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A Timeline for the Historical Development of Christology
- 1. A Timeline for the Historical Development of Christology Robert King Casa Grande, Arizona 07/03/17 1
- 2. Who is the Christ? Man, God, or Demigod? 07/03/17 2
- 3. Ignatius of Antioch (AD 110) God, first subject to suffering and then beyond it, Jesus Christ our Lord. (Ign. Eph. 7:2) 07/03/17 3 Who is both flesh and spirit, born and unborn, God in man, life in death, both from Mary, and from
- 4. Justin Martyr (AD 150-160) • Begotten by God before all creatures. • Does not exist by abscission. • The Logos and Wisdom. • Second in rank to the Father. • Worshipped as God. 07/03/17 4
- 5. Irenaeus (AD 175-185) The specifics of the eternal Son as begotten are incomprehensible and should not be speculated upon. The Logos was Always with the Father as God. Distinct eternally as a thought of a word already in God’s mind. Along with the Spirit, one of the two hands of God during the creation.07/03/17 5
- 6. Clement (AD 182-202) God is transcendent, ineffable and unknown by humanity. The Logos was the mediator by which God is made known. 07/03/17 6 • In Mind of God • Comes Forth • Fully God • One with Father • Teacher • Savior
- 7. Tertullian (AD 197-220) The Logos is eternal as the “reason” that existed within God, being projected from himself at the initiation of creation. There was a time that the Son as a personal distinction was not. The Logos proceeded from the Father as of the same substance, distinct, yet not divided. All things were created through the Logos. 07/03/17 7
- 8. Origen (AD 203-250) • Son was always with God as God. • Father generates the Son in eternity. • He is the image of the Father’s substance. • The Son is subordinate to the Father. • Reveals God to humanity. 07/03/17 8 “Therefore we worship the Father of truth and the true Son, being two things in hypostasis, but one in sameness of thought and in harmony, and in sameness of will” (contra Celsum, VIII.12).
- 9. Monarchians (3rd Century) • Stresses strict Monotheism with no personal distinctions in God. 07/03/17 9 • The Dynamic Monarchians held that Christ was a human born of a virgin with no ontological relationship to the Father and could not be referred to as God, but was adopted as God’s Son upon his baptism by the Spirit. • Modalistic Monarchians generally held that the Father and the Son were manifested modes of the one God possessing the same substance rather than two distinct persons united in the Godhead. • Two Schools of Thought consisting of Dynamic Monarchians and Modal Monarchians
- 10. Debating Christ’s Nature 07/03/17 10 God or First Creature? • Athanasian Creed: We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance. • Arius. The Son was created as an independent substance from the Father.
- 11. Nicene Creed (AD 325) “We believe in One God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible. 07/03/17 11 “And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, only begotten, that is, of the nature of the Father. God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, both things in heaven and things on earth; who for us men and for our salvation came down and was made flesh and assumed man’s nature, suffered and rose the third day, ascended to heaven, [and] shall come again to judge the quick and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost.“
- 12. God in Christ (4th- 5th Century) Antiochene School • The Logos as God was in the human Christ. • Neither God nor the Logos suffered or died. • The deity and humanity of Jesus were united in will. • Suggests a conjunction of two persons in Christ. 07/03/17 12 Antiochene School versus the Alexandrian School Alexandrian School •The impassible Logos became passible in the incarnation. •There was a real union between God and humanity in Christ. •His humanity was impersonal and was used by the Logos. •The Logos did not enter fully into the human experience.
- 13. God in Christ (4th- 5th Century) Nestorius of Antioch versus Cyril of Alexandria 07/03/17 13 Cyril of Alexandria • Asserted there was one nature united in one person. • The Logos was active and personal “in” Jesus as a unity. • The Logos truly became human, yet remained God. • He stressed the divinity of the God-Man. • He preferred the use of the title “theotokos” for Mary. Nestorius of Antioch • Saw the two natures in Jesus as one person. • There was an association of the two natures. • The Logos did not nullify the flesh in the incarnation. • He stressed the humanity of the God-Man. • He preferred the use of “Christotokos” for Mary.
- 14. Chalcedon (AD 451) • Complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting also of a reasonable soul and body. • Of one substance with the Father as regards his Godhead, and at the same time of one substance with us as regards his manhood; like us in all respects, apart from sin. • As regards his Godhead, begotten of the Father before the ages, but yet as regards his manhood begotten, for us men and for our salvation, of Mary the Virgin, the God-bearer. • One and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, recognized in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation. • The distinction of natures being in no way annulled by the union, but rather the characteristics of each nature being preserved and coming together to form one person and subsistence, not as parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and Only- begotten God the Word, Lord Jesus Christ. 07/03/17 14
- 15. Protestant Reformation • Martin Luther 07/03/17 15 o Christ consisted of both a human divine and human nature. o For believers there is no other God we can understand than Christ. o The two natures of Christ fully participated with one another. o In some sense God suffered and died in the humanity of Christ. o If it was only a man, and not God in man, dying on the cross, then "we are lost." o Christ was divine, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. o After the resurrection, the human body of Jesus became omnipresent. o Focused more on the divine nature of Christ.
