History of the image creation
The most ancient icons dedicated to the birth of Jesus Christ are images created by the first Christians. They were created in the catacombs, since the church was persecuted for a long time. Later, the iconography was formed by Byzantine masters based on the Gospel. The story of the birth of the Savior was sanctified by two evangelists - Luke and Matthew. Church tradition was also used.
Orthodox icon "Nativity of Christ"
Orthodoxy came to Rus' from the Byzantine Empire, and therefore the iconography of the image. The truly Orthodox image was created by the great master Andrei Rublev. The icon dates back to the 15th century – the period of Middle Antiquity. It is made in the Byzantine style. The master created it during the design of the Annunciation Cathedral. Later, the icon began to be placed in home iconostases as an independent image. The Feast of the Nativity of Christ is celebrated on January 7th. On this day, it is not the icon itself that is venerated, but the great event depicted on it.
Celebration
The holiday of the birth of the Messiah symbolizes the beginning of a new era in the history of the Christian religion. The celebration is considered the twelfth (one of the 12 most important) and is celebrated on January 7, preceded by the Nativity Fast.
This day is dedicated to the appearance of the main savior, who to this day continues to protect and protect people from many life circumstances.
As a sign of reverence and respect for the Lord God, people with their whole families go to religious services, during and at the end of which they pray to Jesus Christ, thanking him for never ceasing to hear and always coming to the rescue.
Iconography of the icon
The peculiarity of the iconography of the image “Nativity of Christ” is its multiplicity. One canvas illuminates several scenes associated with the birth of Jesus Christ. In the center of the icon is an image of the Most Holy Theotokos and the Infant God. They are in a cave, as it is said in the Holy Gospel.
The Savior himself is depicted in a manger - a special feeding trough for animals. Near him are the animals themselves: a donkey and an ox. According to legend, they were in the cave at the time of the birth of Christ. There is also a legend that there were old and sick animals in that cave. But they were healed, strengthened and were able to get up. In front of the image of the Lord are placed the Magi, who came to worship the Savior of the world and brought Him gifts.
The canonical icon has other features:
- Upper left corner. The Magi are depicted here. For now they are only following the star leading them to the city of Bethlehem.
- Top right corner. The Heavenly Host is written here - the Angels of God glorifying the birth of the Savior.
- To the right of the center image. This part of the icon contains an image of shepherds. They received news from the Angels and rushed to the cave.
- Bottom right corner. Describes the scene of the washing of the born Child of God.
- Lower left corner. Two figures are placed here, one of which is depicted as larger - this is the image of the righteous Joseph. He is at the feet of the Most Pure One. The smaller figure is St. Prophet Isaiah. In the Old Testament period, he prophesied about the coming of the Savior into the world, His birth from the Most Pure Virgin.
The icon is made in bright colors, which symbolizes the joy and triumph of the earthly and heavenly worlds. Jesus voluntarily came into the world to accept terrible torment and death on the cross for the sake of sinful man.
Catholic images are strikingly different from the Orthodox canonical icon. Usually they depict the Holy Family in a cave above a manger without a multiplicity of subject matter. And in the paintings of artists, for example, Caravaggio, unacceptable things are depicted (the naked shoulder of the Most Pure One).
