Calvin's Institutes

Section: 1.11.5-10

5. Scripture judges otherwise

I know that it is pretty much an old saw that images are the books of the uneducated. Gregory said this;11 yet the Spirit of God declares far otherwise; if Gregory had been taught in His school with regard to this, he never would have spoken thus. For when Jeremiah declares that “the wood is a doctrine of vanity” [Jer. 10:8, cf. Vg., order changed]; when Habakkuk teaches that “a molten image is a teacher of falsehood” [Hab. 2:18 p.], from such statements we must surely infer this general doctrine, that whatever men learn of God from images is futile, indeed false. If anyone takes exception that it was those who were misusing images for impious superstition who were rebuked by the prophets, I admit it is so. But I add, what is clear to all, that the prophets totally condemn the notion, taken as axiomatic by the papists, that images stand in place of books. For the prophets set images over against the true God as contraries that can never agree. This comparison, I say, is set forth in the passages that I have just now cited. Since there is one true God whom the Jews were wont to worship, visible figures are wickedly and falsely fashioned to represent God; and all who seek the knowledge of God from these are miserably deluded. In short, if it were not true that whatever knowledge of God is sought from images is fallacious and counterfeit, the prophets would not so generally have condemned it. At least I hold this: when we teach that it is vanity and falsehood for men to try to fashion God in images, we are doing nothing else but repeating word for word what the prophets have taught.

6. The doctors of the church, too, partly judged otherwise

One ought, besides, to read what Lactantius and Eusebius have written concerning this matter, who do not hesitate to take as a fact that all whose images are seen were once mortals. Likewise, Augustine clearly declares that it is wrong not only to worship images but to set them up to God. Yet he says nothing else but what had been decreed many years before in the Council of Elvira, of which the thirty-sixth canon reads: “It is decreed that there shall be no pictures in churches, that what is reverenced or adored be not depicted on the walls.” But especially memorable is what the same Augustine elsewhere cites from Varro, and confirms by his own subscription, that the first men to introduce statues of the gods “removed fear and added error.” If Varro alone had said this, perhaps it would have had little authority, yet it deservedly ought to strike shame in us that a pagan man, groping so to speak in the dark, arrived at this light, that bodily images are unworthy of God’s majesty because they diminish the fear of him in men and increase error. Facts themselves certainly testify that this was said no less truly than wisely; but Augustine, having borrowed from Varro, as it were, brings it forth from his own thought. And at the outset, indeed, he points out that the first errors concerning God in which men were entangled did not begin from images, but once this new element was added, errors multiplied. Next, he explains that the fear of God was diminished or even destroyed, because in the folly of images and in stupid and absurd invention his divinity could easily be despised. On the second of these points, would that we might not have experienced it to be so true! Whoever, therefore, desires to be rightly taught must learn what he should know of God from some other source than images.

7. The images of the papists are entirely inappropriate

Therefore, if the papists have any shame, let them henceforward not use this evasion, that pictures are the books of the uneducated, because it is plainly refuted by very many testimonies of Scripture. Even if I were to grant them this, yet they would not thus gain much to defend their idols. It is well known that they set monstrosities of this kind in place of God. The pictures or statues that they dedicate to saints-what are they but examples of the most abandoned lust and obscenity? If anyone wished to model himself after them, he would be fit for the lash. Indeed, brothels show harlots clad more virtuously and modestly than the churches show those objects which they wish to be thought images of virgins. “For martyrs they fashion a habit not a whit more decent. “Therefore let them compose their idols at least to a moderate decency, that they may with a little more modesty falsely claim that these are books of some holiness!

But then we shall also answer that this is not the method of teaching within the sacred precincts believing folk, whom God wills to be instructed there with a far different doctrine than this trash. In the preaching of his Word and sacred mysteries he has bidden that a common doctrine be there set forth for all. But those whose eyes rove about in contemplating idols betray that their minds are not diligently intent upon this doctrine.

