Seraphim Icon Group at work in the Library during the Symposium this May
In Session Five (Friday 24th
of May) of Ways of Seeing, the Carmelite Centre’s three-day spiritual workshop,
iconographer Rob Gallacher spoke on discovering contemplative prayer with
icons. Here is Rob’s introductory paper to the session.
Let me
introduce this session with some words from Aidan Hart (Beauty, Spirit, Matter p.2)
“The icon is as radical way of seeing, and therefore suggests
a radical way of acting. When we look
at an icon we see as a saint sees. We
are inside their head and heart and looking out through their eyes. For when a saint sees a filthy homeless
person he sees a prince of the King of Heaven.
When he sees a slug he laughs with joy to see the humour and
practicality of its Creator. For the
saint sees not just with the eye of his body but with the eye of his
spirit. He sees, as it were, in four
dimensions and in full technicolour, the inside as well as the outside of
things. In short the saint sees things
as they are.”
While I can resonate with these words, my own experience is
slightly different. Certainly when I became
involved with icons I saw things, and people differently. But it was more like
this:
I was in a situation that was causing me to feel stress. I
had the usual symptoms, sleeplessness, tummy ache, and a brain that was churning at high speed
and wouldn’t turn off. I saw that John Bayton had started an Icon School at St
Peters, Eastern Hill, and I decided to join.
John’s methods were extremely painstaking, and that was one thing that
slowed me down. But more importantly, the icon gave me a sense of
perspective. It lifted me to a vision
of the greatness of Christ that made the disputes in which I was involved seem
small. Then I saw that the icon I was using as a model had survived wars and
revolutions, plagues and famines, and that however the arguments of the people
around me were resolved the icon would go on delivering its message.
So I became less judgemental. I saw people as all God’s
children rather than as being on my side or otherwise opposed.
And I discovered a different way of praying, a way of
dwelling in the world the icon opened to me.
I call it contemplative prayer.
Consider the Australian
crucifixion. The cross is outside the city. Traditionally the city wall
would be in the background, but it seems to me that in today’s terms, the world
of the crucified lamb of God is different from that of the opera house, the
MCG, or factory filth. So these replace
the wall. We are outside the city in a
similar but modern way. Secondly, there are the Mother of Jesus and the Beloved
Disciple. With the words, “Woman behold
your son” and “Son behold your mother” Jesus
established a community of mutual caring, characterised by the sacrificial live
he is displaying on the cross. This is John’s image of the church that will
carry on Christ’s work of redemption when his earthly life is finished.
It is a different way of seeing.
Take the Transfiguration
icon and study the mandorla. It took me a long time to realise why there is
the dark colour at the centre. It is a way of expressing the spiritual
journey. When you first see the light of
Christ, the world is illumined with a bright, light blue light. But as
you start to see the world differently those sharp distinctions, those clear
cut judgements about people, become a little blurred or modified. It is like
entering a cloud or a fog. The more you perceive the greatness of God, the deeper
the mystery becomes, until you come close to the giver of light, who is beyond
light, the darkness at the centre. The cloud of unknowing.
Blue is a fortunate choice for divine light. Think about the
sky. You see blue, but you know that
there is a world of wonder beyond. The darker the blue the more of the mystery
you see. But you know that all that is out there is infinite, and humankind
will just go on perceiving a bit here and a bit there. So it is with the world
of the spirit.
Our experience at St Denis in Paris. Abbot Suger (1081 –
1151). He built the first Gothic
Cathedral. Only the ambulatory remains,
but it is enough to perceive how he used blue light for divine light. When I entered it seemed dark and hard to
make out the art work and the tombs. It took about half an hour, and then I
began to feel at home in a strange way.
All was bathed in this deep blue, but now I could move around with ease.
I could see, but I was seeing
differently. A bright light would have had another effect – a focus on objects
rather than atmosphere.
Hart Again, (page 3),
“Divine beauty is one of the rays of
light coming from the One (God)…… This
divine beauty is splendour and glory, a
radiance which, if we are willing, makes
us like itself.”
Let me break
that down a little. How does the icon
help us shine with divine radiance?
First, by
faithfulness to Scripture. The icon has
to be as accurate as a translation. But it can brings passages together in a
way that words can’t.
Consider
this Baptism icon. Not only is John
the Baptist caught in the act, but Jesus
is naked, cf. Philippians 2: “He humbled
himself”.
Angels
ministered to him, as after the Temptations
(Matt 4:11).
To be raised
with new clothes. Paul speaks of
putting on the new, Ephesians 4:24: “to clothe yourselves with the new
self, created according to the likeness
of God.”
And, on one
side there is desert, while on the other it is a fertile paradise. Romans 8:21: “the creation itself will be set free.”
If you want
to be politically correct you can relate that to global warming and climate
change, which adds significance to
“Already the axe is laid to the root of the tree” Matthew 3: 10
Hart speaks
about seeing with the eye of the heart
(page 47) and uses Moses as
his example. The bush had always been
burning, only he had not had his eyes opened to see this. This icon speaks to me of the call of God
which is ongoing, and of the I AM who always is.
As well as
putting me in touch with Scripture, the icon also involves me in the tradition
of the church. Take, for example, the Mandylion.
Eusebius, c 250 CE, included a story about Angar 5th. He was king of Edessa at the time of
Christ. He had leprosy. Abgar sent his servant, Ananias, to fetch
Jesus so he could be healed. When
Ananias approached Jesus he was washing his face. He said he could not go, but gave Ananias the towel he was
using. The imprint of Jesus face was on
the towel, and Abgar was healed. Whether or not there is truth in the story, as
our western minds judge truth, there
certainly was a towel with a face on it.
It was produced when the Persians attacked Edessa in the 5th
century. It was cited at the 7th
Ecumenical Council in 787. It was part
of the price Edessa paid to Constantinople for protection against the Turks in
the 10th century. It became
the palladium of the city of Constantinople until it was lost during the 4th
Crusade in 1204. But by then there were
copies, eg the Holy Face of Laon. Painted
in the Slav states, as the writing shows, it was given by Pope Urban IV to his sister, Sybille, in 1249. She was Abbess of a nunnery in France. In 1679 it was installed in a silver
reliquary. A century later came the
Revolution. During the reign of Terror
it was seized and the silver was melted down.
But the icon itself was sequestered by Administrator Lobjoy, and hidden
till 1795, when it was taken to the
Cathedral of Laon, which is where it now
is.
Contemplate your own
experience in the light of this tradition and you will come to a very special
Way of Seeing.
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