Epiphany - baptism icon
Christ’s Baptism: Theophany
Can you recall any paintings of naked kings? Artists went to great lengths to show how richly a ruler was dressed, for nothing revealed wealth and power more vividly than opulent clothing. In some versions of the icon of Christ’s baptism, the king of kings is without even so much as a loin cloth. His startling nakedness underscores the theme of self-emptying love shown in many icons of Christ — for the sake of the world and the salvation of the human race, he stripped himself of everything, of every privilege and comfort. In the nakedness of Christ we see not another emperor, but a new Adam.
We see the Savior is surrounded by water. Like the people of Israel crossing the Red Sea, this is an image of a new beginning, a second birth.
On the left side of the icon stands the last of the prophets, John the Forerunner, in a garment as rugged as the land surrounding the River Jordan, while on the right angels worship the Savior, their hands covered as a token of reverence.
Though overcome with the realization that he is unworthy even to touch the strap of Jesus’s sandal, nonetheless John is baptizing the Messiah. It is an act of obedience. John had begged to exchange places and himself be baptized, but Jesus insisted that John do to him as he had done to others. “Leave it like this for the present; it is fitting that we should in this way do all that righteousness demands.”
The humility of Christ in asking John to baptize him underscores the Gospel message that the Son of Man has come not to rule but to serve and to take upon himself all the sins of the world. “Being himself the fullness,” comments Father Lev Gillet, “he wished to take into himself all that was incomplete and unfinished.”
There is significance in John the Baptist’s hand resting on Christ’s head, a sacramental gesture that remains to this day is an integral element of the baptismal service.
In many versions of the icon, two strange small figures are found in the water on either side of Christ’s feet among the fish. One has turned his back on Christ, the other is seen riding a fish or running away. The figure on the left is an allusion to Elisha turning the river Jordan backward in its course, making it a dry pathway while the figure on the left is an allusion to the parting of the Red Sea to provide a safe passage to the people of Israel fleeing Egypt, an event the Church came to recognize as prefiguring baptism.
What will become the rite of entrance into the Church, baptism, has its origin in this event in the Jordan. The water is at once both grave and womb; the old, unredeemed self is drowned and a new self is born, made one with Christ. While Christ himself had no need for the purification implied by baptism, he not only provided a pattern for the sacrament, but in his baptism we see his crucifixion and resurrection prefigured.
Yet the event this icon connects us to is more mysterious than baptism. The word Theophany, another word used for the Feast of Christ’s baptism, comes from the Greek and means the showing or manifestation of God. What is of primary importance in Christ’s baptism is that occasioned a revelation of the Holy Trinity. It is for this reason, in the hierarchy of festivals, Theophany is third in importance, after Pascha and Pentecost.
On the banks of the Jordan, John and all who witnessed the event heard the voice of God the Father, “This is my beloved Son,” while they saw the Holy Spirit descending like a dove and resting on the head of Christ. Still more than John’s action, it is this mystical event that is the real baptism of Christ.
As also in the Nativity icon, the presence of God the Father is represented with a circle partially visible at the top of the icon. This mirrors the text in Mark’s Gospel: “the heavens opened.” We find the Holy Spirit, having become visible in the form of a dove, in the smaller circle within the ray of divine energy reaching toward the figure of Christ. (The image of God the Father as an elderly man with a white beard violates Orthodox canons of iconography. Iconographers suggest the Father through such devices as an empty throne or a hand reaching out from a heavenly cloud. )
The angels on the right also underscore the Holy Trinity. When there are three — as in this example, a fifteenth century icon from Novgorod — the person at prayer before the icon is reminded of the three angels who appeared to Abraham and Sarah at the oak of Mamre, the Bible’s first vivid hint of the Trinity.
Theophany is also the celebration of the beginning of Christ’s public ministry. Few had been called to worship in the stable of his birth, and for three decades afterward almost nothing is known of Jesus’s activities. In coming to John for baptism, Jesus reveals himself to those whom he is saving. He who was hidden, whose true identity had been known only to Mary and Joseph, now stands revealed as Messiah in the view of all.
