What’s with the halos in Christian art?
Modern cartoons show the halo as a sort of neon circle that floats over the head, but in ancient times, and in historic Christian art, the halo is a stylized backlighting effect. Before the Christian era, artists used halos to help the viewer identify the important people in the picture. In an age without photography, that was necessary. Originally, halos were blue and surrounded either the head or the whole body. Christian halos generally surround only the head and can be almost any color. At home I have a modern Orthodox icon of Jesus at His Resurrection, showing Him with an oval blue halo around His entire body. On my desk at work, I have a small icon of Jesus with His head surrounded by a circular golden halo with a red rim. The halo did not come into Christian art until the third century, after it had largely fallen out of general use. In early Christian art, only Jesus had a halo, whether He was depicted as a man or symbolically as the Lamb of God. By the fifth century, halos wer