The peculiarity of the iconography of the image is its multiplicity
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ICONOGRAPHY OF THE NATIVITY OF CHRIST
The Day of the Nativity of Christ was established in honor of the birth of the Divine Infant Jesus Christ in Bethlehem by the Mother of God and from the 4th century. celebrated by the church on December 25 (in the new style - January 7). Since that time, this event has been embodied in fine art. One of the main motives of the Nativity icons is the welcoming of Christ’s appearance into the world and the worship of God as King and Judge. The whole world: a host of angels, wise men with gifts, shepherds and even the Star of Bethlehem worship the Infant God. The visual plot is based on the stories of the evangelists Matthew and Luke and apocryphal books, primarily Pseudo-Matthew and the Proto-Gospel of James, which contain all the details reflected in the icons. The so-called carpet composition of an icon depicts on one level events that occurred in different places and at different times, so that we see them at the same time. According to the apocryphal Pseudo-Matthew, the animals worshiped Christ in the manger on the third day after Christmas, and the wise men reached Jerusalem and Bethlehem only two years later. This does not prevent the Magi from being depicted in the Nativity scene next to the nativity scene and manger. Accents are placed using color and arrangement of parts of the image. The plot of the Nativity, one of the first “historical”, and not just symbolic-allegorical plots, appears quite often, for example, in the Roman catacombs (in the catacomb of St. Sebastian of the 4th-5th centuries an ox and a donkey are depicted bending over a manger with the Infant God). The early Christian iconographic scheme of the Nativity plot, with some variations, has survived to this day. Over time, Byzantine art developed a stable canonical model, which combines all the episodes of the tradition and which served as a model for the compositional construction of the Nativity of the Mother of God and the Nativity of John the Baptist. Russian iconography of the Nativity got its start in Byzantium. The most ancient Russian images, which are certainly present in the festive row of the iconostasis, follow the Byzantine canon. Later, an incomplete scheme began to exist, and deviations from the canon appeared.
According to the decision of the Stoglavy Council of 1551 (“The Stoglavy Cathedral was in Moscow under the Great Sovereign Tsar and Grand Duke Ivan Vasilyevich in the summer of 7059”), the icons of Andrei Rublev’s writing were recognized as the standard of icon painting as “the most Orthodox” and canonical: “Painters should paint icons from the ancients” examples of how Greek painters write or wrote, and how Rublev wrote, ... and do nothing from your plans.” In the guide to iconography, “The Iconographic Original of S.T. Bolshakov (1903), the canon is given: “The Hedgehog according to the flesh is the Nativity of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ. The Nativity of Christ is written: 3 angels look at the star, the front robe has azure, and two have an angel buchan, an angel announces the good news to the shepherd, cinnabar robe, under the azure, on the shepherd there is a bakan robe, the Most Pure One lies at the nativity scene, the robe has a hook, the Young Savior lies in the manger , the manger is vohra, the nativity scene is black, and a horse looks halfway into it, and on the other side a cow sees, halfway up, three angels above the nativity scene, a mountain of vohra with whitewash, on the right side the vols bowed, three of them, one old, Vlasyev’s brother, in a hat, the robe is green, the underside is cinnabar, the second middle brada is Kozmin, in the hat, the robe is cinnabar, the underside is game, the third is young like George, in the hat, the robe is gaff, the underside is azure game, and all of them are holding a vohryan in their hands, under them is a mountain , and in the mountain there is a den, Joseph the Betrothed is sitting on a stone, the braid of the Apostle Peter, the robe is green, from under the cormorant, and he closed it with his hand, and propped it up with the other, and in front of him stands a shepherd, sitting, the brad of John the Theologian, bald, a shaggy robe of goat meat, azure with in ink, in his hand there are three crutches, and he held out the other to Joseph, behind them is a young shepherd, a cinnabar robe, and he is driving goats, black and white and striped. Baba Solomiya sits on the floor of the mountain, her robe is lowered to her waist, her underside is white, her hands are bare, and she holds Christ with her hand, and the other hand in the font, her robe is cinnabar, her underside is azure.” So, in the composition of the icon of the Nativity of Christ the following events are presented: The Mother of God reclines in a den (cave) near a manger. A donkey and an ox (or a horse and a cow) bent over the Baby lying in the manger. A ray of light from the Star of Bethlehem falls on the cave from above. At the top right, angels (or one angel) are traditionally depicted preaching the gospel to shepherds (less often to one shepherd); on the left are three angels - the personification of the heavenly powers; below is often a scene of the adoration of the Magi. Even lower is a midwife with a baby in her arms or two midwives washing the baby. Also below is the doubting Joseph with the figure standing before him. The icon may also depict other events: the scene of the beating of infants (King Herod ordered the extermination of all infants under two years of age), the Annunciation to Joseph, the flight of Joseph, Mary and the Son of God to Egypt (at the instigation of an angel), the appearance of an angel to the Magi, the procession of the Magi , the salvation of the infants John the Baptist and Nathanael and others.
