Divine Media:

The Media Elements of Eastern Orthodox Iconography in PavelFlorensky sIconostasis

By Taylor Colwell

PavelFlorensky sIconostasis Date: Iconostasis was written in 1922 in Russia, only five years after the Bolshevik October Revolution. It was in this year that the Soviet Union officially formed. The communist government declared a strict separation of church and state, leaving the Russian Orthodox Church bereft of much of its national support. The USSR conducted an anti-religious campaign from 1917 to 1922 that resulted in the execution of thousands of Orthodox priests and a still-unknown number of devout lay people. A much larger number were imprisoned or exiled specifically for reasons of religious belief. Additionally, most churches were taken over by the Soviet government and either destroyed or used as warehouses. Religious education, writing, and preaching were strictly prohibited, but continued in secret. Orthodox iconography was seen by the state as anti-revolutionary art and was ordered to be destroyed. It was during this period of anti-religious persecution that PavelFlorensky wrote Iconostasis.

Author: PavelFlorensky was born in January of 1882 in Azerbaijan. He initially had no religious interests or background. In his early life he developed a great proficiency in mathematics and science and was considered a polymath. He graduated from Moscow State University in 1904 in the mathematics department at the top of his class. During his time at the university, he gradually developed an interest in philosophy and theology that developed to the point that after his graduation he declined an offer for a teaching position at Moscow State University and instead went into theological studies at the Ecclesiastical 1

Academy. While there, he became well known in the Russian Symbolism movement and began writing his primary work on Christian theodicy, The Pillar and Ground of the Truth. In 1911, after graduating from the Ecclesiastical Academy, Florensky was ordained into the priesthood of the Russian Orthodox Church. He continued to write in the areas of mathematics, electrodynamics, philosophy, theology, and art theory while serving as pastor to a congregation. He also studied and practiced iconography under monastic iconographers. After the October Revolution in 1917, he was relocated by the order of Leon Trotsky to Moscow to help with the State Plan for the Electrification of Russia . The soviet state recognized his engineering brilliance to such an extent that they allowed him, unique among all clergy, to continue wearing his priestly cassock and cross while working for the state. However, his continued religious activity led to his imprisonment in a Siberian labor camp in 1928. He was forced to continue conducting scientific research while imprisoned, and secretly ministered to his fellow Christians at the camp. In 1943 he was again relocated to Leningrad where he was executed by firing squad, supposedly for refusing to reveal the location of certain Orthodox icons that the state wished to destroy. Iconostasis was Florensky s last major written work and combined elements of his theology, philosophy, and art theory.

Purpose: PavelFlorensky sIconostasis is meant to place the Eastern Orthodox tradition of iconography into a philosophical, historical, and artistic context. Much of the text is a philosophical justification of the reality and efficacy of icons. At a time when iconography was becoming a lost and misunderstood art (due to the wholesale iconoclasm of the Soviet

Union and the institution of atheism in Russia), Florensky was attempting to defend iconography and preserve its meaning. While many Orthodox Christian writers wrote on iconography before Florensky, none had done a systematic or encompassing study of the theology and philosophy of icons. Florensky s work served to bring together the many ideas and doctrines surrounding iconography into one simple text that would be understandable to a general audience. The central arguments of the work are that Orthodox iconography is a necessary manifestation of the spiritual within the lives of Orthodox believers and that iconography serves to preserve the tradition of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Florensky desired to compound the importance of iconography and to do so not only using theology and dogma but also using philosophy and art theory. Format and Summary:Iconostasis begins with a discussion of the spiritual dimensions of dreams1. Dreams are described as a means by which to experience the invisible world. Dreams are representative of the spiritual realm because within them the normal laws governing everyday life do not seem to fully apply. Time, especially, is altered so that what may have only been a five minute long sleep can produce a dream that is experienced as several days or even a lifetime. Florensky uses dreams to help explain iconography. The spiritual realm is meant to be displayed in iconography in much the same way that the spiritual realm is thought by him to be experienced in dreams. Icons are timeless, and their appearance seems a bit off from what we experience as reality. This is because icons, like dreams, are windows or gates into the spiritual realm. Florensky goes on to explain how

