Appearance of the Holy Trinity to Alexander Svirsky. Righteous Abraham

So, Abraham was 75 years old when, in obedience to God, he took his wife Sarah, all his property that they had acquired, all the servants and went to the country that the Lord showed him ( m-f 06/video. To the Promised Land: 41 s).

The land into which the Lord brought Abraham was called Canaan (mf 07. Promised Land).

· Whose descendants do you think lived on this earth?

The descendants of Canaan lived there - the Canaanites - one of the most wicked peoples (mf 08/video. Promised Land: 1 min 2 s.

Entering this land, Abraham built altars and brought a thankful sacrifice to the One God.

After that, the land of Canaan began to be called Promised. promised, because God promised it to Abraham and his offspring. This land is now called Palestine.)

It was on this earth that the promised Savior, Jesus Christ, was born from the Virgin Mary. m-f 09. Christmas).

· What was the work of Abraham? ( Abraham was already 75 years old, but, having a firm faith in the word of God, he leaves his relatives, his father's house, his native inhabited land and goes to unknown lands.

In this, Abraham showed unshakable faith in God.

Abraham settled in the land of Canaan near the city of Hebron. , at the oak forest of Mamra ( mf 10/video. At the oak forest of Mamra: 20 s).

Abraham and Sarah were already very old, but they never had children. Abraham constantly thought about it and was very sad. To comfort Abraham, one day the Lord appeared to him in a vision and told him m-f 11. Look at the sky ...): “... look at the sky and count the stars if you can count them. … you will have so many descendants.” Abraham believed the Lord and God counted it to him as righteousness.” .

When Abraham was already 99 years old, i.e. 24 years have passed since he, obeying God, left his native land, and, believing the word of the Lord, was waiting for the birth of the promised son, an amazing event happened: the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of three Wanderers ( mf 12/video. The Appearance of the Most Holy Trinity to Abraham-1: 1 min 01 s : One day, during the heat of the day, Abraham was sitting under the shade of an oak, at the entrance to his tent, waiting for the guests, who were especially in need at this time, of reinforcements and peace. Abraham loved to receive strangers, considering it a great joy to serve them . And suddenly he sees: three Men are standing against him. He immediately got up and ran towards them, bowed to the ground and began to call them to him to rest under a tree and refresh themselves with food.

When the Strangers came to him, Abraham washed their feet. Washing their feet in sultry and dusty Palestine, where only light sandals served as shoes, was a matter of necessity and the first duty.hospitality. Then he served bread, immediately prepared by his wife Sarah, served butter, milk, and the best roast calf, and began to treat them. He himself stood under a tree near them.)

Look, guys, with what fiery zeal, cordiality, with what joy and great pleasure Abraham meets, as he thinks, ordinary wanderers. !.. He does everything and offers! As the travelers ate, this hundred-year-old man stood before them! He didn't even consider himself worthy to sit with them!

M-f 13 / video. The Appearance of the Most Holy Trinity to Abraham - 2: 1 min: The strangers asked him, “Where is Sarah your wife?” He replied: "Here, in the tent." And one of Them said: “In a year I will be with you again, and Sarah your wife will have a son.”

Sarah, who was standing at the back of the tent door, heard these words and laughed to herself and thought, “Will I, when I am old, have such consolation, and my lord is old.”

But the Stranger said, “Why did Sarah laugh? Is there anything difficult for the Lord? At the appointed time, I will be with you, and Sarah will have a son.” Sarah was afraid and said, "I didn't laugh." But He told her, "No, you laughed." )

The fact that this wonderful Guest turned out to know his wife by name, and even more so that He spoke the promise of the birth of a son from her, already well known to Abraham from previous cases of communication with the Lord, opened his eyes to the real heavenly nature of this Guest.(m-f 14 / video. The Appearance of the Most Holy Trinity to Abraham - 3: 20 s. And Abraham realized that before him were not ordinary wanderers, but God Himself was speaking to him. .)

A year after the appearance of God to Abraham in the form of three strangers, the prediction of the Lord was fulfilled: Abraham and Sarah had a long-awaited son, whom they named Isaac.

The miraculous appearance of God to Abraham in the form of three Wanderers is displayed in the icon of the holy icon painter Andrei Rublev (mf15. Andrey Rublev)"Trinity", where the Wanderers are depicted as three Angels (m-f16 / icon. A. Rublev. Trinity).

· Let's compare the icons "The Appearance of God to Abraham" (m-ph 17. The Appearance of God to Abraham)and the icon of Andrey Rublev "Trinity" (you can use the picture in your notebook) . Where do you see the difference?

There are no Abraham and Sarah on Andrei Rublev's icon, there is no scene of the slaughter of the calf, even the attributes of the meal are reduced to a minimum. Andrey Rublev depicted the Angels not eating, but talking. The fact that the scene is depicted on a biblical story is indicated only by a bowl with a calf's head on the table, a tree and Abraham's chambers in the background.

