Image Worship

The first commandment emphasized the truth that God is God alone, and that there is no God beside Him. 

The second commandment presupposes the principle that God is a Spirit, invisible, and infinitely glorious.

Hence, while the first commandment deals with the question who and what God is, the second rather gives an answer, in negative form, to the question how God is. 

The negative and prohibitive form of this commandment is : "Thou shalt not make unto thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. Thous shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them."

Now, what does one do who presumes to make an image or representation of the invisible, incomprehensible, infinitely glorious God? He looks about himself in the visible universe. From that visible creation that exists in time and space, that, therefore, is strictly finite, limited, he derives his idea. He looks at the heavens above, at sun, moon, and stars; at the things in the earth beneath: man, beast, and creeping things; or at the creatures that are "under the earth," below the surface of the earth, in the waters: the fish of the sea, and all sorts of sea-monsters. Of them he makes an image, of silver or gold, of wood or stone. And he declares that the image he made is a true representation of God, that God is like unto the image he made.

This was the sin Israel committed at Horeb, a sin which they never overcame, the consequences of which pursued them all through the desert and throughout their whole history, until, finally, they were rejected as a nation, and the kingdom of God was taken away from them. They wanted to see their "gods" that brought them up out of the land of Egypt and that would go before them. For thus they spoke to Aaron: "Up, make us gods, which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him." For these visible gods they were willing to offer their gold. For, when Aaron told them to "break off the golden earrings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, of your daughters, and bring them to me, they willingly complied with his request. And after they had so done, Aaron "fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf." Then the people said: "These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." This god, which was supposed to be a representation of the living God, they worshipped. For it Aaron made an altar, and proclaimed: "Tomorrow is a feast unto the Lord." Unto it they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings and "sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play." Such is image worship.

It is the making of a lie about the invisible God, and worshipping that lie. The image worshipper wantonly deprives God of His glory.

For the living God is the Creator, but an image is always the representation of a creature. God is a Spirit and essentially invisible, but an image is always material and visible. God is the eternal One, but an image is the representation of a creature which drags God into the limits of time. God is immense, omnipresent, immanent and transcendent, but the image worshipper deprives God of His greatness. God is infinite in all His glorious virtues, but the image worshipper declares of a dumb image, which has neither knowledge nor understanding, which can neither hear nor speak, that it is a true representation of the God of glory. God is independent and exists of and by Himself: He is Jehovah, the eternal I AM, with whom there is no change or shadow of turning; but the image worshipper represents Him as a changeable creature, dependent on the one that made it, and that can be carried about according to the fancy of him that formed it. Image worship, therefore, is the heinous sin of dragging down the glorious Creator of heaven and earth to the level of the creature, and of depriving the Lord of glory of all His adorable virtues.

Nor must we imagine that this sin is committed only by pagans, and that it is inconceivable in the civilized, Christian world. Fact is that this sin is deeply ingrained in our sinful nature. By nature, we all image worshippers. We are always inclined to lie about God, and to deprive Him of His glorious attributes. No, indeed, we do not carve or chisel a representation of God in wood or stone, in gold or silver, as do the heathen. But we do make images of Him in our mind, in our false conceptions of Him. Many are the images of the living God formed by modern theology and philosophy. Whenever we form a conception of God that is not according to His own revelation in the Holy Scriptures, we lie about God and make an image of Him. When we conceive of God as a Being that is so filled with love that He condones sin, we deny His righteousness and make an image of Him. When we imagine a God that is so merciful that He cannot possible cast the sinner into eternal desolation as punishment for his sin, we deprive Him of the glory of His immutable justice, and form an image of Him in our mind. When, in our prayers, we attempt to approach God without seeking forgiveness in the blood of Christ Jesus our Lord, we are worshipping an image just as really as the Israelites at Horeb worshipped the golden calf. When we conceive of God as a sort of a Santa Claus, that exists to bestow all kinds of good things upon us, to fight our wars and give us our victories; as a God that must solve the problems we create in our sinful world, as One to whom we cry when we are in trouble, but for the rest forget Him, Whom we do not care to glorify and in Whose way we do not care to walk, we simply worship an image of our own making. When we deny the Scriptural truth of election and reprobation, deny that He is merciful to whom He will be merciful and whom He will He hardens; when we represent God as, in saving the sinner, being dependent on the will of man, so that the latter must open the door of his heart before God can enter; or when we conceive of Him as being gracious, in the preaching of the gospel, to all that hear, head for head, and soul for soul, we deny His absolute sovereignty, and fashion an image of God just as really as the pagans carve one in wood or chisel one in stone. If we entertain the dualistic notion that God is the Lord of all good but not of evil; that He sends us health, but not sickness, prosperity but not adversity, peace but not war, plenty of work but not times of depression, life but not death; we deny that God is the Lord of all the earth, and we worship our own lie.

