ARTICLE

Early Christian Art and Divine Epiphany

Robin M. Jensen
robin m. jensen is Luce Chancellors Professor of the History of Christian Art and Worship, Vanderbilt University. Abstract: Drawing upon the work of art historians, historians of ancient Christianity have incorporated the evidence of early Christian visual art in their studies, primarily in order to identify the iconographic content, formal style, and social or religious context of the artifacts or monuments under consideration. This essay argues that, while their standard motifs and compositions undoubtedly served a didactic purpose and reected the cultural, ideological, or exegetical location, practices, or commitments of patrons, early Christian art also served an epiphanic function; it presented the divine image to viewers in an external and accessible form. Thus, by attending specically to the relationship of image and observer and the setting in which these objects were viewed, it is possible to see them, like later icons, as devices that facilitated meditation, prayer, and even visionary encounters with the holy. Keywords: icon/image, idol/idolatry, prototype/gure, portrait, theophany, veneration

In a letter to his friend Sulpicius Severus, written in either 403 or 404, Paulinus of Nola described the mosaic that he had commissioned for the apse of his episcopal basilica. Although the mosaic no longer exists, Paulinus gives us a pretty good idea of how it must have appeared from:
The Trinity shines out in all its mystery. Christ is represented by a lamb, the Fathers voice thunders forth from the sky, and the Holy Spirit ies down in the form of a dove. A wreaths gleaming circle surrounds the cross, and around this circle the apostles form a ring, represented by a chorus of doves. The holy unity of the Trinity merges in Christ, but the Trinity has its threefold symbolism. The Fathers voice and the Spirit show forth God, the cross and the lamb proclaim the holy victim. The purple and the palm point to kingship and to triumph. Christ himself, the Rock, stands on the rock of the Church, and from this rock, four splashing fountains ow, the evangelists, the living streams of Christ.1

His description makes it clear that Paulinus credited visual arts potential to reveal something about the nature of God. It is also evident that Paulinus intentionally avoided an anthropomorphic representation of any of the Trinity. Rather, the three are shown as a voice (probably visually represented by a disembodied hand), a dove, and a lamb or cross. Even the Apostles are depicted

Toronto Journal of Theology 28/1, 2012, pp. 125144

DOI: 10.3138/tjt.28.1.125

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as doves and not as men. Yet, Paulinus has no doubt that viewers will understand what they see, and that it is meant to represent or reveal God: to be an epiphany of sorts. Until fairly recently, historians of early Christianity have paid relatively little attention to visual art as a mode of theological expression, and even less to the ways that seeing visual art could have shaped the beliefs or piety of viewers. When they have done so, the text historians have tended to rely on the studies of art historians who, by profession, ordinarily are more interested in formal, compositional, or stylistic developments than in the artworks possible reection of certain theological teaching or its devotional functions. Nevertheless, those art historical studies laid important groundwork, identifying, dating, describing, and cataloguing iconographic themes, especially from the most extensive corpus of evidence that comes from the Roman catacombs and sarcophagi. As such, many of the best have became standard references for traditional text scholars who occasionally incorporate visual art into their analysis of early Christian theology and practice.2 While text scholars reliance on art historians works should be regarded as the respectful acknowledgement of one scholarly guilds expertise by another, in the last three decades or so, both groups have raised pertinent questions, opened up the terms of the discussion, and blurred the edges of formerly distinct disciplinary elds. Analyses that focus on the social context and function of the monuments and urge that visual art be studied independently from the patristic textual canon in order to avoid text-skewed interpretations have challenged older studies, which examined the remains primarily in light of traditional Christian doctrine or sacramental theology. Some of these reappraisals have concluded that the extant evidence demonstrates a distinction between popular and ofcial Christianity and the existence of a subgroup of Christian believersthe illiterate or disenfranchised members of the communitywho were more likely to be users or viewers of art.3 Other examinations have attended to Christian arts emergence from and continuity with Greco-Roman religious art more broadly, arguing that boundaries should not be drawn too sharply between rank-and-le Christians and their non-Christian neighbours, or between popular and ofcial expressions of theology or modes of worship.4 Simultaneously emerging with these generative and even compelling theories of how early Christian art reected social and cultural location, values, and religious practices is a burgeoning interest in the theology of eastern Christian icons.5 The enormous interest in and literature on the subject is a phenomenon unto itself. Yet most of the attention has focused on Byzantine Christian iconography, but rarely considering the formative and even mystical dimension of viewing images in general, or the possibility that early Christian art served a similar purposeto serve as a focus for contemplation or meditation on the nature of the divine Being. It was not to be the recipient of adoration itself, but to mediate the prayers and reverence of the faithful, effectively transmitting

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Figure 1: Early Christian sarcophagus, rst half of the fourth century. Now in the Museo Pio Cristiano, Vatican. Photo: author.

