JOHN OF DAMASCUS

£8,500 · Offered by Sokol Books

A very good, crisp, well-margined copy of the editio princeps of John of Damascus s Apology (c. 730), edited by the humanist Nicolaus Majoranus. Born in Syria, then under Muslim rule, John of Damascus (c.675-c.749) had a Christian education imbued with Hellenic influences, and became a monk. His Apology played a fundamental role in debates on the justification of the use of sacred images within the Eastern Orthodox Church. The first attack against religious images, seen as impious representations of the ineffable nature of God, was launched by the Byzantine Emperor Leo III in 730. The period of iconoclasm that followed, during which all sorts of spiritual art and artefacts were destroyed and their worshippers prosecuted, continued almost uninterrupted until the reign of Empress Theodora in the early C8. The Second Council of Nicaea in 787 temporarily reinstated the veneration of images; the Apology provided an important theoretical foundation. The work argued against the iconoclasts that Christians were allowed to paint images of Christ, saints and biblical figures as a profession of faith, and that such icons could be venerated and honoured (though not worshipped). A major question was the nature of imitation . On the one hand, iconoclasts declared that images were imperfect copies of the perfect, transcendent and ineffable reality of God. On the other hand, the Apology argued that artists were guided by the divine hand; they expressed their maker s closeness to God and the

• Binding: Hardcover

Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.