- 16. Protestant Reformation • John Calvin 07/03/17 16 o Calvin saw Jesus as the mediator between God and humanity. o Calvin insisted that Jesus must be fully human and also fully divine in order to reach us and save us. o Calvin unites the two nature of Christ without any type of fusion, morphing together, confusion or mixture. o His deity and humanity remain distinct and unimparied within the unseparated unity of the person Jesus. o God become man in Jesus Christ so that through his obedience he might restore our relationship with God that came from the disobedience of Adam. o In his divinity, Christ operates outside the body as God both within the incarnation and afterwards.
- 17. Jesus of History (19th -20th ) • The Quest forthe Historical Jesus • The First Quest (1778-1906) • The “No-Quest Era” (1896-1954) • The New Quest (1954-1980s) • The Third Quest (1980s-Present) 07/03/17 17
- 18. Christ of Faith (19th -20th ) • Wilhelm Herrmann (1846-1922) • Faith in Christ must move beyond any critical- historical study of Jesus and step into the power of his personality that left an impacted the disciples and solidified their testimony. • Martin Kähler (1835-1912) • We can bypass the problems of history as we are overpowered by Christ who evokes faith in us and allows us to encounter the same Christ who was portrayed by the first witnesses. • Paul Tillich (1886-1965) • Faith in the same Christ that was portrayed by the first witnesses is independent of the uncertainties in historical research and there is no need for an exact historical biography. 07/03/17 18
- 19. Karl Barth (20th Century) • Christ is the center of Christian theology. • It is through Christ that we can Know and Understand God. • The Logos is God and remained God in Christ, and will forever be God. • He was God with us. • He is also fully human like us. 07/03/17 19
- 20. Kenotic Christology (19th -20th ) • Gottfried Thomasius. The Son in an act of free will divested himself of his glory with the Father in love and fully assumed human nature without hereditary sinfulness while still remaining deity with both natures united in one person. • Hugh Ross Mackintosh. The traditional doctrine of the immutability and impassibility of God should be redefined, for what is really immutable in God is his holy love that makes up his essence. • Jürgen Moltmann. God suffered and died in Christ with a death “in” God consisting of a separation between the Father and the Son. 07/03/17 20
- 21. Bibliography Apostolic Fathers English Translation from the Ante-Nicene Fathers (APE). Edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson. Buffalo, NY: The Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1896. BibleWorks v.9. Cross, Terry L. A History of Christian Doctrine. Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013. PDF. Hall, Christopher A. Learning Theology with the Church Fathers. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002. Print. 07/03/17 21
Editor's Notes
- Such has been the debate ever since Jesus appeared in Israel about 2,000 years ago. When Jesus was on the earth, many rejected his claims to be the Christ (the Messiah), the Son of God. Others chose to believe him and follow him. He was resurrected from the dead. This did not end the debate, but expanded it. Divisions arose over exactly who the Christ was and his exact ontological relationship with God. One of the earliest disagreements was some who denied his deity (e.g. Ebionites). The apostles and the evangelists defined Jesus as possessing a divine nature and as having always been with God.
- The dates appearing on the panels are related to the relevant time for the opinions being written, not the actual life span when church fathers are referenced. This is a more accurate way to portray the development of Christological thought. However, these dates are approximate. Ignatius was a disciple of the Apostle John and wrote this to the church of the Ephesians on the way to his martyrdom. This statement in the PowerPoint above comes from Ignatius of Antioch (A.D. 110) and sums up his teachings about Jesus, though there are others in the same vein of thought. For example, “Wait expectantly for him who is above time: the Eternal, the Invisible, who for our sake became visible; the Intangible, the Unsuffering, who for our sake suffered, who for our sake endured in every way” (Ign. Pol. 3:2). Ignatius believed that Jesus was the Word (Logos, like his mentor John), eternal, invisible, unable to suffer, and unbegotten before the incarnation. Ignatius believed that the Word was fully God, equal with God the Father, but distinct and separate both before and after the incarnation. He was fathered by both the Holy Spirit and Mary, becoming Son of God and Son of Man at the incarnation (Ign. Eph. 18:2a; Ign. Eph. 20:2b; Ign. Smyrn. 1:1b). He suffered for our sake, that we might be saved through his sacrifice. Ignatius would have rejected the doctrines of eternal Sonship and eternal generation that later became part of the creeds, which insist that the Logos is eternally the “Son” and that he was being begotten back throughout eternity.
- Justin Marty a Greek apologist (a defender of the faith to both pagans and Jews) who lived and wrote around the middle of the second century, eventually being martyred around A.D. 160 for his faith. He brought his background in philosophy, especially Platonic thought, into his ideas about the Christ. Unlike Ignatius, he saw the Word as begotten by God by his own will, even before the incarnation, as a Beginning, a rational power from Himself before all creatures. Not by abscission as to diminish God, but like a fire kindled from another. He saw him as having come out of God and of his nature, thus considered him God. Also saw his existence as that of a spoken word. There is debate as to whether Justin saw the personhood and the distinction of the Word as eternal or as originating at some point before the creation, as well as over whether he saw the begetting as an eternal generation or an economic emission. Identified him with both the Logos of John and the personification of Wisdom in Solomon. Unlike Ignatius, he was second in rank and in subjection to the Father even before the incarnation. He felt that Jesus was worthy or both worship and adoration (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 4-5, PDF.).
