Richard
Price, in his introduction to his translation of the acts of the Second Council
of Nicea (alt. Nicaea), in an attempt to find “early” references to what would
later be dogmatised in 787, provided the following example:
To pray before an icon was to address the
saint represented as if he or she was present in it or at least by it. An early
text that makes this point explicitly is an epigram in the Greek Anthology by
Agathias (third quarter of the sixth century) on an image of the archangel
Michael (The Greek Mythology I.34, trans.
Cyril Mango [1972] 115):
The wax, greatly daring, has represented the
invisible, the incorporeal chief of the angels in the semblance of his form.
Yet it was no thankless [task], since the mortal man who beholds the image
directs his mind to a higher imagination. His veneration is no longer
distracted: engraving within himself the [archangel’s] traits, he trembles as
if he were in the latter’s presence. The eyes encourage deep thoughts, and art
is able to by means of colours to transfer [to its object] the prayer of the
mind. (The Acts of the Second Council of
Nicaea (787): Translated with Notes and an Introduction [trans. Richard
Price; Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2020], 8)
The third
quarter of the sixth century would be between 550-575! Contra Price, who tries to be very fair to the RC/EO position in his fine book, is too generous in calling such "early"--is not early, it is
very late, and just another evidence of how the practice of veneration o1f
images and the “heavenly prototypes” thereof is not apostolic in origin.
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