Our Lady of the Passion

In the West this icon is known as Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. The icon of Our Lady of thePassion is founded on a Greek hymn ‘Tetrastichia’. This runs as follows: ‘The person who once announced to her the Most Sacred Joy (the angel Gabriel) shows her the future sign of passion, and Christ, a mortal man really, seeing this, gets terrified, fearing death’

Reading this hymn we think of what St Paul wrote in his letter to the Hebrews: ‘During his life on earth he offered up prayer and entreaty, aloud and in silent tears, to the one who had the power to save him out of death, and he submitted so humbly that his prayer was heard. Although he was Son, he learnt to obey through suffering; but having been made perfect, he became for all who obey him the source of eternal salvation and was acclaimed by God with
the title of high priest of the order of Melchizedek.’ (Hebr. 5: 7-10)

The Greek name of this icon is Arnolintos, the Pre-eminent One, the Unblemished One, which name alludes to the first words of the Tetrastichia. The Russian name is Strastnaja, Mother of God of the Passion. This icon did not show the divergences that more or less lead our attention away from the essential, as is the case with the icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. With the fall of Constantinople in 1453 Greek icon painting lost its centre, many artists going to Crete which belonged to Venice. In this way these painters got into contact with Western painting and especially the Italian way of painting.

That the icon of Our Lady of the Passion became well-known is especially due to Andreas Rico. There is quite a series of icons from the Palaeological period (the last dynasty of the Byzantine Empire and the beginning of the decline), all dating from the 15th and 16th centuries, and ascribed to Rico, to his son, his workshop or his followers.

In his icons Rico shows his predilection for the purely Byzantine type. For instance, he paints Mary’s face with unequalled beauty but at the same time he expresses in her grievous look the truly human, motherly premonition of the future passion of her Child. On either side of Mary Rico has depicted an angel, on the right the angel Gabriel, who, his hands covered, shows the cross, and on the left Michael with the lance and the reed with a sponge, which are placed in a jar. In his fright the child lets the sandal slip from his right foot and terrified presses himself against his Mother, with both hands gripping Mary’s hand. This human aspect is clearly due to western influences. For the school of Crete was strongly affected by Italian, particularly Venetian influences. Accordingly the term Italo-Byzantine art is used.

The icon, which in Rome is venerated as an object of grace, is named ‘Mater de perpetuo succurso’, ‘Mother of Perpetual Succour’. Influenced by Western art Mother and Child wear a crown on their heads. Strictly speaking, this is against iconographical principles, which do not admit any distraction of the attention from the essential. The original colours of the green undergarment and the red himation with its symbolic meaning that in Mary humanity has been covered by divinity have also been lost here. Probably this icon was made by Andreas Rico himself. It is dated about the middle of the 15th century. In 1498 the icon arrived in Rome; it is now to be found in the Redemptorist church of San Alfonso. In 1866 the icon was restored and, unfortunately, heavily repainted, so that it no longer has the beautiful soft colouring of the old icons.

Source: Theotokos - Iconen van de Moeder Gods - Theologie en Symboliek van de Iconen by brother Louis Bastiaansen