- Irenaeus was bishop of Lugdunam (Lyons) and a disciple of Polycarp. He refuted Gnosticism and their idea that God who is spirit separated himself from matter (which was evil) by a series of emanations (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 8, PDF.). This included rejecting their belief that Christ was not really human flesh (Ibid., 9-10). He asserted that the Logos made flesh, both human and divine (Ibid., 8). Yet he still believed in the transcendence of God the Father and separated him from creation by God the Son (Logos) as one of the two hands of God along with the Spirit. Irenaeus built upon the Logos Christology of Justin. The Son is eternal God, one in substance, but distinct and subordinate to the Father (Ibid., 9). Irenaeus believed that the Son was begotten from the Father before the incarnation. The Logos was distinct like a word of thought already in the mind in potential (Ibid., 8). However, he admitted all the specifics were incomprehensible and felt we should not venture into speculating on such unknowns (Ibid., 8-9). Because of this, he focused primarily on the revealed Son of God who became flesh (Ibid., 8). The Divine Christ from the Human Jesus are one in unity. The Logos as God became a human being to save humanity. This includes during the death on the cross. We all have insulted God through Adam; through Eve the entire sex has tragically fallen into death. Only God can help us—and this he does by bringing in the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, who redeems the First Adam and restores to humanity all that had been deprived of it through Adam’s fall. For Irenaeus, Christ must be God in order to remain obedient, and he must be man in order to redeem man (Ibid., 10).
- Clement of Alexandria led the Catechetical School in Alexandria and was the teacher of the church father Origen (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 13, PDF.). Like Justin, he was influenced and tainted by Greek philosophy in his Christological ideas (Ibid., 13-14). He taught that God is "utterly transcendent and ineffable—that is, unknowable by humans" (Ibid., 14) The Logos was always with the Father and the two of them are one (Ibid., 15). The Logos was in the mind of God coming forth from the Father as full deity (Ibid., 14-15). He was the Father's counselor (the personification of Wisdom in Proverbs 8:22) before the creation of the world (Ibid., 15). The Logos bridges the gap between this transcendent, ineffable God and humanity as a mediator. The Logos is the source of all knowledge and morality (Ibid., 14) He is a teacher who reveals the true knowledge about the Father that humanity might "ascend the ladder of knowledge to God's presence. The Logos is fully God who comes down from the heavens as the revelation of God in Jesus Christ to free men from their sins (Ibid., 15-16).
- Tertullian was a lawyer that was converted to a form of Christianity that admonished a strict moral lifestyle. Like Irenaeus, he also refuted the Gnostics, claiming that the real church possessed the "rule of faith" that was passed down from the apostles. Tertullian was the first to use the term "Trinity" to describe the three persons of the Godhead (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 11, PDF.). The Logos is eternal because reason and word have always existed with the Father (Ibid., 11-12). God was never alone because he had "reason" within him (Ibid., 12). Yet, the Logos was impersonal as such and there was a time when he was not. He only became personal and distinct when creation began (Ibid., 12-13). He proceeds from the Father as having been projected from like a root brings forth the tree (Ibid., 11-12). He is of the same substance with the Father, but distinct, yet not divided (Ibid., 11-13). He is a portion or “derivation” of the whole (Ibid., 13). He is in subjection to the Father (Ibid., 12-13). All things were made through the Logos (Ibid., 11).
- Origen of Alexandria was the son of a martyr and a student of Clement of Alexandria and eventually took over Clement's school there and later established his own catechetical school in Caesarea. There is one God the Father. (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 16, PDF.). He is simple, invisible and incorporeal, pure intelligence, transcending intelligence and existence (Ibid., 17). The Son was always existing with God (Ibid., 18). He was always God and there was not a time when he was not (Ibid., 18-19). The Father begat the Son within himself in an eternal generation that is continual with no starting point in time. "There is no beginning for the Logos, since the begetting is placed in eternity without beginning or ending" (Ibid., 19). He is the exact image of the Father's substance and thus divine (Ibid., 18, 20). “Therefore we worship the Father of truth and the true Son, being two things in hypostasis, but one in sameness of thought and in harmony, and in sameness of will (contra Celsum, VIII.12)." (Ibid., 20). A "second God" as a virtue and reason containing all other virtue and reason whatsoever that exists in all things (Ibid., 18). He is a distinct person and different from the Father, existing in his own appropriate fashion (Ibid., 17-18). As the Logos he is the idea of the world "lying in God" (Ibid., 17). He is also Wisdom and the "product of the divine wisdom stemming from the will of God" (Ibid., 17-18). The Son is subordinate to the Father (Ibid., 18-19). "Standing directly between the Uncreated One (God) and the created Many (humans and other creatures), the Logos becomes changeable, thereby allowing God (the unchangeable One) to enter into experiences that the human race encounters" (Ibid., 19). The Son reveals God to humanity as possessing the highest share in the absolute reason, absolute wisdom and absolute righteousness (Ibid., 18).
