Holy Trinity Icon

The Holy Trinity is an important subject of iconographic representation in Eastern Orthodox Christianity.

There are two different types of Holy Trinity icons: the "Old Testament Trinity" and the "New Testament Trinity" (Троица Ветхозаветная and Троица Новозаветная in Russian).

Old Testament Trinity

The Old Testament Trinity subject is best known from the famous icon written by St Andrey Rublev (created sometime between 1408 and 1425).

This icon is actually more properly called the "Hospitality of Abraham" (see Genesis 18). The appearance of the three angels to Abraham at Mamre was a type of the Holy Trinity, not an appearance of the Holy Trinity itself. There is only one hypostasis, the Divine Logos, Jesus Christ in the form of an angel and two angels.

New Testament Trinity

The New Testament Trinity depicts the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit distinctly. The Father is painted as a white-bearded man with a very special type of nimbus (it contains two rombic figures: one is red, another is blue). The Holy Spirit is shown as a white dove with a halo of the same type as Father has. The dove may be placed between the Father and the Son (if they sit near each other at the same level), or the dove may be shown in a beam of light from the mouth of the Father, as if the Holy Spirit was just sent by Him.

Christ may be shown either as an adult, (in this case he is sitting right from His Father) or as an infant (in this case he is sitting on His Father's knees). The name of this type of icon is also called "Paternity".

It is interesting that in Eastern Orthodoxy, depictions of God the Father are prohibited. However, when the movement of antitrinitrarians became strong in medieval Novgorod, a new type of iconography appeared: Spas Vethiy Denmi (The Savior Old with Days). In this type of icon, Jesus Christ is depicted as an old white-haired man. The basis of this iconography is that Jesus is saying that He and the Father are one. This very image of God the Father is used in New Testament Trinity icons.

Nevertheless, according to the Synodic Act of the Seventh Ecumenical Synod, this icon remains heretical.

The New Testament Trinity subject may be actually introduced into any icon where the Christ is shown: for this purpose the painter needs only to add the Father and the dove at the upper side of the icon.

The New Testament Trinity is not popular in official Orthodoxy in Russia nowadays, though it was popular in Novgorod earlier. Among Popovtsy Old Believers this type of an icon is very widespread, since the New Testament Trinity is depicted above any crucifixion icon (without the Son, since he is on the Cross in this case). The New Testament Trinity also appears on the wonder-working icon of Our Lady of Kursk (also without the Son, since in this case Mary holds him on her knees).

Further reading

For more on the topic of the Holy Trinity in Orthodox iconography see George S. Gabriel, "Mary: the Untrodden Portal of God" and "Forbidden Images".the dove of trinity means peace.

George Gabriel's writings on icons are heretical, as is this Wikipedia article. Icons of the Holy Trinity where the Beginningless Father is depicted as the "Ancient of days" are neither heretical nor are they forbidden in the Orthodox Church.