Saint Athanasius
Introduction
The purpose of this essay is to investigate the theology of
Athanasius as ordered by certain portions of the Nicene Creed.
As such, this essay belongs to a series of essays in which I lay
bare the underlying theological divide that now rends the
contemporary church. I have described that fault line by two
terms, "objective" and "ecstatic," each being
an way of understanding God. link
In this essay I shall show that Athanasius belongs to the
"objective" school of revelation, and further, that he
sheds significant light on the implications of the objective
approach.
Athanasius began writing theology when quite young. His
earliest works, Against the Heathen and his Incarnation
of the Word, were written when he was some twenty years old.
These works show an appreciation of the presence of God the Word
in the man Jesus. His later works continue his emphasis on God's
full presence in Christ, while at the same time presenting a much
stronger sense of Christ's humanity. In the body of this essay,
however, I will not discuss the development of his thought.
Rather, I will begin with his mature theology. Further, I will
seek the underlying intelligibility of that theology, the
simplest and most rational way to get out the underlying pattern
of his thinking. In other words, my treatment will be
theological rather than historical. In another essay, I will
discuss the development of his thought and address several
theological issues pertinent to his mature theology and my
treatment of it.
Athanasius has been called the "Father of the Nicene
Creed." The Nicene Creed takes its name from the Council of
Nicea in 325 A.D. At that time a creed was adopted, in part
motivated by a desire to deny the Arian heresy. Athanasius was
the great defender of the faith against Arius and key elements of
his defence are found in the Nicene Creed, especially the second
paragraph. The original creed of Nicea was then modified and
expanded at the Council of Constantinople in 381. This expanded
Creed was accepted at that time by the universal church sitting
in council. It was given the title "Nicene Creed"
because it reflected the spirit and truth of the earlier creed of
Nicea. It also included critical wording introduced by
Athanasius. This creed is said every Sunday in most Christian
churches under the title "Nicene Creed." It is the
primary theological standard of the faith. J.N.D. Kelly
describes it with the these words,
Of all existing creeds it is the only one for which ecumenicity, or universal acceptance, can be plausibly claimed. Unlike the purely Western Apostles' Creed, it was admitted as authoritative in East and West alike from 451 onwards, and it has retained that position, with one significant variation in its text, right down to the present day. So far from displacing it, the Reformation reaffirmed its binding character and gave it a new lease of life and an extended currency by translating it into the vernacular tongues.(1)
Structure of the Creed
Before introducing Athanasius' theology, I will diagram
aspects the Nicene Creed. This diagram will help to present
Athanasius' theology in an orderly fashion.
The Creed is organized into three articles. The first
article deals with the Father and creation, the second with the
Son and incarnation, the third with the Holy Spirit and the life
of the world to come.
1. The One Living God
/ | \
/ | \
/ | \
2. The Father The Son The Holy Spirit
3. as pure origin eternally begotten proceeds from the
| of the Father Father and the Son
| | |
| | |
4. makes incarnate sent
| | / \
| | / \
| | forms brings
| | | |
5. creation Jesus Christ (church) world to come
Inside and Outside God
When thinking of God, Athanasius recognized that there was a
correspondence between what occurs in God and what God did
outside himself. He knew that God was one, but he also claimed
that God was internally three persons as seen in lines 2 and 3.
By correspondence, outside himself, the one God did three things
as seen on lines 4 and 5. By contrast, Arius thought that God
was essentially one, or to put it another way, he did not believe
in the complexity of three persons within God. From this it
followed that God did only one thing outside himself, create the
world and sustain it as ground.
In the theological controversy between Athanasius and Arius,
the real issue was columns 1 and 2, the relations between Father
and Son, creation and incarnation. The divinity and work of the
Spirit was not at the forefront of the conflict. Athanasius
recognized the Holy Spirit, considered the Spirit God, but did
not focus on the Spirit's work. He did, however, lay the
foundation for understanding how a complexity of persons could
exist in God. This complexity eventually led to the inner-triune
relations of Father, Son, and Spirit, each distinct from yet
related to the others. At Nicea, the third article of the Creed
simply read, "and in the Holy Spirit." As mentioned
above, the elaborations of today's Nicene Creed occurred later.
In light of Athanasius' notion of inside and outside God,
the diagram can be understood as follows: Lines 1, 2, and 3
refer to what happens in God. God is one, line 1, and inside the
one God, there are three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
line 2. God the Father is pure origin, the Son is eternally
begotten of the Father, and the Spirit proceeds from both as seen
on line 3. The ways in which the Son comes from the Father, and
the Spirit from both, are called "issues." There are
two issues in God, the begetting of the Son by the Father and the
procession of the Spirit from both. All this happens inside God,
in the one God of three persons related by two issues.
Lines 4 and 5 describe God's acts outside himself. God acts
in three different ways, line 4, by making the world as Father,
becoming incarnate as Son, and by being sent as Spirit. This
leads to three primary acts of God outside God--the making of
creation, the incarnation of Jesus Christ, and the life of the
world to come. These are listed on line 5. The church is
included on line 5 in parentheses. It is in parenthesis since it
is derivative from the other three primary divine acts.
The diagram doesn't show everything. For example, since God
is one and triune, all God's acts must involve all three persons.
