THE CHRISTOLOGICAL HERMENEUTICS OF THE IMAGE IN THE HOROS OF THE SYNOD OF HIEREIA (754) AND ITS PATRISTIC SOURCES

Wojciech SŁOMSKI

professor, Vizja University in Warsaw, Okopowa 59, 01-043 Warsaw, Poland, w.slomski@vizja.pl, ORCID: 0000-0003-1532-0341

Abstract

Aim: The study aims to analyze the Christological hermeneutics of the image in the Horos of the Synod of Hiereia (754) in light of patristic sources and Byzantine-Slavic reception. It examines how the iconoclastic rejection of the image arose from apophatic Christology and how the Second Council of Nicaea (787) reinterpreted these principles into a positive theology of representation.

Method: The research employs an interdisciplinary approach combining historical-critical examination of sources (Krannich – Schubert – Sode, 2002), philological exegesis of Greek texts (Horos Hiereiae, Acta Nicaena II), and patristic-dogmatic comparison (John of Damascus, Cyril of Alexandria, Theodore the Studite). The results are interpreted within the framework of systematic image theology and mediology (Brubaker 2022; Coakley 2022; Hovorun 2022).

Results: The findings demonstrate that Hiereia does not deny the Incarnation but interprets it as a transcendent revelation beyond visible mediation. Nicaea II transformed this apophatic framework into a sacramental theology of the image, where the icon becomes a mode of presence, not substitution. In Byzantine-Slavic tradition, these principles developed into canonical iconographic norms — the image as theology of presence.

Conclusion: Hiereia and Nicaea II represent two hermeneutical poles of the same Christological dogma: the former protects hypostatic unity through negation, the latter through affirmation. Their synthesis in the Triumph of Orthodoxy (843) produced an ontology of manifestation, where the image embodies the invisible.

Originality: This article offers a novel reading of iconoclasm as an apophatic form of orthodoxy rather than heresy, highlighting the continuity between Hiereia, Nicaea II, and Byzantine-Slavic theology as a unified evolution of the theology of presence.

Keywords

Hiereia 754; Second Council of Nicaea; icon; Byzantine theology; apophaticism; hypostatic unity; Eucharistic ontology; patristic hermeneutics

SUMMARY

The Synod of Hieraea, the Second Council of Nicaea, and their reception in Eastern iconography present a unified theological story about the image of God – about the tension between invisibility and visibility, transcendence and presence. The apophatic rejection of Hieraea became the positive confession of Nicea II and, finally, the visual spirituality of Slavic Orthodoxy. As the tradition, confirmed by the Fathers from Cyril of Alexandria to John of Damascus, shows, the true image is not what it depicts, but what it reveals.

The Byzantine-Slavic tradition thus shows that dogma can be expressed not only in words, but also in color, light, and silence – and that the theology of the image remains today a challenge to understanding the mystery of God, who is “ἀόρατος καὶ ὁρατός, ἀκατάληπτος καὶ ἐμφανής” – invisible and yet revealed.

(Language: english)

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