lawful use of, and reverence paid to, pictures by Christians. He
blames the emperor’s interference in ecclesiastical matters and his persecution
of image-worshippers. A council is not wanted; all Leo has to do is to stop
disturbing the peace of the Church. As for Leo’s threat that he will come to
Rome, break the statue of St. Peter (apparently the famous bronze statue in St.
Peter’s), and take the pope prisoner, Gregory answers it by pointing out that
he can easily escape into the Campagna, and reminding the emperor how futile
and how abhorrent to all Christians was Constans’s persecution of Martin I. He
also says that all people in the West detest the emperor’s action and will
never consent to destroy their images at his command (Greg. II, “Ep. I ad
Leonem”).
The emperor answered,
continuing his argument by saying that no general council had yet said a word
in favour of images that he himself is emperor and priest (basileus kai lereus) in one and therefore has the right to make
decrees about such matters. Gregory writes back regretting that Leo does not
yet see the error of his ways. As for the former general Councils, they did not
pretend to discuss every point of the faith; it was unnecessary in those days
to defend what no one attacked. The title Emperor and Priest had been conceded
as a compliment to some sovereigns because of their zeal in defending the very
faith that Leo now attacked. The pope declares himself determined to withstand
the emperor’s tyranny at any cost, though he has no defence but to pray that
Christ will send a demon to torture the emperor’s body that his soul be saved,
according to 1 Corinthians 5:5.
Meanwhile the
persecution raged in the East. Monasteries were destroyed, monks put to death,
tortured, or banished. The Iconoclasts began to apply their principle to relics
also, to break open shrines and burn the bodies of saints buried in churches.
Some of them rejected all intercession of saints. These and other points
(destruction of relics and rejection of prayers to saints), though not
necessarily involved in the original programme are from this time generally (not
quite always) added to Iconoclasm. Meanwhile, St. John Damascene (d. 754), safe
from the emperor’s anger under the rule of the Khalifa, was writing at the
monastery of St. Saba his famous apologies “against those who destroy the holy
icons”. In the West, at Rome, Ravenna, and Naples, the people rose against the
emperor’s law. This anti-imperial movement is one of the factors of the breach
between Italy and the old empire, the independence of the papacy, and the
beginning of the Papal States. Gregory II already refused to send taxes to
Constantinople and himself appointed the imperial dux in the Ducatos Romanus.
From this time, the pope becomes practically sovereign of the Ducatus. The
emperor’s anger against image-worshippers was strengthened by a revolt that broke
out about this time in Hellas, ostensibly in favour of the icons. A certain
Cosmas was set up as emperor by the rebels. The insurrection was soon crushed
(727), and Cosmas was beheaded. After this, a new and severer edict against
images was published (730), and the fury of the persecution was redoubled.
Pope Gregory II died in
731. He was succeeded at once by Gregory III, who carried on the defence of
holy images in exactly the spirit of his predecessor. The new pope sent a
priest, George, with letters against Iconoclasm to Constantinople. But George
when he arrived, was afraid to present them, and came back without having
accomplished his mission. He was sent a second time on the same errand, but was
arrested and imprisoned in Sicily by the imperial governor. The emperor now
proceeded with his policy of enlarging and strengthening his own patriarchate
at Constantinople. He conceived the idea of making it as great as all the
empire over which he still actually ruled. Isauria, Leo’s birthplace, was taken
from Antioch by an imperial edict and added to the Byzantine patriarchate,
increasing it by the Metropolis, Seleucia, and about twenty other sees. Leo
further pretended to withdraw Illyricum from the Roman patriarchate and to add
it to that of Constantinople, and confiscated all the property of the Roman See
on which he could lay his hands, in Sicily and Southern Italy. This naturally
increased the enmity between Eastern and Western Christendom.
In 731, Gregory III
held a synod of ninety-three bishops at St. Peter’s in which all persons who
broke, defiled, or took images of Christ, of His Mother, the Apostles or other
saints were declared excommunicate. Another legate, Constantine, was sent with
a copy of the decree and of its application to the emperor, but was again
arrested and imprisoned in Sicily. Leo then sent a fleet to Italy to punish the
pope; but it was wrecked and dispersed by a storm. Meanwhile every kind of
calamity afflicted the empire; earthquakes, pestilence, and famine devastated
the provinces while the Moslems continued their victorious career and conquered
further territory.
