Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: rock@sun.com (Bill Petro) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Who do you say Christ is? (and other questions) Message-ID: Date: 11 Sep 89 06:15:14 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 290 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu kodak!isctsse!mcmahon@cs.rochester.edu (Brendan McMahon) writes: >Now for some questions: > > o) Do not most Christian churches teach the divinity of Jesus? > o) How do other Christians who profess Jesus as "one in being with the > Father", account for apparent Biblical contradictions such as "the > Father is greater than I", "Why do you call me good, only the Father > is good", ... others indicating a separate Father. ... It turns out that the question of the divinity of Jesus was decided more than a millenia ago during that period of church history called the era of the Theologians. Three Questions During the era of the Theologians these questions were asked: What was Jesus Christ before He came? What was Jesus Christ when He came? What did he do? What he was before he came deals with the trinity or Theology proper, what he was when he came deals with the merger of the God-ness and man-ness in one person or Christology. How do you get 100% of one and 100% of the other in one person - is this not just bad math? What he did deals with salvation or Soteriology. What was Jesus Christ before He came? The first question deals with Theology proper, the preincarnation question. It was a debate between a presbyter in Alexandria in the 4th century named Arius whose favorite phrase was, "There was a time when Christ was not". He believed that Christ was not always eternally existent but he began in time. Arius was opposed by the bishop of Alexandria named Athanasius. This was what was called the "Arian Controversy". It began about 318 AD and was debated at the the first post-biblical church in Nicea. This was actually the second church council. The first one was during biblical times and is recounted in Acts 15. The church decided on an orthodox statement of Jesus Christ - eternal. Arius taught that God was always eternal, but Christ and to a lesser degree creatures (us), had beginnings in time. "There was a time when Christ was not." Athanasius understood that if you believed that you had destroyed salvation. It took an eternal God to die the quality of death that procured salvation for us. A good man at the best could not do it, not even an elevated man. The Council of Nicea, just outside Constantinople, and called by the newly Christianized emperor Constantine himself, in 325 condemned Arianism. Unfortunately, following this condemnation, Arianism enjoyed a resurgence. Arius recanted his views. But after he recanted his views, he recanted his recantation. At the second great council in 381, among other things discussed, they condemned Arianism a second time. Athanasius was a good man, he was kicked around the empire five times. He's kicked out of his church, he comes back, he's kicked out again. Finally, his friends come to Athanasius, who alone is standing for this doctrine and they say to him "Athanasius, don't you know that the whole world is against you?" ...and it was, even the emperor. Athanasius said, "If the whole world is against me, then I am against the world." In fact, Arius at one time succeeded him as bishop of his church, and Athanasius prayed dearly that God would not let Arius take his pulpit. When Arius arrived at the church in Alexandria arrayed in purple on a palanquin as he rose up the steps of the church, he fell over dead. That was the end of that heretic. But that was not the end of that heresy and it survives today, in the theology of Mormon Church and the Jehovah's Witnesses. So, it was during the era of the Theologians that they solved forever, that before Jesus Christ came to this earth, he had to be what? God. They hammered it out as they poured over the Bible. What was Jesus Christ when He came? We know he was a man and we know he was God, but how do the two get together? You and I believe what the bishop of Rome wrote in 451 AD. Leo I of Rome said, "Our Lord Jesus Christ was 100% man, 100% God, in one person, without confusion, forever." And we believe that, but it took years to figure it out. Unfortunately the church figured it out by figuring out what it wasn't. So we had people in the church coming up with erroneous theories about the God-ness and the man-ness only to be declared heretics and be removed from the church. Apollinarius One of the first of these was Apollinarius. He said that if the human being has three parts - a body, soul and spirit, then when you come to Christ, he had a human body and a human spirit, but not a human soul. His human soul was removed and his diety filled it. So what he is denying was what? The true human-ness of Jesus Christ. He was not a human, he was a super human. If he is not human what have you destroyed? Salvation. Because a man died on that cross, like you and I, just like you and I, apart from sin. So he was condemned at the Council of Constantinople in 381. Nestorius Nestorius came along and thought he had the correct solution. Nestorianism basically taught that Jesus was Siamese twins. He