Our Lady of Vladimir November 12,2006

Our Lady of Tenderness — The Lady Who Saves Russia

This icon is attributed to the hand of St. Luke the Evangelist who painted the Virgin from life. In 450 the icon was taken from Jerusalem to Constantinople; and in the early 1100’s to Kiev, in 1155 to Vladimir and later to Moscow.

Image

The miraculous image given the title, Our Lady of Vladimir, is known as an Eleousa,the Greek word meaning, Mother of Tenderness. The Christ Child nestles tenderly close to his mother, he gazes at her and is so closely linked to her that his left arm embraces her fully. His right hand gently touches her left cheek. The original image is a large painting of the type known as the St. Luke icons. Mary looks out at the people. Yet, there is no doubt that she is intimately united to her Divine Son.

Origin

The origin of the ancient Marian icon, Our Lady of Vladimir, can be traced back to 1125. For many, The Lady Who Saves Russia is the most loved image of the Eastern Church.

The oldest known representation of Our Lady of Vladimir is presently located at the Tretjakow Gallery in Moscow. According to research, this excellent representation of an Eleousa was commissioned in Constantinople by a Russian, who then had the painting taken from city to city during the period of united Ukranian-Russian history. In 1169, Duke Andrej Bogoljubskij had the icon brought from Kiev to the new cathedral of Vladimir. Due to the honor and reverence of the people, who attributed gracious assistance to Our Lady’s help throughout the Ukrain, a large cathedral was built for her in Vladimir.

Miraculous Character

When the Mongol invasion threatened Moscow in 1395, the icon was brought to Moscow, where she was honored as the unconquerable shield of the Russian people. Important state transactions took place before her image; her blessing was sought before battle. In time, Our Lady of Vladimir became the sign of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Devotion

There are thousands of representations of the Vladimir icon. It is said that there is no Orthodox Church, nor Orthodox home’s religious corner, without this image somewhere represented. During the time of the Communist regime, Our Lady of Vladimir gained international fame, but not so much for political reasons, as for ecumenical endeavors. The unity of the churches came to be symbolized, and hoped for, in the unity of the Child and his mother. The intimate relationship of Our Lady of Tenderness with her divine son, Jesus Christ, is presented as an ideal indication of the Christian’s relationship to Christ.
On an international level, devotion to this Marian icon began in the twentieth century, when the Christian faithful were instructed about the religious significance, the beauty, and the power of invocation to Mary and the saints. By introducing the profound religious significance of the Byzantine icons, the western church learned to appreciate the value of religious symbols and signs, a form of catechesis which draws us into a participation in the divine mysteries by beholding the truth represented in the icon. Icons are never simply made for the sake of decoration or sale. A true icon is an expression of prayer and long contemplation. The artist (and often those who wish to obtain the icon) paints the image while fasting and observing silence, in a spirit of obedience to the Word of God, and the spirit of chastity. The guidelines for painting the icon are strictly normed because they are to represent a fixed or solid doctrine of the faith.
In 1995, on the 600th anniversary of the transference of the icon from Vladimir to Moscow, an academic conference was held in the Tretjakow Fine Arts Gallery. Topics for the conference included such themes as Marian devotion linked to the culture of a Christian people. Our Lady of Tenderness continues to “speak” to us through her icon today.

Meditation

Icons have been described as windows to the divine. Those who take time to meditate on the divine realities expressed through the paintings, do so with the inner eye of the soul reaching beyond the representation to the truth it represents. Meditation can be simply a quiet observing in silence and wonder. Words are not necessary. Perhaps this is the best meditation of all. Meditation can also inspire prayer to share with others. We invite you to reflect on Our Lady of Tenderness with us.

Mary, Mother of God,
The gentle tenderness you share with your child is a quiet, strong thing, reflected from your image. There is no distance between his soft, but total embrace and you. He loves you. Yes, there is no doubt! O how this child loves you! You are molded as one. His body from your body; his flesh from your flesh, his heart from your heart… His eyes praise you and thank you for your share in his humanity.
Like a strong, powerful, but peaceful magnet, your gaze holds mine. Quiet, calm, endlessly gazing at me from nine centuries of reflected wisdom; You ask only one thing of me: to share the love you share.
Love is not gentle, soft tenderness in the sense of weakness. Love is gentle in the sense of strength: enduring, radical, unbroken unity.
Lady of Tenderness, your gaze is both statement and question: If this is the unity he seeks — a love so strong between God and the human being that nothing can divide it — then can I not at least try to love as he has loved? Can I not at least try to break down barriers that separate the nations? Can I not make my decisions in his presence and under your gaze — the presence of this call to unity from the fulness of tender love?
Mary, perhaps if I would pause long enough to return your gaze, stop long enough to love tenderly for just one moment, I could learn from you what wisdom really means. Mary Frisk.