By spiritual here is meant of or pertaining to the realm of divinity, God, angels, the saints, etc. In Eastern Orthodox Christianity, the spiritual realm is not seen as completely cut-off from the experienced material realm, yet there is nonetheless a separation between the two that can be mended through religious practice and faith. 3

the faces in icons are representative of spiritual perfection; through the iconic windows the viewer is able to see perfection unmarred by human sin. The fact that icons do not display shadows is representative of the state of spiritual perfection as embodying light itself; the holy people represented in icons are their own light source. Florensky makes it clear that icons are not optional or extra in Orthodox Christian life; they are fundamental to Orthodox Christianity. In an Eastern Orthodox church building, the icons represent the host of angels and saints surrounding the Throne of God. The saints and angels are believed to be truly present in religious services through the icons. The iconostasis (for which the work is named) is the icon-covered wall separating the nave (congregation) from the altar (Throne of God). The iconostasis allows the spiritual realm to be viewed indirectly, as the fallen nature of Man precludes the possibility of viewing the spiritual realm directly. In the next section of his work, Florensky describes the development of the practice of iconography and how these practices have been preserved; each miniscule detail of the creation of an icon must be exact and in strict accordance with tradition. Following this, Florensky explicates on the process of icon painting, the materials and techniques used, as well as how this process differs from Western Christian iconographic practices.

InKursk, Russia a massive celebration is occurring. The entire city is shut down, all offices and schools are closed. Everyone is rapt with the proceedings. The interior of the cathedral is resplendent in gold. Uplifting Church Slavonic choral chant resounds throughout the bright, vaulted interior. A procession of bearded men wearing magnificent sky-blue robes embroidered with gold slowly makes its way through the thronging crowd. Leading the tranquil procession is a man carrying a rectangular object, perhaps one foot by one-and-ahalf feet in size, above his head. It looks almost like a book, and is colored similarly to the men in the procession. The leader displays the object to the crowd (they bow and are completely silent) then places it upon a stand decorated with colorful flowers. He removes his crown-like hat, bows to the object, kisses it, and reverentially touches his forehead to it. The other members of the procession follow his example. At this point of the spectacle, the chanting comes to a deafening crescendo. The object is taken outside the cathedral and raised before the multitudes. They, and many more watching on live broadcast television or listening on radios, are all here to catch some of the magic of this momentous occasion: the reinstituting of a previously lost icon. From the outsider s perspective, it is no more than a small painting with some gold engraving, and an unimpressive painting at that. Some may even say that it is simply unimpressive. The figures depicted on it appear unrealistic, there is little detail, and the colors are faded and dark. Yet, somehow, the attention of all of Russia could be fixated on this object. The event is broadcast on live television throughout Russia and is recorded, so that today anyone can watch it happen by downloading the video from the Internet. The event described above is the re-institution of the Wonderworking Kursk Root Icon in its home of Kursk, Russian. This 13th Century Russian Orthodox icon of the Theotokos(Virgin Mary) has since the 1920s served as a symbol of the diaspora of the 5

Russian Orthodox Church around the world following the rise of the Soviet Union. In that time the icon was smuggled out of Russia to protect it from destruction by the Soviet authorities and it traveled around the globe, visiting the various diaspora communities and reminding them of their heritage. In 2009 it was finally returned to Russia, and this marked an enormous celebration in the Russian Orthodox Church.2 That this object can be surrounded by such symbolism, meaning, pomp, emotion, and sacrifice is an indicator of the status of icons in the Eastern Orthodox Church. Icons are not merely paintings to Orthodox Christians. Iconography is considered to be a divine medium in the fullest sense possible. To Eastern Orthodox Christians, Iconography is the medium through which the spiritual realm is experienced and remembered. The purpose of this essay is to describe iconography as media and through doing so to help better understand how and why iconography is central to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. By examining especially the writings of iconographer-theologian Father PavelFlorensky, it is possible to discern a relationship between the Eastern Orthodox iconographical tradition and modern understandings of media. In order to understand the relationship between iconography and media, it is first necessary to understand iconography in its religious and historical context. Within the Eastern Orthodox Christian3 churches there is a very clear understanding of both what

