The First Icon - The Story Of King Abgar
Abgar was the king of Edessa, a small country in the Middle East. It was a
lovely kingdom, between two great rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates.
But King Abgar had a terrible disease called leprosy, which was eating away at
his body, and which could not be cured. No one would come near him in case they
caught it.
One day he heard of a man who worked miracles. He had made blind men see and
lame men walk. But the special thing was that he could heal leprosy. This man's
name was Jesus of Nazareth and he lived in a country not so far from Edessa.
So Abgar sent his servant Hannan with a letter to Jesus, asking him to come to
Edessa. Hannan was a painter, so Abgar told him to paint a picture of Jesus and
bring it back with his answer. Hannan set out.
When he came to the place where Jesus was he could not get near him because of
the crowds of people who had come to hear him and be healed of their diseases.
He climbed on to a rock to get a better view. "Well, at least I can sit here and
paint a portrait of him for my king," he thought. But it was not so easy. Jesus'
face seemed to shine with goodness in a way that was impossible to paint. Poor
Hannan! He did not know what to do.
Suddenly, Jesus caught sight of him, and called him over. Hannan jumped down and
pushed his way through the crowds.
"Why are you trying to paint me?" Jesus asked. Hannan explained about King
Abgar's illness and handed over his letter. Jesus smiled kindly at Hannan, and
wrote a reply to King Abgar, saying that he could not leave his work in his own
country to travel to Edessa. But he promised that when his work was over he
would send one of his disciples to the king.
Then Jesus asked for some water, washed his face and dried it on a piece of
cloth. When he took the cloth away from his face, its image remained on the
cloth. "Take this to your king as well", he said.
Hannan was overjoyed. He hurried back to Edessa, and when King Abgar received
the portrait on the cloth his leprosy was cured.
But it left some ugly scars on his face. After Jesus' death and resurrection,
his disciple Thaddeus came to Edessa and healed all the scars, just as Jesus had
promised, and King Abgar became a Christian. He had the portrait placed in a
niche above the town gate so that all his people could look at the face of
Jesus. It became known as the "Image (Icon) Not Made With Hands".
Many years later Abgar's grandson became king. He was a pagan, so the bishop of
Edessa walled up the portrait in the niche so that the king would not harm it,
and it stayed there, hidden, for nearly 400 years. People eventually forgot
about it.
Then in the year 545, when Edessa was being attacked by the Persians, the
portrait was rediscovered, and the town was saved. After that it stayed in
Edessa for a long time, and many famous people from history came to see it.
In the year 944 it was taken to the city of Constantinople and placed in a
church, where it remained until 1204, when the Crusaders carried it off. It was
never seen again.
So how do we know today what Jesus looked like? There were no photographs in the
time of King Abgar, but there were many painters who copied his icon very
carefully. They painted on panels of wood in those days, as paper had not been
invented.
Icons of Jesus are copies of the copies of the first Icon Not Made With Hands.
That is why they all look so alike, whether they were painted hundreds of years
ago or in modern times.