- By the time we reach the third century, the Logos has been defined and explained as the person of God who though deity, is subject to a changeable nature that enables him to enter into the human experience (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 20, PDF.). The deity of Jesus had become an accepted fact, though the discussion on the relationship between the Son and the Father with its relevance to unity and distinction had not yet been fully resolved. Thus, this struggle between different church leaders resulted in different ideas. From this, the Monarchians arose who strived to maintain the doctrine of monotheism and thus asserted the preeminence of God the Father with the subordination of the Son (Ibid., 20-21). They insisted there was one God without distinction within him in reference to the Logos and the Spirit (Ibid., 20). They felt that others believed in two or three Gods while they worshipped one God. The Monarchians are generally understood as having consisted of two schools of thought. This included the Dynamic Monarchians and the Modal Monarchians. Both groups believed in the monarchy of God, though they parted ways on much of the rest of their theological positions (Ibid., 21). The Dynamic Monarchians (also referred to as Adoptionists) held to the position that Christ was only human born of a virgin with no ontological relationship to the Father and thus could not be referred to as God (Ibid., 21-22). Jesus was adopted at his baptism and empowered for the miraculous by the Spirit of God and exalted to the position of Son of God due to his piety and obedience (Ibid., 22). There was not some heavenly being that entered into Jesus, but it was rather more like an anointing that inspired him such as took place among the Old Testament prophets (Ibid., 22-23). The Modalistic Monarchians (also referred to as Patripassians) held that the Father and the Son were the same person rather than two distinct persons united in the Godhead. In other words, the substance of Christ did not differ in any degree from the Father because they were one and the same. They believed that God the Father was born of himself into the world as the Son, entered into the human experience as a man, suffered on the cross, committed his spirit to himself, died and did not die, rested in the grave, and raised himself on the third day (Ibid., 24-25). While others who encountered him in his human life perceived him as the Son, he was in fact the Father. Some Modalistic Monarchains found problems with this model since they held that God was impassible, and they asserted that their was a distinction between the Father as God-Spirit-Christ who did not suffer in any real physical sense, and the Son Jesus in the flesh who did (Ibid., 24). In both of these views, Christ was God and his divinity was maintained while monotheism was also protected. The basic ideas of Modalisitc Monarchianism are found in the teachings of Sabellius, who believed there was one God who manifested himself in three forms of appearance or manifestation: the Father as Creator and Lawgiver, the Son as Redeemer during the incarnation until the ascension, and the Holy Spirit who has been the form of appearance since then. In other words, these forms of appearance are three modes relevant to the economic appearance of God. Sabellius also asserts that ontologically the Father extends himself into the Son and the Spirit, even insisting that their name will cease to exist when they are no longer needed (Ibid., 25).
- Lucian was a follower of the Dynamic Monarchian Paul of Samosata, even after this teaching was condemned at the Council of Antioch in AD 268 (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 28, PDF.). He began a school of Scriptural exegesis in Antioch where he taught Paul's Adoptionism Christology mingled with the Logos Christology of Origen, as an opponent of the "pluralistic tendencies of Trinitarians.” He believed that God was one and that there was an eternal inner logos that was always with the Father as in the mind of God. However, he felt that the external logos was a created god (Ibid., 29). However, though Lucian eventually returned to the teaching of the broader church, his student Arius did not (Ibid., 28-29). Arius continued to maintain much of what he had learned from Lucian. While Arius was a priest in Alexandria, Egypt, under the bishop Alexander, he began to push his controversial views about Christ despite the refutation of such views by his own bishop (Ibid., 29, 33). Sometime after the debate between Arius and Alexander began, the entire city and even the region was aflame with conflict by AD 318. "Alexander was concerned that he was dealing with a heresy of all heresies," slinging accusations at Arius and his followers as antichrists, enemies of God, murders of the divinity of Christ, blasphemers, and traitors like Judas (Ibid., 33). Arius and his followers did not take the rebuke without fighting back and issued out accusations of their own. They accused Alexander of being both contradictory and confusing with his dualism that they felt did not offer any real distinction between the Father and the Son. Athanasius was first a deacon and then a priest in Alexandria under Alexander, assisting him with the biblical arguments against Arius. He would eventually take the mantle in the debate as the theological hero of those who believed the Logos was fully God and fully man. After the death of Alexander in AD 238, he became the new bishop of Alexandria. He argued against Arius through the decades of continual conflict until his death in AD 373 (Ibid., 34). Arius was extremely monotheistic and did not believe that God could be divided (Ibid., 30-31). Arius' could not accept that the Logos was ontologically the same as the Father, while also distinct. He rejected any idea of an eternal coexistence. Arius insisted that the Son "possesses nothing proper to God, in the real sense of propriety, for he is not equal to God, nor yet is he of the same substance" (Ibid., 31). He held that the Son possessed an independent substance from that of the Father (Ibid., 32). Arius insisted that the Logos was created before the worlds were created. He was generated by the will and grace of God as a new and perfect creature through whom everything else was made (30-31). He was the intermediary that was necessary for God to create the world and its creatures (Ibid., 32). The Logos was the only-begotten God and was divine in some sense of being created as a god. But not in the same sense that the Father was God since the Father was not originated and the source of everything, including the Logos (Ibid., 30). Arius stresses that there was a time when the Logos did not exist (Ibid. 31). The only reason that Arius could refer to Son as God is because participates in a "gracious sharing of the Father’s divinity and attributes" as a created god. The Logos took on a human body capable of suffering and moral development as Jesus. But he was not fully a human being like we are and lacked a human. The Logos took the place of the human soul in Christ (Ibid., 30, 32-33). Arius also believed that the Son was worthy of worship as the greatest