Therefore, when the first article of the Creed states that God
the Father created the world, the Creed will also state that it
was made through the Son, second article. The Spirit was also
active in creation since the Spirit gives life, article three,
and life was first given in the making of creation. Similarly,
in the second article concerning the Son, the Father eternally
begets the Son, and the Son is born of the Holy Spirit and the
Virgin Mary. Therefore, both Father and Spirit are involved in
the work of the Son. Similarly, in the third article. The
Spirit proceeds from Father and the Son so both are involved in
the Spirit's work. In short, each person of the Trinity is
involved in the work of the others, although the Creed assigns
each person within God to a specific act outside God.
Inside and Outside God Correspond
For Athanasius, what God does outside himself must
correspond to God inside himself. If God inside himself is not
who he is outside himself in his actions, then God has not
truthfully revealed himself in his actions. The faith has always
claimed that God is truthful, his acts reveal his person.
Therefore, God in his actions is God in himself and conversely.
Since Father, Son, and Spirit are all distinct within God,
creation, incarnation, and world to come must all be distinct
outside God. Further, inside God, the three persons of the
Trinity are related by the two issues. Therefore, creation,
incarnation, and final day must have similar relations. For
example, outside God, in eucharist, the Spirit takes the bread
and wine of creation, consecrates it as the body of and blood of
Jesus Christ, and uses it to feed the church and give a glimpse
of the world to come. In this way the work of the Spirit
proceeds from the Father (bread and wine of creation) and the Son
(body and blood of incarnation), to feed the church and give a
foretaste of the heavenly banquet (Spirit). In short, the
structure of God inside himself must be reflected in his actions
outside himself and conversely.
For this reason the horizontal lines reflect each other both
up and down vertically. To confuse at one level is to confuse at
another. For example, Arius blended the Father and the Son on
line 2 by saying there was only the Father. Line five, however,
reflects line 2. Therefore, on line 5, Arius was forced to blend
creation and incarnation by saying God did only one thing, make
creation and also make the spiritual being that became in
incarnate in Jesus Christ. Or, suppose we blend creation and
incarnation, line 5. Since line 2 reflects line 5, Father and
Son must be blended on line 2. As a result, God is no longer
triune. This latter example is probably the greatest theological
failing of the church and is a form of the Arian heresy. I have
analyzed this failing elsewhere.
link
link
link
God is First Father, then
Creator
The Creed begins with the phrase, "We believe in one
God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all
that is, seen and unseen." If Athanasius were reading this,
he would notice that this article calls God "Father"
rather than "Creator." Why not call God Creator rather
than Father? That seems like a sensible thing to do since
believers in God all know that he creates all things. If we did
that, the Creed would then read, "We believe in God, the
Creator, the maker of heaven and earth."
Athanasius, however, would have none of this. He knows that
God is Creator and that he makes everything. But he wants to
make a distinction, and that distinction is extremely important
for Athanasius and the Christian faith. Athanasius made a
distinction between God who makes creation and what we know of
God in creation, and who God is in incarnation and what we know
of God in Jesus Christ. Though related, the two are very
different. They are different because creation and incarnation
are different.
According to Athanasius, we can know that God is
"almighty" by looking at creation. Anyone who believes
that God created the universe with its billions of galaxies knows
that God must possess astounding power. This amazing power to
create is reflected in the ancient Christian claim that God
creates out of nothing. How God can create from nothing is
simply unimaginable. Not only is God almighty, he is also
orderly. We know this by the fact that God created an orderly
world. If there were no order, if everything were chaos, we
could not have a world. The laws of science and common
experience all attest to an orderly world. Athanasius states it
as follows,
... that the God we worship and preach is the only true One, who is Lord of Creation and Maker of all existence. Who then is this, save the Father of Christ most holy and above all created existence, Who like an excellent pilot, by His own Wisdom and His own Word, our Lord and Saviour Christ, steers and preserves and orders all things, and does as seems to Him best?(2)Athanasius saw all these things and concluded that we could know God's power and order in creation, but that was not the most important thing to know about God. For Athanasius, the most stunning thing about God was the revelation in Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ, Athanasius knew God as personal love, as a Father who loves his children. He is not like sinful earthly fathers, but the father as revealed in Jesus Christ. As John's gospel says, "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love." Athanasius did not know God fully in creation because he did not see creation redeeming human life. In fact, due to sin and the fall, Athanasius believed evil, corruption, and death had entered the world and creation could do nothing about it. Something more was required. Only in Jesus Christ did he see God at work to restore, save, and redeem his children. As a result, Athanasius made a clear distinction between creation and incarnation.
What similarity is there, I ask, between the creature and the Creator? Can he who beholds the former, behold it in the nature of the latter? If they say they are alike, they will next affirm that the Creator is the express image of his creatures. The end of all this is to turn everything into confusion; to exalt the creature into an equality with the Creator, and to bring down the unmade being to the same level with the things which He has made; ...(3)
God as Personal Revealed in
Incarnation
But suppose the builder had a son. Suppose the son lived in
the builder's house. Suppose he was just like the builder, and
that he told wonderful stories about the builder. Then one could
know the builder personally, even though the builder had never
been seen or heard. This is the analogy Athanasius uses in
regard to knowledge of God in creation and knowledge of God in
Jesus Christ. In creation we can know God as all-powerful and
orderly, but we know God personally as love in his only-begotten
Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Here are Athanasius' words.