was 100% man and 100% God, but not in one person. He was tangentally connected, but not really. He spoke in terms of a moral "conjunction" or a merging of wills rather than that of an essential "union". At the third great ecumenical (general) council held in Ephesus in 431, Nestorianism was condemned. The church might not have had it all figured out but they did know this: he was a real human being, and that he was one person not two. Eutyches Closer, but still a way to go. Eutyches was an aged monastic superior in Constantinople who taught that Jesus was of two natures, he was man and he was God, but when they came together in their collision course, they ceased to be either and became a third "something". He was a "tertiumquid", an eclecticism in which he lost his identity. He suggested that Christ's humanity was absorbed by his divinity like a drop of wine in the sea. But he solves the problem of the error of Nestorius by getting one person, but that person does not have 100%-ness in him, of either kind. This teaching was answered at the fourth great council, and perhaps the greatest council, at Chalcedon. It was at Chalcedon that Bishop Leo I of Rome addressed his letter, called the "Tome of Leo". Over four hundred Greek bishops attended, with representatives from Rome. This Leo was one of the earliest great administrators getting backing from the emperor and making extensive use of the text "You are Peter" from Matthew 16:19 as speaking of the pope himself. This same Leo later convinced Attila the Hun to turn back from Rome and managed to minimize the damage done to the city when it was captured by the Vandal hoards. The Tome of Leo "We all with one voice confess our Lord Jesus Christ one and the same Son, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting of a reasonable soul and body; of one substance with the Father as regards his Godhead, of one substance with us as regards his manhood, like us in all things, apart from sin;...to be acknowledged in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, or without separation; the distinction of natures being in no way abolished because of the union, but rather the characteristic property of each nature being preserved, and coming together to form one person and one entity, not as if Christ were parted or divided into two persons..." This was decreed to be orthodoxy at Chalcedon in 451. The bishops of Rome are the most orthodox you are going to find. If you wanted a good statement on what the Bible teaches, you went to Rome to get it - for 600 years. This was one of the reasons for the primacy of Rome in the church. Everyone said, "Wow, this is what we've been trying to say all along, this is it." The church hammered out what he was before he came, then the church hammered out what he was when he came - and they did it in reverse process. They figured out first what he wasn't then they arrived at what he was. That's how we usually do it. We are more adroit at figuring out what is wrong than what is right. Because of Apollinarius the church agreed that he was 100% man. Because of Nestorius the church agreed that he was one person not two. Because of Eutyches the church agreed that the distinction of the natures remain distinct. Therefore, at Chalcedon, the Tome of Leo I said that "Jesus is 100% man, 100% God, in one person, without confusion, forever." He is today reigning in heaven, the God-man. And when he walked upon the earth he was the God-man. God cannot die, so in what sense did he die on the cross? The man died, and the diety permitted himself to have his spirit be dismissed. That's why he says, "No man can take my life, but I lay it down." How can you kill God? So Jesus died on the cross voluntarily, because he wanted to, no one took it. What did Jesus do? This debate rings through the church repeatedly, the question of "how do you get saved." Of course, the real highlight in the development of soteriology is the information in the New Testament, everything else is just a shadow. Augustine was the first to clarify and systemize the meaning of the New Testament. He did it more brilliantly than anyone else had done. The Protestant Reformation is essentially a regurgitation of Augustine. Martin Luther read his writings. The issues are: Does man have any innate ability to effect in any measure his standing before God? Is there any goodness in man that would cause God to look upon him with favor? Is man totally depraved? Can man do anything to save himself? Can I do anything to save myself? Can you? Augustine and Pelagius Pelagius was an errant teacher who traveled the empire until he was finally excommunicated. He taught that man could save himself by his own native ability without so much as the work of Christ. He was a tall, brilliant, muscular, handsome man, just exactly what you don't want a false teacher to be. It was said of him, "his morality was not so much the rich deep life of faith so much as it was the external legalism, the ascetic self-discipline and self righteousness of monkery." And that's what he was. In those days if you had an error to teach, all roads made their way to Rome. That's where you went to ply your trade. Every -ic, -ism, -asm, and -spasm could be heard there, like Hyde Park in London, or