them from the image to its prototype.6 To this end, this essay considers how early Christians might have regarded their visual art and proposes that the act of viewing generated a certain kind of subjective epiphanic experienceone that was cognitively different from hearing a sermon or reading Scripture and more like having an eyewitness encounter with the holy. Thus, along with examinations of the stylistic, iconographic, theological, sociological, and contextual dimensions or function of early Christian artworks, it seems appropriate to consider their possible spiritual or visionary purpose, and to start by considering a concrete example. A marble sarcophagus was removed, probably sometime in the mideighteenth century, from Romes Catacomb of San Sebastiano (gure 1). Dated to the 330s, it was restored and transferred to the Christian Museum of Pope Benedict xiv. Today it is in the Vatican Museo Pio Cristiano. Unlike Paulinuss apse, this object shows Jesus and the Apostles as quite normallooking human beings. The slightly reconstructed front frieze presents (from left to right) scenes of Christ giving the symbols of work to Adam and Eve prior to their expulsion from Eden, Jesus healing the paralytic who carries his bed on his shoulders, Jesus changing water to wine at Cana, Jesus entering Jerusalem on his donkey, Jesus healing the man born blind, and Jesus raising Lazarus. The scenes do not conform to any narrative sequence, although they do seem to draw predominantly on the Gospel of John (e.g., the Johannine version of the paralytic healing story, the Cana miracle, the Johannine version of the entry upon the healing of the man born blind, and the raising of Lazarus). Jesus, of course, appears in all the scenes. They also include gures who might be identied as witnesses or disciples, including one of Lazaruss sisters. Another appears in a tree in the entry scenepossibly the gure of Zaccheus, borrowed from the story of Jesuss entry to Jericho as recounted in Luke 19:16. One other individual seems to appear in allor nearly allof the scenes. His receding hairline and long face indicate that he should be identied as Paul. The inclusion of Paul as witness to events that, according to the Gospels, he could not have been present (or even alive) to see is intriguing. It might indicate that Paul symbolizes the viewer who

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comes to know the stories of Jesus and how they reveal Gods plan for salvation, from Fall to Resurrection. This frieze is just one among dozens somewhat like it. By the late third century, some Christians clearly were afuent enough to afford such monumental cofns. Many were able to pay for the excavation and decoration of family mausoleums in underground cemeteries (catacombs). Some of these were lovingly decorated with wall paintings and simple stucco work. These remains, mostly from the environs of Rome and predominantly from a funerary context, constitute the largest, primary corpus of early Christian art. Emerging around the beginning of the third century, the content and style of the work follows a clear trajectory of development. In the beginning, the motifs were mostly simple, conventional signs such as anchors, sh, doves, or praying gures (orantes). These symbols pointed to aspects of the faith or references to the piety or identity of the faithful. Similarly, the image of the Good Shepherd with his ock was a visual metaphor referring to Christs attributes as a guide and guardian. Soon, along with these, appeared abbreviated depictions of Old Testament narratives. These developed as types that had Christian signicance or could be interpreted as allusions to Christian sacraments or teachings. In a funerary context, they likely expressed the believers trust in the Shepherds loving care, and her expectation of resurrection from death. The gure of the orante may symbolize the soul of the deceased, offering prayer that she be received into heaven. This expectation, arising out of her having undergone Christian baptism, may explain the inclusion of certain gures, e.g., Noah, Jonah, and the Three Hebrew Youths (gure 2). Like the frieze of the Vatican sarcophagus, the wall paintings in catacomb hypogea or on other Christian sarcophagi seem to be composed from common motifs drawn from the sample books offered by artists workshops. Representations of Jesuss baptism, Jesus raising Lazarus, and the adoration of the Magi could be combined with an orante, a Shepherd, Jonah, Abraham offering Isaac, Adam and Eve, and Daniel. Another monument might contain some of the same themes, along with others, in a varied but similar arrangement. Beginning in the fourth century, scenes of Jesus teaching, healing, and working wonders became more popular, often displacing the earlier symbolic or typological themes. Along with particular episodes from Jesuss lifethe adoration of the Magi, the baptism, and the entrance to Jerusalemsuch scenes regularly constituted a kind of compositional melange. A series of dis crete narratives were synthesized into a somewhat jumbled set whose overall pictorial narrative might seem a bit confusing but nevertheless projects the general message that Jesus was teacher, healer, wonder-worker, and lifegiver. The inclusion of Old Testament narratives (e.g., Adam and Eve, Noah, Jonah, Abrahams offering of Isaac, Daniel in the lions den) attests to the belief that the sacraments as well as Christs death and resurrection were pregured and eternally part of the Gods plan for human salvation (gure 3).

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Figure 2: Decoration of early Christian hypogeum, Catacomb of Priscilla, Rome. Photo: author.

