Daily Prayer Before a Picture of the Holy Family

By John Sanidopoulos

The main reason Orthodox Iconography is more about imitation than innovation is to prevent heretical concepts from entering the Church, since heresy can just as much exist depicted in icons every bit written in books and proclaimed from the pulpit. One such innovation in Orthodox Iconography that began in America is the depiction of the "Holy Family unit", showing Christ either in the arms of both St. Joseph and the Virgin Mary, or in the arms of St. Joseph lone. While such depictions may seem innocent, they in fact display a lack of attending to essential matters of Orthodox doctrine.

Such depictions of the "Holy Family" are based on innovations of Catholicism, which has in modern times instituted a Feast of the Holy Family. As 1 Roman Catholic scholar has remarked, in contrasting the Catholic feast centered on the Holy Family unit to the Christian Feasts of antiquity, "[The Banquet of the Holy Family unit]...is a product of our modern age, the times to which we belong."ane In traditional Orthodox Iconography, the Christ Child is properly portrayed, not alone with St. Joseph, but rather solitary with His Female parent, thereby stressing the dogma that He is "a Son without a father, Who was begotten of the Male parent without a mother earlier the ages."two

In fact, to protect the true-blue from an improper understanding of his fatherly role and his relationship to the Theotokos, traditional Orthodox Iconography downplays the figure of St. Joseph (without, of class, denigrating his person), just as the Church Fathers are also laconic when talking almost him. For example, in the Icon of the Nascence of Christ, equally Professor Constantine Cavarnos comments, "he is non shown at the key part of the limerick, similar the Theotokos and the Child, simply away, at a corner, in order to emphasize the Scriptural account and the teaching of the Church that Christ was born of a Virgin."3 Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky, in their pivotal work on iconographic theory, make a similar observation: "Another detail emphasizes that in the Nativity of Christ 'the lodge of nature is vanquished'—this is Joseph. He is not function of the key group of the Kid and His Mother; he is not the father and is emphatically separated from this grouping."4 Too, in Icons with similar themes, such as the Meeting of the Lord or the Flight into Egypt, Orthodox iconology does not empathise St. Joseph to be the head of some sort of "Holy Family"; rather, he is seen as the Providentially-ordained guardian of the Theotokos and her Divine Kid. His humble acceptance and virtuous fulfillment of this role are precisely the points of focus in his veneration by the Orthodox Church building.5

St. Augustine of Hippo further notes, "Joseph...might be called the father of Christ, on business relationship of his existence in a sure sense the husband of the mother of Christ...,"six only he qualifies this admission by insisting that, in their spousal relationship, "there was no bodily connection."7 Elsewhere he elaborates on this indicate: "And because of this conjugal fidelity [i.e., their mutual celibacy] they are both deservedly chosen 'parents' of Christ (not only she as His mother, but he as His father, as existence her married man), both having been such in mind and purpose, though not in the flesh. Only while the ane was His father in purpose simply, and the other His mother in the flesh also, they were both of them, for all that, but the parents of His humility, not of His sublimity; of His weakness [see II Corinthians thirteen:4], not of His divinity."8 Thus, if the three are to be depicted in iconography together, they should be depicted fulfilling their divine purpose, rather than as a family unit according to the mankind.

St. Ambrose of Milan, again safeguarding the traditional Christian teaching about St. Joseph and his role as the husband of the Virgin Mary, warns the states that by misunderstanding this item biblical poetry, "the snake of unbelief, released from perverse hiding places, lifts its head and vomits along mischief from serpentine hearts."nine One group of people this depiction of the "Holy Family" may particularly confuse are converts from Evangelicalism. Evangelicals merits to believe in the Virgin Nascency, yet in big part reject the ever-virginity of the Virgin Mary, which means that they only accept this dogma of the Virgin Nativity partially. Role of this has to do with the fact that Evangelicals consider marital domesticity the highest ideal of the Christian life, in sharp contradiction with Scripture and the Fathers who teach that the loftiest land of the Christian life is virginity, because it helps a Christian better focus on attaining their union with God. Similar the notorious heretics as the Ebionites, Helvidius, and Jovinian, Evangelicals hold to the nearly-irreverent view that St. Joseph and the Virgin Mary engaged in physical intercourse after the birth of Christ, and by this means bore other children. St. John of Damascus calls those who hold such a view "enemies of Mary".10 Thus when Evangelicals convert to Orthodoxy and encounter such icons every bit the "Holy Family unit", information technology should be no surprise that such an image confuses them and may justify a retention of their previous heretical views.

