Editing Icon (section)

===Emergence of the icon===
{{further|Image of Edessa}}
{{further|Religious images in Christian theology}}
[[File:Trinity tikhon filatiev.jpg|thumb|upright|Russian icon of the [[Holy Trinity]]]]
[[File:MikołajDSC 0186.jpg|thumb|upright|The icon of [[St Nicolas]] carved in stone (between {{circa}} 12 and 15th centuries), at the [[Radomysl Castle]], in Ukraine<ref>Bogomolets O. Radomysl Castle-Museum on the Royal Road Via Regia".  Kyiv, 2013 {{ISBN|978-617-7031-15-3}}</ref>]]
[[File:Evangelist Luka pishustchiy ikonu.jpg|thumb|upright|Luke painting the [[Theotokos of Vladimir]] (16th century, [[Pskov]])]]
[[File:Byzantine - Saint Arethas - Walters 4820862.jpg|thumb|A rare ceramic icon depicting [[Arethas of Caesarea|Saint Arethas]] (Byzantine, 10th century)]]
[[File:Ushakov Nerukotvorniy.jpg|thumb|''Image of the Saviour [[Acheiropoieta|Not Made by Hand]]'': a traditional Orthodox [[iconography]] in the interpretation of [[Simon Ushakov]] (1658).]]

====Origins in primitive Christianity in the first century====
Pre-Christian religions had produced and used art works.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nichols |first=Aidan |author-link=Aidan Nichols |title=Redeeming Beauty: Soundings in Sacral Aesthetics |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=2orYAAAAMAAJ |via=Google Books |series=Ashgate studies in theology, imagination, and the arts |location=Aldershot |publisher=Ashgate |date=2007 |page=84 |isbn=9780754658955 |access-date=31 May 2020 |quote=...&nbsp;ancient religious art can be said to have created, all unconsciously, a pre-Christian icon.}}</ref> Statues and paintings of various gods and deities were regularly worshiped and venerated. It is unclear when Christians took up such activities. Christian tradition dating from the 8th century identifies [[Luke the Evangelist]] as the first icon painter, but this might not reflect historical facts.<ref>Michele Bacci, ''Il pennello dell'Evangelista. Storia delle immagini sacre attribuite a san Luca'' (Pisa: Gisem, 1998).</ref> A general assumption that [[Aniconism in Christianity#Early Christianity|early Christianity was generally aniconic]], opposed to religious imagery in both theory and practice until about 200, has been challenged by Paul Corby Finney's analysis of early Christian writing and material remains (1994). His assumption distinguishes three different sources of attitudes affecting early Christians on the issue: "first that humans could have a direct vision of God; second that they could not; and, third, that although humans could see God they were best advised not to look, and were strictly forbidden to represent what they had seen".<ref name="ReferenceA">Finney, viii–xii, viii and xi quoted</ref>

These derived respectively from Greek and Near Eastern pagan religions, from Ancient Greek philosophy, and from the Jewish tradition and the Old Testament. Of the three, Finney concludes that "overall, Israel's aversion to sacred images influenced early Christianity considerably less than the Greek philosophical tradition of invisible deity apophatically defined", so placing less emphasis on the [[Jewish Christianity|Jewish background]] of most of the first Christians than most traditional accounts.<ref name="ReferenceA"/>

Finney suggests that "the reasons for the non-appearance of Christian art before 200 have nothing to do with principled aversion to art, with other-worldliness, or with anti-materialism. The truth is simple and mundane: Christians lacked land and capital. Art requires both. As soon as they began to acquire land and capital, Christians began to experiment with their own distinctive forms of art".<ref>Finney, 108</ref>

