The Face Of The Invisible

Idols and icons are ways of seeing the divine, of making the invisible visible. For the Jews of the old testament there was no difference between an idol and an icon – any visible representation of God was blasphemous. But Christians could not ignore that Jesus became a visible representation of the invisible God, yet they do not consider him an idol. And so a distinction had to be drawn between these two concepts.

The Idol

The idol has its origin in a desire to gaze upon the invisible. This intention to see the divine is not easily satisfied, for most of what is visible is not what the gaze is hoping for. As such, we see through the visible. We see through it for it does not contain the substance that satisfies the searching gaze, and so becomes translucent.

This is what separates the idol from other objects. The gaze penetrates and sees right through ordinary objects but when it falls upon the idol it is stopped. It does not see through it and as such the idol is the first truly visible.  

It is not the quality of the craftsmanship that creates the idol, but the gaze. The idol is the visible representation of the divine precisely because that is where the gaze was arrested, decided to settle, and find its fulfillment. It is not the inherent beauty of the idol that makes it visible and worthy of adoration, but rather the fact that here the gaze stopped and transferred the beauty it longed for onto a visible form. The more intense the desire and the greater the intention, the more splendor will be seen in the idol. Whether this be an object, a man or a woman, a concept, or a god, wherever the gaze settles in fulfillment, an idol is created.

In the idol the invisible is finally made visible – it ends the search, it fulfills the desire, it completes the concept and renders it in perfect form. The idol does not exist independently, it has no face of its own, but acts as a mirror, reflecting the face of the gaze, taking on the splendor and form of our desire.

The idol is not simply a false god, but might even have had its beginning in an authentic encounter with the divine. The emotion and fulfillment that the artist experienced in this encounter is what inspired the artist to capture the event, to paint or to sculpt in order to preserve the fulness that satisfied the gaze. The artist crafts this idol in the hope that the same experience can be shared as other worshippers allow their gaze to be saturated by the image.

Modern humanity has for the most part lost their ability for such splendid idolatry. It is not that we are no longer capable of idolatry, but rather that it has taken a particular form. We no longer project our gaze upon visible idols for we now consider it superstitious. Our understanding of metaphysics has advanced too far … or so we think. But another form of idolatry, one more subtle, has emerged – the concept. 

“When a philosophical thought expresses a concept of what it then names “God,” this concept functions exactly as an idol.”

_{– Marion, Jean-Luc. God Without Being: Hors-Texte, Second Edition (Religion and Postmodernism) . University of Chicago Press. Kindle Edition.} 

Dear children, keep yourselves from idols. 1 John 5:21

The concept that is sculpted to capture our gaze and satisfy our vision of the divine is as idolatrous as any graven image. These concepts simply mirror the face of our desires. How do we enter into an intelligent relationship with God without creating idols? What distinguishes the idol from the icon?

The Icon.

Who[the Son] is the image[icon] of the invisible God -Col 1:15

If in Jesus, the invisible God has been made visible, how does Jesus differ from an idol? Have we not simply projected onto Jesus what we hoped to see in God? Have we not used his story to carve out concepts with which to render the invisible God, visible? It is indeed possible for Jesus to become yet another idol if we mold his story to fit our gaze. 

But in Jesus we are given an opportunity to apprehend God in a completely new kind of visibility. Whereas the idol has its origin in a desire to gaze upon the invisible, the icon originates in the desire of the invisible to be known. The icon does not simply fulfill the desire of the gaze, but transforms it. He surprises us by showing us more than we desire, and in doing so, our desires are expanded and transformed. 

Jesus does not make the invisible God visible in such a way that nothing further can be shown. If that is how we interpret Jesus we have created nothing more than another idol. No, Jesus does not exhaust the revelation of God. Rather, Jesus makes the invisible God visible in such a way that God remains invisible, and He remains the event in which more and more revelation is given. And so even in the process of rendering the invisible visible, the icon refers to another beyond itself. Consequently, the icon does not satisfy the gaze, but summons it to see more. It teaches the gaze to never settle but always see more.

Yes, like the idol, the icon arrests our gaze by giving a face to the invisible, but this face is not the mirror reflection of our own intentions. It is not our gaze that creates the icon. It is not the highest aim of our concepts that finds fulfillment in him, but rather, the boundaries of our concepts are transgressed by a surplus of meaning. It is indeed something like the face of the invisible God that is given in the Son – a gift larger than our capacity to receive. And as such it can never be exhausted.

The icon inverts the idol. The idol makes visible the face of our desires and as such captures our gaze and exposes its intention. But in the icon we begin to see a face that is more than the projection of our own desires. Another gaze meets us – the gaze of the invisible One. Consequently, our gaze does not stop or settle on the icon, but it is swallowed up and inverted by another gaze more intently focussed on us. We are confronted with a truly other face, the gaze of the invisible One who sees us in truth.

But all of us with face unveiled, mirroring the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into the same image[icon], from glory to glory, as by the Lord’s Spirit. 2 Cor 3:18

And so we are no longer occupied with what we see but mesmerized by what is seen in us. It is this inversion of the gaze that transforms us. The glory and favor of the One who knows us is reflected on our countenance and so we are transformed into the same icon/image. An image that is never exhausted but progresses from glory to glory.