The ever-virginity of the Theotokos is a basic presupposition for truly accepting the dogma of the Incarnation. As St. Gregory Palamas writes: "God deigned to receive our nature from us, hypostatically uniting with it in a marvelous way. Just it was incommunicable to unite that Nearly High Nature, Whose purity is incomprehensible for human reason, to a sinful nature earlier it had been purified. Therefore, for the conception and birth of the Bestower of purity, a perfectly spotless and Most Pure Virgin was required."11 St. Basil the Great calls icons "the books of the illiterate". He says: "What better proof have we that images are the books of the illiterate, the always-speaking heralds of honoring the saints, educational activity those who gaze upon them without words, and sanctifying the spectacle. I have not many books nor fourth dimension for study, and I go into a church, the mutual refuge of souls, my mind wearied with conflicting thoughts. I see before me a beautiful picture show and the sight refreshes me, and induces me to glorify God."12 Now if an illiterate person enters an Orthodox church building and sees an icon of the "Holy Family", how are they supposed to read it correctly without a lengthy estimation? Rather, if an image gives off an obvious and immediate apparent falsehood or heresy, then it should exist rejected lest it leads the innocent and simple astray. There is supposed to be perfect harmony between the written dogmas and the images that adorn our churches.

In the Orthodox Church, we take many holy families, such equally Joachim and Anna with the Theotokos, Zechariah and Elizabeth with John the Forerunner, the family of Basil the Great, the family of Gregory Palamas, the family of Eustathios Plakidas. All these and many others are truly holy families that nosotros should celebrate and depict in our churches, because they were families co-ordinate to the flesh. On the other mitt, the family of St. Joseph and the Virgin Mary with Christ, was not a family of the flesh, but as St. Augustine wrote, a family unit "of listen and purpose", who were brought together by a divine society to make sure Christ accomplished His work of conservancy to redeem the human race.

Notes:

1. Pius Parsch, The Church's Twelvemonth of Grace, trans. the Rev. William G. Heidt, O.South.B., Vol. I (Collegeville, MN: St. John's Abbey, 1962), p. 289.

ii. Dogmatikon, Tone 3.

3. Constantine Cavarnos, Guide to Byzantine Iconography, Vol. I(Boston: Holy Transfiguration Monastery, 1993), p. 134.

four. Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky, The Pregnant of Icons, trans. One thousand.E.H. Palmer and E. Kadloubovsky (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir's Seminary Printing, 1982), p. 160.

5. Though early depictions of the Flight Into Arab republic of egypt bear witness the Theotokos holding the Christ Child, there are late medieval frescoes, such as that of Decani Monastery from the 14th century, that describe St. Joseph holding the Christ Kid (probably influenced from western iconography such as that of Capella Palatina in Palermo, Sicily from the twelfth century). Though this is an innovation and should be avoided, it can be acceptable in the sense that it depicts St. Joseph in his historical role with the Kid leaning towards His Mother, rather than equally a "family according to the flesh" portrait.

6. St. Augustin, "Reply to Faustus the Manichaean," trans. the Rev. Richard Stothert, rev. Albert H. Newman, in The Writings Against the Manichaeans and Confronting the Donatists, Vol. IV of A Select Library of the Nicene and Mail service-Nicene Fathers, 1st Ser., ed. Philip Schaff (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1979), p. 159.

7. Ibid., p. 315.

8. Idem, "On Matrimony and Concupiscence," trans. Peter Holmes and the Rev. Robert Ernest Wallis, rev. Benjamin B. Warfield, in Anti-Pelagian Writings, Vol. V of A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 1st Ser., ed. Philip Schaff (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1978), p. 268.

9. Saint Ambrose of Milan, Exposition of the Holy Gospel According to Saint Luke, trans. Theodosia Tomkinson (Etna, CA: Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, 1998), p. 62.

ten. Saint John of Damascus, Writings, trans. Frederic H. Chase, Jr. (Washington, DC: The Catholic Academy of America Press, 1958), p. 131.

11. "Homily on the Entry of the Mother of God into the Temple".

12. St. John of Damascus, "Apologia Confronting Those Who Decry Holy Images".

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Source: https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2015/12/the-heretical-icon-of-holy-family.html

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