RELIGIONS AND FIGURATVE REPRESENTATION

Introduction

The position adopted by Latin Christendom[1]'s religious authorities regarding images was tentative, hovering between the complete rejection arising from the Old Testament prohibition and the acceptation endorsed by Gregory the great at the end of the 6th century. The outcomes of the iconoclastic crisis that tore the Byzantine world apart gave the Latin authorities the leeway to arrive at a position midway between iconoclasm[2] and a full acceptation of images in worship. This position, established by the Carolingian decision makers differed from that adopted by Greek Christendom and added to the divergences between Western and Eastern practices. It structured, framed and defined the thinking about images, consigned to a secondary role strictly controlled by the religious authorities. The history of figuration in Western Middle Ages is, all told, that of a tension between acceptation and rejection of the image. Paradoxically, it ended up mainstreamed to a greater or lesser extent, opening up to its use in worship and pastoral theology, paving the way to the “pivotal iconographic shift” Jean-Claude Schmitt situates in the 10th and 11th centuries. From the 12th and 13th centuries on, the lingering wariness the Roman Church harbored towards images gradually subsided and images circulated in abundance. Figurative art, fully accepted, would henceforward give its full measure in Latin Christian worship.

  1. Latin Christendom

    This term covers all the kingdoms and territories acknowledging the religious authority of the Church of Rome, adopting Roman rituals and Latin as the liturgical language. It broadly corresponds to the Western bloc of the European continent. It is distinct from Greek Christendom, which accepts the joint authority of the emperor and the patriarch of Constantinople and uses Greek rituals and language. This Greek Christendom spilled out and beyond the Byzantine Empire to include the churches of the near and Middle East, of the Balkans and, from the 10th century, the Russian plain. This distinction became pronounced during the period under review most notably between the 8th and 12th century.

  2. Iconoclasm

    literally the act of breaking images. In its broadest sense, the term refers to violent occurrences of image destruction, notably religious images. In the Christian world the term speaks against the adoration of images, sometimes considered idolatrous (iconodule). This opposition between two extreme positions culminates in the iconoclastic crisis or struggle over images (iconomachy), that is the very long crisis that shook the Byzantine Empire from 717 to 843.

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