A man, for instance, builds a house by exercising counsel and deliberation, but he begets a son by nature. Whatever is built comes to pass gradually, and there is no identity of substance between the materials and the person of the builder. But the son is the proper offspring of the father's substance, and is not external to him; wherefore, neither does he exercise counsel about him, lest he should appear to counsel and deliberate about his own being. Wherefore, as a natural product us much more excellent than a mere voluntary one, so the nature and the generation of the Son is far superior to the nature and formation of the creature.(4)When Athanasius says the "nature and the generation of the Son is far superior to the nature and formation of the creature," he means that the revelation in the Son Jesus Christ is far superior to that in creation. This is because the Son is a "proper offspring," not simply something made out of materials which are external to a builder.
Therefore it seems more in accordance with religious feeling and truth to call God the Father from His relationship to the Son, than to name Him only from His works, and to call Him the "Unmade."(5)As a result, Athanasius sees God the Father doing two distinct but related things. First, God the Father sends his Son, and in Jesus Christ reveals himself as a personal, loving Father. Secondly, this Father is also the "maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible."
Idolatry--Creation Reveals God as
Personal
One way to deny that God's personal nature is revealed in
the Son and not in creation is to attribute to creation personal
qualities that belong only to the Son. In Athanasius' day, this
confusion was expressed as the worship of idols. Idols were and
are the forces of creation given personal form. For example,
love is a part of creation. When love is personified as Athena
and worshipped, that is idolatry. One can give personal
allegiance to almost anything, the sun, the moon, the power
within, the American way of life, success, anything. In fact,
that is the essence of life in our time. Athanasius did
everything in his power to convince people that the forces and
powers of created nature were not personal, were not divine, and
should not be worshipped.(6) He did this because he relied on
Scripture. He took with utmost seriousness the first two
commandments: "Thou shalt have no other gods but me,"
and "Thou shalt not make any graven image." These two
commandments forbid the worship creation in any form.
But Athanasius was willing to worship God in Jesus Christ.
In Jesus Christ, God took a personal form. That is because
Athanasius understood incarnation as different from creation. In
creation God did something outside himself, something external.
Incarnation, on the other hand, was the incarnation of God's very
self, the incarnation of God the Son who is the second person of
the Trinity. The Son has the same character, the same nature,
the same personality, as the Father who sent him. Creation
doesn't. It only shows that God can create and design, that he
has infinite power and wisdom. But it doesn't reveal God's true
nature.
For now, we may summarize with four ideas: God the Father
who creates out of nothing transcends the world. 2. By
creation, God the Father can be seen as "almighty," as
orderly and as a supreme designer, but his personal nature is not
found there. 3. The personal nature of God requires a second
distinct act of God, the sending of his Son Jesus Christ who
personally reveals God. 4. Creation and incarnation are two
different things. They are related since God is one. The Father
who sends the Son to be incarnate is also the one who makes the
creation. We may now consider the second article of the Creed,
the personal revelation of God.
The Eternally Begotten Inside God
The second article of the Creed begins as follows,
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father.These lines refer to what happens inside God and they seen unduly repetitious. These repetitious lines were a direct result of Athanasius' fight against Arius, and in that light, we may investigate them a bit further.
The Arian Heresy
Arius denied this. For him, there was no "eternally
begotten" Son inside God. There was only God, one simple
undifferentiated God who did nothing but make the world.
Therefore, if there was some special almost divine being that
became incarnate in Jesus Christ, that being also had to be made.
Therefore, Jesus Christ was made. He was created, a creature.
But if Jesus Christ was a creature and not God, then we do not
know God in him, nor can Jesus Christ save us since only God can
finally save. For Athanasius, however, God did more than just
make. God the Father made "heaven and earth" outside
himself, and inside himself, the God the Father eternally begat
the Son. The eternally begotten Son was then sent by the Father
to be "incarnate from the Virgin Mary."
We may use a part of our original illustration to compare
Athanasius with Arius. On the left we have the God of Arius. In
the two right-hand columns, we have the view of Athanasius in
regard to the Father and the Son.
1. God Father--->eternally begets the Son
| | |
| | |
2. makes makes becomes incarnate in
| | |
| | |
3. creation creation Jesus Christ
In this diagram, line 1 describes what happens in God. For
Arius, nothing happens inside God. God exists eternally without
change. He is like an unmoved mover. He sustains everything
that is, but within himself, he is unmoved. For Athanasius, God
the Father eternally begets the Son inside God and this Son is
God, the second person of the Trinity. As we saw in the first
diagram, other things happen in God, the proceeding of the
Spirit, for example. But Athanasius's primary concern at this
point was with the Father and Son.Only the Son Incarnate
For Athanasius, only the Son, not the Father, becomes
incarnate. Classical Christian faith has always claimed this.
This implies that the Father's relation to creation is different
from the Son's relation to creation. The Father is not incarnate
in creation. He simply makes creation. The Son is not incarnate
in creation in general, only in the man Jesus. As incarnate, the
Son redeems what the Father made in creation. Creation and
incarnation are both acts of the one God since the God who made
the world also wishes to redeem it. Athanasius sees this quite
clearly. He makes a very sharp distinction between the Father
who makes, and the Son who is eternally begotten inside God, and
then becomes incarnate outside God.