Aside from the legend that Pilate had made an image of Christ, the 4th-century [[Eusebius of Caesarea]], in his [[Church History (Eusebius)|''Church History'']], provides a more substantial reference to a "first" icon of Jesus. He relates that King [[Abgar V|Abgar]] of [[Edessa]] (died {{circa|50 CE}}) sent a letter to Jesus at Jerusalem, asking Jesus to come and heal him of an illness. This version of the Abgar story does not mention an image. A later account found in the Syriac ''[[Doctrine of Addai]]'' ({{circa|400?}}) mentions a painted image of Jesus in the story. Even later, in the 6th-century account given by [[Evagrius Scholasticus]], the painted image transforms into an image that miraculously appeared on a towel when Christ pressed the cloth to his wet face.<ref>''Veronica and her Cloth'', Kuryluk, Ewa, Basil Blackwell, Cambridge, 1991</ref> Further legends relate that the cloth remained in Edessa until the 10th century, when it was taken by General [[John Kourkouas]] to [[Constantinople]]. It went missing in 1204 when [[Fourth Crusade|Crusaders]] sacked Constantinople, but by then numerous copies had firmly established its iconic type.

The 4th-century Christian [[Aelius Lampridius]] produced the earliest known written records of Christian images treated like icons (in a [[Paganism|pagan]] or [[Gnostic]] context) in his ''Life of Alexander Severus'' (xxix) that formed part of the ''[[Augustan History]]''. According to Lampridius, the emperor [[Alexander Severus]] ({{reign|222|235}}), himself not a Christian, had kept a domestic chapel for the [[veneration]] of images of deified emperors, of portraits of his ancestors, and of Christ, [[Apollonius of Tyana|Apollonius]], [[Orpheus]] and [[Abraham]]. Saint [[Irenaeus of Lyons|Irenaeus]], ({{circa|130–202}}) in his [[On the Detection and Overthrow of the So-Called Gnosis|''Against Heresies'']] (1:25;6) says scornfully of the Gnostic [[Carpocratians]]:

{{Blockquote|They also possess images, some of them painted, and others formed from different kinds of material; while they maintain that a likeness of Christ was made by Pilate at that time when Jesus lived among them. They crown these images, and set them up along with the images of the philosophers of the world that is to say, with the images of Pythagoras, and Plato, and Aristotle, and the rest. They have also other modes of honouring these images, after the same manner of the Gentiles [pagans].}}

On the other hand, Irenaeus does not speak critically of icons or portraits in a general sense—only of certain gnostic sectarians' use of icons.

Another criticism of image veneration appears in the non-canonical 2nd-century [[Acts of John]] (generally considered a [[gnostic]] work), in which the [[Apostle John]] discovers that one of his followers has had a portrait made of him, and is venerating it:

{{Blockquote|[John] went into the bedchamber, and saw the portrait of an old man crowned with garlands, and lamps and altars set before it. And he called him and said: Lycomedes, what do you mean by this matter of the portrait? Can it be one of thy gods that is painted here? For I see that you are still living in heathen fashion.|[[Acts of John]], 27}}

Later in the passage John says, "But this that you have now done is childish and imperfect: you have drawn a dead likeness of the dead."

At least some of the hierarchy of the Christian churches still strictly opposed icons in the early 4th century. At the Spanish non-ecumenical [[Synod of Elvira]] ({{circa|305}}) bishops concluded, "Pictures are not to be placed in churches, so that they do not become objects of worship and adoration".<ref>{{cite web | url= http://www.conorpdowling.com/library/council-of-elvira | title= The Gentle Exit » Council of Elvira | work= Conorpdowling.com | access-date= 2012-12-10 | archive-date= 2018-11-06 | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20181106195812/http://www.conorpdowling.com/library/council-of-elvira | url-status= dead }}</ref>

Bishop [[Epiphanius of Salamis]], wrote his letter 51 to John, Bishop of Jerusalem ({{circa|394}}) in which he recounted how he tore down an image in a church and admonished the other bishop that such images are "opposed{{nbsp}}[...] to our religion".<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001051.htm|title= Church Fathers: Letter 51 (Jerome)|website= www.newadvent.org}}</ref>

====Icons in Eusebius to Philostorgius (425 AD)====
Elsewhere in his ''Church History'', [[Eusebius]] reports seeing what he took to be portraits of Jesus, [[Saint Peter|Peter]] and [[Paul the Apostle|Paul]], and also mentions a bronze statue at [[Banias]]/Paneas under Mount Hermon, of which he wrote, "They say that this statue is an image of Jesus".<ref>Eusebius, ''Church History'', 7:18</ref> Further, he relates that locals regarded the image as a memorial of the healing of the [[woman with an issue of blood]] by Jesus (Luke 8:43–48), because it depicted a standing man wearing a double cloak and with arm outstretched, and a woman kneeling before him with arms reaching out as if in supplication.

