Mar Isaac of Nineveh and his Devotion to the empty cross

Isaac of Nineveh (died c. 700) also remembered as Isaac the Syrian was a Seventh century bishop and theologian of church of the east best remembered for his written work. He was born in the region of Qatar or Bahrain, on the western shore of the Persian Gulf. When still quite young, he and his brother entered a monastery, where he gained considerable renown as a teacher and came to the attention of the Catholicos George, who ordained him Bishop of Nineveh far to the north. The administrative duties did not suit his retiring and ascetic bent: he requested to abdicate after only five months, and went south to the wilderness of Mount Matout, a refuge for anchorites. There he lived in solitude for many years, eating only three loaves a week with some uncooked vegetables, a detail that never failed to astonish his hagiographers. Eventually blindness and old age forced him to retire to the monastery of Shabar, where he died and was buried. At the time of his death he was nearly blind, a fact that some attribute to his devotion to study.

Mar Isaac stands in the tradition of the eastern mystical saints and placed a considerable emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit.

Prayer before the Cross by Mar Isaac . (600~700 AD)

In many places Isaac mentions prayer and prostrations before the Cross, kissing the Cross, and other signs of special reverence which must be shown by a Christian to the Cross.These frequent references to the Cross in Isaac’s writings are connected with the exceptional place that the Holy Cross occupies in East Syriac Christianity. The East Syrian Church has never had its own tradition of icon-painting.

At the same time , since very early on, the East Syrian Church has surrounded the Holy Cross with devotional and liturgical veneration, as a symbol of human salvation and of God’s invisible presence. In this respect Isaac’s teaching on prayer before the Cross is of special interest as it allows us to come into contact with the ancient tradition of theSyrian Orient and to see what the importance was of the Cross in the spiritual life of Isaac’s compatriots and contemporaries.In Chapter XI of Part II Isaac expounds the teaching on the Holy Cross as a symbol of divine dispensation and an object of religious veneration. He presents a very elaborated theology of the Cross, which is based on the idea of the power of God being constantly present in the Cross.According to Isaac, this power is nothing else but the invisible Shekina (Presence) of God, which dwelt in the Ark of Covenant. This power was venerated by Moses and the people of Israel, who lay prostrate before the Ark because of divine revelations and wonders manifested in it. The very same Shekina is now residing in the Holy Cross.

it has departed from the Old Testament Ark and entered the New Testament Cross. This is why the miracles of the Apostles, which are described in the New Testament, were more powerful than those performed in Old Testament antiquity.In fact, the whole of the Old Testament cult, with all its signs and wonders, was primarily a symbol pointing forward to the New Testament realities: this cult was unable to eradicate sin, whereas the Cross destroyed the power of sin and death.

Speaking of the Old Testament images, Isaac asks why was it that before the wooden construction of the Ark, which was built by the hands of craftsmen, adoration filled with awe was offered up continuously, in spite of the prohibition of the Law to worship the work of human hands or any image or likeness.Because in the Ark, he answers, unlike in the pagan idols, the power of God was manifested openly and the name of God was set upon it. Isaac therefore sweeps aside the accusation of idolatry, the very same accusation that was brought up against the Iconodules in Byzantium in the seventh and eighth centuries.Though the context of Byzantine polemic with Iconoclasm was different, and the main argument for the veneration of icons was the Incarnation of God the Word, which made possible the depiction of God in material colours (a theme not touched upon by Isaac), in more general terms Isaac’s idea of the presence of the Godhead in material objects has much in common with what Byzantine polemicists of his time wrote on the presence of God in icons. In particular, Isaac says that if the Cross was made not in the name of that Man in whom the Divinity dwells, that is, the Incarnate God the Word, the accusation of idolatry would have been just.

He also alludes to the interpretation of the church Fathers, according to which the metal leaf, which was placed on the Ark,was a type of the human nature of Christ. Old Testament symbols, according to Isaac, were only a type and shadow of New Testament realities: he emphasizes the superiority of the Cross over Old Testament symbols.The material Cross, whose type was the Ark of the Covenant, is, in turn, the type of the eschatological Kingdom of Christ. The Cross, as it were, links the Old Testament with the New, and the New Testament, with the age to come, where all material symbols and types will be abolished.

The whole economy of Christ, which began in Old Testament times and continues until the end of the world, is encompassed in the symbol of the Cross: For the Cross is Christ’s garment just as the humanity of Christ is the garment of the Divinity.Thus the Cross today serves as a type, awaiting the time when the true prototype will be revealed: then those things will not be required any longer. For the Divinity dwells inseparably in the humanity... For this reason we look on the Cross as the place belonging to the Shekina of the Most High, the Lord’s sanctuary, the ocean of the symbols of God’s economy. This form of the Cross manifests to us, by means of the eye of faith, the symbol belonging to the two estaments... Moreover, it is the final seal of the economy of our Saviour. Whenever we gaze on the Cross.., the recollection of our Lord’s entire economy gathers together and stands before our interior eyes.We see that in the Syriac tradition in general and in St Isaac in particular, the Cross is in fact the main and the only sacred picture which becomes an object of liturgical veneration.

In the Syriac tradition prayer is, as it were, focused on one point, and this point is the Cross of Christ..

Isaac describes different forms of prayer before the Cross.

1)One of them is lying prostrate before the Cross for a long time in silence. Thus, lying down before the Cross is, according to Isaac, higher than all other forms of prayer as it encompasses them in itself, being an experience of extreme concentration and collectedness, which is accompanied by an intensive feeling of God’s presence.

2)Another form of prayer before the Cross is the prayer with the raising of the eyes and continual gazing upon the Cross: this prayer can be accomplished while standing or sitting, as well as kneeling with the hands stretched out. In one passage Isaac speaks of insight into the Crucified One during prayer before the Cross.

The question here is not of the Crucifixion, the Cross with the image of the crucified Christ, but of the simple Cross without any image, which is a symbol of the invisible presence of the Crucified One.The images of the crucified Christ, which were so popular in Byzantine East and Latin West, did not spread to the Syrian tradition Isaac also speaks of prostrations before the Cross and kissing it many times.