This distinction, then, Holy Scripture very plainly makes between begotten and made or created. It declares the Son of God to be the former, and that He has no beginning of existence, but is eternal. And, on the other hand, it asserts the creature to have had such a beginning, and that the being and substance of creatures are wholly external and foreign to the divine nature.(8)The principle way in which Arius proved that God only created, and therefore created the Son who became incarnate, was by way of Scripture. In rebuttal, Athanasius was forced to analyze virtually the whole of the biblical revelation. He did so by interpreting each verse in light of the whole and the whole in light of each verse. It was a rigorous analysis. On the basis of his research, he claimed that the verses which seemed to indicate that Jesus Christ was created do not refer to him as the divine Son of God, but rather, to his ministry which began with his incarnation. It was his body, his earthly body, that was made, rather than the eternal divine Son who became incarnate. In other words, as in the previous diagram, "making" only refers to what happens on lines two and three, never at line one.
For the Second Person of the Trinity assumed our nature, and in that nature, by virtue of that union, He became as much more a glorious Administrator of His Father's will than any of the Angels, and accomplished a purpose of God as much more stupendous than that which any Angle could have done; as the condition of a Son is superior to a servant, and the nature of a Creator to that of a creature. Let them cease, therefore, from interpreting this word "made" of the nature of the Son, for He is not one of created things; but let them admit that it simply has reference to His ministry and the new dispensation of things which He introduced.(9)
Jesus Christ Redeems
Creation
The Creed claims, "through whom all things were
made." This refers to Jesus Christ. God the Father makes,
but he creates according to a certain order, structure, or plan.
At this point, Athanasius made use of a concept from Greek
philosophy, the idea of the Logos, the order or structure
of the universe. On the basis of John 1:1-14, the Logos
became flesh. Therefore, Athanasius deduced that Christ is the
order or structure of the universe. He noticed, for example,
that sunlight and rain, days and nights, heavenly bodies and
earthly ones, are in harmony with one another.(10) That
order or harmony is given in Jesus Christ "through whom all
things were made." When this harmony is broken, when it
becomes disordered, Jesus Christ has the power to set creation
aright since it was made through him in the first place. For
Athanasius, Jesus could and did still the storm, he multiplied
the loaves and fishes, he raised Lazarus from the dead. link Storms that kill, creation
without food, and human life ending in death, were not a part of
God's original creation as described in Genesis one and two. As
the Redeemer, Jesus redeems creation. This power to redeem
creation is not a part of creation, but only in incarnation, and
therefore, it is placed in the second article of the Creed and
not the first.
God the Son's Incarnate Acts in Jesus
Christ
The next section of the Creed describes the incarnation.
Here the Son, "Who because of us men and because of our
salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate from the Holy
Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became man, and was crucified for
us under Pontius Pilate, suffered and was buried, and rose again
..." These phrases describe the earthly life of Jesus
Christ ending with his resurrection. We begin with the phrase,
"because of us men and because of our
salvation."
In regards to salvation, Athanasius emphasized two things.
First, after being created, Adam sinned, and with him, the whole
of the human race fell into sin. As a result of sin humanity is
subject to corruption and death. Here Athanasius is thinking of
Genesis 1-3, God's creation of a good world, Adam's sin, and the
resultant corruption of the human race leading to universal
death.(11) Secondly, since God the Son was in Jesus Christ,
God the Son did in him only what God could do. Only God could
restore corrupted human nature. Only God could conquer death.
Only God could forgive the sin that led to death. Athanasius
claimed that the Son who became incarnate in Jesus was truly God
because only God could do what Jesus did. Given that so much of
contemporary theology and biblical exegesis fails to emphasize
the healing, saving, living acts of Jesus Christ, both then and
now, I must be specific and detailed, drawing directly from
Athanasius.
First, Jesus's body did not suffer corruption in the tomb by
virtue of its union with the eternal and omnipotent Son of God.
Again, by virtue of that same union, Jesus was raised from the
dead, body and soul. By virtue of that union, God bore the sins
of humanity on the cross, abolished them, and thereby brought
believers into the presence of God. By virtue of the eternal
Son's presence in him, Jesus' personal words and deeds revealed
the personal and sublime nature of God whose personal nature
cannot be known from creation. By virtue of the Word's presence
in him, the human Jesus spoke the word and God raised Lazarus
from the dead. Jesus said, "Peace be still," and God
stilled the storm. Jesus ordered the demons, "Come out of
him," but it was God who sent the demons away. Jesus
instructed his mother, and she the servants, but God the Son in
union with the man Jesus turned the water into wine. Jesus told
the paralytic, "your sins are forgiven," but God
forgave the sins and healed the man who got up and walked. As
God, Jesus reinterpreted the Old Testament Law, authorized
disciples to heal, cast out demons, inaugurated the new age,
healed the sick, forgave the guilty, blessed the innocent,
redeemed the wretched, and proclaimed the end of all suffering,
sorrow, and dismay. And Jesus did all of these things because
the eternal all-powerful divine Son of God was united to his
human nature, and therefore, whatever God did in him he did as
man, and the man Jesus did the deeds of God, and he did this
"for us and our salvation." This is how Athanasius
understands the union of God the Son with the man Jesus. This is
why he fought so hard against Arius, because Arius denied that
the Son who became incarnate in Jesus Christ was God. If this be
true, then God did not act in Jesus to save and Christianity is a
religion of death. I now quote Athanasius, a handful of the
many, many relevant passages.
