The Christ in Majesty iconography is based on the scene of the vision to the Prophet Ezekiel (Ezekiel 1: 4–28, 10: 1–22) and similar visions to the Prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 6: 1–4) and John the Theologian (Revelations. 4: 2–9).

Christ is seated on a throne, his left hand is raised in a blessing gesture, with his right hand He holds an open Gospel book. The Savior’s figure is surrounded by a rhomb-like glory and a broad oval sphere. The internal red rhomb with concave sides is inscribed in a greenish-blue sphere, filled with the images of cherubs and seraphim. The sphere, in its turn, is superimposed on a quadrangle with concave sides, in its corners are four apocalyptic creatures (the symbols of the Evangelists) – an angel, an eagle, a lion and a calf. The outline of the throne are shown through the internal rhomb and sphere. Christ’s feet rest on the pedestal.

There are several interpretations of the Christ in Majesty iconography in contemporary science. The most convincing is an eschatological interpretation of the icon and the recognition as the iconographic source of Byzantine apsidal frescoes dated to the 5th - 6th centuries AD, though a hypothesis of the Western origin of the iconography was also put forward. The shape of the glory is intepreted as an image of the universe, in which the external red rhomb with monochromous symbols of the Evangelists in the corner symbolizes the Earth, a blue oval (sphere) with the seraphim and the “thrones” mean the heavenly sphere with the internal red rhomb symbolizing the fire that Ezekiel saw in his vision. The red rhomb is also interpreted as the crystal symbolizing the glory of God, referred to in the Apocalypse, and as a throne of the Lord himself. From the mid-15th century, the most widespread inscription on the Gospel were citations from the Gospels of John and Matthew (John 7: 24; Matthew 7: 2), foretelling the coming of the Final Judgment.

The images of Christ in glory, surrounded by the heavenly host and four apocalyptic creatures illustrating the Old Testament eschatological visions and texts of the Apocalypse had been well-known since the early Christian times, gaining wide cirulation in Western European medieval art. However, the ultimate development of the Christ in Majesty iconography took place in Rus, where, with the appearance of the high iconostasis in the 14th - 15th centuries, this composition became central in the Deesis tier. A model for many Russian iconographers was an icon dated 1408 - 1410 from the St. Vladimir Assumption Cathedral, ascribed to the venerable Andrei Rublev. The earliest depiction of this scene is found in the Deesis tier of the Annunciation Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin (the late 14th century), whose authorship is attributed the Theophany the Greek.

Zhanna G. Belik,

Ph.D. in Art history, senior research fellow at the Andrei Rublyov Museum, custodian of the tempera painting collection.

Olga E. Savchenko,

research fellow at the Andrei Rublyov Museum.

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