From Philosophy to Pastoral: A Theological Review and the Pastoral Explications of the Doctrine of the Two Natures in Christ -Chalcedon and Luther

From  Philosophy  to  Pastoral:  A  Theological  Review  and  the  Pastoral  Explications  of  the  Doctrine  of  the  Two  Natures  in  Christ              -­‐Chalcedon  and  Luther  

Craig  Nehring  

Institute  of  Lutheran  Theology  

EPR  503  

December  19,  2013  

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“Christ, by highest heav’n adored, Christ the everlasting Lord, Late in time

behold Him come, Offspring of a virgin’s womb. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see, Hail

the incarnate Deity! Please as Man with man to dwell, Jesus, our Immanuel.” So goes

the second verse of the of Charles Wesley’s Christmas hymn, “Hark! The Herald Angels

Sing.” Hidden is this classic song that is sung, one would imagine in abundance on

Christmas Eve in our congregations, is the explication of the heart of our confession in

who was this man Jesus Christ we believe to be the salvation of mankind.

Thus, as we sing this hymn, we are actually making a deep theological assertion

to the world. For these lines contain is nothing less than the doctrine and theology of the

two natures in our Lord Jesus Christ. In it we are making a declaration of the heart of

what we believe who it is that we worship and what we are confessing to what took place

in the giving of Christ in His birth, death and resurrection. That in the midst of our

worship of God, the lines of this hymn, and of so many others, we are fundamentally

singing of the very nature of our Christian faith.

It is within this mindset that the genesis of this paper came to be. The doctrine of

the two natures in Christ has been one of the most debated, thought about and fought over

in the history of the Christian Church. Starting with the earliest believers in Christ, the

question of just whom He is has been one that has been asked and forced an answer. Saint

Peter, when asked by Jesus Himself, who he believed He was, confessed, “You are the

Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:16)1 Since then, what Peter said has been

declared to be a central doctrine of the Christian faith and so has needed to be discussed

and defined to what it means that this Jesus, who the Gospels say was born in Bethlehem

1 Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, the English Standard Version (ESV). (2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.)

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to a specific set of parents (see primarily Matthew 1:18-2:23, Luke 2:1-40) was yet the

very Son of the Living God.

How this was thought about and doctrinalized has a unique and rich history that

started from that first moment Jesus arrived on the scene all the way to this present day.

Church councils have been called and dismissed and untold amount of ink has been used

in trying to place down on paper just what it means that Jesus is true God and true Man.

Through the ages, peoples and ideas have been debated, approved and rejected until we

have come to the point where, generally, by the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD, a

doctrine was set down that the Church catholic agreed was the true understanding of

Christ.

Of course, that has not kept people since then to continue to think about and even

wrongly believe about Christ. With every generation there has been people and ideas that

have tried to place further words and explanations of what was decreed at Chalcedon and

how it plays into the life of the Church. Some of these have been helpful and others have

fallen flat. However, even the most contemporary idea has been affirmed wrong are

understood to be little more than old heresies that were dismissed in those first

ecumenical councils.

And this was true during the time of Martin Luther. In his battles with the Roman

Catholic Church, the Anabaptists and those whom he declared to be the sacramentarians,

Luther found himself against those old heresies dressed up in new packages. However,

how he took these people on represented a change in what had been typically done up to

that time. Scholarly debate, theological tomes and systematic dissertations were what

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were used when speaking to these theological questions. And no doubt, Luther could and

did use such means to refute those who strayed outside of the catholic faith.

Yet Luther also fought against wrong ideas in a different matter that is generally

found with his ancestors, contemporaries and future theologians. Because Luther was a

pastor at heart and spent much of his career in preaching and teaching the faith to the

common person in the classroom and pew, he developed a way of teaching the ratified

faith in terms that everyone could comprehend. He sought to make the difficult accessible

to all Christians because, and even if he didn’t realize it, he understood that right

theology is needful and wholesome for all the faithful.

This will, then, be the theme and purpose of this paper. We will be looking at the

doctrine of the two natures in Christ, how it developed to what Chalcedon produced in

451 and then how Luther used Chalcedon to talk about the two natures in his own

writings. It is not my intention to re-write a history of Chalcedon and the events leading

up to it, nor will I be trying to gain a complete and dogmatic understanding of Luther’s

thought. But what I will seek to do is to talk about what led up to Chalcedon, what

Chalcedon developed and how Luther then used Chalcedon’s theology to debate those

whom he saw as falling out of line with the doctrine of Christ’s two natures confessed at

Chalcedon.