For more information concerning the Kursk Root Icon, see: Kursk Root Icon Home at <http://www.kurskroot.com/kursk_root_icon_home.html>. 3 By Eastern Orthodox Christian is meant those groups of Christians who are not Roman Catholic or Protestant, who acknowledge the authority of the first seven Christian Ecumenical councils, and are in communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. These groups include the Russian Orthodox Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Antiochian Orthodox Church, the Romanian Orthodox Church, the Orthodox Church in America, and several others. While Eastern Orthodoxy is not a strictly 6

constitutes iconography and the place of iconography within the tradition. Icons are holy images and the word icon comes from the Greek for image or portrait .4 In the early decades of Christianity, holy images were used to preserve in the imaginations and memories of Christians the persons and events involved in their religious narrative. Depictions of Christ and the Virgin Mary appear on the walls of underground catacombs in Rome from the centuries when Christianity was a persecuted and secretive minority sect.5 These early images were in the style of Roman art, and many of the elements of that style are preserved in the iconographic tradition up to the present day. Iconography was practically important during this time especially because it provided a means of depicting the Christian narrative for those who could not read and it indicated to the public the newness of Christianity. Contrary to the stigma against holy images within Judaism derived from the transcendence of God, the Christian belief was that God had taken material form in Christ; thus, the divine could be depicted materially because the divine had been experienced with the material senses. Following a brief period of iconoclasm in the seventh century when some Christians considered iconography to be idolatrous, the Bishops of the Churches of the Byzantine Rite (at the time, this consisted of the vast majority of all Christians worldwide, though the other jurisdictions always incorporated icons and never had iconoclasms) gathered to make a declaration concerning the place of icons in Christianity. This meeting was called the Seventh Ecumenical Council, or the Second Council of Nicaea. The canonical statements of this council declare that holy images monolithic institution, there is enough similarity between the Eastern Orthodox churches that they may be considered under the same communion or category. 4 Leonid Ouspensky. Theology of the Icon. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1978. p. 39.
5

Ibid. 41. 7

are not only acceptable in Christianity, but that they areactually necessary in order to remember and commemorate their prototypes (or the figures they depict) and to form a connection with the spiritual realms.6This decision was considered so important to the Eastern Orthodox Christians that to this day it is commemorated each year as the Triumph of Orthodoxy . Iconography today mainly comes in the form of egg tempera paintings on wood boards, sometimes embellished with gold and precious stones. Given an iconographic subject, such as a particular saint, a set template of the depiction is followed to produce a copy. The templates for most icons are many centuries or even a millennia old (though, of course, with new saints a new template is formed through consensus) and are considered accurate depictions of the persons they represent. Each detail is supposed to be the same between the template and the new copy, thus creating a continual uniformity through the centuries. Due to the painstaking work and ritual that goes into icon writing (it is traditionally referred to as writing not painting ), many icons are produced in monasteries as spiritual practice. A completed icon is supposed to remain in the altar of a church for forty days in order to be blessed before it is displayed in a church or home. It is at this point that an icon is considered genuine or effective ; the icon-writing process itself, while a rigorous and ritualized spiritual practice, is not the ultimate source of the iconic efficacy.7In Orthodox Christian churches, icons are displayed throughout the walls,

Decree of the Holy, Great Ecumenical Synod, the Second of Nice . Christian Classics Ethereal Library at ww.ccel.org. Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky. The Meaning of Icons. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1982.
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ceiling, and on icon stands, while most Orthodox Christian homes will have special areas called icon corners where icons are displayed. Some icons and their copies are considered especially holy due to miracles attributed to them or exceptional old age, an example being the Kursk Root Icon . Regarding non-conventional iconography, such as those that do not follow template stylistic rules or electronic icons, there is yet to be much discussion within the tradition concerning their authenticity or spiritual efficacy. Approaching iconography as a medium in itself corresponds to many points made by modern media theorists considering the nature of media technology. This is especially true regarding iconography as it is interpreted by Father PavelFlorensky. PavelFlorensky describes icons as windows to the divine that allow viewers to perceive things that would otherwise not be able to be seen.8 As Florensky understands it, the spiritual realm is normally hidden from human perception due to human sinfulness; sin obscures the fundamentally real from humanity. Icons, created by humans who have partially overcome this sinfulness through living holy lives, give the Orthodox a glimpse into this hidden realm, a foretaste of what is expected in the afterlife. In somesense, this is similar to the way some media theorists have understood the function of media technology in general. For instance, iconography would qualify as a form of pre-electronic mass media under the definition given by John Durham Peters, wherein mass media discloses to a broad audience information that would otherwise not be available to them.9 In this case, the disclosure occurs on two levels. First, iconography reveals narrative information to those who cannot

