Icons are written because they communicate the Church’s faith in visual form, just as Scripture communicates it in words. Both are ways of proclaiming the Gospel.
You’ll hear this language all the time in Orthodox circles. Someone will say they’re “writing an icon” or that St. Luke “wrote the first icon of the Theotokos.” It sounds strange at first, especially if you’re used to thinking of painting as something you do with a brush and pigment. And that’s exactly the point. The language is meant to signal something different is happening here.
What Writing Has to Do With It
The Greek word for making icons is hagiographia, literally “holy writing.” The same root shows up in “Scripture” (graphe). That’s not an accident. The Church has always understood icons as a form of theology, a way of teaching and proclaiming truth that works through the eyes instead of the ears. When you stand in front of an icon of the Transfiguration, you’re receiving the same Gospel account that Matthew, Mark, and Luke wrote down. Just in color and gold leaf instead of ink.
This matters because icons aren’t personal artistic expression. They’re not about what the iconographer feels or imagines. They follow prototypes handed down through the centuries, just like the words of Scripture follow the inspired text. An iconographer doesn’t invent a new way to show Christ or the Theotokos any more than a scribe invents new words for the Gospel. They’re transmitting something received.
The Seventh Ecumenical Council made this explicit. Icons show the same truth the Scriptures proclaim. They’re bound together. If you can write down the Word made flesh, you can depict Him. Both are possible because of the Incarnation.
The Incarnation Changes Everything
Here’s the theological heart of it. God became man. The invisible became visible. The Word took flesh. That means matter can now bear divine reality and show it to us. We can see holiness. We can look at a face and encounter the person of Christ or His saints.
Before the Incarnation, images of God were forbidden. How do you depict the invisible, infinite, uncreated God? You can’t. But when the Son of God took a human body, was born of Mary, walked in Galilee, died on the Cross, and rose from the dead, everything changed. He could be seen. He could be touched. And so He can be depicted.
Icons proclaim that truth. Every icon of Christ is a small declaration of the Incarnation. It says, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” That’s why iconoclasts were wrong. Rejecting icons meant rejecting the full reality of the Incarnation. If Christ can’t be depicted, then maybe He wasn’t really, fully human. The Church fought hard for icons because the Church was fighting for the Incarnation itself.
A Visual Gospel
People sometimes call icons “theology in color” or “the Gospel for those who can’t read.” Both phrases get at something true. For most of Christian history, most Christians couldn’t read. But they could see. Icons taught them the faith. They showed the life of Christ, the feasts of the Church, the witness of the martyrs, the prayers of the saints.
Walk into any Orthodox church and you’re surrounded by this visual catechism. The icon screen shows you Christ enthroned, the Theotokos interceding, the apostles and prophets and saints all present in the liturgy. You’re not just looking at pictures. You’re standing inside the story of salvation. You’re seeing what the Church believes and prays.
That’s why we say icons are written. They’re not decoration. They’re proclamation. They teach, they witness, they open windows into the heavenly reality that the Incarnation has joined to earth.
Does It Really Matter?
Some people think this is just semantics. Icons are obviously painted with brushes and pigment, so why not just say “painted”? Fair enough. The physical process is painting. Nobody denies that.
But language shapes how we think. When we say “written,” we’re reminding ourselves what icons are for. We’re connecting them to Scripture, to the Word, to the Church’s teaching authority. We’re saying this isn’t just religious art. It’s a means of grace, a form of prayer, a way the Church hands down the faith.
If you visit St. Michael’s, you’ll see icons throughout the church. Some were painted (yes, painted) by iconographers who prayed and fasted as they worked, who followed ancient patterns, who understood they were doing something liturgical. Those icons are there to teach you, to invite you into prayer, to show you the communion of saints that surrounds every Divine Liturgy.
Next time you stand before an icon, try reading it. Look at the gestures, the colors, the inscriptions. Ask what it’s proclaiming. You might find it speaks as clearly as any verse of Scripture. That’s what it means to say icons are written. They’re another form of the one Gospel we’ve received.
