The term ‘icon’ traverses the depth-psychology corpus along several distinct but intersecting axes. In Orthodox theological contexts, recovered principally through Louth’s studies of Russian religious thinkers and Coniaris’s Philokalia commentary, the icon functions as a theological object of profound metaphysical weight — not illusion but revelation, not mimetic copy but theophanic presence. Florensky and Evdokimov, as Louth demonstrates, approach the icon as an epistemological alternative to Western rationalism: where linear perspective constructs an illusion of reality, the icon ‘is not trying to achieve an illusion of reality, but something else.’ In classical Greek religious thought, Vernant traces a structurally analogous function in the xoanon and kolossos — cult images that ‘present’ the invisible divine, oscillating between presence and absence, bound by ritual into animated power. Carson, reading Longus, identifies the ‘painted icon of Eros’ as the triangular object of desire that generates narrative longing. James’s cognitive psychology introduces the entirely distinct ‘iconic memory’ — a rapidly decaying sensory register. Place reads the tarot ‘Christ in Majesty’ as a standard Christian icon repurposed through Neoplatonic synthesis. These usages collectively reveal icon as a site where image, presence, reality, and the invisible intersect — psychologically, ritually, and aesthetically.
Icon painters are not painting the way they do because they are ignorant of linear perspective… they are not trying to achieve an illusion of reality, but something else.
Louth argues, via Florensky, that the icon’s formal conventions embody an intentional metaphysical alternative to Western representational realism, not a technical deficiency.
, Modern Orthodox Thinkers: From the Philokalia to the Presentthesis
The idol is made in order to be shown and hidden, led forth and fixed in place, dressed and undressed, and given a bath. The figure has need of the rite if it is to represent divine power and action.
Vernant demonstrates that the Greek cult image (xoanon) enacts divine presence only through ritual animation, making icon and rite structurally inseparable.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983thesis
There is the painted icon of Eros, an object of ideal beauty (kalliston) transcending all the act… Longing (pothos) seized him to ‘create a rival image in writing.’
Carson identifies the icon of Eros in Longus as the originary triangular object of desire whose beauty provokes the rival creation of the novel itself.
, Eros the Bittersweet: An Essay, 1986thesis
The effect of the eidolon is a kind of trickery, deception or snare (apate): it is the presence of his friend, but it is also his irremediable absence; it is Patroclus in person, yet at the same time it is simply a breath of air.
Vernant situates the Greek eidolon within the same psychological field as the kolossos, revealing the ancient icon as a figure of simultaneous presence and irreducible absence.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
The Icon of St. John of the Ladder… portrays monks climbing a ladder toward Christ who stands at the top of the ladder. Some monks are shown falling off the ladder into the hands of waiting demons.
Coniaris reads a specific Orthodox icon as a visual theological argument encoding the necessity of ascetic discipline and the ever-present danger of spiritual failure.
, Philokalia: The Bible of Orthodox Spirituality, 1998supporting
One of the themes of early twentieth-century Russian theology is the rediscovery of the icon… Leonid Ouspensky and the monk Fr Gregory Krug… drew the practice of icon-painting among the Russians in Paris back to its roots.
Louth traces the historical recovery of authentic icon-painting as a central project of the Russian Religious Renaissance, connecting theology, aesthetics, and spiritual identity.
, Modern Orthodox Thinkers: From the Philokalia to the Presentsupporting
It was round about this time that Orthodox, not just in Russia, but elsewhere (Romania, Greece), began to regain an appreciation of the traditional form of the icon, which had been overwhelmed.
Louth frames Berdyaev’s creative theology as a reaction against the concurrent Orthodox rediscovery of the traditional icon, situating the icon at the center of early twentieth-century theological controversy.
, Modern Orthodox Thinkers: From the Philokalia to the Presentsupporting
This image is based on the standard Christian icon called Christ in Majesty, representing Christ on his celestial throne surrounded by the symbols of the four Evangelists.
Place traces how the tarot’s World card appropriates the standard Christian icon of Christ in Majesty, transforming it through Neoplatonic and Renaissance synthesis.
, The Tarot: History, Symbolism, and Divination, 2005supporting
The disruption of iconic memory by a later stimulus event is an instance of backward masking, a counterintuitive phenomenon where a later stimulus obliterates an earlier one.
James’s cognitive psychology introduces ‘iconic memory’ as a rapidly decaying visual register susceptible to backward masking, deploying the term in a strictly empirical rather than sacred register.
, The Principles of Psychology, 1890supporting
I will now show you… an easy path to mystical theology… the way to an intuition of the mystery of God through the contemplation of an image.
Campbell, via Cusanus, presents contemplation of a sacred image as a method of mystical theology, aligning icon-use with apophatic spiritual practice.
, Creative Mythology: The Masks of God, Volume IV, 1968aside
Hera’s cult image was a wooden image probably dating from the eighth century… The memory still lingered, however, of an earlier stage when the goddess had been represented simply by a plank (sanis).
Burkert traces the archaic Greek cult image from aniconic plank to formed wooden statue, illuminating the developmental prehistory of the icon in Greek religious practice.
, Greek Religion: Archaic and Classical, 1977aside