Thus could we continue. But let this be sufficient to convince us that the sin of image worship dwells in our own sinful flesh, and that, according to the inclination of our evil nature, we are always inclined to worship our own lie and to deny the God that has revealed Himself in His Word in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The second commandment puts its finger on a very sore spot in our sinful nature when it warns us: "Thou shalt not make unto thyself any graven image..."

No, indeed, this does not mean that we may not make any representations of the creature as such. It certainly does not imply that the second commandment forbids all works of art, such as sculpture or painting or photography. This is not the implication of the second commandment. Of course, even in this respect we must clearly discern between the true and the false, and not at random characterize every work of art as a beautiful product of "common grace." So called "lovers of art" are apt to walk around in old Athens and admire the beautiful remains of sculpture produced by the old Greeks. They reveal, according to some, the marvel of God's "common grace." But the apostle Paul viewed these same works of art with a different eye, and "his spirit was stirred within him, when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry." The same judgment I would pass on much of modern art, such as e.g., cubistic painting. Nevertheless, the second commandment certainly does not forbid to make representations of creatures, or of anything at all in creation. When, in our homes, we have paintings or photographs we are not violating the second commandment. What is forbidden is to make any image in order to represent God. This is also the teaching of the Heidelberg Catechism in question and answer 97: "Are images then not at all to be made? God neither can, nor may be represented by any means: but as to creatures; though they may be represented, yet God forbids to make, or to have any resemblance of them, either to worship them or to serve God by them." ...

Ursinus, in his exposition of the Heidelberg Catechism, offers eight reasons why images should not be tolerated in the churches. These are as follows:

(1) It is contrary to the express command of God that images should be made and set up in churches.

(2) Images placed in churches have been the occasion and means of horrible idolatry in the Romish Church.

(3) God expressly commanded that idols should be removed, as well as every corruption of the true doctrine and worship of God, and in this way declared His displeasure against idolatry. 

(4) Our confession of the sincere worship, and our hatred to idolatry, cannot be expressed only in words, but must reveal itself in outward actions. Hence, we ought to remove all images from our churches.

(5) The Scriptures speak in commendation of pious kings, such as Asa, Hezekiah, Josiah, who destroyed the images and idols which had been set up. 

(6) We must avoid all offence, and prevent all superstition and idolatry, so that the church and ignorant souls may be preserved from danger and sin, which formerly fell upon our forefathers for their idolatry. 

(7) The enemies of the church may not be given occasion by this spectacle which looks so very much like idolatry to be driven farther from a profession of the truth and to cast reproach upon it. 

(8) Images have never resulted in any good to those that had them. The history of Israel plainly reveals that images were always the cause of corruption and idolatry.

