The Second Council of Nicaea is recognized as the last of the first seven ecumenical councils by the

Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern Orthodox Church, also called the Orthodox Church, is the second-largest Christian church, with approximately 220 million baptized members. It operates as a communion of autocephalous churches, each governed by its bishops via ...

and the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...

. In addition, it is also recognized as such by the Old Catholics, the

Anglican Communion The Anglican Communion is the third largest Christian communion after the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. Founded in 1867 in London, the communion has more than 85 million members within the Church of England and other ...

, and others.

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

opinions on it are varied. It met in AD 787 in

Nicaea Nicaea, also known as Nicea or Nikaia (; ; grc-gre, Νίκαια, ) was an ancient Greek city in Bithynia, where located in northwestern Anatolia and is primarily known as the site of the First and Second Councils of Nicaea (the first and s ...

(site of the First Council of Nicaea; present-day İznik, Bursa, in

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...

), to restore the use and

veneration Veneration ( la, veneratio; el, τιμάω ), or veneration of saints, is the act of honoring a saint, a person who has been identified as having a high degree of sanctity or holiness. Angels are shown similar veneration in many religions. Etym ...

icon An icon () is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, in the cultures of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Catholic churches. They are not simply artworks; "an icon is a sacred image used in religious devotion". The mos ...

s (or holy images),Gibbon, p.1693 which had been suppressed by

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edict An edict is a decree or announcement of a law, often associated with monarchism, but it can be under any official authority. Synonyms include "dictum" and "pronouncement". ''Edict'' derives from the Latin edictum. Notable edicts * Telepinu Proc ...

inside the

Byzantine Empire The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

during the reign of Leo III (717–741). His son, Constantine V (741–775), had held the Council of Hieria to make the suppression official.

Background

The veneration of icons had been banned by Byzantine Emperor Constantine V and supported by his Council of Hieria (754 AD), which had described itself as the seventh ecumenical council. The Council of Hieria was overturned by the Second Council of Nicaea only 33 years later, and has also been rejected by Catholic and Orthodox churches, since none of the five major patriarchs were represented. The emperor's vigorous enforcement of the ban included persecution of those who venerated icons and of monks in general. There were also political overtones to the persecution—images of emperors were still allowed by Constantine, which some opponents saw as an attempt to give wider authority to imperial power than to the saints and bishops. Constantine's iconoclastic tendencies were shared by Constantine's son, Leo IV. After the latter's early death, his widow, Irene of Athens, as regent for her son, began its restoration for personal inclination and political considerations. In 784 the imperial secretary Patriarch Tarasius was appointed successor to the Patriarch Paul IV—he accepted on the condition that intercommunion with the other churches should be reestablished; that is, that the images should be restored. However, a council, claiming to be ecumenical, had abolished the veneration of icons, so another ecumenical council was necessary for its restoration. Pope Adrian I was invited to participate, and gladly accepted, sending an archbishop and an

abbot Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various Western religious traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not the head of a monastery. Th ...

as his legates. In 786, the council met in the Church of the Holy Apostles in

Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...

. However, soldiers in collusion with the opposition entered the church, and broke up the assembly. As a result, the government resorted to a stratagem. Under the pretext of a campaign, the iconoclastic bodyguard was sent away from the capital – disarmed and disbanded. The council was again summoned to meet, this time in Nicaea, since Constantinople was still distrusted. The council assembled on September 24, 787 at the church of Hagia Sophia. It numbered about 350 members; 308

bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ...

s or their representatives signed. Tarasius presided, and seven sessions were held in Nicaea.

Proceedings

The twenty-two canons drawn up in Constantinople also served ecclesiastical reform. Careful maintenance of the ordinances of the earlier councils, knowledge of the scriptures on the part of the clergy, and care for Christian conduct are required, and the desire for a renewal of ecclesiastical life is awakened. The council also decreed that every altar should contain a

relic In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...

, which remains the case in modern Catholic and Orthodox regulations (Canon VII), and made a number of decrees on clerical discipline, especially for monks when mixing with women.

