Iconoclasm

Religious and political destruction of the sacred images or monuments, usually (though not always) of another religious group.

Byzantine Iconoclasm

Emperor Leo III the Isaurian banned the use of icons of Jesus, Mary, and the Saints and commmanded the destruction of these images. The Iconoclastic Controversy was fueled by the refusal of many Christians resident outside the Byzantine Empire, including many Christians living in the Islamic Caliphate to accept the emperor's theological arguments. This came to an end at the Seventh Ecumenical Council in 787.

Islamic Iconoclasm

Because of the prohibition against figural decoration in mosques - not, as is often said, a total ban on the use of images - Muslims have on occasion committed acts of iconoclasm against the devotional images of other religions. An example of this is the 2000 destruction of the monumental statues of the Buddha at Bamian by the Taliban.

Reformation Iconoclasm

Some of the Protestant reformers encouraged their followers to destroy Catholic art works by insisting that they were idols. Huldreich Zwingli and John Calvin promoted this approach to the adaptation of earlier buildings for Protestant worship.

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Serapeum - Christian destruction (388) of temple in Alexandria

Anglesey - Roman destruction of Druid shrine

Adalbert of Prague - Christian vs. Sacred Oaks

Martin of Tours - Christian vs. Sacred Tree