Three pensive Angels sit around the throne with a bowl, which form a kind of vicious circle - a symbol of eternity, light and love. The gestures of the Angels, smooth and restrained, testify to the sublime nature of their conversation.
Lifetime Andrei Rublev coincides with the turning point in the liberation struggle of the Russian people against the Tatar-Mongol yoke ( m-f 18. The battle of "Rus" for freedom). In those days, Russia was torn apart by the internecine wars of the Russian princes, and the devastating invasion of the Mongol-Tatars once again showed that the Russian princes needed to stop internecine hostility, live in peace and harmony, that only by uniting they could finally get rid of the "evil Tatar" ( mf 19. Mongol-Tatar yoke).

It was during that difficult, but significant period of Russian history (about 1411), when bloodless and humiliated by a foreign yoke (mf 20. Destruction of cities), Russia got up from its knees, straightened its shoulders and began to prepare for liberation from the oppression of the Golden Horde, Andrei Rublev created his best work - “Trinity” (mf 21. “Trinity”), which he wrote at the behest of the abbot of the Trinity Monastery Nikon of Radonezh, - under whose leadership he began his path as a monk, - "in praise of Sergius of Radonezh" ( m-f 22. The history of the creation of the icon: 1 min 39 s.Founding his monastery, Sergius of Radonezh (as it is said in one of his lives) “built the temple of the Trinity ... so that by looking at the Holy Trinity the fear of the hated separation of the world would be overcome”)

· To whom God, through the holy icon painter Andrei Rublev, bestowed this miraculous icon (mf 23. A. Rublev. Trinity)? (Children's guesses)

God gave His image not only for Russia, but for all mankind. The Holy Trinity, depicting Divine harmony, was a symbol of unity: people created in the image and likeness of God should live in the image of the Holy Trinity: in peace, harmony and love.
At the heart of the philosophical concept of the "Trinity" is the idea of ​​the powerful all-conquering power of love as the innermost human essence, the disclosure of which serves as a real guarantee of the realization of the unity of mankind. In the color rhythm of the icon, in the melodious lines, smooth coordinated gestures, the soft inclinations of the Angels' heads, in the harmonies of pure shining colors, a feeling of unanimity, mutual love and sublime spiritual purity is born.

The content of the Trinity is multifaceted. The holy icon painter depicted on the icon the Pre-Eternal Council of the Holy Trinity.

· How do you understand the expression "Eternal Council"?

The Council is called eternal because it takes place outside the time inherent in our created world. The pre-eternal Council of the Holy Trinity is carried out in Divine eternity; and it is called the Council because all the Persons of the Most Holy Trinity participate in it.

At the Pre-Eternal Council, God expresses His Divine will to create man in His own image and likeness. Foreseeing the human fall before the creation of the world, God in eternity determined the ways of mankind's salvation. At the eternal Divine Council of the Holy Trinity, a decision was made on the Incarnation of the Son of God, on the salvation and redemption of the human race through His death on the cross and resurrection from the dead. On the icon of Andrey Rublev, all everyday details of the biblical narrative are discarded, which make it difficult to perceive the Divine plan for man. The semantic and compositional center of the icon - a bowl with the head of a slain calf, symbolizing the sacrificial feat of Christ.

(At the discretion of the teacher. The First Person of the Holy Trinity, God the Father, acted as the Planner of this decision.

The Second Person of the Holy Trinity, the Son of God, for the sake of the salvation of mankind, agreed to Incarnation , which is reflected in the words of Scripture: "You did not desire sacrifices and offerings, but prepared a body for me. Burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin are not pleasing to you. Then I said, Behold, I am going, as it is written about me at the beginning of the book" (Heb. 10:7 -10), and also in the words "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16).

The Third Person of the Holy Trinity The Holy Spirit prepared Himself to be sent down by the Father in the name of the Son, in order to spiritually transform those who believe in the Son of God by His grace-filled action, to assimilate to them the fruits of His sacrifice, to communicate to them the priceless gift of the knowledge of God, to make them "partakers of God's nature" (2 Peter 1: four).

For reference. Behind each of the three angels is his emblem. Behind the middle one is a tree, which means not only the oak of Mamri from the biblical narrative, but also the “tree of life”, “tree of eternity”, the path to which, after the expulsion of the first people from paradise, was blocked by a “seraphim with a fiery rotating sword”. According to Christianity, this tree could be a symbol of the resurrection.

Behind the second angel rise light, slender chambers. In the Psalter, the chambers are an artistic image that is used very often as a sphere of joyful and inspired knowledge. The creation of the inner world of a person in Christianity was likened to the work of an architect and was called "house-building".

Behind the third angel rises a mountain - an ancient symbol of all that is sublime. The mystery and unexploredness of the majestic mountain heights have always acted on the imagination of people. In the Bible, the “mountain” is an image of the “rapture of the spirit,” which is why the most significant events take place on it: at Sinai, Moses receives the tablets of the covenant, the Transfiguration of the Lord takes place on the tabernacle, the Ascension takes place on the Mount of Olives ...)

Work in a notebook. Test: Test yourself:

The history of mankind's salvation is the core of the Old Testament.

Old Testamentthis is an ancient (old) agreement, or _ _ _ _ God with God's chosen the people in which the Savior will be born.

