Editorial July 3, 1915 Issue

True Iconoclasm

Annie M. Knott

There is great difference of opinion respecting the value of iconoclasm, or image-breaking; and well there may be, since so much that is classed in this way is destructive to the good in human consciousness as well as to the bad. The word iconoclast, indeed, has come to include those who attack the cherished beliefs of others, and especially with respect to religion. According to sacred history, Abraham was the first notable iconoclast. It is said that Terah, his father, was a maker of images, and from his boyhood Abraham was closely associated with gods made by men's hands. At length spiritual enlightenment came to him, and he not only renounced idolatry, but proceeded to destroy the images which he had helped to make; for which offense he was sentenced by the priests to die by fire. Tradition has it that he came out of this ordeal unharmed, and soon received and obeyed the divine command to leave behind him his country and kindred, and under divine guidance to found a great nation in a land which God would show him.

It is not necessary here to pass upon the literal correctness of these accounts. What concerns us is to know that Abraham not only emerged from idolatry, but gained such a concept of God that he could commune with the one perfect Mind and be conscious of divine guidance at every step of the way. Nor was this all, for his abandonment of false gods did not leave him stranded on the dreary shores of materialism, as have been many since his day who essayed to break the idols of an unreasoning and unreasonable theology, but who failed to give men something better in the place of that which they took away. It matters not that many of these have pleaded sincerity, for those who would probe the wounds of humanity can never bring to it healing by offering a mere negation. God is the one necessity of our existence from childhood up, and whether we pray well or ill, pray we must.

It is true that inconsistent concepts of Deity cannot last, because they fail to meet human need, and it requires no "image-breaker" to make this apparent sooner or later. Of the true reformer it may be said, "He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second." Such was Abraham, who in turning away from idols found "the living and true God;" found, too, "the faith that makes faithful" and made it a living power in all the ages since his day. Christ Jesus is sometimes called the great iconoclast. He indeed lifted thought above an imperfect concept of God to the open vision of the Father, who not only "hath life in himself," but who also gives to the Son the understanding by which to have "life in himself," which in Christian Science would mean the reflection of the Life divine. The great Teacher was stern and unsparing in his denunciations of idolatry, by whatever name it might be called, but he was ever ready with the proof that God is Love as well as Life.

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