Cross Belt Buckles
As people get more religious and the popularity of crosses grow, so does the fashion and accessories related. One of the most common clothing accessories has become the Cross Belt buckle. Cross Belt Buckles are available at the belt buckles shop.
The Christian cross is a familiar religious symbol of Christianity.
It is significant for Christians based on the gospel accounts of the
New Testament, which describe the manner of Jesus Christ's death as crucifixion.
This painful method of execution was common for slaves and non-Romans
convicted of serious crimes in the Roman Empire. It was an innately disgraceful
association in the eyes of the Roman world for at least 250 years after
the death of Jesus. It was different in Egypt, which had another kind of
cross, the Ankh. It had been a religious symbol for 2500 years. It was this
exception, the association of the cross and ankh, that allowed the cross
to become the symbol of the entire faith.
The type of cross actually used by Romans for crucifixion is now known
as St. Anthony's Cross, shaped like the letter "T", unlike the
traditionally depicted Latin cross.
History and Usage
During the first three centuries of Christianity, the cross was rare
in Christian iconography as it depicts a purposely painful and gruesome
method of public execution by impalement and/or exposure. The Ichthys,
or fish symbol, was used by early Christians to covertly identify each
other. The Chi-Rho monogram, which was adopted by the emperor Constantine
in the fourth century as his banner called the labarum, was an Early Christian
symbol of wider use.
Descriptions of the cross are to be found in Christian writings from
the early 2nd century onwards. The Cross first became prominent in
Christian imagery during the 3rd century in Egypt. A Christian bust
from the site of an early church in Fayoum, Egypt, shows an ankh partially
evolved, changing, over time, from a round upper section, to one that
is half-way through a "morphing
process", leading to the Coptic cross . It is being worn, in this
half-way mode, as a necklace on the bust.
An early third century reference (there are few others) is in Clement
of Alexandria's unfinished Stromateis or 'Miscellanies' (book VI):
he speaks of the Cross as tou Kuriakou semeiou tupon, i.e. "the symbol of the
Lord." His contemporary Tertullian could designate the body of Christian
believers as crucis religiosi, i.e. "devotees of the Cross" (Apol.,
chapter xvi). A crucifix or cross is considered by some Christians
as one of the most effective ways of warding off evil.
In Christianity, the cross represents Christ's victory over death and
sin, since it is believed that through His death he conquered death
itself. Catholic Christians often make the sign of the cross by moving
their right hand so as to draw a cross upon themselves. Orthodox Christians
make the sign with their right hand as well. Making the sign of the cross
was already a common Christian practice in the time of Augustine. One
of the twelve great feasts in the Eastern Orthodox Church is the Exaltation
of the Cross on September 14, which commemorates the consecration of the
basilica on the site where the (allegedly) original cross was discovered
in 326 by Helena of Constantinople, mother of Constantine the Great. In
the Catholic Church the comparable feast is the Invention of the Cross,
celebrated on May 3.
The Cross was the first of the Instruments of the Passion that came
to be venerated in the form of relics. In time, even the "Holy Nails" that
were used to nail Christ to the cross would be sought out, discovered,
elaborately mounted as relics, and venerated in Catholic circles. A nail,
said to be one of these, is mounted in the Iron Crown of Lombardy, preserved
in the cathedral of the former Lombard capital, Monza.
Numerous relics are claimed to be pieces of the True Cross, often brought
to Europe during the Crusades. By the 16th century, skepticism surfaced:
Erasmus joked that one could build a ship with all that wood. Santo
Toribio de Liébana in Spain holds the biggest of these pieces and
is one of the most privileged pilgrimage sites for the Catholic Church.
Even a large portion of the cross of the 'good thief' crucified with Jesus
(who came to be given the name Dismas in medieval legend) has been recovered;
it is reverenced at Rome in the altar of the Chapel of the Relics at
the church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme.
Connected with the cross is the medieval legend of the Tree of Jesse,
from the wood of which the cross was said to have been fashioned