In these images, the representation of Jesus is remarkably consistent. He most often appears as a beardless youth with long, curly hair (see gures 1, 3). Jesus appears several times in many compositions, always distinguished from the other adult male gures by his lack of beard and long, curly hair. Other than these distinguishing facial features, he is otherwise like them. He is about the same size and wears the garments of a well-dressed, respectable Roman male. He has neither halo nor sceptre. He does not appear nude, like the heroes or gods of Greco-Roman iconography. Jesuss garb is exactly like the others around him, which is that of a well-dressed Roman citizen of the mid-fourth century: a tunic with draped pallium. Like several other gures, he often holds a scroll and raises his hand in a gesture indicating speech. In short, he is recognizable by his coiffure, but not overly intimidating in any of his features. In depictions of the most popular miracle stories, such as the healing of the paralytic or the man born blind, the recipients are often shown as relatively small in comparison to characters. Perhaps their diminutive size was intended to reect their social position; they are suppliants and thus little ones. Jesus normally extends his hand to touch those he heals (see gure 1). One exception, the woman with the hemorrhage, reaches out to him instead, or rather to

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Figure 3: Early Christian sarcophagus, Rome, mid fourth century. Now in the Museo Pio Cristiano, Vatican. Photo: author.

his cloak. Jesuss imposition of his hand is a simple gesture, described in many Gospel accounts (e.g., Matt 8:1415, 20:2934; Mark 1:41). By contrast, in depictions of wonders such as the changing of water to wine, the resurrection of the widows son, and the raising of Lazarus, Jesus wields a staff: the only identiable or special sign of his power and authority, and a detail not mentioned by the Gospels. Two other gures in early Christian art hold a similar staff; Moses and Peter both use it to strike a rock to produce water, the former for thirsty Israelites, the latter to baptize his Roman jailers, a scene from an apocryphal narrative (see gure 3).7 Thus, Jesuss miracles are not incidents intended to show that he is so very different from all others as to manifest his glory and to reveal the nature of his kingdomwhere the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them (Matt 11:5). Perhaps as signicant as what early Christian iconographic programs include is what they do not. The Annunciation to Mary, the Transguration, the Last Supper, the Passion, the Empty Tomb, and the Ascension appear either rarely or not at all before the fth century. Although depictions of episodes from the Passion begin to appear by the last quarter of the fourth century and incorporate scenes of Jesus before Pilate or Simon carrying the cross, they do not include representations of the actual crucixion. In its place stands a triumphant and empty cross, surmounted by a wreathed christogram (gure 4). Beneath, a Roman soldier looks up as if recognizing truly, this is the son of God (Mark 15:39). Generally, artistic representations of what came to be the holy mysteries of Incarnation, Crucixion, and Resurrection are relatively late, compared to the typological allusions to prophecy and fulllment and popular portrayals of Jesus teaching and working miracles.

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Figure 4: Passion sarcophagus, Rome, third quarter, fourth century. Now in the Museo Pio Cristiano, Vatican. Photo: author.

Some historians have suggested that Christian visual art could have emerged only in a community that had grown lax about enforcing the Second Commandments prohibition against graven images.8 As the Church began to admit dominantly gentile converts, authorities clearly struggled against residual habits and practices of idolatry. Arguably (according to certain analyses), they accepted the need to compromise and began to accommodate images in the form of pictorial art. However, these historians own theological ambivalence about visual art, rather than evidence for actual aniconism in the ancient Church likely drives such a conclusion. These scholars appear to interpret early Christian condemnations of idol worship as a general denunciation of pictorial art in general, rather than the repudiation of false gods. Without doubt, early Christian apologists condently contrasted Christian lack of divine images to the practices of their polytheist neighbours. Nevertheless, they never condemned visual art for itself; rather they focused specifically on what they described as foolish the making or worshipping of divine images (and in this respect they agreed with many ancient philosophers). To this point, they also cited the biblical injunction against visual artYou shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth below (Exod 20:4: Deut 5:8)but understood as a command to honour no other gods, or to bow down to and adore their material representations. Although that injunction could have inhibited some pre-third-century Christians from making or enjoying paintings, mosaics, or sculptures, the reasons for its relatively late emergence is more likely explained in other ways.9 Most ancient critiques of images, whether philosophical, Jewish, or Christian, concentrated on the problem of mistaking art for reality (the image for truth), or of worshipping false gods instead of the true one. They were not attacks on visual art per se. For example, in his treatise against idolatry, dated to the end of the second century, Tertullian cites the biblical prohibition as directed against anything manufactured specically for the purpose of veneration.10 He denes images