And thus when there was need to restore to health Peter's wife's mother who was sick of a fever, our Lord's hand touched her, but His Godhead cured her (S. Matt. viii. 14). It was not the spittle and the clay, but Christ's Almighty Power that gave sight to the man that had been blind from his birth (S. John ix. 11). The voice of man called Lazarus out of the grave, but it was the Word of God which raised him from the dead (S John xi. 43). And our Lord, by acting in this manner, gave evidence of His manhood, and prevented any suspicion if His being only an apparition or phantom.(12)
For his charging evil spirits, and their being driven forth, this deed is not of man, but of God. Or who that saw him healing the diseases to which the human race is subject, can still think him man and not God. For he cleansed lepers, made lame men to walk, opened the hearing of deaf men, made blind men to see again, and in a work drove away from men all diseases and infirmities: from which acts it was possible even for the most ordinary observer to see his Godhead.(13)
Or who, seeing the substance of water changed and transformed into wine, fails to perceive that he who did this is Lord and creator of the substance of all waters. For to this end he went upon the sea also as its master, and walked as on dry land, to afford evidence to them that saw it of his lordship over all things. And in feeding so vast a multitude on little, and of his own self yielding abundance where none was, so that from five loaves five thousand had enough, and left so much again over, did he show himself to be any other than the very Lord whose providence is over all things.(14)
But by virtue of the union of the Word with it [the body of Jesus], it was no longer subject to corruption according to its own nature, but by reason of the Word that was come to dwell in it, it was placed out of the reach of corruption. And so it was that two marvels came to pass at once, that the death of all was accomplished in the Lord's body, and that death and corruption were wholly done away by reason of the Word that was united to it. For there was need of death, and death must needs be suffered on behalf of all, that the debt owing from all might be paid.(15)
This, then, was the reason why the Saviour came among men, to bear witness to the truth of God, to die upon the Cross for our redemption, to raise us up from the dead, and to defeat all the machinations of the devil. Had it not been for these ends, He had never assumed our flesh; had not the resurrection of His body been necessary for ours, He had not died; and He could not have died unless He had taken upon Himself a mortal body.(16)
Our Lord united a human body to His infinite nature; that in it He might conduct us to the Kingdom of Heaven and the presence of his Father, saying 'I am the Way,' and 'the Door,' and 'By Me if any man enter in He shall be saved' (S. John xiv. 6; x. 9). He is not called the 'First-born from the dead,' as being the first of us that died, for we were all in a state of death before Him. But that title belongs to Him, because He freely laid down His life for our sakes, abolished the kingdom and power of death, and arose from the dead on our behalf, and it is a guarantee of our resurrection. It was necessary that He should first rise, because He was to raise us from the dead, and His Resurrection was to be the means and pledge of ours.(17)
These Incarnate Acts Bring
Salvation
In subsequent essays, I shall say more on the presence of
the second person of the Trinity in Jesus Christ. For now, the
most important thing is that God the Son united himself to the
human nature of the man Jesus and thereby acted to save. For
Athanasius, this occurred through an exchange. The divine Son
exchanged his exalted status for the suffering and death that
belongs to human nature, while the human nature exchanged its
corrupted status for a life that overcomes death.
Those who believe in Jesus Christ, those who accept his Word
and Sacrament, are united to him in his humanity, and from there
are united to God the incarnate Son and through him to the
Father. Through these relations sinful human beings receive the
very life of God. That is what Athanasius believed, and
that is what the Creed affirms in the present section.
The Critical Redemptive
Exchange
Athanasius is extremely rigorous at this point. He refuses
any suggestion that the person of Jesus Christ was not a personal
union of a complete human nature joined to the fully divine Son.
Given its importance, we may consider this further with a
diagram.
One Person Jesus Christ
/ \
/ \
/ \
/ \
The Human Nature <------> The Divine Nature
made <------> eternally begotten
(sinful) <------> sinless
lost from God <------> one with the Father
in conflict <------> reconciles
corruptible <------> incorruptible
suffers <------> does not suffer
doomed to die <------> resurrection
subject to demons <------> power over demons
subject to sickness <------> power over sickness
subject to nature <------> power over nature
personally visible <------> transcendent Image
personally audible <------> transcendent Word
understandable <------> above understanding
According to Athanasius, in Jesus Christ the divine Son
exchanged his exalted status for the corruption and death of the
human nature, while the human nature exchanged its corrupted
status for a life that overcomes death. This diagram describes
how that happened.Four Ways to Deny the
Exchange
Athanasius saw several ways this exchange could be denied. I
will describe them in four points.
1. There were those like Arius who said that the spiritual
being united to the human nature of Jesus was not really God. If
that is true, God did not really save in Jesus Christ. Against
this, Athanasius countered by saying that the divine nature was
eternally powerful in Jesus Christ, that it did not suffer, did
not die, performed miracles, created virtue, raised the human
nature from the dead, forgave sins, and did things that only God
could do.
2. There were those who said that the spiritual being in
Christ was God the Son, but the Son did not fully become
incarnate. If this be true, then God did not really redeem the
human nature since he never became incarnate in that nature.
Against these, Athanasius claimed that God the Son became fully
human, that God was born, talked, ate, forgave, suffered, died,
and rose from the dead. This claim is not a claim about God or
creation in general. Creation is not incarnation. God is not so
united to creation that each time something dies, God dies. That
is pantheism. Rather, this is only true of incarnation, when God
the Son is in union with the human nature of Jesus Christ. These
statements, simply as statements, contradict those of point 1.
That apparent contradiction is found in Athanasius. I shall
return to this.