of all creatures. He believed that the Holy Spirit was a second impersonal substance made with Christ that was subordinate to Christ (Ibid., 32). Like Arius, Athanasius believed God is one being, a monad of divinity, except that he saw God as consisting of distinctions or duality in unity (Ibid., 36-38). The unity of the Father and the Son was a fundamental argument for Athanasius (Ibid., 37). This divinity is not separated among the distinctions and they are one in nature (Ibid., 36). The divinity that was in Christ is of this unity within the Godhead was always with the Father and is not a creature, but true God. He believed that the Son was the offspring of the Father like a the light that comes from the sun as an image and reflection of the Father, but not in any sense like human generation like a human. He did use the term "begetting" in contrast to "creating" to signify a production so to speak of the Son from the same substance of the Father. The Son shared in the nature of the Father without diminishing the Father when he was begotten (Ibid., 36). By God becoming a human being and entering into the human experience, it allowed for man to be saved and to become godlike (Ibid., 35). He took upon himself human flesh and united with humanity as fully human with a human body and soul (Ibid., 38). Athanasius believed that the Arians leaned toward polytheism by insisting that there was a great God and a lesser God that was begotten or generated from that greater God (Ibid., 36-37). They also felt that to worship a creature as the Arians were supposedly doing according to their Christology was a form of paganism (Ibid., 35). Athanasius also rejected the Arian argument that God needed a created Logos intermediary to create the world and have interaction with humanity, but that he instead created and saved directly (Ibid., 35). Overall, Athanasius felt that the Arians erred by trying to think about God the Father and God the Son in human terms instead of recognizing that he is God and cannot be exactly compared to humans for understanding (Christopher A. Hall, Learning Theology with the Church Fathers (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 40, Print).
- This debate between Arius and Athanasius eventually led to the Council of Nicea in AD 325 under Emperor Constantine. The views of Athanasius and his party formed the basis of the Nicene Creed. The council condemned much of the beliefs of the Arian party. Arius himself was condemned and his books ordered to be burned. However, the debate continued to rage on for decades afterwards with a teeter-totter of theology and politics. The Arians went back and forth in and out of favor in a continual conflict in the East against Athanasius and the orthodox. “We believe In one God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, only begotten, that is, of the nature of the Father. God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, both things in heaven and things on earth; who for us men and for our salvation came down and was made flesh and assumed man’s nature, suffered and rose the third day, ascended to heaven, [and] shall come again to judge the quick and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost.” (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 46-47, PDF.).
- After the Nicene Creed, another debate developed in the church about the specifics of God in Christ, summed up in the positions of Antiochene School and the Alexandrian School based on the cities from which the two opposing groups lived and/or centered. The Christology of the Antiochene School was based on the literal and critical interpretation of Scripture with an insistence on the humanity of Jesus (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 119-20, PDF.). They built many of their theological ideas about Christ on the literal history about Christ in the Gospels, rejecting any form of allegorical interpretation for which those in Alexandria were often known (Ibid., 119). The Logos as God was in the human Christ from the moment of conception and throughout his entire life (Ibid., 120). The divine and human nature in Jesus were seen as separate and distinct, maintaining the unchangeable nature of the Godhead and the Logos and preventing any possibility of the idea that God or the Logos suffered or died. There was not a union of essence or substance between the deity and humanity of Jesus, but rather one of "moral fellowship and communion" according to God's grace and good pleasure that also left his humanity unchanged, being one of will rather than substance (Ibid., 120-21). They described this as God dwelling with a temple in which neither God nor the temple undergo any change or merging of natures (Ibid., 120). However, critics have noted that this unity of the natures as defined by the Antiochene School was not real in substance, but rather was one only in name, really suggesting that there was actually a conjunction of one divine person and one human person in Christ (Ibid., 120-22). For the Antiochenes, Mary did not give birth to God, but to a human being. According to the Antiochenes, humanity possessed a free will in which they could chose to morally act according to their own decisions, which meant that even Jesus exercised moral development and free will during the incarnation in his life here on the earth as a human without interference or assistance of the divine nature (Ibid., 119-20). They felt that the Logos entered into the human experience both to save humanity from sin and to elevate them back into the higher state of Adam before the fall (Ibid., 120-21). He saved man as the second Adam through his moral choices and achievement and humans can be saved by imitating him in our moral choices and achievements. The Alexandrian School on the other hand, did not restrict itself to a literal interpretation of Scripture, but favored allegorical or spiritual methods of interpretation in their Christology in order to supposedly discover concealed truth in the literal Gospel narratives and the rest of the biblical texts. Unlike the Antiochene School, they focused more on the deity of Christ rather than his humanity. They saw the humanity of Christ as "passive and almost impersonal" and in a sense something used by the Son of God during his incarnation without entering fully into the human experience (Ibid., 121). Unlike the Antiochenes who stressed the necessity of the full humanity of Jesus in salvation, the Alexandrians took the other extreme by insisting that our salvation (which they saw as consisting of a deification) necessitated a real union between God and humanity in Christ. Thus, the impassible Logos actually became passible in the incarnation, in contrast to the Antiochenes who deny such an idea in their Christology. They also did not accept the Antiochene idea of Jesus as and independent human undergoing a moral development along with free choice that brought God's favor and grace. His humanity was impersonal and was used by the Son in a way that his deity was not corrupted in any way. Salvation in the Alexandrian School consisted of an exchange of our fallen nature with the divine nature of Christ (Ibid., 122).
