HIERATIC SYMBOLISM AND DIVINE REVELATION IN SACRED ARCHITECTURE AND ICONOGRAPHY
HIERATIC SYMBOLISM AND DIVINE REVELATION IN SACRED ARCHITECTURE AND ICONOGRAPHY

Summary/Abstract: To know God and the unseen world, and to draw closer to divinity, humans have always relied on symbols. All Holy Scripture is filled with symbols, and just as the Word of God was conveyed through symbols and parables, so too in the Church and in iconography, everything carries meaning. Each element observed by the faithful symbolizes something for the faith. Symbols are present in the Liturgy, in religious acts, and in the design and ornamentation of places of worship. In both church architecture and religious painting, holiness and grace cannot be conveyed or described through human means alone; hence, a symbolic language is used, employing specific shapes, colors, and lines. Through such means, Revelation, which comes from above, when expressed in material form, becomes accessible to our understanding. Church art, expressed through symbols, lines, colors, and shapes, becomes, through the continual testimony and invocation of Christ, a spiritual vision beyond the physical one – a vision of the Kingdom of Heaven through Faith.

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