To do this, the paper will be divided into three sections. First, we will discuss

those that led up to the need for the council of Chalcedon to be convened-some of the key

people and ideas involved. Second, I will discuss the final outcome of Chalcedon,

focusing in particular on the Tome of Leo and The Definition of Faith. Finally, I will look

at some works by Luther in which he spoke to and about the two natures in Christ,

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primarily his 1540 Disputation on the Divinity and Humanity of Christ, as well as his

writings on the doctrine of the real presence in the Lord’s Supper. It is the goal of the

paper to not simply obtain a greater cognition of this doctrine, but also to see just how

one can emulate Luther and make difficult and philosophical statements comprehensible

to the average Christians sitting in the classroom or pew of our own congregations and

schools.

Part One: To Chalcedon

The events and people that led to the definitive council at Chalcedon to decide

upon just what the Church believed in regards to the two natures in Christ is interesting in

its own right. Perhaps what catches the eye first of all is that the various ideas and

thoughts that developed came not from those who were considered immediately to be

outside of the Church and her theology, but from the heart within. That the sides that

became entrenched and the peoples that rose to importance or infamy were from those

who did not wish to challenge the current thought, but simply to further define what was

meant when the Church confessed that when one confessed they believed in Jesus Christ,

they were confessing the belief that He was both God and Man.

The two main “players” in the arena of ideas were the theological distinctions

coming from two of the East’s theological centers: Antioch and Alexandria. Alister

McGrath gives a nice summary which gives the most basic of the differences experienced

in each “school:”

“The Alexandrian writers were motivated primarily by soteriological considerations. Concerned that deficient understandings of the person of Christ were linked with inadequate conceptions of salvation, they used ideas derived from secular Greek philosophy to ensure a picture of Christ which was consistent with the full redemption of humanity. The idea of the Logos was of particular importance, especially when linked with the notion of the incarnation…The Antiochene writers differed here. Their concerns were moral, rather than purely soteriological, and they drew much less significantly on the ideas of Greek philosophy. The basic trajectory of much Antiochene thinking on the

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identity of Christ can be traced along the following lines…This leads to the coming of the redeemer as one who united humanity and divinity, and thus to the reestablishment of an obedient people of God.” 2

It’s not that one school stressed the two natures in Christ more than the other; but

what separated them was the emphasis each placed upon the natures. They both

confessed that in Christ was both the divine and human natures. But Alexandria sought to

“protect” the confession of the divine nature so not to become lost in the midst of the

humanity of Christ, whereas Antioch sought to “protect” Christ’s human nature from

being overwhelmed by the confession of His divinity. In many ways, each was fighting

from the extremes of the other. Alexandria saw the danger of one of the first

Christological heresies of Ebionism where Christ ends up being a man “equipped by God

with special gifts.”3 Antioch saw the danger of the other early heresy of Docetism where

Christ simply appeared to be a man, in whom the divine “united himself for a limited

time, namely, to the day of the crucifixion, with the man Jesus but left him before his

death.”4

Perhaps the key figure leading up to Chalcedon for the Alexandrian view was

Cyril of Alexandria. In his battles with Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople (whom we

will discuss shortly), Cyril explicated the essence of the what the Alexandrian school was

seeking to protect. It was Cyril who emphasized the idea of the “hypostatic” and

“natural” union of the divine to the human natures in Christ. That in Christ, one finds the

two distinct natures, divinity and humanity, hypostatically united; that is, they are

2 Alister E. McGrath, Christian Theology: An Introduction, Third Edition. (Malden: Blackwell Publishers Inc., 2001), 362. 3 Bernhard Lohse, A Short History of Christian Doctrine: From the First Century to the Present. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985), 74. 4 Ibid, 74.

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personally united so that now it can be said that the Person of Jesus Christ was both and

truly God and Man.5 What Cyril is stressing here is that in the incarnation, there is no

limited or diminishing of the divine nature, but that in the Man Jesus Christ, the very Son

of God was united absolutely and completely.