- The two conflicting thoughts about Christ arising from the Antiochene and Alexandrian debates came to came to a point of serious conflict in their opposing Christology between the years AD 428-451 (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 122, PDF.) Much of the conflict during this time can be centered upon the views of Nestorius of Antioch and Cyril of Alexandria. Nestorius saw the two natures of God and human in the incarnation of Jesus Christ resulting in one person. There was a conjunction or association of the two natures without mixing them (Cross, Christian Doctrine , 127; Christopher A. Hall, Learning Theology with the Church Fathers (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 93, Print). The Logos came into the flesh of Jesus Christ without nullifying or changing the flesh. He stressed the humanity of the God-Mam. He preferred the use of the name Christotokos or anthropotokos for Mary since she bore the man in whom the Logos dwelt. Cyril held to much of the Alexandrian thoughts about Christology. He implied in his teachings that there was one nature united in one person in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. This is because the Logos is active and personal “in” Jesus Christ as a unity, not “in” merely the human Jesus. Cyril rejected the conjunction or association of the two natures without mixing them as asserted by Nestorius. “Cyril said that the Logos did not merely indwell the human Jesus, but truly became human, yet somehow remained God.” He preferred the use of the name theotokos for Mary since she bore the union between the Logos and the human Jesus in whom the Logos dwelt. He stressed the divinity of the God-Man (Cross, Christian Doctrine , 127). By AD 430, Cyril had turned the tides of much of the Christian world against Nestorius and issued a demand that he recant many of his views as heretical. Nestorius requested that Emperor Theodosius II gather together a council to resolve the matter. This took place in Ephesus in AD 431 The council decided that the views of Nestorius were heretical (Ibid., 126).
- After more debates about the nature of Christ, the doctrine of Christ was finally settled at the council of Chalcedon that took place in October 451. It was called by the new empress and emperor Pulcheria and Marcian, respectfully. It was a gathering of somewhere between 500 and 600 bishops, the largest gathering ever at the time. The outcome of this council was the Declaration of Chalcedon. There were at least seven major ideas that came from that Declaration. 1. There was a true incarnation of the Logos. 2. A precise distinction between the nature and person. 3. The God-Man was the result of the incarnation. 4. A duality of the two natures. 5. A unity of the person. 6. “The whole work of Christ is attributed to his person, and not the one or other nature exclusively.” 7. The independent personality of the human nature of Christ (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 130-31, PDF.).
- During the Protestant Reformation (16th century), not much changed regarding Christology even among the reformers. They mostly agreed with the full deity and humanity of Christ as determined in the councils of the early church. This included both Martin Luther and John Calvin who agreed with the Catholic church in all major points. Nevertheless, there was some differences between Luther and Calvin on what Cross refers to as the finer details. Martin Luther agreed with the Catholic Church that Christ consisted of both a human divine and human nature (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 133, PDF.). Luther insisted strongly on the deity of Christ even insisting that for us as believers there is no other God since to contemplate beyond Christ is nothing but speculation (Ibid., 134). Luther even believed that it is through the work of Christ that we can understand his person (Ibid., 135). For Luther, the two natures of Christ fully participated with one. In some sense God suffered and died in the humanity of Christ (Ibid., 134-36). It was not the Father suffering in the Son, but God in Christ doing so (Ibid., 135). However, if it was only a man, and not God in man, dying on the cross, then "we are lost" (Ibid., 136). Luther felt Christ was divine, "omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent" (Ibid., 134). He even believed that his subjection in becoming a man was only of attitude, but that he still retained his full deity and power from his birth even before the baptism (Ibid., 134-35). Luther believes that after Jesus' resurrection, his human body became omnipresent and that he is now located everywhere by a repletive presence that is "simultaneously and wholly present in all places and it fills all places, yet is unable to be circumscribed (measured) by any place" (Ibid., 137-38). Luther's primary stress on the deity of Christ resulted in some accusing him of encouraging the supremacy of the divine nature at the expense of his humanity (Ibid., 134). Though some identify Luther's Christology as revolving around mystery and paradox, others see contradiction or unresolved tensions (Ibid., 136).