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as representations of deities, fashioned out of ordinary materials and transformed by ritual consecration into objects of worship. He mocks those who pay homage to statues, for they are inanimate counterparts to their dead originals.11 Tertullians fellow African, Minucius Felix, points out that polytheists apparently found the absence images of the Christian god slightly suspicious, as if Christians were trying to conceal or hide the nature of their deity. In his dialogue, Octavius, Minucius Felix describes the protagonist, Octavius, responding by asking what kind of visible representation he could fashion for his God, seeing that humans are, themselves, rightly considered to be Gods true image (see Genesis 1:26). Furthermore, statues and other images are absurd: birds roost in and spiders weave webs over them. They rust and decay.12 A century later, Arnobius of Sicca, in his discourse Against the Nations, likewise ridicules those who bow down to images made of base materials, baked in kilns, forged in furnaces, or whittled by knives. Is it not folly, he asks, to kneel down in supplication to an object that you made with your own hands?13 Unquestionably, most ancient Christians, whether simple believers or theologically sophisticated authors, considered idols to be images of someone elses gods (i.e., false gods)and did not include pictorial art depicting stories from the Bible or even representations of Christ or the saints, in the category.14 About the time that the Vatican Sarcophagus described above (gure 1) was produced (ca. 335), Athanasius, the fourth-century bishop of Alexandria and champion of Nicene orthodoxy, wrote a two-part apology. The rst part, Against the Nations (Gentes), opens by summarizing his objections to idolatry and concludes by explaining the role of the Divine Word in salvation. In an early chapter of the Against the Nations, he launches his critique of idols, saying that those who pay homage to images ignore and dishonour the craftsmen who made the works; they worship the products of skill and art, rather than the recognizing the skills or paying tribute to the artists.15 A little further on he echoes his predecessors, condemning idols for being as phony as the gods they depict and asserting that those who worship them are deluded, impious, and irrational. Quoting the Epistle to the Romans he says, Professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things, wherefore God gave them up unto vile passions (see Rom 1:2224).16 At the same time, Athanasius realizes that Christians are not different from pagans in their sense that seeing God is crucial for their comprehension of the divine. In the second part of his treatise On the Incarnation, Athanasius lays out what he believed to be the orthodox explanation for Gods coming to the world in human form. Here he propounds a theology of visuality that could be understood as a divine antidote to the deception of idolatry and thus as the constructive part of his two-part treatise. Although he asserts that human knowledge of God relies on sensual perception as much as on cogni-

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tive processes, he warns that mortals are easily deceived, both in what they perceive and how they mentally evaluate or assess it. Their eyes are often tricked, he says, into mistaking false for true images and into offering the adoration due to the invisible divine being to mundane and even demonic visible objects. Humans do this, he adds, even though God is not hidden from their sight, but rather is revealed in myriad ways and forms, especially in the beautiful works of creation. Yet they remain ignorant of the creator (Rom 1:20). They tend to mistake the ephemeral for the eternal; they cast their eyes on illusions, confusing them with reality. They are so distracted by worldly goods that they miss the source of goodness itself.17 According to Athanasius, the merciful and loving God did not will for humans to remain in this state. Recognizing human weaknesses, God tried to accommodate them in different ways. God sent the law and prophets, holy men and women who instructed the people and modelled a virtuous life. Yet humans, being mired in evil habits and subject to clouded vision and lack of reason, persisted in their errors and refused to amend their pleasure-seeking habits. Most of all, they did not recognize themselves as bearing the divine image, however clouded it had become by their sinfulness. Finally, God, unable by nature to be unconcerned with the dissolute state of Gods own handiwork, could not allow humans to suffer further corruption or even to perish altogether. Thus, God condescended to become physically and visibly present in the Incarnation of the Wordin a mortal bodyso that humanity might be confronted with its original image. In a passage that evokes the images of ancient Egyptian panel portraits and even shows that Athanasius may have been thinking about visual art as a kind of medium for making the holy one present (see gure 5), Athanasius compares Gods work with the renewal of a painted likeness:
For as, when the likeness painted on a panel has become effaced by stains from without, he whose likeness it is must needs come once more to enable the portrait to be renewed on the same wood, for, for the sake of the picture, even the mere wood on which it is painted is not thrown away, but the outline is renewed upon it; in the same way also the most holy Son of the Father, being the image of the Father, came to our region to renew humanity, once made in his likeness.18

Therefore, Athanasius continues, God made himself visible. Not in order to come down and x things or even to gure out, at close range, how they had come to be broken, but rather to become sensibly present to creation itselfto be seenso that it could be restored to its original beauty. But it was not enough simply to make a brief, corporeal appearance and then immediately sacrice himself on a cross and die. Christs manifestation needed to encompass visible acts and deeds that demonstrated both his power and his purpose and revealed who he was by the works and wonders he performed. Thus, Christs earthly life included his human birth, death, resurrection, and ascension, but also manifestations of Gods love for creation, humanitys

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Figure 5: Portrait of a Woman, Antinoopolis (Egypt), ca. 130161. Photo: Author.

