“And thus, when in the early morning we were going towards the sea along the shore (of the Tiber), that both the breathing air might gently refresh our limbs, and that the yielding sand might sink down under our easy footsteps with excessive pleasure; Caecilius, observing an image of Serapis, raised his hand to his mouth, as is the custom of the superstitious common people, and pressed a kiss on it with his lips. Then Octavius said: “It is not the part of a good man, my brother Marcus, so to desert a man who abides by your side at home and abroad, in this blindness of vulgar ignorance, as that you should suffer him in such broad daylight as this to give himself up to stones, however they may be carved into images, anointed and crowned; since you know that the disgrace of this his error redounds in no less degree to your discredit than to his own.””
-Minucius Felix, The Octavius of Minucius Felix 2-3
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-04/anf04-34.htm#P5530_808394
[His argument against the pagan is that they are giving honor to stones (even if they represent those who are being worshipped).]
Later, Caecilius, the pagan in the debate, makes these comments about Christians:
“Why have they no altars, no temples, no acknowledged images?”
-Caecilius, as found in Minucius Felix’s The Octavius of Minucius Felix 10
Octavius later responds:
“But do you think that we conceal what we worship, if we have not temples and altars?...But certainly the God whom we worship we neither show nor see. Verily for this reason we believe Him to be God, that we can be conscious of Him, but cannot see Him; for in His works, and in all the movements of the world, we behold His power ever present when He thunders, lightens, darts His bolts, or when He makes all bright again… Do you wish to see God with your carnal eyes, when you are neither able to behold nor to grasp your own soul itself, by which you are enlivened and speak?”
-Octavius, as found in Minucius Felix’s The Octavius of Minucius Felix 32
[First,
it should be noted that both the pagan and the Christian said that Christians do not have altars contrary to the claims of Roman Catholicism
and its
“Meditation is above all a quest…The required attentiveness is difficult to sustain. We are usually helped by...holy icons…”
-Catechism of the Catholic Church, Paragraph 2705
They are clearly contrary to each other.]
“As, then, this act of self-restraint, which in appearance is one and the same, is found in fact to be different in different persons, according to the principles and motives which lead to it; so in the same way with those who cannot allow in the worship of the Divine Being altars, or temples, or images. The Scythians, the Nomadic Libyans, the godless Seres, and the Persians, agree in this with the Christians and Jews, but they are actuated by very different principles. For none of these former abhor altars and images on the ground that they arc afraid of degrading the worship of God, and reducing it to the worship of material things wrought by the hands of men. Neither do they object to them from a belief that the demons choose certain forms and places, whether because they are detained there by virtue of certain charms, or because for some other possible reason they have selected these haunts, where they may pursue their criminal pleasures, in partaking of the smoke of sacrificial victims. But Christians and Jews have regard to this command, “Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve Him alone;” and this other, “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me: thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them;” and again, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.” It is in consideration of these and many other such commands, that they not only avoid temples, altars, and images, but are ready to suffer death when it is necessary, rather than debase by any such impiety the conception which they have of the Most High God…we may reply that it is easy to know that God and the Only-begotten Son of God, and those whom God has honoured with the title of God, and who partake of His divine nature, are very different from all the gods of the nations which are demons; but it is not possible at the same time to know God and to address prayers to images.”
-Origen, Against Celsus 7.64-65
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-04/anf04-62.htm#P11182_3031247
[Again, it is stated by another Christian that Christians have no altars (contra Roman Catholicism) or images (contra Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy).]
“Here also the advocates of images are wont to say this also, that the ancients knew well that images have no divine nature, and that there is no sense in them, but that they formed them profitably and wisely, for the sake of the unmanageable and ignorant mob, which is the majority in nations and in states, in order that a kind of appearance, as it were, of deities being presented to them, from fear they might shake off their rude natures, and, supposing that they were acting in the presence of the gods, put away their impious deeds, and, changing their manners, learn to act as men…”
-Arnobius, Against the Heathen 6.24
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-06/anf06-139.htm#P8047_2535390
[Compare this to the words of the Council of Trent:
“…great profit is derived from all sacred images, not only because the people are thereby admonished of the benefits
and gifts bestowed upon them by Christ, but also because the miracles which God has performed by means of the saints, and their salutary
examples, are set before the eyes of the faithful; that so they may give God thanks for those things; may order their own lives and
manners in imitation of the saints; and may be excited to adore and love God, and to cultivate piety.”
-Council of
The argument used by the Roman Catholic Church for the veneration of images is the exact same as the one used by the pagans that Arnobius mentions!]
