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Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2026 2:22 pm
I asked on the internet, and various artificial intelligences, chatbots — what is “Christ in Glory,” and why on the icons of “The Last Judgment” is this the second-to-last level, and what is above it. And here is what they write to me: “Christ in Glory — also known as the Saviour in Power, or Christ in the Mandorla — is not just a beautiful picture. It is the appearance of Christ already transfigured, already risen, already ascended, and seated at the right hand of the Father. He is seated on a rainbow or on a celestial sphere, and around Him are the radiant circles of glory. The red rhombus is the symbol of divine fire and of glory; the blue oval is the heavenly world, the angelic powers; the red square at the very bottom is the symbol of Earth, of the four elements and of all creation subjected to Him (in its corners, there are usually the symbols of the Evangelists). In His hands are the Gospel and the blessing. This is the One Who has already conquered death, has already passed through everything we fear, and now looks at us from the end of times. This is the image of a future that has already come about in God. Christ in Glory is already the final reality, towards which everything is moving.”
And further on: “And here is The Last Judgment on the icons. There, the structure is most often as follows, if one examines it from top to bottom. The very top is the level of eternal being, from which everything proceeds: God the Father (Sabaoth), or the composition ‘the New Testament Trinity’ with the dove of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes the Empty Throne — the Etimasia — is depicted there. A little lower is Christ in Glory, as the Judge, surrounded by the angels, with the Mother of God and John the Forerunner on either side. This is the classical Deisis motif, where the Apostles sit on thrones behind them. It is precisely here that the centre of almost all icons of The Last Judgment is found: Christ in the Mandorla, with all the signs of glory. Lower still — the ‘Throne Prepared’ with the Gospel and the instruments of the Passion (the cross, the spear, the reed), to which Adam and Eve fall down. And here the action itself unfolds: the resurrection of the dead, the scales of deeds (the weighing of souls), the separation into the righteous and the sinners, and the peoples going to the judgment.” And further on, there are even more divisions.
But I start reflecting again — what’s interesting is this: He is sitting there with the Mother of God. And who is the Mother of God? After all, if there is the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, we have always pictured this as the Father, the Son,
And further on: “And here is The Last Judgment on the icons. There, the structure is most often as follows, if one examines it from top to bottom. The very top is the level of eternal being, from which everything proceeds: God the Father (Sabaoth), or the composition ‘the New Testament Trinity’ with the dove of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes the Empty Throne — the Etimasia — is depicted there. A little lower is Christ in Glory, as the Judge, surrounded by the angels, with the Mother of God and John the Forerunner on either side. This is the classical Deisis motif, where the Apostles sit on thrones behind them. It is precisely here that the centre of almost all icons of The Last Judgment is found: Christ in the Mandorla, with all the signs of glory. Lower still — the ‘Throne Prepared’ with the Gospel and the instruments of the Passion (the cross, the spear, the reed), to which Adam and Eve fall down. And here the action itself unfolds: the resurrection of the dead, the scales of deeds (the weighing of souls), the separation into the righteous and the sinners, and the peoples going to the judgment.” And further on, there are even more divisions.
But I start reflecting again — what’s interesting is this: He is sitting there with the Mother of God. And who is the Mother of God? After all, if there is the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, we have always pictured this as the Father, the Son,