“Therefore, whom, then, do the papists call uneducated whose ignorance allows them to be taught by images alone? Those, indeed, whom the Lord recognizes as his disciples, whom he honors by the revelation of his heavenly philosophy, whom he wills to be instructed in the saving mysteries of his Kingdom. I confess, as the matter stands, that today there are not a few who are unable to do without such “books.” But whence, I pray you, this stupidity if not because they are defrauded of that doctrine which alone was fit to instruct them? Indeed, those in authority in the church turned over to idols the office of teaching for no other reason than that they themselves were mute. Paul testifies that by the true preaching of the gospel “Christ is depicted before our eyes as crucified” [Gal. 3:1 p.].What purpose did it serve for so many crosses-of wood, stone, silver, and gold-to be erected here and there in churches, if this fact had been duly and faithfully taught: that Christ died on the cross to bear our curse [Gal. 3:13], to expiate our sins by the sacrifice of his body [Heb. 10:10], to wash them by his blood [Rev. 1:5], in short, to reconcile us to God the Father [Rom. 5:10]? From this one fact they could have learned more than from a thousand crosses of wood or stone. For perhaps the covetous fix their minds and eyes more tenaciously upon gold and silver than upon any word of God.

8. The origin of images: man’s desire for a tangible deity

“Next, what is held in the book of Wisdom concerning the origin of idols is received virtually by public consent: that the originators of idols were those who conferred this honor on the dead, and thus superstitiously worshiped their memory. Of course, I admit that this perverse custom was very ancient, nor do I deny that it was a torch with which to fire men’s mad dash into idolatry all the more; yet I do not concede that this was the original source of the evil. For it appears from Moses that idols were in use before this eagerness to consecrate images of the dead prevailed, which is frequently mentioned by secular writers. When he relates that Rachel stole her father’s idols [Gen. 31:19], he is speaking of a vice that was common. From this we may gather that man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols. After the Flood there was a sort of rebirth of the world, but not many years passed by before men were fashioning gods according to their pleasure. And it is believable that while the holy patriarch was still living his descendants were giving themselves over to idolatry, so that he discerned with his eyes (not without the bitterest pain) that the earth, whose corruptions God had recently purged by a most dreadful judgment, was polluted with idols. For as Joshua testifies [Josh. 24:2], Terah and Nahor were worshipers of false gods before the birth of Abraham. If Shem’s offspring degenerated very rapidly, what are we to judge of Ham’s descendants who had already been cursed in their father? So it goes. Man’s mind, full as it is of pride and boldness, dares to imagine a god according to its own capacity; as it sluggishly plods, indeed is overwhelmed with the crassest ignorance, it conceives an unreality and an empty appearance as God.

To these evils a new wickedness joins itself, that man tries to express in his work the sort of God he has inwardly conceived. Therefore the mind begets an idol; the hand gives it birth. The example of the Israelites shows the origin of idolatry to be that men do not believe God is with them unless he shows himself physically present. “We know not,” they said, “what has become of this Moses; make us gods who may go before us.” [Ex. 32:1.] They knew, indeed, that this was God whose power they had experienced in very many miracles; but they did not trust that he was near them unless they could discern with their eyes a physical symbol of his countenance, which for them would be a testimony of the ruling God. Therefore they wished to recognize from an image going before them that God was the leader of their march. Daily experience teaches that flesh is always uneasy until it has obtained some figment like itself in which it may fondly find solace as in an image of God. In almost every age Wisdom of Solomon 14:15-16.

since the beginning of the world, men, “in order that they might obey this blind desire, have set up symbols in which they believed God appeared before their bodily eyes.

