Page 257 - Orthodoxy Zizioulas

T H E I C O N A N D T H E T R U T H O F P R E S E N C E
nected. It is, in consequence, a dangerous view (shared by
many Orthodox) that the divine energies somehow reside in
the nature of these sacred objects, if we do not simultane-
ously stress the personal character of the divine energies. The
divine energies are always hypostatic, and what sanctifies is the
personal presence of the saint and not the physical contact of
the object with the divine energies (impersonally and in them-
selves). I consider that the theology of divine energies, if it is
not clearly linked with that of hypostatic energies and gener-
ally with the notion of the person, can lead straight to pagan-
ism.
...
In the icon, therefore, we behold not merely sacred art, but
the truth of the Kingdom itself: creation transfigured, death
overcome, and the world already illumined by the light of the
age to come.
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