- Though John Calvin's Christology was more oriented toward soteriological concerns, he, like Martin Luther, also felt that the person of Christ can be understood by his works. He saw Jesus as the mediator between God and humanity who subjected himself to the weakness of human flesh in the incarnation (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 138, PDF.). Since we as weak humans are too low to attain to the majesty of God and cross that bridge, God came to us in Christ that we might come to know his love and restore us into a right relationship with God. For Calvin, it was absolutely necessary that Christ as mediator was God for it was only in this way that a man can reach to the heights of God and function as the mediator in restoring our peace with God. He took upon our humanity that he might give to us what was his while entering into the human experience in common with us. God become man in Jesus Christ so that through his obedience he might restore our relationship with God that came from the disobedience of Adam and the fall (Ibid., 139). For this reason, he needed to fully enter into the human experience as fully man, thereafter taking Adam's place. Calvin unites the two nature of Christ without any type of fusion, morphing together, confusion or mixture. His deity and humanity remain distinct and unimparied within the unseparated unity of the person Jesus. In this way, Calvin, though what some might see as a paradox, Jesus was really like us in his humanity, and he was really fully God rather than some new type of creature. Calvin, like Luther, insisted that Jesus must be fully human and also fully divine in order to reach us and save us. Calvin was actually accused by the Lutherans as in error because of his stress on dividing the two natures. Unlike Luther who felt that the human body of Jesus became omnipresent after his resurrection, Calvin argued against this as a divinization of the body of Jesus that amounted to some new creature that could not really be either God or man (Ibid., 140). For Calvin, it is in his divinity that Christ operates outside the body as God both within the incarnation and afterwards, thus maintaining his humanity and his deity. "Christ’s life and work as the Eternal Son goes beyond his life and work as the Incarnate Son.” The Lutherans felt that this teaching of God being wholly in Jesus while also wholly outside of him was in direct contradiction to the sharing of attributes in Christ, and mocked this as "the Calvin extra" (Ibid., 141). This was a major area of dispute between the Lutherans and the Calvinists.
- From the the Chalcedon Document in the fifth up until the sixteenth century, there was little activity or change in Christological theology. In the 1700s, Christology encounter new challenges and idea brought about by the focus of reason and history during the Enlightenment. The Bible began to be looked at by many intellectuals as superstition and immaturity of intellect. The philosopher Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729 – 1781) questioned the truth of history, which included that of the Bible as well. “If no historical truth can be demonstrated, then nothing can be demonstrated by means of historical truths. That is: accidental truths of history can never become the proof of necessary truths of reason." He explained this as a ditch that we cannot cross. This set the direction of re-examining the history of the gospel narratives and questioned the accuracy of their historical claims. Christian responded to this new ideal with attempts at rationality, even questioning the miracles and the resurrection itself. This eventually resulted in an effort to find the real historical Jesus (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 141-42, PDF.). There were generally four periods of the Quest for the Historical Jesus recognized by many scholars. The First Quest (1778-1906) The first quest took a variety of turns from various scholars, which included: Rationalist who removed the supernatural from the story of Jesus. Romanticists who viewed Jesus as a heroic figure with a strong personality. David Friedrich Strauss (1808 – 1874) who removed the rational, mythological and supernatural elements in the story of Jesus to focus on what is left after that (Ibid., 144-45). He felt that though there may be some historical truth to the gospels, it was simply impossible to reconstruct what is historical fact and what is myth. Strauss' historical Jesus was self-deluded in believing that he was the Messiah, which led him to failure on the cross despite his great teachings. In 1906, the German and French theologian Schweitzer insisted that the quest for the historical Jesus should be abandoned because of bias in the research. The core idea that emerged in this first quest for the historical Jesus was "a Jewish claimant of the Messiahship, whose world of thought is purely eschatological." Schweitzer suggested that we who are living on the other side of the ditch from the historical truth about Jesus should approach Jesus from a position of faith based on the faith of the eyewitnesses (Ibid., 146). The “No-Quest Era” (1896-1954) Based on Schweitzer's call for an end to the quest for the historical Jesus, there was little movement in this area during this time, partially due to the rejection of theologian Rudolf Bultmann and his cohorts of any such attempts. Following Schweitzer's lead, he felt that the historical Jesus cannot be know and all that is required for salvation is the Christ of faith (Ibid., 147). The New Quest (1954-1980s) Bultmann's student Ernst Käsemann (1906-1998) renewed the quest for the historical Jesus in challenging some of the current ideas at the time. He proposed that there was a greater connection between Jesus and the community that followed him that warranted further inquiry into finding the historical Jesus. (Ibid., 147) The Third Quest (1980s–Present) Some have question whether this period actually represents a "Third Quest." There is more historical truth that can be found in the gospels than was considered previously. The outcome has been a wide variety of different views on who the historical Jesus really was. Does not seem to have produced anything even near a consenseous (Ibid., 147). One modern example of this third quest has made it into the public spotlight with Reza Aslan's best seller based on sloppy work accepted by the gullible public, Zealot.