So Cyril seeks to find a philosophical explanation of the principle of the two

natures. In Christ, there are the two properties of the each person-divine and human. They

each retain and own within themselves the complete qualities of their nature. In the

incarnation,

“the Invisible though compounded with a visible body, remains uncompounded (ασυνετος) because it is not contained within the limits of a body, and the body remains in its own measure as it accepts union with God; as iron, when blended with fire, though it may appear as fire, does not change its nature (φυσις), so the union of God with the body does not change the body; and just as, in respect of man, the body animated by the soul remains in its nature, so, in respect of Christ, the ‘commingling (συγκρασσις) does not so change that body that it is not a body.’” 6

Each essence of the two natures retain their wholeness, both before and after the

hypostasis, and even though the human and divine, in their properties hold a great gulf

between them, as they are joined, there is no separation nor confusion taking place in

Christ.7

5 R.V. Sellers, The Council of Chalcedon: A Historical and Doctrinal Survey. (London: S. P. C. K., 1953), 140-141. Sellers writes, “Cyril’s own contribution, it seems, lay in his definition of the union of the Logos with flesh as a ‘hypostatic” and ‘natural’ union; and it is abundantly clear that he introduced it to enforce the truth, already insisted on by the Laodicene (Apollinarius), that Jesus Christ in one Person, the Logos in his incarnate state, and that any ‘dividing’ of this one Person is altogether impossible.” 6 Sellers, 146. Sellers quotes Cyril’s work from the original source. 7 Sellers, 154. “Similarly Cyril returns to the cardinal trust of the unity of Christ’s Person in what follows the quotations already adduced from his letter to Acacius of Melitene. For after he has said: ‘As we accept in thought those things out of which is the one and sole Son and Lord Jesus Christ we say that two natures have been united;’ he goes on: ‘But after the union, the cleavage into two having disappeared, we believe that the nature of the Son is one-one [Person] that is, but [the one Person] made man and incarnate;’ and after the statement: ‘When the manner of the Incarnation is investigated, the human intelligence must see that two things have been brought together in union, ineffably and without confusion;’ this follows: ‘Yet what has been united one in no wise divided but believes, and accepts as fixed that there is One out of both-God and Son and Christ and Lord.’”

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This is where the idea of the communicatio idiomatum comes to a helpful use in

Cyril’s Christology. While there is absolutely no confusion or mixture between the two

natures, yet each are so inseparably united that a sharing takes place between the two.

Metaphysically, it is not that the God is born or that man is divine, but now in Christ, in

the incarnation, there is no longer any way in which to separate the two natures or to

speak of one without speaking of the other. So, contra to what we will see in Nestorius

later in this paper, Mary can be called the Theotokos because in the incarnation, the two

natures have been completely joined together and the child Mary gave birth to was, in

fact, the very Son of God, wholly and completely. The same can then be extended to

Christ’s death. Cyril says,

“And although according to his own nature he was not subject to suffering, yet he suffered for us in the flesh according to the Scriptures, and although impassible, yet in his Crucified Body he made own the suffering of his own flesh; and by the grace of God he tasted death for all…For ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God, and the Word was with God,’ and he is the Maker of the ages, coeternal with the Father, the Creator of all; but, as we have already said, since he united himself hypostatically human nature from her womb, also he subjected himself to birth as man.” 8

Cyril didn’t take this position by chance, but it really grew out of a situation with

a fellow Alexandrian theologian named Apollinarius of Laodicea. Apollinarius, whose

ideas were rejected at the Council of Constantinople in 381, in seeking to honor the

divinity of Christ, sought to ensure the primacy of the divine nature. He, in the words of

J.N.D. Kelly, “put forward an extreme version of the Word-flesh Christology. He

delighted to speak of Christ as ‘God-incarnate’ (θεος ενσαρκος), ‘flesh-bearing God’

8 William C. Placher, Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume One: From Its Beginning to the Eve of the Reformation. (Philadelphia: the Westminster Press, 1988), 72.

