Spiritual Seeing: Picturing God's Invisibility in Medieval Art (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Spiritual Seeing: Picturing God’s Invisibility in Medieval Art Yvonne Dohna Spiritual Seeing: Picturing God’s Invisibility in Medieval Art. By Herbert L. Kessler. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 2000. Pp. xv, 265.) This fascinating book is largely composed of eight essays in which the author in general discusses the possibility of picturing divinity during the Middle Ages and the continuity of Jewish thought in Christian theology. The first chapter reviews the arguments concerning the permissibility of images of God, and the [End Page 133] book concludes with the positive assessment of the relations between art and doctrine. The basic problem, as Herbert Kessler sees it, is whether and by what artistic means the divine grace and truth revealed by Christ's Incarnation can berepresented in art. The chapters are delicately interwoven, and the abundant visual and literary documentation allows the reader to follow step by step the ever more conscious self-identification of Christian thought on images. In the opening chapters Professor Kessler proves that the new language of Christian images signified not only the invention of an iconography based on archetypal models, but also the redemption of the incapacity of the Jews to view God. The enemies of iconoclasm refuted with subtle arguments the objections to images, objections understood as undermining the reality of the Incarnation. On the other hand they interpreted images as refuting not only Jewish law, but also Jewish literalism. This line of argument is continued in the third chapter. According to Cyril of Alexandria and John Chrysostom the Old Testament is only the first draft which lays out the fundamental sacred ideas, while the communion with Christ provides the precise and perfect painting. The New Testament, in other words, completes the original sketch. The author deftly plays one argument against the other to illustrate the increasing rigor employed by Christian apologists in the development of image theory, by which they were convinced positively to surpass the Jews and negatively to demonstrate Jewish ignorance and blindness. Even the techniques of artistic representation were eventually transformed by theological considerations. Theodore of Studios compares the creative process with the Incarnation itself. He notes that the original icon of the Holy Face of Edessa was achieved not by copying but by the imprinting of Christ's face on a cloth. According to Nicephoros the task of art was not to illustrate the external characteristics of the Saviour, but the essential aspects of his Incarnation. Art was now to visualize the invisible and to materialize the immaterial. The Christian apologists refuted intellectually the iconoclastic proscription of pictures; they justified the use of color and elevated the creative process to the spiritual plane. The argumentation of the iconodules proceeded further and was manifested theologically in art works as well as in the statements of the so-called Eighth Council: Whoever does not venerate the depicted face of Christ will not be able to recognize him at his Second Coming. The veneration of images becomes a demanding spiritual task and at the same time denies to the Jews any capability of divine cognition. The image also acquired increasing importance in religious practice, for images resolve the tension between human materiality and invisible divinity and provide different approaches to hidden truth. In spite of all the objections, the triumph of images in 843 could not be prevented. Kessler illustrates again and again the tissue of fine theological argument which justified artistic expression and pressed at the same time to proceed ahead. His analyses of single works of art clarify the alterations in exemplary manner. [End Page 134] Carolingian art resumed the debate about words and images. In earlier chapters it is made clear that Christian interpretations of the relation between the two had variously constituted the bases for image theories. The distinctions between words and images culminated now in the hypothesis that words were only words while pictures also represented their spiritual interpretation and transformation. Images surpass words at several levels of intention. In the final chapter Kessler shows how Christian art acquired the freedom of biblical interpretation. Abbot Suger's project of St. Denis concretized the theological discussions of the twelfth century which attributed fresh importance to image theory...