THE VIRGIN In the center of the composition of the icon of the Nativity of Christ is the Mother of God. Usually She is presented in front of the entrance to the cave lying on a bright red bed (regardless of which direction She is facing), which emphasizes the reality of Christmas and thereby the Incarnation. According to Catholic tradition, the Mother of God is depicted sitting, bending over a manger, thus placing special emphasis on the purity and virginity of the Mother of God (Her usual name is the Virgin Mary). In the Orthodox Church, Mary is more often called the Mother of God, the Mother of God. Orthodoxy cares about the reality of Christmas, and therefore the reality of the Incarnation, the union of Divine and human nature (since the 17th century, under the influence of Western tradition, the Mother of God sometimes begins to be depicted sitting at a manger). The Virgin Mary is depicted turning away from the swaddled Christ. This position of the Mother of God indicates that the Infant of God born by Her no longer belongs to Her, but to the whole world. This turn also symbolizes the Mother of God’s appeal to the world, for which from now on She must become an intercessor and comforter. The mountain in which we see the cave with the manger is traditionally associated with the Mother of God, and the cave in this case can be interpreted as Her womb. The cave also symbolizes the fallen world, in which the “Sun of Truth” - Christ - shone. MENCH Next to the Virgin Mary is the Infant God lying in a manger. His head is in a cross-shaped halo - the usual iconographic attribute of Christ. John Chrysostom says that the manger represents the throne of heaven, and the cattle represent the presence of the angels. The animals closest to Christ are depicted - the ox and the donkey (part of universal worship, the creature worships the Creator). They are not mentioned in the Gospel. Traditionally, the prophecy of Isaiah is cited as a biblical source, in which the ox, the donkey and the manger are brought together in relation to the Lord: “The ox knows its owner, and the ass its master’s manger; But Israel does not know Me, My people do not understand” (Isaiah 1:3). Interpreters of this plot agree that the ox (who spends his entire life in a yoke) is a symbol of the Jews, Israel (living within the framework of the Law), and the donkey is a symbol of the pagans. And between them is depicted the divine Child, who accepts both of them and frees them from under the yoke: some from the yoke of the law, others from the worship of idols. On Russian soil, due to the loss of understanding of the meaning of this image, the ox and donkey are often replaced by the cow and horse familiar in rural use.
STAR At the top there is a semicircle of the sky with a star, from which comes a ray falling on the Baby lying in the manger (sometimes three rays - in the image of the Trinity). It was the Star of Bethlehem that led the magi and shepherds to the birthplace of the Savior. Therefore, the characters' attention is often focused on the star. The star determines the axis of the composition, and the ray falling on the manger of the Infant indicates the main miracle of this moment - the Birth of “He who existed before the ages,” the position in the manger of the Immense One, the wrapping of the swaddling clothes of the One who “covers the sky with clouds.” According to St. John Chrysostom, the star was not just a physical phenomenon, but an “angelic force.” The star was also interpreted as the Holy Spirit. In some later images of Christmas in the 17th-18th centuries. the star is replaced by an angel. SHEPHERDS The Nativity icon certainly depicts two or three shepherds - young and old (less often - one shepherd). The elder is one of the most beloved figures by Russian icon painters, on icons of the 15th–16th centuries. he is called the “shepherd”, and on some icons of the 17th century. - Anenom. The shepherds, the first of all people to learn about the Nativity of the Savior, are simple souls, “the worthless things of this world.” The Lord in his sermon exalted the image of the shepherd, saying about Himself “I am the Good Shepherd.” The shepherds in the images of the Nativity express delight, the intoxication of a miracle, which only the “pure in heart” and “poor in spirit” are capable of. Here (above) the angels preaching the gospel to them is depicted.