- Wilhelm Herrmann (1846-1922), a theology professor in Germany, held that faith in Christ cannot rely on historical judgment no matter how valid it may seem. Faith must move past and beyond any critical-historical study of the Jesus of history. He held that it was folly to try to establish faith based on historical investigation. It was the power of the inner life of Jesus that left an impression and impact on the disciples and solidified their testimony. "The power of Jesus’ personality rushes forward like a current in a stream throughout history into the present." It is by stepping into this stream of his personality that we ourselves become connected with that flow. This is how we bridge the ditch between history and faith (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 148, PDF.). Martin Kähler (1835-1912), a professor in Germany, also seemed to echo much of what Herrmann had to say, insisting we can bypass the problems of historical research by approaching the Christ of faith. He concluded that much of the Gospel accounts prior to the last week in the life of Jesus may have some connection to our faith, but not as an historical account of Jesus. What we find in the Gospels is a character sketch of Jesus with the real focus on the who and how that can produce faith rather than historical fact. We can find certainty in our salvation due to the "drawing power of the Savior" as we are overpowered by Christ who evokes such faith in us (Ibid., 149). Faith does not need a biography, but rather "an encounter with the same Christ who was portrayed by the first witnesses" (Ibid., 150). Paul Tillich (1886-1965) attempted to bypass the problems of historical research in Christology by establishing faith as something independent of the uncertainties that comes with historical research. There was no need for an exact historical biography of Jesus while he was on the earth. Instead, he saw the life of Jesus as similar to an expressionist portrait in which the details are of little significance. Jesus becomes real by faith in the same Christ that was portrayed by the first witnesses. There is a consensus in the biblical witness that Jesus is now the Christ of God and that it all we need to see in order to have faith. Only the mythical aspect of the biblical records is needed for faith, while the accuracy of historical details about Jesus are not essential. There is also no need to isolate the factual element from the symbolic element in the portrait when it comes to faith. He felt that faith was created by the Spirit within humans and not by the intellect that might be influenced by historical research. In fact, Jesus can never really be known apart from the reception of the early believers. By approaching the historical problem in this manner, Tillich felt that we can sidestep the ditch of history. (Ibid., 150-54)
- The Christ of Contemporary Theology Some of the key players and their ideas related to Christology. Karl Barth (1886-1968) Saw Christ as the Center of Christian Theology. His thought was that if one wants to know anything about God, one must begin and end with Jesus Christ (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 155, PDF.). Jesus Christ is God Himself in person is active and present in the flesh of humanity. He is a revelation of God's character that conveys his "movement towards humanity." Jesus is the Mediator between God and humans, and his very existence of being both God and man is atonement and reconciliation. His Christology fits within a Chalcedonian framework (Ibid., 156). "To say the Word became flesh means that the acting subject of the God-Man is the eternal Word; but it is also to say that God stoops to our level as an act of God’s divine freedom" (Ibid., 157). When the Logos as God became flesh it did not cease to be the Logos and he will always still be God. He was God with us. He is also truly and fully human in his humanity just like us, having fully entered into the human experience (Ibid., 158).
- Kenotic Christology focuses on the Philippians 2:5-11 passage of Christ emptying himself in the incarnation. It became prominent in the 1800s as theologians in Germany and England began to question what this means exactly. There was an increased emphasis on the humanity of Christ. With it came attacks on the Christology of Chalcedon and the divinity of Christ (Terry L. Cross, A History of Christian Doctrine (Cleveland, TN: Lee University, 2013), 165, PDF.). Key Players Gottfried Thomasius (1802 - 1875) Began contributing to the ideas of Kenotic Christology beginning in 1845 (Ibid., 165). Felt that both the human and divine properties in Christ were really shared with and given to each other. It was not simply the divine assuming human nature without changing it. It was necessary for both God and the human to suffer and die as the one Christ for our reconciliation with God (Ibid., 166). Within the Trinity, only the son was fit to become a human and save humanity because of his status in the Trinity. Yet, it was his own choice to do so. The immersion of the Logos as God into the creature is into a sphere that is related to him because man was created in the image of God. The Son of God assumed human nature without hereditary sinfulness while still remaining deity. The Christ was both deity and humanity united in one person (Ibid., 167). What the Son of God divested himself of as declared in Philippians is the divine glory in his mode of divine being that he shared from the beginning with the Father and the Spirit in ruling and governing creation(Ibid., 169). The Son of God is the ego of the God-Man and there is nothing lacking to him that is essential to man. With a limit to his divine nature while on the earth he still does not cease to be fully divine, and he is free to be a human being while still remaining God (Ibid., 170). He divested himself of his glory and came to earth and entered into the human experience in love. Being both God and man has now become his permanent form of existence (Ibid., 171). Hugh Ross Mackintosh (1870 – 1936). He ignited Kenotic Christology in England. He found the "two natures" doctrine of Chalcedonian Christology troubling since he felt in created a "thoroughgoing dualism." He rejects the traditional doctrine of the immutability and impassibility of God. This doctrine needs to be redefined based on God's love as revealed in Christ. The humbling of Christ in the incarnation begins in the divine will. Christ was willing to do whatever was necessary in compatibility with a moral nature to redeem the lost. What is really immutable in God is his holy love that makes up his essence. "The Son may possess all the qualities of divinity 'in the form of concentrated potency rather than of full actuality'" (Ibid., 172-74). Jürgen Moltmann (1926-Present) Revised Kenotic Christology in 1972. He saw cross event between God and God rather than God and humanity. God suffered and died in Christ on the cross. This includes both divine and human natures. There was a death "in" God. God the Father abandoned the Son to his death which God the Son suffered along with his death. "The Son experiences dying, while the Father suffers the death of the Son." The Father suffers the death of Fatherhood because the Son has died and he is now experiences Sonlessness. Thus, they both suffer a separation and/or a split in some sense (Ibid., 175-77).