See Religions and Expectations. Poul Anderson describes a society in religious ferment where new beliefs can arise, coalesce and solidify into dogmas. Jaan the Shoemaker believes not that he is the incarnation or reincarnation of a god but that his consciousness has merged with that of an Ancient. In this science fictional, future historical context, Anderson has reproduced past historical turning points.
-Frances Young, Chapter 5, "Two Roots or a Tangled Mass?" IN John Hick, Ed, The Myth Of God Incarnate (London, 1977), pp. 87-119 AT p. 98.
(Addendum: But Young goes on to show Jewish antecedents of incarnational theology.)
Theologies develop:
(i) Jesus was able to be the Messiah promised to the Jews because he was in patrilineal descent from Abraham.
(ii) He was not in patrilineal descent from Abraham but was the Son of God because the divine Spirit had impregnated his mother.
(iii) He was not only the Son Of God but also God the Son because, although this was not known before, God is three Persons and Jesus was the Incarnation of the Second Person.
(iv) He was the Incarnation not of a divine Person but of a lesser, although powerful, supernatural being.
Paul started with (i), then, under the pressure of controversy with Samaritan Gnostics, adopted (iv) but did not preach (ii) or (ii). The Trinity doctrine is not in the New Testament but is inferred from John's deification of the Son and personification of the Spirit. Also of interest are three entirely different accounts of Jesus' last words before his death.
Addendum: I have tried to clarify the developing doctrines about Christ here.
11 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I know you are, at the very least, DOUBTFUL God exists, never mind whether His Son became Incarnate as man for our salvation. But, one point doesn't seem to have been mentioned: what would it have been LIKE for God to have assumed a human nature to His Godhead and lived as man? I remember Fr. Brown giving some thought to that in an earlier version of AN INTRODUCTION TO NEW TESTAMENT CHRISTOLOGY.
I do believe Our Lord was a descendant, thru his human forebears of Abraham and King David. First, legally so thru St. Joseph as His adoptive father; and actually so thru His Mother, whom some believe was also a descendant of David.
And I certainly believe in your Point iii, summarizing orthodox Christian belief. I have to disagree with your Point iv, because I do believe St. Paul believed in the divinity of Christ, even if he did not use the TERMINOLOGY developed later by the Church under the pressure of the Christological and Trinitarian controversies. I have read the letters of St. Paul and he does take a "high" Christological view. Your Point iv seems more Arian than anything else.
I used to accept that the Synoptic Gospels had a later, rather than earlier date. However, David Dungan's book HISTORY OF THE SYNOPTIC PROBLEM and the Oxford Fragments of Matthew's Gospel has convinced me this is not feasible. Fragments of Matthew's Gospel were found mixed among legal documents in Egypt dated to the twelfth year of Nero's reign. Assuming about a decade for the Gospel to reach Egypt from Syria, then Matthew already existed by about AD 55. Which also makes it likely Mark and Luke existed before AD 70. In short, I no longer believe in the Q theory.
Sean
Sean,
I know a Biblical scholar, James Crossley, who has argued for a very early Mark and might be in the process of changing the scholarly consensus. You think that Matthew preceded Mark?
Paul.
Paul and Sean:
Regarding the question of Christ's human heritage from David, Lew Wallace, in the novel *Ben Hur*, described Mary as being some fairly close degree of cousin to Joseph, making her also a descendant of David, as Sean suggested in his second paragraph. I don't know, however, what authority Wallace consulted for this notion.
Both,
As a conceptual sequence, (iii) and (iv) would be better in reverse order. Thus:
(iii) Christ is the Son of God not only because of his virgin birth but also because he is the incarnation of a pre-existent divine agent, "...the first-born of all creation..." (Colossians, 1, 15).
(iv) Christ is God Incarnate.
The Jews tended to elaborate their monotheism by hypostatizing and even personifying divine qualities, thus generating a proto-Trinity.
Paul.
We can see the ideas developing, e.g.:
"...in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell..." (Colossians, 1. 19)
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, the arguments and evidence offered by Biblical scholars such as Abbot John Chapman, OSB; Bernard Orchard (author of MATTHEW, MARK & LUKE, William Farmer, and David Dungan has convinced me that Matthean priority is true.
I wouldn't be surprised if William Farmer's work in particular has been instrumental in persuading James Crossley to accepting an early date at least for Mark.
Sean
Kaor, DAVID!
I sort of, kinda knew that. I mean, Lew Wallace was once an agnostic/atheist before he became convinced of the truth of Christianity (albeit, he never formally joined any Christian church). Yes, logically, if St. Joseph and the BVM were descended from branches of David's house, then they were cousins.
The US Civil War General Lew Wallace became a historical novelist after the war and I have read of the difficulties he had with researching his books. That is, libraries were still few in the US at that time and scholarly resources were difficult to find or consult.
Sean
Kaor, Paul!
Replying to both your comments here. Exactly! I had in mind the very high Christological view of Jesus that we can find in the letters of St. Paul. Including how Paul said in one of his letters (Colossians?) that Our Lord is EQUAL to God. No Arian would say that!
Yes, we can see in the later books of the OT how Jewish thinkers tended to personify some of the divine qualities. Altho I don't think they had the Trinity in mind.
Sean
Sean,
Can you find the reference for Pauline equality of Jesus with God?
Thanks,
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
This is what I had in mind--Philippians 2.5-6 says (Confraternity translation): "Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who though he was by nature God, did not consider being equal to God a thing to be clung to..." My point being that if the entire corpus of St. Paul's writings are kept in mind, then he did indeed believe in the divinity of Christ, as the text from Philippians clearly shows.
Sean
Sean,
Thanks.
Paul.
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