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original image, and Gods intention that this image should be rescued, refocused, and renewed. For this, the work of the eye was central. By encountering God in a human body and observing his works, mortals would recognize their origin and understand their potential. As Jesus, himself, says in the Gospel of John, Whoever has seen me has seen the Father (John 14:7). And if, Athanasius, posits, someone would wonder why not in a nobler instrument than a mere human body (e.g., the sun or moon or re or air), he explains that the Lord did not become incarnate only in order to make some grand, dazzling display, but to heal and teach, to care for the suffering, and to give himself to those in want. In this way, Christs appearance did not exceed human capacity to receive him. That would have rendered the incarnation useless, by terrifying or stupefying those to whom Christ appeared. Rather, Jesus came to humans in a form that resembled them, allowing them to comprehend and contemplate their own true nature through their physical and visual encounter with the Lord.19 Consequently, seeing is salvic. Athanasius does not believe that human salvation is primarily a matter of thinking correctly or assenting in the mind to certain dogmas or ethical principles. Humans need to perceive God in order to know God. This may happen in the works of nature, but it was ultimately accomplished in the Incarnation. Seeing Christ in the esh was the beginning of the reformation of the whole person, body and soul. Having such a vision, humanity is transformed by its beauty and comes to know its true character and purpose: to love and glorify God. Humans become what they see. Again and again, Scripture emphasizes the importance of physically seeingand perceiving. The imperative behold (Greek idou or orao) is ubiquitous. Seeing Christ is often a turning point in a Gospel story. A miraculous healing leads to the recognition, as when the crowds saw the paralytic get upon and walk (Matt 9:7). Johns Gospel enumerates a series of signs in which Jesus manifests his glory, as in the changing of water to wine in Cana (John 2.11). Peter, James, and John are granted a preliminary vision of his glory at the Transguration (Mark 9.28 and parallels). Pilate commands, Behold the man (John 19:22). The centurion at the foot of the cross witnesses the earthquake and bodies of saints coming out of their tombs and realizes who it was whom he had been guarding (Matt 27:51). Realization sometimes is linked with a characteristic gesture, vocal cue, or other sign. For example, Mary Magdalene mistakes Jesus for the gardener and realizes whom she addresses only when he speaks her name (John 20:16). The disciples travelling to Emmaus were unable to recognize him until he broke bread at table (Luke 24:31). In Johns Gospel, Jesus reveals himself through the straining nets of the shermen (John 21:7). Athanasiuss explanation for the Incarnation, of course, presents the question of how those did not see Christ could come to this same recognition. What about those who did not live at that very time or place that Christ

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came to earth? Athanasius, himself, is included in that disadvantaged group. If Gods purpose in the Incarnation is, as he says, to make God visible to those who otherwise could not see the divine Creator behind creations tempting beauties and desirable pleasures, how are humans to be aided after the ascension? Athanasiuss explanation seems, moreover, to contradict Jesuss reproach to the doubting Thomas: Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe (John 20:29). One may ask when the prototype is due to return so that the canvas can be renewed once again. One answer, of course, is that Jesus continues to appear to his followers in some form or other. Stephen saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God just before his death by stoning (Acts 7:5556). Jesus speaks to Paul, out of a ash of light, on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:36) and converses with Ananias in a vision (Acts 9:316). The Son of Man, the Living One, and the Lamb of God appears to John on Patmos (Rev 2:1220, 5:68). Later visionaries have similar encounters, like those of Francis of Assisi, to whom Jesus appeared with instructions to repair the church, or Catherine of Siena, whose vision included a mystical marriage to Christ. But, unlike those saints, most of the faithful are not granted such visions. Nevertheless, these ordinary believers are not bereft of visual revelations to the extent that the divine image can be seen in the lives of those holy men and women, encountered in the beauties of nature, or mediated through visual art. Like the portrait painting on a panel, where the image exists after the person has gone (even if the image begins to fade), an artistic representation preserves the appearance just as the Scriptures preserve the words of Christ. To this end, the art of fourth-century Christian monuments can be viewed as intentionally epiphanic. Observers saw more than simple decorative motifs; they encountered an image of the image of God. At the very least, certain aspects of the iconography indicate that viewers would have perceived more than simple, decorative, or didactic illustrations of Bible stories. They may have been prompted to imagine themselves as eyewitnesses, along with the disciples, Paul, Martha, and Zaccheus. Dressing these gures along with Jesus in ordinary Roman street garb emphasizes this identication. The recurring scenes of Jesus performing earthly works and healings not only reveal and emphasize his divine power and identity, but also demonstrate his particular care for the suffering and the needy. What they could not have perceived in life, they could through the medium of art. As the pagans did, they were able to see an image of their god, but in this case performing revelatory works of love and power. The images, themselves, were not designed to be objects of adoration or prayer, but they may have closed a gap in time and space, allowing contemporary observers to experience a certain kind of theophany. Along with the healing and miracle scenes, three scenes from the narrative of Jesuss life that appear with some frequency in mid-fourth-century artthe adoration of the Magi, his baptism by John (in which he is shown as a young child rather than an adult), and his entrance into Jerusalemare ones in