THE MAGIC Guided by the Star of Bethlehem, the Magi - the old man Gaspar, the young man Melchior and the middle-aged Belshazzar - are the first pagans who came to worship Christ and brought him gifts (the three ages emphasize the fact that Divine Revelation is given to people regardless of age and life experience). The Magi, in a sense, can be contrasted with the shepherds. They are learned people who have cognized all human wisdom and the Wisdom of God poured out in nature, accessible to the knowledge of the pagans. The Magi sought in heaven and on earth only the truth and did not stop at any obstacles when the good news of the birth of the One who said about Himself “I am the Way and the Truth and the Life” appeared to them in the form of a star. The gifts of the Magi to God are gold, frankincense and myrrh. John Chrysostom writes that they symbolize science, love and obedience, which the eastern sages bring to God. St. Augustine and St. Gregory the Double see in the gifts of the Magi the recognition of Christ as a King (offering of gold), God (offering of incense) and a Man ready to die (offering of myrrh).
ANGELS In the upper part of the composition, an angelic army is presented, praising and singing: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will towards men.” Angels teach the shepherds, and at the same time all people, to sing with them.
WASHING OF CHRIST The lower part of the icon depicts the washing of the infant Christ, which is performed by two women (less often, one). The midwife was brought to the cave by the righteous Joseph. Having seen the miraculous birth, she called another woman into the cave, Salome, who had doubts about everything that was happening. We read the description of subsequent events in Tradition (Pseudo-Matthew): “And as soon as Salome extended her finger, she screamed and said: Woe to my unbelief, for I dared to tempt God. And now my hand is taken away as if on fire... and then the angel of the Lord appeared before her and said to her: Salome, Salome, the Lord has listened to you, bring your hand to the baby and hold Him, and healing and joy will come for you. And Salome came and took the Child, saying, I will worship Him, for a great King of Israel has been born. And Salome was immediately healed.” The scene of the washing of Christ by Salome appears in Nativity compositions later than the images of the Nativity themselves; art historians name the ciborium from the Cathedral of San Marco in Venice (5th century) and the pulpit of Maximilian (550) among the first. The second woman (usually shown pouring water into the font) is sometimes called Zelomia. The image of the Baby's bathing again emphasizes the truth of the coming of God in the flesh and testifies to the actual Incarnation of God. In the bathing of the Baby one can see a prototype of the Baptism of the Lord.
JOSEPH THE BEROAD The last necessary element of the iconography of the Nativity is the image of Joseph sitting in thought. This pose is associated with his doubts after the Annunciation. Joseph's doubts about the iconography of the Nativity materialize in the figure of an old man in goatskins standing over him. This figure has caused and continues to cause a lot of controversy among researchers. To some, this strange old man seems to be simply a shepherd who came to talk with Joseph about the mysteries of the House of God; another - Jacob, the apocryphal son of Joseph, who allegedly accompanied his father to Bethlehem and was also a witness of the Nativity of the Savior; the third - the prophet Isaiah, who predicted the birth of the Child by the Virgin (but the absence of a halo above his head testifies against this), the fourth - the embodiment of Joseph’s doubts in the image of the devil (who is sometimes presented with horns or a tail). The last interpretation is the most common. In this case, the elder’s crooked stick symbolizes the lie on which he relied in his conversation with Joseph. In their dialogue, according to researchers, the collision of two worlds is shown: the rationalistic one, which does not want to believe in miracles, and therefore in any form of spiritual life, and the world of the Spirit, in which man is not subject to earthly laws.
https://www.lectures.edu.ru/default.asp?ob_no=16400
Additional stories
A number of icon plots have their own characteristics:
- Animals. The image of an ox and a donkey not only conveys the true state of affairs as described in the Gospel, but also focuses on the fact that there was no place for Jesus in the city. Although at that time the people were expecting the coming of the Savior, and almost everyone knew the signs of the time when He was supposed to appear.