3. There were those that claimed that God the Son did not
become truly human because the man Jesus was not really human.
He was simply a phantom. Against these claims, Athanasius
claimed that God was united to a fully human Jesus from the
moment of conception, and that the biblical witness to Jesus is
filled with statements that affirm Jesus' complete human nature--
he ate, drank, talked with friends, suffered, wept, rejoiced, and
prayed.
4. There were those who claimed that the human nature of
Jesus did not take on the properties of the divine nature, but
remained forever human, parallel to the divine nature, but not
partaking of its infinite power and blessings. Against this,
Athanasius asserted that the man Jesus received the properties of
God. The man Jesus forgave sinners, healed the sick, cast out
demons, stilled the storm, raised Lazarus from the dead, and
entered into the eternal and incorruptible life by resurrection.
Only God can do these things. For this reason, he was worshipped
and called God by his disciples. (Jn. 20:28) These statements,
simply as statements, contradict those of 3 which see Jesus as
only human.
Jesus Christ Did Four Related
Things
These four sets of statements about Jesus Christ: divine
with divine properties, divine with human properties, human with
human properties, and human with divine properties, were
organized by Athanasius as follow: First, the four sets of
statements refer to the person of Jesus Christ who is one person
and only so with two natures, human and divine. For this reason,
the second article of the Creed begins with the statement,
"and one Lord, Jesus Christ ..." It does not begin
with two natures, but one person.
This one person the Lord Jesus Christ was divine and did
divine things, statements 1. The one person the Lord Jesus
Christ was divine and did human things, statements 2. The one
person the Lord Jesus Christ was human and did human things,
statements 3. The one person the Lord Jesus Christ was human and
did divine things, statements 4. These ideas express the
communicatio idiomatum, that the human nature of Jesus
Christ has divine properties, the divine nature human properties.
This is only true of incarnation, not creation.
Considered in itself, simply as divine nature, the divine
nature cannot do human things such as suffer and die. This is
true of creation, but incarnation is not creation. In
incarnation, in the one person Jesus Christ, God can be both
divine, eternal, all-powerful, and yet do human things such as
suffer and die. Similarly, the human nature, strictly as human,
cannot do divine things such as raise the dead. This is true of
creation, but creation is not incarnation. In incarnation, in
the one person, Jesus Christ, the human can do divine things,
such as raise the dead, still the storm, and cast out demons.
When each nature took on properties of the other, it was not
by being converted into the other nature. The divine nature did
not convert itself into human nature like water into wine. It
remained the divine nature, but assumed the human nature and did
human things while remaining divine. Likewise, the human nature
was not converted into the divine nature. It was assumed by the
divine nature and did divine things while remaining human.
In developing these ideas, Athanasius will deny the
following statements: the human and divine nature were not
united, the union of the two natures became a third thing neither
human nor divine, the human was converted into the divine or
vice-versa, there were two persons in Jesus Christ rather than
one person of two natures, the divine did not assume human
properties and do human things, the human did not receive divine
properties and do divine things.
In the following statement, Athanasius begins with the
person of Jesus Christ, and then, in that context, claims that
the presence of one nature cannot deny the presence of the other.
We cannot fail to have a right notion and belief concerning the person of Christ, if we distinguish, as we should, between the two natures; and if, at the same time, that we attribute to each nature its proper faculties and functions, we look upon both as the powers and acts of one person. He whose contemplation of Christ's Divine powers and miraculous acts induces him to deny the propriety of His manhood, and he who suffers himself to be misled by the consideration of any weakness or defect in Christ's human nature, so as to deny the person union of His Divine with it, and to form unworthy conceptions and propagate dishonourable doctrines of this Divine Person; both the one and the other is equally in the unhappy condition of the Jew, who 'mixed his wine with water' (cf. Isa. 1. 22), and who makes the Cross a 'stumbling block,' or he is like the Gentile who accounts the Gospel of Christ 'foolishness' (cf. I Cor. i. 23). (18)In the next three statements, Athanasius affirms the closest possible union between the divine and human natures. They form one person, not two persons, but one person of two natures with each nature still preserving its special properties. If the two natures are separated as two persons, then the divine was not incarnate as human, but merely accompanied the human.
Now, if these men confess the Divinity of the Word, and then separate the human nature from it, affirming that the Divine Person of the Word sent the human Person of Jesus Christ, then they are, without knowing it, contradicting themselves. For those who in this place separate the Divine Word from the Divine Incarnation, have, it seems, a base and low notion of the doctrine of the Incarnation.(19)
Why, then, after He has taken our nature into His own, and has made Himself the first-fruits of our immortality by uniting Himself with us, must the two natures be thus divided into two persons?(20)
Therefore, Christ is God the Word, and is both God and Man, born of the Virgin Mary. He is not some other Christ, but the Word and the Man are one and the same Person. He was before invisible in heaven even to the celestial powers themselves, but now by the union of His invisible nature with the visible, made visible to all. He is visible, I say, not in His invisible Godhead, but by those manifestations of the Divinity, which are exhibited in the acts and operations of His human nature; and this human nature He has entirely renewed by receiving it into a personal union with Himself.(21)In the next statement, Athanasius begins with the person of Jesus Christ and then affirms, first, that he was fully divine, and secondly, that the divine did human things.