“What madness is it, then, either to form those objects which they themselves may afterwards fear, or to fear the things which they have formed? But, they say, we do not fear the images themselves, but those beings after whose likeness they were formed, and to whose names they are dedicated. You fear them doubtless on this account, because you think that they are in heaven; for if they are gods, the case cannot be otherwise. Why, then, do you not raise your eyes to heaven, and, invoking their names, offer sacrifices in the open air? Why do you look to walls, and wood, and stone, rather than to the place where you believe them to be? What is the meaning of temples and altars? What, in short, of the images themselves, which are memorials either of the dead or absent? For the plan of making likenesses was invented by men for this reason, that it might be possible to retain the memory of those who had either been removed by death or separated by absence. In which of these classes, then, shall we reckon the gods? If among the dead, who is so foolish as to worship them? If among the absent, then they are not to be worshipped, if they neither see our actions nor hear our prayers. But if the gods cannot be absent,-for, since they are divine, they see and hear all things, in whatever part of the universe they are,-it follows that images are superfluous, since the gods are present everywhere, and it is sufficient to invoke with prayer the names of those who hear us. But if they are present, they cannot fail to be at hand at their own images. It is entirely so, as the people imagine, that the spirits of the dead wander about the tombs and relics of their bodies. But after that the deity has begun to be near, there is no longer need of his statue…But they fear lest their religion should be altogether vain and empty if they should see nothing present which they may adore, and therefore they set up images; and since these are representations of the dead, they resemble the dead, for they are entirely destitute of perception…But God is greater than man: therefore He is above, and not below; nor is He to be sought in the lowest, but rather in the highest region. Wherefore it is undoubted that there is no religion wherever there is an image. For if religion consists of divine things, and there is nothing divine except in heavenly things; it follows that images are without religion, because there can be nothing heavenly in that which is made from the earth. And this, indeed, may be plain to a wise man from the very name. For whatever is an imitation, that must of necessity be false; nor can anything receive the name of a true object which counterfeits the truth by deception and imitation. But if all imitation is not particularly a serious matter, but as it were a sport and jest, then there is no religion in images, but a mimicry of religion.”
-Lactantius, The Divine Institutes 2.2, 19
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-07/anf07-05.htm#P444_174781
[Lactantius brings up the point that the pagans use the argument that they aren’t actually worshipping the statue but the thing that is represented by the statue. This is the exact argument used by Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox (emphasis mine):
“Through sacred images of the holy Mother of God, of the angels and of the saints, we venerate the persons represented....The Christian veneration of images is not contrary to the first commandment which proscribes idols. Indeed, ‘the honor rendered to an image passes to its prototype,’ and ‘whoever venerates an image venerates the person portrayed in it.’”
-Catechism of the Catholic Church, Paragraphs 1192 and 2132
Second, he implies that Christians don’t have altars (contra Roman Catholicism and its Mass). Third, he brings up the uselessness of images. If the thing being prayed to is absent and can’t hear the prayer, then what is the point in praying at all? If the thing being prayed to is omnipresent or can hear the prayer from wherever it is, then what is the point in making an image in the first place since the object of veneration is present? These arguments can easily be applied to image and icon veneration as well. Fourth, he argues that the reason paganism does not get rid of images is that the people would not have anything to focus their worship on. Shockingly, this is the same argument made by Roman Catholicism:
“Meditation is above all a quest…The required attentiveness is difficult to sustain. We are usually helped by...holy icons…”
-Catechism of the Catholic Church, Paragraph 2705
The last point that is made is quite blunt: there is no religion where there are images.]
“Since I have mentioned this city I do not think it proper to omit an account which is worthy of record for posterity. For they say that the woman with an issue of blood, who, as we learn from the sacred Gospel, received from our Saviour deliverance from her affliction, came from this place, and that her house is shown in the city, and that remarkable memorials of the kindness of the Saviour to her remain there. For there stands upon an elevated stone, by the gates of her house, a brazen image of a woman kneeling, with her hands stretched out, as if she were praying. Opposite this is another upright image of a man, made of the same material, clothed decently in a double cloak, and extending his hand toward the woman. At his feet, beside the statue itself, is a certain strange plant, which climbs up to the hem of the brazen cloak, and is a remedy for all kinds of diseases. They say that this statue is an image of Jesus. It has remained to our day, so that we ourselves also saw it when we were staying in the city. Nor is it strange that those of the Gentiles who, of old, were benefited by our Saviour, should have done such things, since we have learned also that the likenesses of his apostles Paul and Peter, and of Christ himself, are preserved in paintings, the ancients being accustomed, as it is likely, according to a habit of the Gentiles, to pay this kind of honor indiscriminately to those regarded by them as deliverers.”
-Eusebius, The Church History 7.18
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF2-01/Npnf2-01-12.htm#P4489_2089272
[Eusebius describes the making of images as “according to a habit of the Gentiles” (i.e. the heathen) and as paying “honor indiscriminately”.]
“Moreover,
I have heard that certain persons have this grievance against me: When I accompanied you to the holy place called
-Epiphanius, Bishop of
http://www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF2-06/Npnf2-06-03.htm#P1778_425555
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Some helpful online reading can be found here:
http://www.reformed.org/books/institutes/bk1ch11.html
http://www.reformed.org/books/institutes/bk1ch12.html
The Rejection of Images and Icons
by the Church Fathers
(Part 2)