9. Any use of images leads to idolatry

Adoration promptly follows upon this sort of fancy: for when men thought they gazed upon God in images, they also worshiped him in them. Finally, all men, having fixed their minds and eyes upon them, began to grow more brutish and to be overwhelmed with admiration for them, as if something of divinity inhered there. Now it appears that men do not rush forth into the cult of images before they have been imbued with some opinion too crass-not indeed that they regard them as gods, but because they imagine that some power of divinity dwells there. Therefore, when you prostrate yourself in veneration, representing to yourself in an image either a god or a creature, you are already ensnared in some superstition. For this reason, the Lord forbade not only the erection of statues constructed to represent himself but also the consecration of any inscriptions and stones that would invite adoration [Ex. 20:25]. For the same reason, also, in the precept of the law a second part is subjoined concerning adoration. For just as soon as a visible form has been fashioned for God, his power is also bound to it. Men are so stupid that they fasten God wherever they fashion him; and hence they cannot but adore. And there is no difference whether they simply worship an idol, or God in the idol. It is always idolatry when divine honors are bestowed upon an idol, under whatever pretext this is done. And because it does not please God to be worshiped superstitiously, whatever is conferred upon the idol is snatched away from Him.

Let those persons take note of this who are looking for miserable excuses to defend the execrable idolatry by which true religion for many past ages has been overwhelmed and subverted. Images, they assert, are not regarded as gods. The Jews, too, were not so thoughtless as to forget that it was God by whose hand they had been led out of Egypt [Lev. 26:13] before they fashioned the calf [Ex. 32:4]. But when Aaron said that those were the gods by whom they had been set free from the land of Egypt, they boldly assented [Ex. 32:4, 8], obviously meaning that they wished to retain that liberating God, provided they could see him going before them in the calf. And we must not think the heathen so stupid that they did not understand God to be something other than stocks and stones. For while they changed images at pleasure, they always kept the same gods in mind. There were many images for one god; yet they did not devise for themselves as many gods as the multitude of images. Moreover, they daily consecrated new images, yet did not believe themselves to be making new gods. Read the excuses that Augustine refers to as having been pretended by the idolaters of his own age: when they were accused, the vulgar sort replied that they were not worshiping that visible object but a presence that dwelt there invisibly. Those who were of what he called “purer religion” stated that they were worshiping neither the likeness nor the spirit; but that through the physical image they gazed upon the sign of the thing that they ought to worship. What then? All idolaters, whether Jews or pagans, were motivated just as has been said. Not content with spiritual understanding, they thought that through the images a surer and closer understanding would be impressed upon them. Once this perverse imitation of God pleased them, they never stopped until, deluded by new tricks, they presently supposed that God manifested his power in images. In these images, nevertheless, the Jews were convinced that they were worshiping the eternal God, the one true Lord of heaven and earth; the pagans, that they were worshiping their gods whom, though false, they imagined as dwelling in heaven.

10. Image worship in the church

Those who assert that this was not done heretofore, and within our memory is still not being done, lie shamelessly. For why do they prostrate themselves before these things? Why do they, when about to pray, turn to them as if to God’s ears? Indeed, what Augustine says is true, that no one thus gazing upon an image prays or worships without being so affected that he thinks he is heard by it, or hopes that whatever he desires will be bestowed upon him. Why is there so much difference among the images of the same God, that one is passed over or honored in a common manner, but upon another is bestowed every solemn honor? Why do they tire themselves out with votive pilgrimages to see images whose like they have at home? Why do they take up the sword to defend these images today as if they were altars and hearth fires, even to the point of butchery and carnage, and more easily bear being deprived of the one God than of their idols? Nevertheless, I do not yet enumerate the crass errors of the multitude, which are well-nigh infinite, and which occupy the hearts of almost all men; I am only indicating what they profess when they especially wish to exculpate themselves of idolatry. We do not call them “our gods,” they say. Neither did Jews nor pagans of old so speak of them, and yet the prophets did not hesitate repeatedly to accuse them of fornications with wood and stone [Jer. 2:27; Ezek. 6:4 ff.; cf. Isa. 40:19-20; Hab. 2:18-19; Deut. 32:37] only for doing the very things that are daily done by those who wish to be counted Christians, namely, that they carnally venerated God in wood and stone.