And here our adversaries are taught very briefly, but plainly, to believe, that the Person who was God from everlasting, the Sanctifier of those to whom He came, and the great Agent of all His Father counsels, was made man for our sakes; and that as the Apostle says, in this man dwells 'all the fullness of the Godhead bodily' (Col. ii. 9), that is to say, that He, although He was God, had His proper human body, formed and organized exactly as ours, and made for our sakes and salvation. And on account of this, the properties of human nature are said to be His, He existed in that nature, and He hungered, thirsted, suffered, laboured, and was perfectly sensible of those infirmities, of which our flesh is capable. ... but if the flesh is the Word's, and S. John says definitely 'The Word became flesh,' then it follows of necessity that the affections also of the flesh are ascribed to Him, whose the flesh is. And thus the same person, who performed such mighty works, and effected our redemption and sanctification, is said to be judged and condemned, to be scourged, to thirst, to be nailed to a Cross, to die, in short, to labour under as many bodily pains and infirmities, as if He was another man.(22)In the next statement, Athanasius begins with the person of Jesus Christ and then affirms, first that he was fully human, and secondly, that the fully human Jesus was God and did the works of God.
They cannot deny that it was one and the same person, who wrought these miracles, and underwent these inconveniences and sufferings. And, indeed, it was necessary that we should be quite sure and certain of the reality of these properties and affections of that human nature, which He held in common with us, such as weeping, hunger, and the like. For if men had not actually seen it, we should have found it difficult to believe, that an impassible and perfect being had really and positively assumed our passive, imperfect, and feeble nature. Again, His miracles were necessary to convince us, that the man we saw, beset with sorrows and infirmities like our own, was also God. And therefore for the proof of this, our Lord appeals to His miracles, saying, 'If I do the works of My Father, though ye believe not Me,' who to your sight and apprehension am no more than a man, 'believe the works, that ye may know, and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him. (S. John x. 37, 38)(23)Finally, in Athanasius's own time, Jesus, by virtue of his resurrection, was doing the very things he did in his earthly body. This was important to Athanasius, for he wanted a God who saved, not just in the time of Christ, but now, in Athanasius' own time, in his life and in the life of his people. This claim needs to be emphasized since contemporary theology so often fails to make this claim in its fullness.
Now these arguments of ours do not amount merely to words, but have in actual experience a witness to their truth. For let him that will, go up and behold the proof of virtue in the virgins of Christ and in the young men that practice holy chastity, and the assurance of immortality in so great a band of his martyrs. And let him come who would test by experience what we have now said, and in the very presence of the deceit of demons and the imposture of oracles and the marvels of magic let him use the sign of that cross which is laughed at among them and he shall see how by its means demons fly, oracles cease, all magic and witchcraft is brought to nought. Who, then, and how great is this Christ, who by his own name and presence casts into the shade and brings to nought all things on every side, and is alone strong against all, and has filled the whole world with his teaching?(24)
But they who disbelieve in the resurrection afford a strong proof against themselves, if instead of all the spirits and the gods worshipped by them casting out Christ, who, they say, is dead, Christ on the contrary proves them all to be dead. For if it be true that one dead can exert no power, while the Saviour does daily so many works, drawing men to religion, persuading to virtue, teaching of immortality, leading on to a desire for heavenly things, revealing the knowledge of the Father, inspiring strength to meet death, showing himself to each one, and displacing the godlessness of idolatry, and the gods and spirits of the unbelievers can do none of these things, but rather show themselves dead at the presence of Christ, their pomp being reduced to impotence and vanity--whereas by the sign of the cross all magic is stopped, and all witchcraft brought to nought, and all the idols are being deserted and left, and every unruly pleasure is checked, and everyone is looking up from earth to heaven--whom is one to pronounce dead? Christ, that is doing so many works? but to work is not proper to one dead.(25)In regard to a living God active upon earth, Saint Anthony was doubtless a major influence on Athanasius. He knew Anthony personally. When young, Athanasius spent time with Anthony, and therefore knew his life, his holiness, and the power of God in him. Here is one of his many statements on Anthony.
Through him the Lord healed the bodily ailments of many present, and cleansed others from evil spirits. And He gave grace to Antony in speaking, so that he consoled many that were sorrowful, and set those at variance at one, exhorting all to prefer the love of Christ before all that is in the world.(26)
If You Have Seen Me You Have Seen the
Father
Returning to an earlier theme and the previous diagram,
please notice the last three entries of the two columns where the
divine nature is seen as transcendent and yet can be seen and
heard by incarnation. Athanasius was especially taken with
Jesus's words, "If you have seen me, you have seen the
Father."(27)
Within God, the Image and Word of God who is God the Son
pour fourth continually from the Father like light from the sun.
Apart from incarnation, the Image and Word of God within God is
completely transcendent, wholly invisible to humanity upon earth.
By incarnation, however, the divine Image and Word could assume
human properties -- speak, be heard, and be understood. This was
described above in point two where it was affirmed that the
divine could take on human properties in Jesus Christ.
Therefore, by incarnation, the appearance and words of the human
Jesus were the divine Image and Word of God and one could thereby
know God personally. In this way, what is forbidden in creation,
ascribing divine properties to created realities, is commanded in
Incarnation. By creation, one cannot say that the human force of
love is divine and therefore the sight and the words of one we
love is a revelation of divinity. That is idolatry. By
incarnation, however, the words and image of the human Jesus are
the Word and Image of God and thereby one can know God personally
in Jesus' words, deeds, and image. The last line of Athanasius'
Against Arius ends, to God's great glory and the
everlasting joy of Athanasius, with the vision of God given in
the finite human image of Jesus Christ the incarnate Word.