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(θεος σαρκοφορος), or ‘God born of a woman.’”9 Where Apollinarius took this

language was to speak of the overwhelming of the human nature with the divine in the

incarnation, to the extent that now only one nature remained in Christ. That in this “God-

man, the divine energy fulfills the role of the animating spirit (ψυχης) and of the human

mind (νοος).”10

This makes Apollinarius to take the philosophical stance of the nature of

humanity, the union of a body and soul, and “make room,” so to speak, for the divine

nature of Christ to be united in Him. So, as Christ took on the body from the nature of the

Virgin Mary, so in the incarnation the usual place of the human soul was replaced with

his divine nature. He makes this leap because he is trying to keep both natures intact and

yet find a philosophical way for them to be united. Thus Apollinarius says in his work On

the Union in Christ of the Body with the Godhead,

“If the same one is a complete human being and God as well, and the pious spirit does not worship a human being but worships God, it will be found both worshiping and not worshiping the same person-which is impossible. Moreover, humanity itself does not judge itself to be an objet of worship…but God knows himself to be an object of worship. Yet it is inconceivable that the same person should both know himself to be an object of worship and not know it. Therefore, it is inconceivable that the same person should be both God and an entire man. Rather, he exists in the singleness of an incarnate divine nature which is commingled [with flesh], with the result that worshipers bend their attention to God inseparable from his flesh and not to one who is worshiped and one who is not…O new creation and divine mixture! God and flesh completed one and the same nature!”11

Now, to an Alexandrian such as Cyril, while Apollinarius views are seen to be defective

and need to be rejected because of falling into a monophysitism, Cyril could at least

9 J.N.D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines. (Peabody: Prince Press, 2003), 291. 10 Kelly, 292. 11 Richard A. Norris, trans & ed. The Christological Controversy. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1980), 107-108.

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understand and agree with what Apollinarius was seeking to do, to protect the divine

nature from being lost in the very humanness of Jesus that the events of His life-His birth,

temptations, beatings, death and burial-which could lead to that old Ebionite position.

However, there was a completely another school of thought that saw the Alexandrian

position, extreme or not, as a danger to falling off the cliff on the other side. This is

where those in Antioch offered another side of the debate that sought to regain, they

thought, the balance needed between the two natures.

As previously mentioned, the emphasis that Antioch wanted to preserve was that

of morality. They start from the problem of mankind was that it had fallen into a bondage

to sin, something definitely attested to in Scripture. Because of man’s sin, they had fallen

under the wrath of God and so became ensnared to death and damnation. Thus they were

concerned with the need for the salvation of man and that is the reason why Jesus Christ

had been given to the world. That since “man, being what he is, is unable to free himself

from the chains of disobedience, God himself must intervene, and, through creating, and

uniting himself, the new Man, bring into being the ‘Man-God,’ that man may be re-

established in obedience to God’s will, and heaven and earth re-united in perfect

harmony.”12

One begins to see the need to protect the human nature of Christ, since it is in His

sinless capacity and life that mankind is restored to a right relationship to God. Christ’s

union to mankind in His human nature is the key to redeeming all of human nature, and

this must be done through a specific human being. This differed from the Alexandrian

12 Sellers, 166-167.

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understanding on the “importance” of the divine nature13 in the fact that for Alexandria,

because Christ’s incarnation was on behalf of all humankind, the specific human nature

was not stressed as deeply as Antioch did.14

This is to say that Antioch sought to understand the two natures in Christ within a

“Word-man” framework, rather than the “Word-flesh” of Alexandria. One of largest

theologians on the Antiochene side was Theodore of Antioch, bishop of Mopsuestia. His

contributions were to make sure that when one spoke of Jesus Christ, one did not lose His

very human nature in the process of confessing Him as God. Christ indeed was divine,

the very Son of God, and in the incarnation, the human nature He took from Mary “had

union with the Logos straightway from the beginning when he was formed in his

mother’s womb.”15 Theodore used the word “indwelling” to state his case as carefully

and fully as he could. Through the work of his critics, one sees how he attempted to

explain this concept. Theodore believed that the Logos could not have “pervaded the

humanity either substantially (κατ ουσιαν) or by direct activity (κατ ενεργειαν)” since

God is, by nature, omnipresent at all times. Thus, it was necessary for the Word to make

Himself “homo assumptus;” placing Himself very spatially and precisely locationally.16

So, Theodore stressed that within Jesus Christ, one found two complete natures

within the one person. He made sure that each of the ousiai was preserved within the

13 I am in no way saying the Antioch did not emphasize nor place great importance on the divine nature of Christ. They completely affirmed and necessitated the need for Christ to be fully divine in His work of salvation. However, to make the distinction clearer between the two schools of thought, to say that Alexandria emphasized the divine and Antioch the human nature in Christ helps us in this endeavor. 14 McGrath. 363. McGrath makes a helpful chart in this by stating, “The answer could be summarized as follows: Alexandria: Logos assumes a general human nature.