To this we may add that it is always quite impossible not only to make an image of God, but even to make an image of Christ incarnate. The Catechism contrasts the use of images in the churches with the lively preaching of the Word. And that is undoubtedly correct. Suppose you have images of all the phases of the historical Jesus, as He sojourned on earth in the years 1 to 33 A. D. Would all those images together be a true representation of the Christ of the Scriptures? They would not; and they could never be. You may make an image of the Babe of Bethlehem lying in the manger; but that image could never represent the Son of God incarnate. You can make images of all the phases of the suffering of Christ on the Via Dolorosa in its different stages - images that are usually set up in the Roman Catholic Churches; but can an image of the cross possibly represent the Word of the Cross, the logos tou staurou, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them? That is forever impossible. Such an image cannot possibly serve as a book for the laity, but can only serve to cover up the gospel of Jesus Christ our Lord. God was not only in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself when the Son of God in human nature died on the accursed tree, but He also put the Word of the cross in the apostles. And the apostles proclaimed that Word of the cross. If it had not been for that revelation of God Himself, we could never have understood the cross. And that cross, arrested in one of its moments by a dumb image, is deprived of all its glory and power. And what to say of an image of the Christ in His resurrection, and in His ascension, and in His exaltation at the right hand of God? It is evident that a dumb image in wood or stone can only serve to deprive the exalted Christ of His glory and power. Hence, we must not have images in the churches, not even as books of the laity. For they can never represent the glorious gospel of God revealed in Jesus Christ our Lord. But we must have the lively preaching of the Word of God, which brings unto is the complete Christ of the Scriptures, the Son of God in the flesh, conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary, Who suffered and died for our sins, and in Whom God reconciled us unto Himself, Who rose for our justification in the glory of immortality, and Who is exalted at the right hand of God, there to make intercession for all His people. Hence, the Heidelberg Catechism is certainly correct when it states in the answer to Question 98: We must not pretend to be wiser than God, who will have His people taught, not by dumb images, but by the lively preaching of His Word."


Herman Hoeksema 
The Triple Knowledge, III: 156-167
   

"Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"

The practical implications of this are very important. On the surface we may probably imagine that this negative form of the commandment, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me," does not apply to us. AS long as we have an eye for that coarser form of idolatry found among the nations of heathendom, bowing themselves before idols of gold and silver, of wood and stone, worshipping the powers of nature, the beasts of the field and creeping things, we may say that we are no idolaters. The first commandment in its negative form has lost its significance for us, Its positive implication may perhaps be still of value. It may serve to remind us that we must always and with all our heart and mind and soul and strength serve the living God. But idolaters, servers of other gods, we surely are not. About this, however, we will change our mind as soon as we understand that we always serve some god. Hence, in as far as we are not delivered from sin, from the inclination of our sinful nature, we are exactly inclined to idolatry; that is, we are inclined to rule out the true God and to place something next to Him in which we trust and on which we rely. Nor is it difficult to discover this tendency to idolatry in our practical life as believers in the world. How often in prosperity do we not place our own strength and ingenuity, conditions and circumstances, next to the living God, or instead of Him. Or, how frequently in distress, in trouble or adversity, in sickness and suffering, do we fix our eye on men, on things, on means, next to the Lord of life and death. All this, according to the Catechism, is idolatry. Next to the Lord there is nothing. He is God, and God alone. Beside Him there is no Savior. All things and every creature are but means in His hand. And therefore, to place our trust in things or creatures is to rob the living God of His glory and is to serve idols.

We may notice too that emphatically the first commandment reveals God to us as a personal Being. He is a Being with intellect and will. He confronts us not as a vague, impersonal power, but as a Person, that speaks to you, that reveals His will to you, that demands that you shall love Him. And in relation to Him as you stand as a rational and moral being, Whose Word you hear, Whose will you are obliged to obey, to Whom you must devote yourselves with all your heart and mind and soul and strength. He is a God whom you may know, to Whom you may speak, to Whom you make your needs known, before Whom you may pour out your hearts, in Whom you may trust, and with Whom you may have fellowship. He speaks of thou and me: Thou shalt have no other gods before me." He is, therefore, not a vague, impersonal power, such as the wind, or the power of electricity. Now should you ever speak of Him as "a kind of Providence," or in similar terms. Neither should we confuse or identify Him with the world, as Pantheism does, and say that God is all, and the world is God. He is an Ego, a Person, a distinct Being. He is the Lord your God.