God chose _ _ _ _ _ _ _ as the founder of this people.

Abraham was 75 years old when, in obedience to God, he took his wife Sarah, all his possessions, all his servants, and went to the country that the Lord _ _ _ _ _ _ to him.

The land into which the Lord brought Abraham was called

The descendants of Canaan lived there - the Canaanites - one of the most wicked peoples.

Entering this land, Abraham built altars and brought thanks to the One God _ _ _ _ _ _ .

After that, the land of Canaan began to be called_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _, i.e. promised, because God promised it to Abraham and his offspring. In 2000 years, the promised Savior, Jesus Christ, will be born on this earth from the Virgin Mary. Now this land is called_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ .

When Abraham was already 99 years old, an amazing event happened: the Most Holy Trinity itself appeared to him in _ _ _ _ _ _ three Wanderers. God said that in a year the promised son would be born to Abraham. At the appointed time, Abraham and Sarah had a long-awaited son, who was named

_ _ _ _ _.

Reference words : sacrifice, Canaan, Isaac, union, indicated, image, Abraham, promised, Palestine.

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In our temple there is an icon of the Holy Trinity with a piece of the Mamre oak. The image was painted from the famous miraculous icon created by St. Andrei (Rublev).

Icon "Holy Trinity"

The church has many different depictions of the Holy Trinity. But that icon, which determines the very feast of the Trinity, is invariably one - this is the image of the Trinity in the form of three angels. The prototype of this icon was the mysterious appearance of the Holy Trinity in the form of three travelers to the forefathers Abraham and Sarah under the oak of Mamre. The Church chose this particular icon, and not any other, not by accident, but because it most fully expresses the dogma of the Most Holy Trinity: three angels are depicted in completely equal dignity, symbolizing the trinity and equal honor of all three Persons.

We find the deepest understanding of this dogma in the icon of the Trinity painted by St. Andrei Rubleev for the Trinity Cathedral of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. This icon is a masterpiece of ancient Russian icon painting, and it was not for nothing that the Church approved it as a model of how the icon of the Trinity should be painted.

In the icon by Andrei Rublev, the faces of the Holy Trinity follow in the order in which they are confessed in the Creed. The first angel is the first Person of the Trinity, God the Father; the second, middle angel is God the Son; the third angel is God the Holy Spirit. All three angels bless the bowl in which the calf, slain and cooked for food, is brought. The slaughter of the calf marks the death of the Savior on the cross, and the preparation of the calf for food is a prototype of the sacrament of the Eucharist. All three angels carry wands in their hands, which symbolize their divine power.

The first angel, depicted on the left side of the icon, is dressed in a blue lower robe - an image of his heavenly, divine nature, and a light purple upper robe - testifying to the incomprehensibility and royal dignity of this angel. Behind him, above his head, rises the house, the dwelling of Abraham, and the altar in front of the house. This image of the dwelling has a symbolic meaning: the house is, as it were, an image of God's economy, and the fact that the image of the building is placed above the head of the first angel points to him as the head (or Father) of this economy. The same paternal principle is reflected in all its form. His head is almost not tilted, and his eyes are turned to two other angels. Everything - both features, and facial expression, and the position of the hands, and the way the first angel sits - everything speaks of his paternal dignity. The other two angels bow their heads and turn their gaze to the first angel in deep attention, as if talking to him about the salvation of mankind.

The second angel is placed in the middle part of the icon. His middle dignity is determined by the position that is inherent in the second Person in the Trinity itself, as well as in the matter of dispensation and providence of God for the world. Oak branches stretch over his head. The robe of the second angel corresponds to that in which the Savior is usually depicted. The lower one has a dark purple color, symbolizing the incarnation, and the upper blue tunic marks the divine dignity and heavenly nature of this angel with its color. The second angel is inclined and turned with his head and movement towards the first angel, as if in a secret conversation. The tree that overshadows it is a reminder of the tree of life that was in the middle of paradise, and of the tree of the cross.

The angel, placed on the right side of the icon, is the third Person of the Holy Trinity - the Holy Spirit. The lower robe of the angel is a transparent blue color, and the upper one is a light smoky green color, depict heaven and earth, signify the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit, life-giving to all that exists. “In the Holy Spirit every soul is alive and exalted in purity,” sings the Holy Church. This exaltation is expressed by purity on the icon of the mountain, which overshadows the third angel.

