Article,
Eusèbe de Césarée face aux images : vers une interprétation plus positive – et moins incertaine – de ses attitudes ?
Antiquité Tardive, (2014)
DOI: 10.1484/J.AT.5.103183
Abstract
We here confront the contradictory opinions more or less recently expressed about Eusebius’attitudes toward images, as attested in several of his texts. Even if it is necessary to be cautious in such matters - given the impossibility of producing any true proof -, it appears, firstly, that the Letter to Constantia may probably be held as an authentic Eusebian testimony, and that some figurative works of art elsewhere mentioned by the Caesarean bishop (mainly at Constantinople and Paneas) certainly were of genuine Christian character; and, secondly, that if Eusebius clearly manifests an opposition to the concept of the portrayal of the Divine Being, his position about allegorical or narrative representations might have been more tolerant - and even favourable.