Antioch: Logos assumes a specific human being.” 15 Norris, 117. 16 Kelly, 305.

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incarnation; stating that each of their prosopon retained its full individuality and

attributions. Care must be taken not to confuse the two natures, for to do so would be to

rob each of the nature of their full and complete personhood.17

It was another Antiochene that would pick this idea of Theodore and carry it

forward to Chalcedon. Theodoret of Cyrus, bishop of Cyrus from 423- c. 457, would take

Theodore’s understanding of the two natures into the one Person of Jesus Christ and

make it the theological underpinnings of the Antiochene position. What Theodoret does

was to take seriously the idea that God, in His creation, did created human nature. That

the human physis is real and true and substantial. It must be preserved at all cost because

it is the actual creation of God and thus His intention for His creation. This nature

includes all that is understood to be a human being.

Thus when it came to the incarnation, one has to hold onto the meaning of the

terms, in their totality. That when Paul speaks in Philippians 2:6-7, “Who, though he was

in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made

himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men,” the term

“’form of God’ refers to what the Word is in himself, to his ousia and physis. He is that;

he is the divine ousia. He does not become in time a form or image of the glory of the

Father.”18 Christ, in His incarnation, held both, complete physis or natures within

Himself; not, however, creating a new kind of “third” being, but one that is was fully God

and fully human at the same.19

17 Sellers, 179. 18 Paul B. Clayton Jr. The Christology of Theodoret of Cyrus: Antiochene Christology from the Council of Ephesus to the Council of Chalcedon. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). 114. Italics are the authors. 19 Ibid. 115.

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However, the difference was that Christ’s two natures received differently

according to what they were, which gives us a hint at the major problem the Alexandrians

recognized with Antioch. Taking this from Theodore,20 Theodoret stressed that each of

the natures acted on and was acted upon the things according to their nature. Holding that

it is the human nature that is subject to sin, temptation, hunger, death, etc., then when

Scripture speaks of such things taking place and upon Christ, it was not His divine physis

that suffered these, but His human. In accordance, in those things that only a divine

physis could do, then it was the Logos who took part in them. This distinction was needed

by Theodoret both to protect each of the natures from being confused with the other and

so to protect from creating a third type of being that is mixture of both the divine and

human.

However, if it could be said that the divine nature in Christ died upon the cross,

then one would be saying that the divine nature was finite-something that a divine nature,

by its definition, cannot have attributed to it. Thus, taking from Theodore, it is the

“indwelling” of the Logos into the human nature of Mary that this can be understood. So

Theodoret says,

“This ‘the Word became flesh’ indicates no alteration of deity, but the assumption of human nature. The evangelist proclaims the ineffable love of God for humanity as he teaches how he was in the beginning, who was God, and who was with God, who never was not, who created all things, who brought into being the things which were not, who was life, the true light, assumed the perishable physis and made the passions of human beings his own, so working out the salvation of humankind. And desiring to show more widely the greatness of his benevolence, he makes no mention of the immortal psyche, but speaks of only passible sarx…By the part he points to the whole.” 21

20 See Kelly, 306-307. 21 Clayton, 124.

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Paul Clayton comments on this, “The assumption of sarx most emphatically does

not mean the change of the Word into created ousia-which by necessity is involved in the

Word replaces the human nous (or intellect, mind, reason) in Christ in a composite mia

physis of Word and human sarx (defined as soma alone).22 One can see the Antiochene

desire to protect each nature from each other. By keeping them united yet separate,

Theodoret was seeking to honor what it meant both to be divine and human and to ensure

that in the person of Christ, one did not fall to either an Ebionite or Doectist heresy.

Just like with Apollinarius and the Alexandria position, so too within the

Antiochene school arose a view that found footing within the theological world because

of its wrongful idea. This happened with the arrival of Nestorius on the scene, which

became the patriarch of Constantinople in 428 AD. The famous situation of his refusing

to call the Virgin Mary the Theotokos, the God bearing, is recounted in many histories of

the time and need not to be recited here. Instead we will be interested in gaining a bit of

an insight of what exactly Nestorius was seeking to do and why it lead, ultimately, to his

rejection at Chalcedon.