Borrowed from the book "Thoughts on the Icon" by monk Gregory Krug

Mamvrian oak

On the icon of the Holy Trinity, we see a tree, in the shade of which the forefather Abraham arranged a meal for the Lord, who appeared to him in the form of three travelers. This tree has survived to this day and it is located on a site belonging to the Russian Spiritual Mission on the territory of the Russian monastery of the Holy Trinity in Hebron, 3 km northwest of the Machpelah Cave, on the West Bank of the Jordan River, in the Palestinian Autonomy. This is the famous Oak of Mamvre, which is one of the trees of the oak forest of Mamvre, where the first in the world appearance of the Holy Trinity took place. The Bible itself does not mention any particular oak tree, but evidence of it appears as early as the 1st century A.D. Flavius ​​Josephus calls him Ogyges (giant). In the time of Flavius, it was believed that this oak stands from the creation of the world. And according to legend, the end of time will come when the oak of Mamre does not give a single green leaf.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the oak trunk had a circumference of seven meters, then it was divided into three massive branches, as if symbolizing the Holy Trinity. Not far from the oak grows two more oaks, which are about 200 years old. The pilgrims dubbed them the Oak of Abraham and the Oak of Sarah. And the Mamre oak itself at the beginning of the 20th century began to slowly dry out. The process was aggravated by pilgrims who tried to pinch off and carry away a particle of the shrine. The last green leaf seen on an oak tree was in 1995.

There is a belief that the end of the world will not come as long as the oak of Mamre is alive. Several years ago, the Lord sent a miracle: a small sprout sprouted from the root of a withered giant. Its height is now about 20 cm. To the great joy of believers, the trunk of this sprout also diverges into three separate trunks, as if representing an ongoing testimony to the Holy Trinity.

• "Lovers and God loves"

• MOU Vesyegonskaya secondary school Osipova T.N.

• And the Lord said to Abraham: Get out of your country, out of your kindred, and out of your father's house [and go] to the land that I will show you; and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will magnify your name, and you will be a blessing; I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you; and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.

• Abraham was 75 years old when, in obedience to God, he took his wife Sarah, all his property that they had acquired, all the servants and went to the country that the Lord showed him

• Migration of Abraham
• Painting by Jozsef Molnar 1850

• The land into which the Lord brought Abraham was called Canaan. The descendants of Canaan lived there - the Canaanites - one of the most wicked peoples.

• Entering this land, Abraham built an altar and brought a thankful sacrifice to the One God.
• After that, the land of Canaan began to be called the Promised Land, i.e. promised, because God promised it to Abraham and his offspring. Now this land is called Palestine.

• In the land of Canaan, Abraham settled near the city of Hebron, near the oak forest of Mamre.
• Abraham and Sarah were already very old, but they never had children. Abraham constantly thought about this and was very sad. To console Abraham, one day the Lord appeared to him in a vision and said: “... look at the sky and count the stars, if you can count them. … you will have so many descendants.” Abraham believed the Lord and God counted it to him as righteousness.

• When Abraham was already 99 years old, i.e. 24 years have passed since he, obeying God, left his native land, and, believing the word of the Lord, was waiting for the birth of the promised son, an amazing event happened: the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of three Wanderers.

• Once, during the heat of the day, Abraham was sitting under the shade of an oak, at the entrance to his tent, waiting for the guests, who were especially in need at this time, of reinforcement and peace. Abraham loved to receive strangers, considering it a great joy to serve them. And suddenly he sees: three Men are standing against him. He immediately got up and ran towards them, bowed to the ground and began to call them to him to rest under a tree and refresh themselves with food.

• When the Wanderers came to him, Abraham washed their feet. Washing their feet in sultry and dusty Palestine, where only light sandals served as shoes, was a matter of necessity and the first duty of hospitality. Then he served bread, immediately prepared by his wife Sarah, served butter, milk and the best roast calf, and began to treat them. He himself stood under a tree near them.

• The strangers asked him, “Where is Sarah your wife?” He replied: "Here, in the tent." And one of Them said: “In a year I will be with you again, and Sarah your wife will have a son.”
• Sarah, who was standing behind the entrance to the tent, hearing these words, laughed to herself and thought: “Am I, when I am old, to have such comfort, and my lord is old.”
• But the Stranger said, “Why did Sarah laugh? Is there anything difficult for the Lord? At the appointed time, I will be with you, and Sarah will have a son.” Sarah was afraid and said, "I didn't laugh." But He told her, "No, you laughed."

• And Abraham realized that before him were not ordinary wanderers, but God Himself was speaking to him.
• A year after the appearance of God to Abraham in the form of three strangers, the prediction of the Lord was fulfilled: Abraham and Sarah had a long-awaited son, whom they named Isaac.

• Trinity of the Old Testament.
• 16th century Novgorod

• The miraculous appearance of God to Abraham in the form of three Wanderers is depicted in the icon "Trinity" by the holy icon painter Andrei Rublev, where the Wanderers are depicted as three Angels.

• In Orthodox teaching, the Trinity is called consubstantial, inseparable and life-giving. How to depict the Trinity on an icon without losing any of these concepts?
• The consubstantiality on the Rublev icon is conveyed by the fact that the angels are endowed with equal dignity.
• Their faces are similar - as if the same face is depicted in three versions.
• Each of the angels holds a rod in his hand - in commemoration of divine power.
• But at the same time, the angels are not the same: they have different postures, different attire.
• There are several more symbols on the icon: a tree, a mountain and a house.