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Figure 6: Adoration of the Magi and Daniel, sarcophagus frieze, Rome, early fourth century. Now in the Museo Pio Cristiano, Vatican. Photo: author.

which his divinity is particularly manifest to and acclaimed by spectators. In the rst, we see three nearly identical gures (the Magi) approaching the Virgin and child in a kind of procession (gure 6). They hold their gifts; the rst one often bearing a wreath or crown to indicate gold, the second and third some kind of vessel (a box or bowl) that could hold frankincense or myrrh. Their garb instantly identies them as easterners; they wear little peaked caps, leggings, and tunics that Roman viewers would have associated with Persians or Babylonians. Their camels often show up in the background. Their recognition of Jesuss divinity as well as his royalty is emphasized in the narrative: Going into the house they saw the child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshipped him (Matt 2:11). The second sceneJesuss baptism by Johnhas, at least to modern eyes, a surprising feature. Jesus is depicted as a small, nude child standing in an ankle-high stream of water (gure 7). John lays his right hand upon Jesuss head in a gesture that evokes the bishops imposition of hands in the later Christian ritual of initiation. A descending dove appears, indicating the presence of the Holy Spirit. The presentation of Jesus as childlike and nude, instead of a full-grown adult, only six months younger than his cousin, John (as indicated in the Gospel narratives, of Luke 1:26, and 3:23), might be explained by the fact that early Christians understood baptism as a symbol of new birth and a return to the state of childlike innocence. Showing Jesus in this way emphasized Jesuss identication with all those who underwent the ritual, just as they participate in his death and resurrection through receiving the sacrament (Rom 6:34). In many compositions, a witness stands to one side. The depiction of the scene naturally evokes Johns prophecy that one would come after him who would baptize with the Holy Spirit, and Gods pronouncement at the scene: You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased (Mark 1.11). In the third image, Jesus appears astride a donkey as he makes his acclaimed entry into Jerusalem (Mark 11:710 and parallels). Jesus makes a gesture of blessing with his one hand and holds a scroll, a rod, or the animals

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Figure 7: Baptism of Jesus on sarcophagus end, mid fourth century and close up detail. Now in the Musee de lArles Antique. Photo: author.

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Figure 8: Jesus entering Jerusalem, detail from fourth-century sarcophagus from Rome, now in the Museo Pio Cristiano, Vatican. Photo: author.

reins in the other (gure 1). Oftenbut not alwaysthe donkey is shown having to contend with a foal scrambling beneath her belly (see Matt 21:5). The crowd is indicated by two or three or, in some instances, a small group of gures, some of them child-sized, others adults. One of the children throws garments under the animals feet; others hold palm branches. The viewer must imagine hearing them cry out, Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! (Mark 11:9). One spectator has climbed up into a tree, possibly an allusion to the story of Zaccheus and Jesuss entry to Jericho in Luke 19. On one of the Vatican sarcophagi, the city gate appears to the right (gure 8), making the scene appear very much like the image of an imperial adventus, a parade in which an emperor enters a city riding a horse (or, sometimes, a horse-drawn chariot). The point of the imperial adventus was to be seen as the savior of the people. Jesuss entry on a donkey rather than a horse was based, at least partly, on the prophecies of Isaiah 62:11 and Zechariah 9:9. But, like the imperial entry, Jesuss entry revealed him as Son of David and Messiah to the crowds. Finally, one very frequent fourth-century motif shows Jesus in a scene that was not taken directly from a biblical narrative but depicts Jesus handing a scroll to Peter to his left. Paul stands to Jesuss right (gure 9). The traditional identication of the image, the Traditio Legis, arises from the words that occasionally appear on the scroll: Dominus legem dat. Sometimes a phoenix sits in a palm tree to one side. In certain depictions Jesus sits on a throne, in others he stands upon a rock from which four rivers ow. The image, adapted for a variety of different media, appears on sarcophagus reliefs, apse mosaics, gold glasses, and wall paintings. Although some interpreters of the scene have

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Figure 9: Jesus giving the law to Peter and Paul (Traditio Legis), detail from a fourthcentury sarcophagus, now in the Musee de lArles Antique. Photo: author.

argued that it shows the commission of Peter as chief of the Apostles (Matt 16:1819), others have claimed that it depicts the Second Coming of Christ.20 A strong case has, however, been made that it portrays a post-resurrectional, theophanic appearance of Christ to the two primary Apostles of Rome, Peter and Paulan appearance in which he delivered the new law to his Church.21 Viewers of any of these monuments might understand themselves to be participant witnesses to divine manifestations. By contemplating the images presented to them, they could form a conception of the nature and as well