The Orthodox Church’s celebration of the feast on January 6 includes a solemn blessing of water. In Russia, I’ve seen an entire parish troop off in bitter weather and falling snow to do this at the nearest river. After the ice is broken, the priest repeatedly traces the sign of the cross in the frigid water while the choir sings the hymns of the day: “You have descended into the waters and have given light to all things.... Where indeed should your light have shone except upon those who dwell in darkness?.... The nature of water is sanctified .... Let us then draw water in gladness, O brethren, for upon those who draw with faith, the grace of the Spirit is invisibly bestowed by Christ the God and Savior of our souls.”
Just as the Son of God became a man of flesh and blood through Mary, he used the material things of our world as means of salvation: water, wine, oil and bread. The water we bathe in, the water we drink, the water that is the main component of our bodies — every drop of water connects us with the water in which Jesus was baptized.
In Jesus’s baptism all water has forever been blessed. In a sense the annual blessing at Theophany is not needed. In blessing what is already blessed, the Church is simply revealing the true nature and destiny of water, and therefore the sacramental nature of all creation. “By being restored through the blessing to its proper function,” wrote Father Alexander Schmemann, “‘holy water’ is revealed as the true, full, adequate water, and matter becomes again a means of communion with and knowledge of God.”
I recall a story about water that I heard over lunch one day at the Monastery of the Protection of the Mother of God in Kiev. At the request of a Jewish neighbor with an eye disease, a woman had walked to a distant monastery to fetch water from a famous spring associated with miracles. “It was a hot day,” said Father Timothy, the monastery’s chaplain. “On the way back the woman became so thirsty she drank all the water she was carrying. When she returned home, she filled the empty bottle from the tap and gave this to her sick neighbor. It was just ordinary tap water, but the neighbor’s eyes were healed. Why? Because she had faith that this was holy water. You see, all water is holy. All water comes from the River Jordan.”
text from "Praying With Icons" by Jim Forest (Orbis)
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Epiphany - baptism icon
Christ’s Baptism: Theophany
Can you recall any paintings of naked kings? Artists went to great lengths to show how richly a ruler was dressed, for nothing revealed wealth and power more vividly than opulent clothing. In some versions of the icon of Christ’s baptism, the king of kings is without even so much as a loin cloth. His startling nakedness underscores the theme of self-emptying love shown in many icons of Christ — for the sake of the world and the salvation of the human race, he stripped himself of everything, of every privilege and comfort. In the nakedness of Christ we see not another emperor, but a new Adam.
We see the Savior is surrounded by water. Like the people of Israel crossing the Red Sea, this is an image of a new beginning, a second birth.
On the left side of the icon stands the last of the prophets, John the Forerunner, in a garment as rugged as the land surrounding the River Jordan, while on the right angels worship the Savior, their hands covered as a token of reverence.
Though overcome with the realization that he is unworthy even to touch the strap of Jesus’s sandal, nonetheless John is baptizing the Messiah. It is an act of obedience. John had begged to exchange places and himself be baptized, but Jesus insisted that John do to him as he had done to others. “Leave it like this for the present; it is fitting that we should in this way do all that righteousness demands.”
The humility of Christ in asking John to baptize him underscores the Gospel message that the Son of Man has come not to rule but to serve and to take upon himself all the sins of the world. “Being himself the fullness,” comments Father Lev Gillet, “he wished to take into himself all that was incomplete and unfinished.”
There is significance in John the Baptist’s hand resting on Christ’s head, a sacramental gesture that remains to this day is an integral element of the baptismal service.
In many versions of the icon, two strange small figures are found in the water on either side of Christ’s feet among the fish. One has turned his back on Christ, the other is seen riding a fish or running away. The figure on the left is an allusion to Elisha turning the river Jordan backward in its course, making it a dry pathway while the figure on the left is an allusion to the parting of the Red Sea to provide a safe passage to the people of Israel fleeing Egypt, an event the Church came to recognize as prefiguring baptism.