• The first Angel, depicted on the left side of the icon, is dressed in a blue lower robe, an image of his divine, heavenly nature, and a light purple upper robe, testifying to the divine incomprehensibility and royal dignity of this Angel. Behind him, above the head, rises the house, the dwelling of Abraham. The house is, as it were, an image of the dispensation of Divine grace, and the fact that the image of the building is placed above the head of the first Angel indicates that before us is the Creator of the world Himself. And the features, and the expression of his face, and the laying of his hands, and the way He sits - everything speaks of His paternal dignity.

• The second angel is placed in the middle part of the icon. Above His head the oak stretches its branches. Oak is a reminder of the tree of life, which was in the middle of paradise, and the lost continuous communion with God. And in the New Testament, the image of a tree acquires the meaning of the Atonement of a person’s sin for the sake of restoring heavenly communion with the Lord: the tree speaks of a wooden cross on which the atoning sacrifice of Christ took place. The vestment of the second angel corresponds to that in which the Savior is usually depicted. The lower one has a dark purple color, which marks the incarnation, the blue tunic marks with its color His Divine dignity, the heavenlyness of His nature.

• The angel, placed on the right side of the icon, is the third Person of the Holy Trinity - the hypostasis of the Holy Spirit. Beyond the third Man is a mountain. The mountain is a symbol of the rapture of the spirit, that is, the spiritual ascent that the saved humanity carries out through the direct action of the third hypostasis of the Trinity - the Holy Spirit.

Among the descendants of Noah was the elder Abram. God promised him that he would become the father of a great, strong nation. Abram had a beautiful wife named Sarah, he became rich in his wanderings, he was wise, and everyone respected him. One thing that saddened Abram and Sarah was that despite God's promise, Abram and Sarah never had children until they were old.

Then one day Abram saw three men approaching his tent. traveler a. These were not travelers, but God in three persons - Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Thus, the 18th ch. The book of Genesis tells how three the one God already in the Old Testament appeared to Abraham and Sarah in the form of three wanderer ov, whom Abram and Sarah hospitably received at the Mamre oak (oak is a large tree): " The Lord appeared to him at the oak forest of Mamre... (= at the oak of Mamre). He raised (raised) his eyes (eyes), and looked, and behold, three men stand against him ... he ran towards ... bowed to the ground. And said:Lord ! if I found favor before the eyesYour do not pass by your servant. And bring some water and wash their feetyour ; andrest under this tree. And I will bring bread, andyou strengthen your hearts... and he took the calf... and hastened to prepare it... and set it before them; and he stood beside them under a tree. And they ate/Genesis 18, 1-8/.

This description combined earthly and heavenly; the presence of God is obvious, physically tangible. But the use of singular and plural forms attracts attention: Abraham sees three, but speaks to strangers as if they were either three or one; literally: 3=1. In the biblical interpretation, this fact is considered an indication of the first appearance of God the Trinity, the most obvious in the entire Old Testament (as a type of the future coming of the Son of God Jesus Christ to earth with the help of the Holy Spirit).

It is important to note why God came to Abraham. He came with the news that Abram and Sarah a son will be born which they have been waiting for all their lives, considering themselves childless. They really had a son a year later, who was named Isaac. He gave rise to the family of King David, from whom the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, later descended. Thus, the Old Testament, a book of prophecies about the events of the New Testament, becomes a preparation for these events. Abram and Sarah receive new names - ABRAAM and SARAH, because. become patriarchs of the Jewish people and the founders of the lineage of the Virgin Mary and, therefore, the earthly line of Jesus Christ.

The first appearance of God in the image of the Trinity in the Old Testament underlies the trinitarian dogma of Christianity. This dogma (teaching) asserts that God is one (= one) in three persons (triune, trinity): God is the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. It is inseparable, incomprehensible (= incomprehensible to the human mind) unity. Hence, for example, such a special superstitious love for the number 3 in Russian culture. This dogma found its most vivid embodiment in the icon "Trinity", named "Old Testament Trinity"(or "Hospitality of Abraham").

Icon (translated from Greek - image)

The icon is a type of religious painting. Due to some features of the development of Russian culture, the icon (image) and literature took on an additional burden - the philosophical understanding of the world, since the philosophical tradition itself received direct development in Russia quite late - in the 19th century. On this basis, we have the right to speak about the iconocentricity and literary centricity of Russian culture.

And these two phenomena also turned out to be interconnected.

Icon painting in Russia arose against the backdrop of the Byzantine-Russian dialogue of cultures (988) and is associated with the Middle Ages of the 10th-17th centuries - before the reforms of Peter the Great. During this time, the icon was the main means of artistic exploration of the world and the only way to reflect the ideals of ancient Russian man (holiness - Holy Russia, spirit-bearing - faith, hope, love).

The icon, thus, took on the additional function of philosophical understanding of the world.

The Russian religious philosopher of the Silver Age, Prince Evgeny Trubetskoy, called the icon " Speculation in colors ».

In Russia, a stable Byzantine tradition of depicting Jesus Christ, the Mother of God, saints and the events of the Bible was preserved and developed. But Russian icon painters embodied in it the spirit of their era, the spirit of the times, with the help of special writing techniques, special colors and poses of saints.

The specificity of the icon as a type of religious painting.