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as the person of Christ and contemplate the signicance of his works and wonders. They could see, as well as hear, the stories of others coming to faith and acclaiming Jesus as Lord. Viewing is, however, qualitatively different from hearing or reading. Instead of an idea in the mind, they had a gure before their eyes. This different experience granted an opportunity to see Christ, in a sense, face-to-facenot merely as a subject in a picture, but as a doer of deeds, recipient of adoration, and a still-living lawgiver. By the end of the fourth century, actual portraits of Christ, the saints, and the Apostles began to appear without a narrative context and showing only the face or gure. Before then, however, those who saw Jesus in art saw him in action, and they could imagine themselves as part of a crowd of onlookers, recognizing God in their midst. Augustine, writing within a century of Athanasius, was more circumspect about the value of physical seeing in the process of human salvation. Taking a different approach, Augustine insisted that the mind comprehends the truth more effectively than the eye. In an extraordinarily long sermon delivered on New Years Day sometime around 404, Augustine admonishes his ock not to behave like the pagans by feasting, drinking, giving good luck presents, going to the theatre or races, and singing silly or disgraceful songs. He urges them, instead, to celebrate the occasion by fasting, praying, singing spiritually uplifting songs, and grieving for those who get caught up in the love of false pleasures or futile pursuitsand by staying in church to listen to his extended preaching.22 Augustine is concerned that some members of his congregation have been venerating images and urges them to purge the places of prayer from such things just as they would purify their hearts. The Scriptures read or sermons heard with the ear are better antidotes to evil than spectacles or pictures presented to the eyes. Anything else, he warns, is too much like the pagan devotion to or adoration of sacred images. Referring to the statues of pagan gods, for example those of Neptune or Tellus, Augustine scoffs at those who foolishly offer their prayers to such idols, preferring human made personications rather to the actual sea or earth. Why would one offer prayer to a representation of the sun instead of the sun itself ? Pleading with his congregation to concentrate, he explains that they should adore the creator of the beautiful things of nature, just as they should admire the craft and skill of the artist more than the loveliness of the object. Even though the one is invisible while the other can be seen and appreciated by the senses, goodness or truth resides in the capacity and not in its products. The latter is visible with the eye, while the former is something one can know only through the mind. That the cognitive apprehension is better than physical perception is clear: the essence of life (soul) is invisible, just as the structure and governance of the cosmos is. These things can be known only by the intellect. As he explains, Because God made you one thing to see these things with, another with which he himself might be seenfor seeing these things he gave you the eyes in your head, for seeing

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himself he gave you a mindyou cannot therefore be allowed to say in that inane way, I cant see him; examine all these things with your intelligence, and you will see the one at work in them.23 Yet even though Augustine deemed physical sight as incomplete, he did not disparage it altogether. He was a good Platonist, even after his Christian conversion. As such, he could argue that contemplation of the sensible world could lead (indeed might be necessary) for apprehension of the purely intellectual realm. So, as long as it is not deemed the primary gauge of truth (e.g., seeing is believing), nor confused with ultimate reality, sensible things have a purpose and value. Images, he allowed, could be a means of mediating divine presence and demonstrating Gods purpose for creation. A mind could rise from the image perceived to the truth that lies behind it. In fact, Jesus revealed himself by being born of Mary, just as the Word was revealed to the patriarchs and prophets of the Israelites. By accommodating the abilities of the humble as well as the adept, he took esh and dwelled among humanity, becoming both the bodily and spiritual creation. Those who cannot rise above creation to perceive the invisible and inexpressible reality may hold onto this as the ground of their knowledge. Those who are able to glimpse that reality still need to grasp its physical manifestation. Augustine adds that this is why Christ performed both signs and miracles, so that he could show who he is: a terror to those who fear him and reassurance to those who love him. Moreover, his humble birth, just as the kind of his miracles, demonstrates his particular affection for common folk.24 If one could synthesize these two points of view in respect to visual art, it would be to afrm the basic value of seeing, so long as what is seen is not adored per se or mistaken for more than an initial or preliminary revelation that subsequently must be contemplated by the mind or soul. Both Athanasius and Augustine assert that Christ came in the esh in order to demonstrate Gods will that humanity rise above the transitory and visible things of the world. Both Athanasius and Augustine emphasize that Christs incarnation was a bodily one, assuring the divine presence in the created realm and manifesting the divine image in human form. Both Athanasius and Augustine insist that Christs works revealed his power and divinity but also visually demonstrated Gods special care for the suffering, the humble, and the needy. These assertions can be argued in words or presented in visual images. While words may have more long-term durability, the images might more closely recreate to the experience of actually seeing Jesus. Because of Augustines insistence on Christs bodily appearance, he probably would not have approved of Paulinuss non-anthropomorphic apse (described at the beginning of this essay). In his great treatise On the Trinity, Augustine asks how Christians are able to love something that they cannot see, or believe to be absent. In the absence of the physical presence of a loved one, the imagination inevitably will fabricate something to cling to, the shape or outlines of a face or body that may or may not be accurate. But, he says,