But the basic principle of the first commandment, in distinction from all the others, is that it reveals to us that God is One, and that He is God alone. There is no God beside Him. And this means, in the first place, that God is a simple Being: He is not composed of parts. You cannot divide Him. All His virtues are essentially one in Him. In fact, He is His virtues. God is infinite in virtues and perfections, such as power and wisdom, righteousness and mercy, justice and grace, love and truth. But all these perfections are in God essentially the same. You cannot present them as being in conflict one with another. You dare not say, for instance, that God is just, but that He is also merciful. On the contrary, you should say that God's mercy is always a just mercy, and His justice is ever a merciful justice. You may not say that God is filled with wrath against the wicked, but that He is also a God of love. You should say: God is love: therefore, He is filled with holy wrath against all the workers of iniquity. Nor is it possible to divide and separate the virtues of God. If you should argue thus: "I like a God of love and mercy, but I must have nothing of a God that is righteous and just, that damns sinners into everlasting perdition," you do not love God at all. You make your own god and worship an idol. God is one. His love is also His wrath. His grace is also His righteousness. His mercy is inseparable from His justice.

...But that God is One also signifies that He is God alone. There is no Go beside Him. God does not belong to a class or a category of beings. There are no gods. God is not a god; He is God. We say that a rose is a flower. There are many flowers, and the rose is one of them. We say that Mr. Jones is a man. There are many men, and Mr. Jones is one of them. But you cannot say: The Lord is god; there are many gods, and Jehovah is one of them. This is the implication of the first commandment, "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." This commandment cannot mean that there are indeed other gods, but that you shall not offer them your worship or put your confidence in them. It does not even mean that among all gods the Lord is supreme, that He is the highest above all gods. Such indeed was and still is the philosophy of the heathen, whether cultured or uncivilized. They say indeed: "We all have our gods. You have you god, and so have we. And we prefer our own." This is not the language of Scripture. Nor will the believing Christian ever speak thus. The believer is intolerant. He claims: "God is GOD. He is God alone. There is nothing beside, above, or next to Him, or even under Him, that can be called or may be worshipped as God. The idol is nothing. It is a figment of man's own evil imagination." Such is the implication of the first commandment.

This implies further that God alone is the Lord: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one Lord." That He is Lord, and one Lord, implies that He is the sole and absolute Proprietor of all things: "The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof." He is the Creator of the heavens and of the earth and of all things they contain. He is their only Possessor, to do with them according to His good pleasure. This signifies too that He alone has all authority, that His is the sole prerogative to determine what the creature shall do and what purpose he shall serve. He is the only lawgiver, Whose will is the criterion for the whole universe and for every creature. Besides, it means that He is the sole Judge, that judges all the world with equity. Moreover, it implies that His is all the power, and that He governs all things according to His eternal good pleasure. No creature is exempt from His control. Nothing betides in heaven or in earth, but by His will. For mark you well, He is not a Lord, but the Lord. He is not merely supreme Lord, but simply Lord, Lord over all, and Lord alone. Even as you cannot divide God's virtues, so you cannot split His Lordship. Lord is He, not only over the good things, but also over the evil; not only of the righteous, but also of the wicked; not only of life, but also of death; not only of prosperity, but also of adversity; not only of peace, but also of war. All things are absolutely under His Lordship, and under His alone: "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." This He can say because He is God alone, and God is the Lord.

Such, then, are the implications of the first commandment. 

God is One, and there is no God beside Him.

Now, when we are saved by grace, redeemed by the blood of Christ, and, in principle delivered from the power of sin and death, so that we stand in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, we embrace the this truth of God and confess it from the heart. Then indeed we respond to this language of the law: "Yea, Jehovah, Thou art my God, and Thou art God alone. There is none beside Thee. Thou art Lord. And I know and confess Thee as my Lord, my Sovereign, my King forever. And Thou hast redeemed me, delivered me out of the power of sin and death, to clothe me with righteousness and life." And then the prayer rises from our heart and from our lips: "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" And the answer comes from the first commandment: "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." And this commandment we love, even as it comes to us in its negative, or prohibitive, form. For, on the one hand, we deeply feel that the motions of sin are still in our members, and that therefore we are always inclined to seek and to serve other gods. And, on the other hand, we understand that the positive meaning of this commandment is that we shall know and acknowledge and worship the one only true God, and Him alone.


Herman Hoeksema 
The Triple Knowledge, III: 134-138   

The Triple Knowledge is available at http://rfpa.org/