Pavel Florensky. Iconostasis. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1996. p 63-64. John D. Peters, Mass Media. In Critical Terms for Media Studies, ed. W.J.T Mitchell and Mark Hansen (Chicgao: University of Chidago Press, 2010).
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read; the Gospel story becomes available to the people who cannot read the Gospel account (who, for most of Christianity s history, constituted the majority of Christians). Second, iconography reveals visual information that is supposedly unavailable to most people due to their sinful or fallen nature. In this way, the Eastern Orthodox iconographical tradition is self-conscious of its own media nature, as both of these aspects of iconography s importance are attested to by Orthodox sources. Iconography would constitute a medium that persists over a large geographic and temporal area and that is self-preserving and uniform. Of course, one major difference between the self understanding of the iconographical tradition and the understanding of media theory is the lack of the idea of sinfulness in the latter; the information revealed in modern mass media is not considered to be unavailable to some people due to any defect in those people (unless not being technologically advanced is seen as a defect, which may be one way of looking at it according to some media theorists). Nonetheless, understanding iconography as a means of making information available beyond temporal or geographic boundaries helps explain how the tradition has persisted and helps explain how Christianity was able to preserve its heritage through the centuries. Many material media technologies have been described as external memory devices . One media theorist who proposes this description is Bernard Steigler, who notes that from prehistoric times human memory has been externalized onto other objects. Examples as diverse as cave paintings and smart phones serve as means to preserve some memory in a place outside of the human mind; both take the burden of memory away from the human mind and allow the memory to persist after the mind that uses it has

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died.10 Similarly, iconography is used in Eastern Orthodox Christianity to preserve the memory of past persons or events in a material form. As Florensky notes, one of the primary purposes of icons is to help Christians remember Christ and the saints. To venerate an icon is to remember and venerate that icon s prototype.11This aspect of remembrance in Orthodox iconography, of using icons as external memory objects, is well attested to in the Eastern Orthodox Christian tradition, though it must be noted that this is not the extent of the perceived purpose of icons within the tradition. One of their primary purposes is much more mystical or transcendent. Consider a telephone: what a telephone essentially does is make some person essentially present to another person so that some communion or communication can take place between those persons. The same is the case, on a broader scale, with media such as television, radio, or the internet (though, in these cases we may argue that the communication is less personal). Media s ability to serve as extensions of man for communication and influence is the subject of media theorist Marshall McLuhan s work Understanding Media. Specifically, McLuhan distinguishes media by the level of interaction that occurs between the medium and the human. A hot medium is one that requires little participation on behalf of the audience (such as a television), while a cool medium is one that requires a high level of participation on behalf of the audience (such as a telephone).12 Outside the Eastern Orthodox tradition, it may appear that icons are hot media; they are simply paintings to be looked at. However,within Eastern Orthodox Christianity, icons are

See: Bernard Steigler. Memory . In Critical Terms for Media Studies, ed. W.J.T Mitchell and Mark Hansen (Chicgao: University of Chidago Press, 2010). 11 Florensky, 70. 12 Marshall McLuham. Understanding Media. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1994. p. 22-23. 11

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seen as providing a form of communion or communication between the living and the dead (though the Orthodox would use the term reposed rather than dead ). When venerating an icon of St. Paul, for instance, Eastern Orthodox Christians consider themselves to be in active communication with St. Paul himself.Additionally, when venerating an icon that commemorates an event, such as the Crucifixion of Jesus or the Last Supper, Eastern Orthodox Christians consider themselves to be truly present at that event as it occurs.13 Thus, under McLuhan s categorization of media, iconography would better be seen as a cool media than as a hot media, because ultimately they are understood to involve a large amount of participation on behalf of the audience. Understanding how Eastern Orthodox Christians participate in this communication using icons helps clarify how iconography should be viewed from the perspective of media and religious studies. In examining the celebration surrounding the reinstitution of the Kursk Root icon with an understanding of Eastern Orthodox Christian iconography and its relationship to media studies, it is easier to understand what the people there are doing . Following the theology of iconography expressed by PavelFlorensky and other Orthodox writers, it is clear that to those Russians venerating the Kursk Root icon, something extra-ordinary was happening. To them, the Holy Theotokos, the Mother of God, was truly present through that icon. By venerating the icon, they feel themselves to be in direct communion with theVirgin Mary in a more real way than any communication between two earthly living humans could ever be. They believe that to be in the presence of this icon is to bear witness to the
13

Leonid Ouspensky. Theology of the Icon. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1978.

p. 191.