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accuracy really is not the point. Faith is not dependent, he insists, on the precision of our images. What is important to believe about Jesus, he says, is that he had an image: he had a face and he had a body. What Christians can know about Christ is what they experience in themselves. If Christians believe this, they will realize that God became one of them as a demonstration of love and humility, joining a soul to a body and living a mortal life. While they have never seen God, Christians are able, from experience and contemplation of comparable things, to love that unseen God until they at last come before the Eternal Presence and see God face to face.25 Notes
1 Paulinus of Nola, Ep. 32.10, trans. slightly adapted from P.G. Walsh, Letters of St. Paulinus of Nola (Westminster, me: Newman, 1967), 2:145. 2 Among the most recent and inclusive scholarly reference works are Friedrich Deichmann, Ulbert Thilo, and P. von Zabern, Repertorium der christlich-antiken Sarkophage. Vols. 13. (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 19672003); Aldo Nestori, Repertorio topograco delle pitture delle catacombe Romane (Vatican City: Ponticio Istituto di Archeologia Cristiania, 1993); and Norbert Zimmermann, Werkstattgruppen romischer Katakombenmalerei (Munster: Aschendorff, 2002). 3 On this see Graydon Snyder, Ante Pacem: Archaeological Evidence of Church Life before Constantine, 2nd ed. (Macon, ga: Mercer University Press, 2003); or, more recently, Ramsay MacMullen, The Second Church: Popular Christianity A.D. 200400 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2009). 4 Here see Jas Elsner, Imperial Roman and Christian Triumph (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998); and this authors work, Understanding Early Christian Art (London: Routledge, 2000), which suggests that textual and material evidence be viewed together and that they emerge from the same religious or theological milieu. 5 Among the best of this genre is the joint work of Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky, The Meaning of Icons (Yonkers, ny: St. Vladimirs Seminary Press, 1999), and Michel Quenot, The Icon: Window on the Kingdom (Yonkers, ny: St. Vladimirs Seminary Press, 1992). 6 For example, see the parallels between the fourth-century denition given by Basil of Caesarea, Spir. Sanc. 18.45, which was repeated in the more commonly cited assertion made in the eighth century by John of Damascus, Apol. 1.21. 7 The story of Peter striking the rock to baptize his Roman jailers is recorded in a sixth-century manuscript: Mart b. Peteri a Lino ep. Conscriptum 5, traditionally attributed to Pope Linus (Peters successor). The fact that artistic portrayals of the scene predate the earliest documentary evidence suggests that the legend was circulated (either in writing or orally) no later than the third or early fourth century. 8 The presumption that originally aniconic Christians became less strict during the third century is common in standard histories, including the work of Henry Chadwick, The Early Church (London: Penguin, 1967), 277. See a summary and critique of this assumption in an essay by Mary Charles Murray, Art and the Early Church, JThS n.s. 28, no. 2 (1977): 304 345. 9 Other explanations for the late emergence of visual art in Christianity are proposed by P. Corby Finney, The Invisible God: The Earliest Christians on Art (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 10810; and Jensen, Understanding Early Christian Art, 1315. 10 Tertullian, Idol. 4 11 Tertullian, Apol. 12. 12 Minucius Felix, Octavius 10.25, 32.17, 24.59. 13 Arnobius, Adv. nat. 6.16.

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14 One exception, Epiphanius of Salamis, did object to images of Christ, the Apostles, and saints that were painted on walls or curtains. See Epiphanius, Frag. 2. The authenticity of this fragment has been questioned but generally accepted as authentic. The authenticity of the famous condemnation of images of Christ attributed to Eusebius in a letter supposedly written to the Augusta Constantia is not so clear. The text may have been forged in order to bolster the arguments of eighth-century iconoclasts. Its oldest version comes the orilegium of the iconophile Nicephorus of Constantinople, Contra Eusebium et Epiphanidem. Another possible exception, the 36th canon of the Council of Elvira (ca. 305), seems only to object to Christian images that might be worshipped, not to art as such. 15 Athanasius, C. Gent. 13. 16 Ibid., 19. 17 Athanasius, Inc. 1112. 18 Ibid., 14. Trans., NPNF, ser. 2 vol. 4.43. 19 Athanasius, Inc. 43. 20 See a summary of scholarly views in Geir Hellemo, Adventus Domini: Eschatological Thought in 4th Century Apses and Catecheses (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1989), 6589. 21 This was particularly the view of Paul Styger, Neue Untersuchungen uber die altchristlichen Petrusdarstellungen, RQ 27 (1913): 66. 22 Augustine, Serm. 198 (Dolbeau 26). 23 Ibid., 31. 24 Ibid., 6162. 25 Augustine, Trin. 8.3.78.

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