- Angels. Iconographically, it turned out that at the top of the image is the Heavenly Host. Holy Angels praise the Lord.
- Description of the shepherds. One of the shepherds is seen wearing a skin used as clothing. Such robes were used by very poor people in those days. Shepherds constantly tended their flocks. They lived simply, were virtuous people and really looked forward to the coming of the Savior. By God's grace, the simple poor people were the first to worship Him.
The iconographic features of the image allow the use of the plot of the flight of the Holy Family to Egypt.
Adoration of the Magi. Fragment of a fresco by Dionysius
Nativity. Icon of Andrei Rublev. 1405
Icon from the festive row of the iconostasis. 17th century
The meaning of the holy image
The birth of Jesus Christ is an important event in the life of all humanity from the creation of the world until the onset of the Last Judgment. After the Savior came into the world, the life of every individual person changed. The Lord took on flesh, and people became children of God. This is vividly depicted in the Nativity of Christ icon.
But Jesus came into the world to voluntarily accept terrible torment for the sake of every person and thereby save humanity. Already from the Bethlehem cave, His path to Golgotha and the cave in which He was buried can be traced. By His coming into the world, Christ opened salvation for people, the door to the Kingdom of Heaven.
When was Christ born?
The exact date is hidden from people. January 25 was set arbitrarily by a certain mathematician monk who compiled the Julian calendar. Over time, astronomical “surpluses” accumulated, for two whole weeks. Therefore, the whole world at the end of the 16th century. switched to the more accurate Gregorian calendar. Russia accepted it only in 1918, and the Russian Orthodox Church still lives according to the Julian style.
Therefore, many may have the wrong impression that our country has its own Christmas. No, it falls on the same date, just according to a different calendar. According to a number of researchers, Jesus Christ could not have been born at the end of December, but everything happened in the spring, before the Jewish Passover. In principle, this is not decisive for the salvation of the soul, otherwise the Lord would have preserved the exact date.
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In the first centuries of Christianity, people did not celebrate birthdays at all. For them, the most important day was the day of death - this is the date of a person’s birth into eternal life, the day of his union with the Creator. Therefore, the Nativity of the Savior was also not celebrated, or rather, it was combined with the Epiphany. Only years later it was decided to set a separate date for this important event. The holiday became widespread for Christians only in the 4th century; in Russia it began to be celebrated in the 10th century, after the baptism of Prince Vladimir.
How does the Nativity of Christ icon help?
In prayers to Christ, an Orthodox person can pour out all his experiences, pain and joy. In front of the icon you can ask for help, thank, praise God and simply tell Him about everything. The Lord loves and waits for every person.
The merciful Lord arranges people's lives in such a way that all circumstances lead to the salvation of the soul. After all, the only goal of earthly life is to be saved, to gain the Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, you need to understand that if the Lord does not give what you ask for, it is not beneficial for a person.
At the end of each prayer it is worth adding “But not as I want, but as You please,” “Thy will be done.” An icon should not be perceived as a talisman or a way to get rid of financial needs or other worries.
Author's advice
The Feast of the Nativity of Christ is celebrated on January 7
Prayer before the icon of the Nativity of Christ
Lord God, glorify the day when Your Birth happened! We, sinners, turn to You for help and ask to save us from the difficulties and problems of everyday life. Hear our prayers and help us find peace of mind, peace and harmony. Appear to us and help us, who are turning to You, the Great Savior. Amen.
The “Nativity of Christ” icon depicts an important event for humanity - the coming of the Savior into the world. It is necessary to distinguish between the Orthodox image and the Catholic one, especially separating simply paintings that cannot be perceived as icons, despite their content. In the house, the icon should be placed in the iconostasis of the holy corner.
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