More…

Theotokos of Vladimir

From; Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Theotokos of Vladimir

The Theotokos of Vladimir, also known as Our Lady of Vladimir, the Virgin of Vladimir or Vladimirskaya (Russian: Владимирская Богоматерь), is one of the most venerated Orthodox icons. The Theotokos (Mary) is regarded as the holy protectress of Russia, and the icon is displayed in the Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow. Her feast day is June 3.

Patriarch Luke Chrysoberges of Constantinople sent the newly made icon as a gift to Grand Duke Yury Dolgoruky of Kiev about 1131. The beautiful image was coveted by Yury’s son Andrei the Pious who brought it to his favourite city Vladimir in 1155. When the horses that transported the icon stopped near Vladimir and refused to go further, this was interpreted as a sign that the Theotokos wanted her icon to stay in Vladimir. To house the icon, the great Assumption Cathedral was built there, followed by other churches dedicated to the Virgin throughout northwestern Russia.

In 1395, during Tamerlane’s invasion, the image was taken from Vladimir to the new capital, Moscow. The spot where people and the ruling prince met the icon is commemorated with the Sretensky Monastery. Vasili I of Moscow spent a night crying over the icon, and Tamerlane’s armies retreated the same day. The Muscovites refused to return the icon to Vladimir and placed it in the Cathedral of the Dormition of the Moscow Kremlin. The intercession of the Theotokos through the image was also credited with saving Moscow from Tatar hordes in 1451 and 1480.

One of the most exquisite icons ever created, the icon of the Theotokos of Vladimir is sometimes described as exhibiting universal feelings of motherly love and anxiety for her child. By the 16th century the Vladimirskaya (as the Russians call it) was a thing of legend. Church tradition asserted that the icon was painted by St Luke, though analysis of the image has disproved the legend. The venerated image was used in coronations of tsars, elections of patriarchs, and other important ceremonies of state. In December 1941, as the Germans approached Moscow, Stalin allegedly ordered that the icon be placed in an airplane and flown around the besieged capital. Several days later, the German army started to retreat.

As a work of art, it is widely regarded as the most important icon produced during the Comedian period, accentuating deeper humanity and emotionality that that typical for Byzantine art of previous centuries. As David Talbot Rice asserts in the latest edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, “it is of considerable importance in the history of painting, for it not only is a work of outstandingly high quality but also is in a new, more human style, anticipating the late Byzantine style that flourished between 1204 and 1453″.

On Statues and Icons…

From: Redemptoris Mater…John Paul II The Great; 1987

33. This year there occurs the twelfth centenary of the Second Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (787).
Putting an end to the well known controversy about the cult of sacred images, this Council defined that, according to the teaching of the holy Fathers and the universal tradition of the Church, there could be exposed for the veneration of the faithful, together with the Cross, also images of the Mother of God, of the angels and of the saints, in churches and houses and at the roadside.

84 This custom has been maintained in the whole of the East and also in the West. Images of the Virgin have a place of honor in churches and houses. In them Mary is represented in a number of ways: as the throne of God carrying the Lord and giving him to humanity (Theotokos); as the way that leads to Christ and manifests him (Hodegetria); as a praying figure in an attitude of intercession and as a sign of the divine presence on the journey of the faithful until the day of the Lord (Deesis); as the protectress who stretches out her mantle over the peoples (Pokrov), or as the merciful Virgin of tenderness (Eleousa). She is usually represented with her Son, the child Jesus, in her arms: it is the relationship with the Son which glorifies the Mother. Sometimes she embraces him with tenderness (Glykophilousa); at other times she is a hieratic figure, apparently rapt in contemplation of him who is the Lord of history (cf. Rev. 5:9-14).

85 It is also appropriate to mention the icon of Our Lady of Vladimir, which continually accompanied the pilgrimage of faith of the peoples of ancient Rus’. The first Millennium of the conversion of those noble lands to Christianity is approaching: lands of humble folk, of thinkers and of saints. The Icons are still venerated in the Ukraine, in Byelorussia and in Russia under various titles. They are images which witness to the faith and spirit of prayer of that people, who sense the presence and protection of the Mother of God. In these Icons the Virgin shines as the image of divine beauty, the abode of Eternal Wisdom, the figure of the one who prays, the prototype of contemplation, the image of glory: she who even in her earthly life possessed the spiritual knowledge inaccessible to human reasoning and who attained through faith the most sublime knowledge. I also recall the Icon of the Virgin of the Cenacle, praying with the Apostles as they awaited the Holy Spirit: could she not become the sign of hope for all those who, in fraternal dialogue, wish to deepen their obedience of faith?

Pray for us, my dearest Papa. Pasterze Moj Pasterze mily.

(Shepherd, My Beloved Shepherd) Amen. Fiat