Sproul Plaza in Berkeley. He finally came to clash with Augustine. He had a godly mother, Saint Monnica, and a pagan father. He lived a rather lustful life. He came right out of the pits. He had an illegitimate son at the age of 19. He sought peace in literature, he became a follower of Manicheis An interesting story is told about Augustine. When he made it back to Africa he was met at the ship by one of his more favorite paramours. She was thinking, "Oh boy, Augustine is back, happy days are here again." She ran up to him and said, "Augustine", and he turned his face from her. She thought that was strange so she ran up to him again and said, "Augustine", and he turned away from her again. So finally, she ran after him and grabbed him and said, "Augustine, Augustine, it is I." And he turned to her and said, "It is not I, but Christ". So he emerged with a very deep sense of sin and when Pelagius came teaching his heresies, they clashed. Pelagius taught that what occurred in Genesis 3 was a myth, it never happened so the effects of that myth are also mythical. He denied the fall of man and the idea of original sin. Man can save himself and has no need for God's grace. Man sins by choice and he can choose to not sin. And it is when he chose not to he saved himself. Augustine taught that man cannot repent unless the grace of God woos him and wins him - as I won my wife. How? Somewhat against her will. But I appeared so loving to her that I caused her to change her mind. And when she changed her mind, I accepted her invitation. That is something like what God does. He appears so loving and so kind and so benevolent that we are caused to be willing. And when we are willing, he saves us. Augustine then taught that men fell from innocence in Adam, man is born in sin because he was born in Adam. Man is totally depraved, unable in any way to effect or influence his position before God. Salvation therefore can only be God's gift apart from any human contribution or lack of it. These are big statements. In the church however, you had these two positions, Augustinianism and Pelagianism. In the medieval period at the Council of Orange in 529, the church decided on a middle-of-the-road position. That is called "cooperationism" sometimes referred to as semi-Pelagianism, which is the foundation stone of the "Ex opere operato" faith of the Roman Church. What is the "Ex opere operato" faith of the Roman Church? It is the idea that grace comes to you by the performing of certain sacraments. There are seven of them, but two of them cancel each other out, marriage and celibacy, as it seems that you can't be in both of these states. As you perform the sacraments you accrue merit, and when you have acrrued enough merit you may get yourself out of Purgatory, that interim waiting state, into Heaven itself. So Heaven is both earned and given. It is not free grace, it is merited. So by the Roman system you merit the merit of Christ by your meritorius good works. This seems to me to be a bit strained and strange from what I read in the Bible. But that is where the church camped for 1000 years of darkness before the Reformation. The difference between Pelagius and the Council of Orange is one of degrees. Pelagius was blatant. He said man can do it alone. Orange said that man and the church and God cooperate. Augustine said that man can do nothing on his own. Augustine taught grace, Orange taught cooperative grace, Pelagius taught no grace at all. Augustine said that Jesus delivered salvation to us freely, Orange said that Jesus delivered salvation to us cooperatively. The difference between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant Church is one word. What is that word? The Roman Church believes in justification by faith. The Protestant Church believes in justification by faith "alone". All the blood shed during the Reformation was for that one word. Not justification by faith plus works, but naked faith. The Protestant Church has much in agreement with the Catholic Church. There are other areas of disagreement, of course - apostolic succession, the veneration of the saints, the role of tradition, etc., but at the very foundation we differ over that little word. Bill Petro {decwrl,hplabs,ucbvax}!sun!Eng!rock "UNIX for the sake of the kingdom of heaven" Matthew 19:12 [The dividing line between the semi-Augustian and semi-Pelagian positions is somewhat hard to place. However I would place the Council of Orange as semi-Augustinian. The Council of Orange has no place for the concept of merit independent of grace. Indeed most of its canons would fit in quite well with the Reformers. Any cooperation occurs only after we have received the grace of God to regenerate us. It is certainly possible that the medieval church moved beyond this position into semi-Pelagianism and possibly even Pelagianism, as you described. However the major doctrinal statements are more careful. The section on justification in Trent -- while not satisfactory to Lutherans or Calvinists -- is also careful to make it clear that we have no merit other than from Christ. It does defend the idea that Christians truly merit eternal life, however this merit comes only from living a redeemed life which is in itself a gift of God's grace. --clh]