He was before invisible in heaven even to the celestial powers themselves, but now by the union of His invisible nature with the visible, made visible to all. He is visible, I say, not in His invisible Godhead, but by those manifestations of the Divinity, which are exhibited in the acts and operations of His human nature; and this human nature He has entirely renewed by receiving it into a personal union with Himself. All honour and adoration be therefore ascribed to Him, who was in the beginning, and is now, and ever shall be, world without end.(28)
Final Theological
Considerations
In another essay, I discussed the objective and ecstatic
ways of understanding God. The objective way was described with
the words, "In the objective view, God is transcendent as
Father but becomes objectively present as God the Word in the
words and deeds of Jesus Christ." link Athanasius belongs to the
objective school.
It is not always easy to grasp the intelligibility of the
objective approach to God. We understand that objects can be
seen, heard, and felt. It is hard, however, to see how God could
have similar properties. Athanasius believed God was objective
because he believed that God the Word in Jesus Christ did human
things and the human Jesus did divine things. This was because
God the Word became human, and we know human beings as the
objects of seeing, hearing, and touch. Therefore, for
Athanasius, when one saw, heard, and touched the person of Jesus,
one saw, heard, and touched God because God was objectively
present in the person of Jesus Christ.
This runs counter to intuition. In thinking of God, it is
not unusual to visualize God as an infinite divine power which
cannot be seen, heard, or felt. As a result, when the Infinite
is manifest, it appears in the finite, but it does not become
finite. Tillich, as usual, expresses it quite neatly.
The nature of finite reason is described in classical form by Nicolaus Cusanus and Immanuel Kant. The former speaks of the docta ignorantia, the 'learned ignorance,' which acknowledges the finitude of man's cognitive reason and its inability to grasp its own infinite ground. But in recognizing this situation, man is at the same time aware of the infinite which is present in everything finite, though infinitely transcending it. This presence of the inexhaustible ground in all beings is called by Cusanus the "coincidence of the opposites." In spite of its finitude, reason is aware of its infinite depth.(29)For Tillich, the Infinite is the ground of all finite things, yet infinitely beyond the world since God is transcendent. Nevertheless, the Infinite appears in the finite. The finite itself, however, is composed of opposing elements such as dynamics and form, freedom and destiny, the individual and participation. These finite opposing finite elements originate in the infinite ground which is God, and when that God becomes manifest, the finite points to the divine One which is known in the "coincidence of the opposites."
Endnotes
1. J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, Third Edition.
New York: David McKay Company, Inc., 1972, p. 296.
2. Athanasius, Against the Heathen. A Select Library of
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church. Volume
IV. Schaff, Philip and Wace, Henry, editors. Grand Rapids: Wm.
B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1978, p. 252.
3. Athanasius. The Orations of S. Athanasius Against the
Arians. London: Farran & Co. The Ancient and Modern Library
of Theological Literature, I, 31.
4. Athanasius. Against the Arians, III, 62.
5. Athanasius, Against the Arians, I, 34.
6. This is a primary theme of Athanasius' Against the
Heathen. A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers
of the Christian Church. Volume IV. Schaff, Philip and Wace,
Henry, editors. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1978.
7. This is probably the most common analogy Athanasius uses to
describe the inner life of God. Athanasius, Against the
Arians. London: Farran & Co. The Ancient and Modern
Library of Theological Literature. See, among other places, II,
33; II, 41; III, 4; III, 14; III, 36; III, 66.
8. Athanasius, Against the Arians, II, 58.
9. Athanasius, Against the Arians, I, 62.
10. Athanasius. Against the Heathen, Part III, section
35, pp. 22f.
11. See the opening sections of Against the Heathen.
12. Athanasius, Against the Arians, III, 32.
13. Athanasius. On the Incarnation of the Word. The
Library of Christian Classics. Volume III. Christology of the
Later Fathers. Hardy, Edward Rochie, and Richardson, Cyril c.,
editors. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1954, p. 72.
14. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, p. 73.
15. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, p. 74.
16. Athanasius, Against the Arians, II, 55.
17. Athanasius, Against the Arians, II, 61.
18. Athanasius, Against the Arians, III, 35.
19. Athanasius, Against the Arians, IV, 31.
20. Athanasius, Against the Arians, IV, 32.
21. Athanasius, Against the Arians, IV, 36.
22. Athanasius, Against the Arians, III, 31.
23. Athanasius, Against the Arians, III, 55.
24. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, p. 102.
25. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, p. 85.
26. A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the
Christian Church. Second Series. Translated into English with
Prolegomena and Explanatory Notes under the editorial supervision
of Philip Schaff and Henry Wace. Volume 4, St. Athasasius,
Selected Works and Letters, p. 569.
27. "As the Son of God, He must be the express Image of His
Father, and this He could not be if He were inferior to His
Father in might and dominion. And therefore, He might well say,
'He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father' (St. John xiv. 9)."
Against the Arians, II, 17.
28. Athanasius, Against the Arians, IV, 36.
29. Tillich, Paul. Systematic Theology. Three Volumes in
One. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1967, p. 81.
The Rev. Robert J. Sanders, Ph.D.
robertsanders@iglide.net
Copyright, February, 2002.
home