PAUL
MOYAERT
HIW, KU, Leuven
Paper
Title: “Praying with Icons Is Touching God in His Image”
Abstract
In my paper I defend praying with images (icons) against those who claim this prayer is objectionable. My hermeneutical defense consists of three arguments. (a) I connect the religious practice to how people relate to ordinary photo’s in non-religious contexts. In ordinary life people relate to photo’s that cannot be explained in terms of their sign-value and similitude alone. (b) I develop an account of praying with images as a symbolic practice. (c) Finally, in order to bolster my argument, I compare icons with a particular class of symbols, i.e. relics. The general idea I put forward is that icons have to be understood as expressions of the reality they represent, and not simply as accurate or inaccurate representations of that reality. Icons are not created by human hands; instead the human hand is the instrumental cause of God’s self-expression, via the painter, on the canvas.