An icon is a type of religious painting, it was written either on a wooden board or on a stone (painting on church walls - frescoes). The choice of this material is not accidental - it is more durable and durable and reflects the eternal incorruptible nature of God. On the other hand, the wooden board on which the icon was written symbolizes the tree of knowledge, from which human sin began from Adam and Eve, as well as the cross, a sign of its redemption by Jesus.

In the system of Christian culture, the icon occupies a special place, while it has never been considered exclusively as a work of art.

Icon functions. The icon is text(text of the Bible), expressed in symbols, therefore requires the possession of certain skills in reading it. The word ICON in Greek means IMAGE. An icon is an image of the Prototype (that is, God, Mother of God, Saint). It contains the highest, mysterious, sacral(secret, divine) meaning. Its essence lies in the fact that the image of the icon, built on the realities of the world earthly(real, present, in which a person lives), reflects completely different concepts - the realities of the world heavenly(= higher, divine, incomprehensible - incomprehensible to the human mind).

Therefore, everything in the icon is symbolic. Each sign of the icon is a symbol - a “window to the spiritual world”, which, like any symbol, means something more than itself.

Color, light, paraphernalia (= details, things in the hands of saints), posture (= position of the body), gesture, interior - all these components of the symbolic language of the icon carry complex and deep sacred meanings. This is symbolic text.

First images of the Old Testament Trinity appeared in the Roman catacombs. They followed the text of the Old Testament, which speaks of the appearance of God to Abraham: "And the Lord appeared to him at the oak forest of Mamre, when he was sitting at the entrance to his tent, during the heat of the day. He lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, three men stood opposite him "(Gen. 18, 1-2). In full agreement with this text, the Persons of the Trinity are initially depicted in the form of men, and only by the 11th century - in the form of angels, which indicates a desire to somehow strengthen external signs holiness, but still the set table, at which Abraham's guests sit, gives the image the character of an everyday (life) scene.

The most significant images of the Old Testament Trinity in ancient Russian painting belong to two great icon painters - Feofan Grek and Andrei Rublev. They lived at about the same time, but belonged to different historical eras, so they put their worldview and ideas of their time into the images of the Trinity.

Feof a n Greek (1340-1405). Byzantine icon painter who created his own school of writing in Russia under the influence of the Novgorod icon painting school. In Novgorod, Theophan the Greek found himself in a very peculiar artistic environment, where highly learned Greek art (for example, some murals in the St. Sophia Cathedral in Novgorod) and the naive, but passionate, expressive local Novgorod tradition were mixed. Theophan the Greek worked in Novgorod, in Moscow, his work was greatly influenced by the Novgorod style of icon painting.

Theophanes the Greek divides all the creations of the world into light and darkness, heavenly and earthly. Hence the picturesque language of Theophanes: he writes everything in two colors - red and white. On a red background the color of the earth immersed in sinful darkness) white lightning flashes - light of god, fire God who burns the sins of man.

Everything is written energetically, expressively, in everything one can feel the spiritual struggle of a person striving for purification from sin, for the search for Divine light. And a person suffers, suffers in search of this path .

Theophan's God is a formidable judge. Let's see the fresco of Theophan " Trinity of the Old Testament», written on the plot of the appearance of three angels to Abraham and Saara - the Trinity, God in three persons. In this fresco there is a dining (refectory) table with a variety of food, as in the Old Testament story, as well as Abraham and Saara. Their presence emphasized dependence of the earthly on the heavenly- the angels sit at the top of the whole composition, at the refectory table, and people, as it were, serve them. The Byzantine master Theophanes the Greek in this follows the text of the Old Testament, where the story of the coming of three wanderers to Abraham and Sarah tells of the meeting of the earthly and the heavenly. Theophanes the Greek, who created his images during the period of the Mongol-Tatar yoke in Russia, calls for a fight, demands punishment and atonement for human sinfulness.

Semantic oppositions of Theophanes the Greek: struggle light-darkness, purity-sin, peace, silence - vanity ( used I.A. Bunin in the story "Clean Monday" ).

PhraseologismREPEAT YOUR SIN - suffer for your sin, repent of it

Novaya Gazeta: “The time will come when Saakashvili will have to atone for his bloody sin before God and the Ossetian people”

The great icon painter sees the world differently and reflects this visionAndrey Rublev. He also survived the Mongol-Tatar yoke, but he also saw the liberation from it, the end of the three hundred years of war.

Andrei Rublev (c.1360 - 1430). Worked in Vladimir, Moscow. He is called a classic of ancient Russian painting, as he is very deeply expressed in the icon the ideals of ancient Russian artistic thinking. This is a philosophy of humanity, kindness, love, harmony and spiritual beauty.. Only they could save Russia, lead her out of the dark circle of historical events. Therefore, the colors of Andrei Rublev are light and harmonious, the plots of his images are inscribed in a harmonious circle - a symbol of spiritual unity, catholicity.