Acceptance by various Christian bodies

The papal legates voiced their approval of the restoration of the veneration of icons in no uncertain terms, and the patriarch sent a full account of the proceedings of the council to Pope Hadrian I, who had it translated (

Pope Anastasius III Pope Anastasius III (Latin: ''Anastasius Tertius''; c. 865 - June 913) was the bishop of Rome and ruler of the Papal States from April 911 to his death. Anastasius was a Roman by birth. A Roman nobleman, Lucian, is sometimes recognized as his f ...

later replaced the translation with a better one). The papacy did not, however, formally confirm the decrees of the council till 880. In the West, the Frankish clergy initially rejected the Council at a synod in 794, and

Charlemagne Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first E ...

, then King of the Franks, supported the composition of the '' Libri Carolini'' in response, which repudiated the teachings of both the Council and the iconoclasts. A copy of the ''Libri'' was sent to Pope Hadrian, who responded with a refutation of the Frankish arguments. The ''Libri'' would thereafter remain unpublished until the

Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...

, and the Council is accepted as the Seventh Ecumenical Council by the

. The council, or rather the final defeat of iconoclasm in 843, is celebrated in the

, and

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of Byzantine Rite as "The Sunday of the Triumph of Orthodoxy" each year on the first Sunday of Great Lent, the fast that leads up to Pascha (Easter), and again on the Sunday closest to October 11 (the Sunday on or after October 8). The former celebration commemorates the defeat of iconoclasm, while the latter commemorates the council itself. Many Protestants who follow the French reformer John Calvin generally agree in rejecting the canons of the council, which they believe promoted idolatry. He rejected the distinction between veneration (''douleia'', ''proskynesis'') and adoration (''latreia'') as unbiblical "sophistry" and condemned even the decorative use of images. In subsequent editions of the '' Institutes'', he cited an influential Carolingian source, now ascribed to Theodulf of Orleans, which reacts negatively the council's acts. Calvin did not engage the apologetic arguments of John of Damascus or

Theodore the Studite Theodore the Studite ( grc-x-medieval, Θεόδωρος ό Στουδίτης; 759–826), also known as Theodorus Studita and Saint Theodore of Stoudios/Studium, was a Byzantine Greek monk and abbot of the Stoudios Monastery in Constantinople. ...

, apparently because he was unaware of them.

Critical edition of the Greek text

*Concilium universale Nicaenum Secundum, in Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum, ser. 2, vol. 3, in 3 parts, ed. Erich Lamberz, Berlin 2008-2016. Also includes the Latin translation by Anastasius Bibliothecarius.

Translations

There are only a few translations of the above Acts in the modern languages: * English translation made in 1850 by an Anglican priest, John Mendham; with notes taken largely from the attack on the council in the Libri Carolini. The aim of the translation was to show how the Catholic veneration of images is based on superstition and forgery. * The Canons and excerpts of the Acts in '' The Seven Ecumenical Councils of the Undivided Church'', translated by Henry R. Percival and edited by Philip Schaff (1901). * Translation made by Kazan Theological Academy (published from 1873 to 1909) – a seriously corrupted translation of the Acts of the Councils into Russian. * A relatively new Vatican's translation (2004) into Italian language. Publishers in Vatican mistakenly thought that they made the first translation of the Acts into European languages. * The new (2016) Russian version of the Acts of the Council is a revised version of the translation made by Kazan Theological Academy, specifying the cases of corruption by the Orthodox translators. There are several dozens of such cases, some of them are critical. * *

References

Sources

* Calvin, John, ''Institutes of the Christian Religion'' (1559), translated by Henry Beveridge (1845). Peabody: Hendrickson, 2008. *

Gibbon, Edward Edward Gibbon (; 8 May 173716 January 1794) was an English historian, writer, and member of parliament. His most important work, ''The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'', published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788, is k ...

. '' The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire''. New York:Random House Inc., 1995. * * * * * * * *