John Francis Wilson<ref>John Francis Wilson: ''Caesarea Philippi: Banias, the Lost City of Pan'' [[I.B. Tauris]], London, 2004.</ref> suggests the possibility that this refers to a pagan bronze statue whose true identity had been forgotten. Some{{who|date=September 2016}} have thought it to represent [[Aesculapius]], the Greek god of healing, but the description of the standing figure and the woman kneeling in supplication precisely matches images found on coins depicting the bearded emperor [[Hadrian]] ({{reign|117|138}}) reaching out to a female figure—symbolizing a [[Roman province|province]]—kneeling before him.

When asked by [[Flavia Julia Constantia|Constantia]] (Emperor [[Constantine I|Constantine]]'s half-sister) for an image of Jesus, Eusebius denied the request, replying: "To depict purely the human form of Christ before its transformation, on the other hand, is to break the commandment of God and to fall into pagan error."<ref>David M. Gwynn, From Iconoclasm to Arianism: The Construction of Christian Tradition in the Iconoclast Controversy [Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 47 (2007) 225–251], p. 227.</ref> Hence [[Jaroslav Pelikan]] calls Eusebius "the father of iconoclasm".<ref name="auto1">{{Cite web|url=https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/themelios/article/answering-eastern-orthodox-apologists-regarding-icons/|title=Answering Eastern Orthodox Apologists regarding Icons|website=The Gospel Coalition}}</ref>

After the emperor Constantine I extended [[Edict of Milan|official toleration of Christianity]] within the Roman Empire in 313, huge numbers of pagans became converts. This period of the [[Historiography of Christianization of the Roman Empire]] probably saw the use of Christian images become very widespread among the faithful, though with great differences from pagan habits. Robin Lane Fox states<ref>Fox, ''Pagans and Christians'', [[Alfred A. Knopf]], New York, 1989.</ref> "By the early fifth century, we know of the ownership of private icons of saints; by {{c.|480–500}}, we can be sure that the inside of a saint's shrine would be adorned with images and votive portraits, a practice which had probably begun earlier."

When Constantine himself ({{reign|306|337}}) apparently converted to Christianity, the majority of his subjects remained pagans. The [[Roman Imperial cult]] of the divinity of the emperor, expressed through the traditional burning of candles and the offering of incense to the emperor's image, was tolerated for a period because it would have been politically dangerous to attempt to suppress it.<ref>{{Cite web |last=BDEhrman |date=2024-08-27 |title=The Conversion of the Emperor Constantine |url=https://ehrmanblog.org/40368-2/ |access-date=2025-04-28 |website=The Bart Ehrman Blog |language=en}}</ref> In the 5th century the courts of justice and municipal buildings of the empire still honoured the portrait of the reigning emperor in this way.<ref name="Dix 1945 413–414">{{cite book |first=Dom Gregory |last=Dix |title=The Shape of the Liturgy |location=New York |publisher=Seabury Press |date=1945 |pages=413–414}}</ref>

In 425 [[Philostorgius]], an allegedly [[Arian]] Christian, charged the Orthodox Christians in Constantinople with [[idolatry]] because they still honored the image of the emperor Constantine the Great in this way. [[Gregory Dix|Dix]] notes that this occurred more than a century before the first extant reference to a similar honouring of the image of Jesus or of his apostles or saints known today, but that it would seem a natural progression for the image of Christ, the King of Heaven and Earth, to be paid similar veneration as that given to the earthly Roman emperor.<ref name="Dix 1945 413–414"/> However, the Orthodox, Eastern Catholics, and other groups insist on explicitly distinguishing the veneration of icons from the worship of idols by pagans.<ref>[http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/icon_bowing.aspx "Is Venerating Icons Idolatry? A Response to the Credenda Agenda"].</ref>{{crossreference|printworthy=y|(See further below on the doctrine of veneration as opposed to worship.)}}