The Trinitarian dogma, like the Christological dogma, is the basis of the Christian faith. According to the theologian Blessed Augustine, it is more difficult to comprehend the mystery of the Holy Trinity than to scoop out the sea with a spoon. The Holy Trinity is not a quantity, but a quality of God, incomprehensible to man, but given to him in revelation. The Rublevskaya icon becomes a turning point in the understanding of the Holy Trinity. Rublev, excluding the figures of Abraham and Sarah from the composition (Hospitality of Abraham - by F. Grek), focused our attention on the appearance of angels, in which the contemplative begins to see clearly image of the Trinity.

On a light gold background, three angels are depicted sitting around a table on which a bowl stands. Medium angel rises above the rest, behind him is depicted tree, behind the right angel - mountain, behind the left chambers. The heads of the angels are bowed in silent conversation. Their faces (faces) are similar, as if the same face (face) is depicted in three versions. The whole composition is inscribed in system of concentric circles, which can be drawn along the halos above the heads of angels (circles symbolizing eternity, the holiness of the depicted), along the wings, along the movement of angelic hands. And all these circles converge at the epicenter of the icon, where a bowl is depicted, and in it is the head of a calf - a sign of sacrifice.

Before us is the Eucharistic meal (=sacrifice, atonement for the sin of people by the blood of Jesus), in which the atoning sacrifice is performed.

The middle angel blesses the cup, the one sitting on the right accepts it, the right angel seems to move it to the one opposite. The main meaning of the Trinity is the Pre-Eternal Council about the Incarnation and the atonement of human sins through the sacrifice of Jesus, his crucifixion. Thus, God decides on the sacrifice of his Son - Jesus Christ. To do this, he must come to earth in the form of a man, and then be crucified on the cross - crucified. I ti.

A common interpretation sees in the middle angel of Jesus, because he is dressed in the clothes familiar to him on icons - a dark red chiton and a blue himation, and on his right shoulder there is a clave (special stripe) - a sign of Jesus, therefore, the father is the one to his right, and to the left of Jesus - the Holy Spirit.

Icon of the Holy Trinity - what is depicted on it? We will talk about this by considering the issue using the example of the ten most famous icons depicting the Holy Trinity.

The Holy Trinity

One of the founding fathers of ancient philosophy, and with it the entire European civilization, the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle said: "Philosophy begins with surprise." The same can be said about Christian dogma - it cannot but cause surprise. The worlds of Tolkien, Ende and Lewis, with all their fabulous mysteries, do not even draw a shadow of the mysterious and paradoxical world of Christian theology.

Christianity begins with the great mystery of the Most Holy Trinity - the mystery of God's Love, manifested in this one incomprehensible unity. V. Lossky wrote that in the Trinity we see the unity in which the Church exists. Just as the Persons of the Trinity are not mixed, but constitute the One, we are all gathered into the one Body of Christ - and this is not a metaphor, not a symbol, but the same reality as the reality of the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist.

How to portray a mystery? Only through another secret. The joyful mystery of the Incarnation made it possible to portray the Indescribable. The icon is a symbolic text about God and holiness, manifested in time and space and existing in eternity, just as the fairytale forest from Michael Ende's "The Neverending Story", created in the imagination of the protagonist, begins to exist without end and beginning.

We can comprehend this eternity thanks to another, far from the last mystery in the world of Christian theology: God Himself enlightens every Christian after the Apostles, giving Himself - the Holy Spirit. We receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit in the Sacrament of Chrismation, and it permeates the whole world, thanks to which this world exists.

So, the Holy Spirit reveals to us the mystery of the Trinity. And therefore the day of Pentecost - the Descent of the Holy Spirit on the apostles - we call the "Day of the Holy Trinity."

The Trinity and “Hospitality of Abraham” - the plot of the icon of the Life-Giving Trinity

The indescribable can be depicted only to the extent that it has been revealed to us. On this basis, the Church does not allow the image of God the Father. And the most correct image of the Trinity is the iconographic canon "Hospitality of Abraham", sending the viewer back to the distant Old Testament times:

And the Lord appeared to him at the oaks of Mamre, when he was sitting at the entrance to his tent, during the heat of the day.

He lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, three men stood before him. Seeing, he ran towards them from the entrance to the tent [his] and bowed to the ground, and said: Lord! if I have found favor in Your sight, do not pass by Your servant; and they will bring some water and wash your feet; and rest under this tree, and I will bring bread, and you will refresh your hearts; then go [on your way]; as you pass by your servant. They said: do as you say.

And Abraham hurried to the tent to Sarah and said to [her], quickly knead three sats of the best flour and make unleavened bread.

And Abraham ran to the flock, and took a tender and good calf, and gave it to the boy, and he hastened to prepare it.

And he took butter, and milk, and a calf that had been cooked, and set it before them, and he himself stood beside them under a tree. And they ate.

The story of a hospitable elder who recognized God in three men is in itself touching and instructive for any believer: if you serve your neighbor, you serve the Lord. We meet the image of this event very early.

Mosaic on the triumphal arch of the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome created in the 5th century. The image is visually divided into two parts. At the top, Abraham runs out to meet three men (one of them is surrounded by a radiance symbolizing the glory of the Godhead). At the bottom - the guests are already sitting at the laid table, and Abraham serves them. Sarah stands behind Abraham. The artist conveys the movement by depicting the old man twice: here he is giving instructions to his wife, but he turned around to put a new dish on the table.

