4.

 How long did the Iconoclast controversy last?

            Iconoclasm was one of the most powerful and prolonged heretical movements, lasting for some 120 years. The seriousness of this heresy was increased by the fact that a whole series of Byzantine emperors energetically championed it for reasons of internal and external politics. Although the instruments of political power were held by the Iconoclasts, who destroyed icons and exiled, imprisoned and sometimes even killed the Iconodules, ultimately their viewpoint was not victorious over Orthodoxy.