Quote:
Originally Posted by BronzDragon
Idolatry is the false worship of images. Interesting twist, that.  As I said, an image is an artistic representation. Like saying a one dollar bill represents one dollar in gold or credit. It doesn't really, it represents (at minimum wage) about ten minutes of work. By focusing on the dollar we miss the effort that went into earning it.
I expect that we intended many of the earliest versions of divine icons as artistic representations of the divine relationship with the artist or society, and the god or daimon that image represented. Subsequent generations failed to see that, and so simply never got past the statue to the god it represents. |
Some years ago I started 'writing' (they don't call it drawing) an icon in the Byzantine style/school- the earliest style actually. The interesting thing about them is that there are no straight lines contained within the figures represented. The representation of an earthy 'object'? Yes. Divine 'object'? No. As such, from what I have gleaned, they
are considered within the tradition- historically speaking- representations of mystical experience.
My own musings on the matter immediately went to the difference in how the brain processes information.
It seems to me that idolatry is straight line -point A to B -kind of thinking. Left brained, you might say. "Do it this way or else." The experience of the divine is something
alltogether different, right-brained, curvy, full of nuance and global in scope. No set limitations. In fact, the absence of limitation it what it's all about.