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realm of the divine. It would be irresponsible to view Eastern Orthodox iconography as merely art. Rather, Eastern Orthodox iconography appears in its religious tradition to be a divine medium, a gateway or window to another world. The veneration of icons ultimately serves as a microcosm of the primary truth claim of Christianity: that the divine became material, that God incarnated in flesh and blood. Icons are material objects, wood and paint. Yet to the Eastern Orthodox icons are also a medium between the divine and the material, just as Christ is a medium between God and man.

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Selected Bibliography:

Bychkov, Victor. The Aesthetic Face of Being: Art in the Theology of PavelFlorensky. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1993. This work is concerned with PavelFlorensky s view of the relationship between aesthetics and meaning. Florensky viewed aesthetics as foundational to all human activity, thought, and purpose. The true and the good are both located in the beautiful . Thus, a culture s aesthetics, whether it manifests in visual art or music, determines every other aspect of that culture. From this is derived the notion that Christian iconography is foundational to Christianity as a whole because it is representative of Christian aesthetics. To change a culture s aesthetics is to change the culture; to change iconography is to change Christianity. This work highlights Florensky s determination that, above all, iconography needed to be preserved from the Soviet cultural purges. However, the necessary connection between aesthetics and meaning is not very apparent outside the world of Christianity.

Decree of the Holy, Great Ecumenical Synod, the Second of Nice . Christian Classics Ethereal Library at ww.ccel.org. The Second Council of Nicaea, or the Seventh Ecumenical Council, met in AD 787 in order to address the issue of holy images in Christianity. The council was in response to the iconoclasm controversy in which some Christian theologians condemned holy

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images as idolatrous. The determination of the council, which would become the Orthodox Christian doctrine, was that the creation and use of holy images is right and proper and is in fact necessary in order to preserve early Christian practice and belief. Veneration of icons was considered by the council to be a method by which to ask for the intercession of saints, a means by which to remember the lives of the saints, and they are useful for the instruction and education of Christians concerning Christian history and doctrine. It also makes a clear distinction between the veneration of icons and the worship of idols, and condemns the later.

McLuhan, Marshall. Understanding Media. Boston: MIT Press, 1994. In this eclectic work, renowned media theorist Marshall McLuhan explicates upon his central idea that the medium is the message . By this is meant that the medium a message carries is more influential than the message itself. Additionally, McLuhan presents the idea that public reactions to media technology are subject to a cycle of innovation, fear, acceptance, and numbness. Within this work McLuhan gives many descriptions of media that indirectly point to iconography as a form of media.

Ouspensky, Leonid. Theology of the Icon. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1978. Theology of the Icon is about the history of Eastern Orthodox Christian iconography and the development of the theology surrounding icons. The work is particularly focused on the transition from art to iconography in early Christianity and the methods by

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which certain iconographic ideas became accepted in Eastern Orthodox Christianity. The process of the canonization of iconography is presenting in the work as slow and gradual; it was not a sudden development. While the text contains a thorough description of iconographic history, it only briefly discusses the practical elements of icon creation and the place of icons in Orthodox worship. Ouspenski is also critical of modern tastes and trends in art; they are degraded and sensual.

Ouspensky, Leonid and Vladimir Lossky. The Meaning of Icons. New York: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1982. The Meaning of Icons focuses on the techniques of iconography, as well as detailed examinations of particular icons. The iconographical techniques are described from the beginning to the end of the production of an icon, and the significance and symbolism of each step is explained. For the individual icons, the authors go in depth in their description and explanation of each detail, down to the directions of the brushstrokes or the number of leaves on plants in the background. They give the impression that every detail of every icon is of the utmost importance and significance. In many instances in the text, two icons depicting the same subject but separated from each other by hundreds of years and across cultures are compared with the purpose of displaying the continuity and uniformity of the Eastern Orthodox iconographical tradition; an icon of Mary from 6th century Greece looks virtually the same as an icon of Mary from 17th century Russia. The work is not very scholarly, however, and appears to serve mainly as a coffee table book.

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