Leo III died in June,
741, in the midst of these troubles, without having changed policy. His work
was carried on by his son Constantine V (Copronymus, 741-775), who became an
even greater persecutor of image-worshippers than had been his father. As soon
as Leo III was dead, Artabasdus (who had married Leo’s daughter) seized the
opportunity and took advantage of the unpopularity of the Iconoclast Government
to raise a rebellion. Declaring himself the protector of the holy icons, he
took possession of the capital, had himself crowned emperor by the pliant
patriarch Anastasius and immediately restored the images. Anastasius, who had
been intruded in the place of Germanus as the Iconoclast candidate, now veered
round in the usual Byzantine way, helped the restoration of the images and
excommunicated Constantine V as a heretic and denier of Christ. But Constantine
marched on the city, took it, blinded Artabasdus and began a furious revenge on
all rebels and image-worshippers (743). His treatment of Anastasius is a
typical example of the way these later emperors behaved towards the patriarchs
through whom they tried to govern the Church. Anastasius was flogged in public,
blinded, driven shamefully through the streets, made to return to his
Iconoclasm and finally reinstated as patriarch. The wretched man lived on till
754. The pictures restored by Artabasdus were again removed.
In 754, Constantine,
taking up his father’s original idea summoned a great synod at Constantinople
that was to count as the Seventh General Council. About 340 bishops attended;
as the See of Constantinople was vacant by the death of Anastasius, Theodosius
of Ephesus and Pastilias of Perge presided. Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, and
Jerusalem refused to send legates, since it was clear that the bishops were
summoned merely to carry out the emperor’s commands. The event showed that the
patriarchs had judged rightly. The bishops at the synod servilely agreed to all
Constantine’s demands. They decreed that images of Christ are either
Monophysite or Nestorian, for — since it is impossible to represent His
Divinity — they either confound or divorce His two natures. The only lawful
representation of Christ is the Holy Eucharist. Images of saints are equally to
be abhorred; it is blasphemous to represent by dead wood or stone those who
live with God. All images are an invention of the pagans — are in fact idols,
as shown by Ex xx, 4, 5; Deut. v, 8; John iv, 24; Rom. i, 23-25. Certain texts
of the Fathers are also quoted in support of Iconoclasm. Image-worshippers are
idolaters, adorers of wood and stone; the Emperors Leo and Constantine are
lights of the Orthodox faith, our saviours from idolatry. A special curse is
pronounced against three chief defenders of images — Germanus, the former
Patriarch of Constantinople, John Damascene, and a monk, George of Cyprus. The
synod declares that “the Trinity has destroyed these three” (“Acts of the
Iconoclast Synod of 754” in Mansi XIII, 205 sq.).
The bishops finally
elected a successor to the vacant see of Constantinople, Constantine, bishop of
Sylaeum (Constantine II, 754-66), who was of course a creature of the
Government, prepared to carry on its campaign. The decrees were published in
the Forum on 27 August 754. After this, the destruction of pictures went on
with renewed zeal. All the bishops of the empire were required to sign the Acts
of the synod and to swear to do away with icons in their dioceses. The
Paulicians were now treated well, while image-worshippers and monks were
fiercely persecuted. Instead of paintings of saints the churches were decorated
with pictures of flowers, fruit, and birds, so that the people said that they
looked like grocery stores and bird shops. A monk, Peter, was scourged to death
on 7 June, 761; the Abbot of Monagria, John, who refused to trample on an icon,
was tied up in a sack and thrown into the sea on 7 June, 761; in 767 Andrew, a
Cretan monk, was flogged and lacerated till he died (see the Acta SS., 8 Oct.;
Roman Martyrology for 17 Oct.); in November of the same year a great number of
monks were tortured to death in various ways (Martyrology, 28 Nov.).
The emperor tried to
abolish monasticism (as the centre of the defence of images); monasteries were
turned into barracks; the monastic habit was forbidden; the patriarch
Constantine II was made to swear in the ambo of his church that although
formerly a monk, he had now joined the secular clergy. Relics were dug up and
thrown into the sea, the invocation of saints forbidden. In 766, the emperor
fell foul of his patriarch, had him scourged and beheaded and replaced by
Nicetas I (766-80), who was, naturally also an obedient servant of the
Iconoclast Government. Meanwhile the countries which the emperor’s power did
not reach kept the old custom and broke communion with the Iconoclast Patriarch
of Constantinople and his bishops. Cosmas of Alexandria, Theodore of Antioch,
and Theodore of Jerusalem were all defenders of the holy icons in communion
with Rome. The Emperor Constantine V died in 775. His son Leo IV (775-80),
although he did not repeal the Iconoclast law, was much milder in enforcing
them. He allowed the exiled monks to come back, tolerated at least the
intercession of saints and tried to reconcile all parties. When the patriarch
Nicetas I died in 780, he was succeeded by Paul IV (780-84), a Cypriote monk
who carried on a half-hearted Iconoclast policy only through fear of the
Government. But Leo IV’s wife Irene was a steadfast image-worshipper. Even during
her husband’s life, she concealed holy icons in her rooms. At the end of his reign,
Leo had a burst of fiercer Iconoclasm. He punished the courtiers who had
replaced images in their apartments and was about to banish the empress when he
died on 8 September 780. At once, a complete reaction set in.
