Iconoclasts

Iconoclasts (Gr. eikōn, 'an image,' and klazō, 'I break'), the name used to designate those in the church, from the 8th century downwards, who have been opposed to the use of sacred images (i.e. of statues, pictures, and other sensible representations of sacred objects), or at least to the paying of religious honour or reverence to such representations. The iconoclast movement had its commencement in the Eastern Church. Opinion is divided as to the origin and antiquity of the practice of Image-worship (q.v.) in the church; but it is certain that in the 6th or 7th century it prevailed extensively, especially in the eastern empire, and that practices existed in some churches which were a source of much suspicion, and even of positive offence. Many bishops interposed to correct these abuses; but the iconoclast movement, strictly so called, began with the imperial edict issued in 726 by the Emperor Leo III., surnamed the Isaurian, forbidding the honours paid to sacred images, and even commanding the removal from the churches of all images, that of our Lord alone excepted. This was followed by another decree in 730, which prohibited, under pain of death, as sinful and idolatrous, all acts of reverence, public or private, to images, and directed that wherever such images should be found they should forthwith be removed or destroyed. The attempt to enforce this decree aroused great opposition, especially in the Greek islands and in Italy. The popes Gregory II. and Gregory III. protested vehemently against it, repudiated the imputation of idolatry, and explained the nature of the honours to images for which they contended. Leo persevered, nevertheless, in his opposition, which was continued by his successor, Constantine, surnamed Copronymus. Under this emperor a council was held in Constantinople in 754, in which the iconoclast decrees were affirmed in their fullest extent; and Constantine's son, Leo IV., renewed, on his accession in 775, the enactments of his predecessors. Under the widow of Leo, the Empress Irene, a council was held at Nicea (787), in which these proceedings were condemned and revoked; but other succeeding emperors, Nicephorus (802-811), Leo V., the Armenian (813-820), Michael II., the Stammerer (820-829), and Theophilus (829-842), returned, with greater or less severity, to the policy of the iconoclast emperors. As regards the Greek Church the controversy may be said to have been finally settled under the Empress Theodora in a council held at Constantinople in 840, or at least by a subsequent one of 870. The modern usage of the Greek Church permits pictures, but rejects graven or sculptured representations of sacred objects. Except in Italy, the iconoclast controversy created but little sensation in the Western Church until the movement in the time of Charlemagne and his successors, to be noticed under the head IMAGE-WORSHIP.