The media age confronts us daily with the fact that our world is defined by images. The extraordinary power that images exert on our present is traced by Marie-José Mondzain back to the iconoclastic crisis in Byzantium in the 8th and 9th centuries. When the Church felt compelled to give images a theological status, it invented a dual doctrine: The doctrine of the image as the invisible was meant to protect the Church from any suspicion of idolatry, while the doctrine of the icon as the visible was the centerpiece of a pedagogical and political strategy aimed at securing the earthly power of the Church. The multifaceted principle underlying this far-reaching philosophical project is that of divine economy, God's plan of salvation for humanity. This lays the foundation for an eminently modern concept of the image.