By the 14th century, the canon "Hospitality of Abraham" had already fully developed. Icon "Trinity Zyryanskaya", which, according to legend, belonged to St. Stephen of Perm - a slightly modified version of it. Three angels are seated at the table, under it lies a calf, and Abraham and Sarah stand at the bottom left. In the background is a building with a turret (Abraham's house) and a tree (Mamvrian oak).

Images may change, but the set of symbols and characters remains the same: three angels, a couple serving them, below - a calf (sometimes with a youth slaughtering him), oak, Abraham's chambers. 1580, icon " Holy Trinity in existence”, surrounded by stamps with images of events related to the phenomena of the Trinity. An interesting detail: Abraham and Sarah are not just serving at the table, but also sitting at it. The icon is located in the Solvychegodsk Historical and Art Museum:

More typical, for example, is an icon of the 16th century from the Trinity Gerasimov Church in Vologda. Angels are in the center of the composition, behind them are Abraham and Sarah.

The icon is considered the pinnacle of Russian icon painting. Trinity, written by Reverend Andrei Rublev. A minimum of symbols: three angels (Trinity), a chalice (Atonement), a table (the Lord's meal, the Eucharist), a reverse perspective - "expanding" from the viewer (the space of the icon, describing the world above, is immeasurably larger than the world below). Of the recognizable realities - an oak (Mamre), a mountain (here is the sacrifice of Isaac, and Golgotha) and a building (Abraham's house? Church? ..).

This image will become a classic for the Russian icon, although there may be some discrepancies in the details. For example, sometimes a cross appears on the middle angel on a halo - this is how Christ is depicted on icons.

Icon of the Holy Trinity, XVII century

Another example: Simon Ushakov depicts the meal in more detail.

The canon "Hospitality of Abraham" is optimal for depicting the Holy Trinity: it emphasizes the unity of essence (three angels) and the difference of hypostases (angels are present in the space of the icon "autonomously" from each other).

Therefore, a similar canon is used when depicting the appearance of the Trinity to the saints. One of the most famous images Apparition of the Holy Trinity to the Monk Alexander of Svir:

Non-canonical images

However, there have been attempts to portray God in the Trinity and otherwise.

It is extremely rare in Western European and Russian temple painting to come across an image used in the iconography of the Renaissance, where three faces are combined in one body. In church painting, it did not take root due to obvious heresy (mixing Hypostases), and in secular painting - because of unaesthetic.

Image by Hieronymus Cosido, Spain, Navarre

But the image Trinity New Testament” is common, although there is another extreme in it - the division of the Essence of the Divine.

The most famous icon of this canon is “ Fatherland» Novogorodskaya school (XIV century). The Father sits on the throne in the form of a gray-haired old man, on his knees is the Child Jesus, holding a circle with the image of the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove. Around the throne are seraphim and cherubim, closer to the frame are saints.

No less common is the image of the New Testament Trinity in the form of the Elder Father, on the right hand - Christ the King (or Christ holding the Cross), and in the middle - the Holy Spirit also in the form of a dove.

XVII century., Museum of Old Russian Art. Andrey Rublev

How did the canon of the "New Testament Trinity" appear, if the image of God the Father, Whom no one has seen, is forbidden by the council? The answer is simple: by mistake. The book of the prophet Daniel mentions the Old Denmi - God:

The Ancient of Days sat down; His garment was as white as snow, and the hair of His head was like a pure wave. (Dan. 7:9).

It was believed that Daniel saw the Father. In fact, the apostle John saw Christ in exactly the same way:

I turned to see whose voice was speaking to me; And turning around, he saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the seven lampstands, like the Son of Man, clothed in a robe and girded around his chest with a golden sash: His head and hair were as white as a white wave, like snow ...

(Rev. 1:12-14).

The image of the "Old Denmi" exists in itself, but is the image of the Savior, not the Trinity. For example, on the fresco of Dionysius in the Ferapontov Monastery, a halo with the Cross is clearly visible, with which the Savior is always depicted.

Two more interesting images of the "New Testament Trinity" came from the Catholic Church. They are rarely used, but also worthy of attention.

Adoration of the Holy Trinity by Albrecht Dürer(the picture is kept in the Vienna Museum of Art History): at the top of the composition is the Father, below Him is Christ on the Cross, and above them is the Spirit as a dove. Worship of the Trinity is rendered by the Heavenly Church (angels and all saints with the Mother of God) and the Earthly Church - the bearers of secular (emperor) and church (pope) power, priests and laity.

Image " Coronation of the Mother of God”is associated with the Theotokos dogmas of the Catholic Church, but due to the deep veneration of the Most Pure Virgin by all Christians, it has also become widespread in Orthodoxy.

Virgin on images of the Trinity, Prado, Madrid

The Virgin Mary is depicted in the center of the composition, the Father and the Son hold a crown over Her head, and a dove depicting the Holy Spirit soars above them.