What will become the rite of entrance into the Church, baptism, has its origin in this event in the Jordan. The water is at once both grave and womb; the old, unredeemed self is drowned and a new self is born, made one with Christ. While Christ himself had no need for the purification implied by baptism, he not only provided a pattern for the sacrament, but in his baptism we see his crucifixion and resurrection prefigured.
Yet the event this icon connects us to is more mysterious than baptism. The word Theophany, another word used for the Feast of Christ’s baptism, comes from the Greek and means the showing or manifestation of God. What is of primary importance in Christ’s baptism is that occasioned a revelation of the Holy Trinity. It is for this reason, in the hierarchy of festivals, Theophany is third in importance, after Pascha and Pentecost.
On the banks of the Jordan, John and all who witnessed the event heard the voice of God the Father, “This is my beloved Son,” while they saw the Holy Spirit descending like a dove and resting on the head of Christ. Still more than John’s action, it is this mystical event that is the real baptism of Christ.
As also in the Nativity icon, the presence of God the Father is represented with a circle partially visible at the top of the icon. This mirrors the text in Mark’s Gospel: “the heavens opened.” We find the Holy Spirit, having become visible in the form of a dove, in the smaller circle within the ray of divine energy reaching toward the figure of Christ. (The image of God the Father as an elderly man with a white beard violates Orthodox canons of iconography. Iconographers suggest the Father through such devices as an empty throne or a hand reaching out from a heavenly cloud. )
The angels on the right also underscore the Holy Trinity. When there are three — as in this example, a fifteenth century icon from Novgorod — the person at prayer before the icon is reminded of the three angels who appeared to Abraham and Sarah at the oak of Mamre, the Bible’s first vivid hint of the Trinity.
Theophany is also the celebration of the beginning of Christ’s public ministry. Few had been called to worship in the stable of his birth, and for three decades afterward almost nothing is known of Jesus’s activities. In coming to John for baptism, Jesus reveals himself to those whom he is saving. He who was hidden, whose true identity had been known only to Mary and Joseph, now stands revealed as Messiah in the view of all.
The Orthodox Church’s celebration of the feast on January 6 includes a solemn blessing of water. In Russia, I’ve seen an entire parish troop off in bitter weather and falling snow to do this at the nearest river. After the ice is broken, the priest repeatedly traces the sign of the cross in the frigid water while the choir sings the hymns of the day: “You have descended into the waters and have given light to all things.... Where indeed should your light have shone except upon those who dwell in darkness?.... The nature of water is sanctified .... Let us then draw water in gladness, O brethren, for upon those who draw with faith, the grace of the Spirit is invisibly bestowed by Christ the God and Savior of our souls.”
Just as the Son of God became a man of flesh and blood through Mary, he used the material things of our world as means of salvation: water, wine, oil and bread. The water we bathe in, the water we drink, the water that is the main component of our bodies — every drop of water connects us with the water in which Jesus was baptized.
In Jesus’s baptism all water has forever been blessed. In a sense the annual blessing at Theophany is not needed. In blessing what is already blessed, the Church is simply revealing the true nature and destiny of water, and therefore the sacramental nature of all creation. “By being restored through the blessing to its proper function,” wrote Father Alexander Schmemann, “‘holy water’ is revealed as the true, full, adequate water, and matter becomes again a means of communion with and knowledge of God.”
I recall a story about water that I heard over lunch one day at the Monastery of the Protection of the Mother of God in Kiev. At the request of a Jewish neighbor with an eye disease, a woman had walked to a distant monastery to fetch water from a famous spring associated with miracles. “It was a hot day,” said Father Timothy, the monastery’s chaplain. “On the way back the woman became so thirsty she drank all the water she was carrying. When she returned home, she filled the empty bottle from the tap and gave this to her sick neighbor. It was just ordinary tap water, but the neighbor’s eyes were healed. Why? Because she had faith that this was holy water. You see, all water is holy. All water comes from the River Jordan.”
text from "Praying With Icons" by Jim Forest (Orbis)
* * *