Nestorius was a true Antiochene, following the thought of Theodore and

Theodoret in seeking to not only attest to the two distinct natures in Christ, but to also

preserve their complete qualities within themselves. JND Kelly says that “I hold the

natures apart (χωριξω τας φυσεις), but united the worship, was his watchword; and he

envisaged the Godhead as existing in ‘the man’ and ‘the man’ in the Godhead without

mixture or confusion.”23 He could not abide by the idea of a hypostatic union between the

22 Ibid, 124. Explanation of nous is mine. 23 Kelly, 312.

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two natures because that would lead to the aspects of each nature to share in the other,

which would have been a philosophical impossibility. Here is where Nestorius used

Theodoret’s work, showing, in the words of Clayton, an “Antiochene metaphysic of the

absolute unchangeableness of the divine ousia-physis.24 No wonder he could not accept

the philosophical idea of a Theotokos because, to use his own words,

“Does God have a mother? A Greek without reproach introducing mothers for the gods! Is Paul then a liar when he says of the deity of Christ, ‘without father, without mother, without genealogy’ [Heb. 7:3]? Mary, my friend, did not give birth to the Godhead (for what is born of the flesh is flesh” [John 3:6]). A creature did not produce him who is uncreateable…A creature did not produce the Creator, rather she gave birth to the human being, the instrument of the Godhead. The Holy Spirit did not create God the Logos (for ‘what is born of her is of the Holy Spirit’ [Matt. 1:20]). Rather, he formed out of the Virgin a temple for God the Logos, a temple in which he dwelt.” 25

Part Two: Chalcedon

The events that led to the Council of Chalcedon are probably more interesting

than the Council itself. In this time, several councils were held to debate various

Christological thoughts. The first at Ephesus in 431 officially condemned Nestorius. This,

however really settled nothing, as Theodoret and the Antiochene’s felt their position had

not been fully understood. In November 448, at a “home synod” in Constantinople, the

teachings of a monk named Eutyches, was debated and condemned.26 His position that

sought to further define the Alexandrian position, called that “while the Savior was of

one substance with the Father, he was not of one substance with us.”27 Thus, while before

24 Clayton, 142. 25 Placher, Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume One, 69. 26 Richard Price and Michael Gaddis, trans. The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon: Volume One. (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2005), 25-30. 27 Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity: Complete in One Volume. The Early Church to the Present Day. (Peabody: Prince Press, 2001), 255.

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the incarnation, it could be said that there were two natures, with a notion of being a

human nature; in the incarnation were only one nature remaining, the divine of the Logos.

This, of course, was denounced and denied by all people. It is noteworthy to say

that at this point, the Western Church began to have a word in the deliberations of these

Councils. Due to the fact that a strong pope was sitting on the papal chair, Leo, the

western church, which had not had the same problems with understanding the two natures

doctrine as had the east (due in part to their holding to Tertullian’s definition of persona

to speak of both the Persons of the Trinity and then of the two natures in Christ, along

with the influence of Augustine), found itself desiring to speak a word in the midst of this

current situation. This is not to say that the West had been excluded, but with the election

of Leo in 440, they had a figure “large” enough to throw some theological weight to

match that of the East.

At this time, another council that was called to meet in Ephesus in 449, created a

problem when supporters of the Alexandrian school convened before representatives of

Antioch could arrive. This was done so to ensure that Alexandria’s position would be set

down as orthodox, over against that of Antioch.28 This led to the council being labeled a

“robbers council,” with Leo in the West upset at the preceding’s. After all the parties

simmered down, a new council was called to meet at Chalcedon in order, hopefully, settle

this debate.

The events around the calling of Chalcedon developed out of the fact that a new

Eastern emperor after the death of Theodosius II on July 26, 450. His sister Pulcheria

assumed power, married a general named Marcian and began discussions with Pope Leo

28 Ibid, 255.

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about seeking to solve the situation that had evolved from the recent history, especially

with that second council in Ephesus. It was this connection with seeking to work with the

Western pope that one can say was instrumental in what developed out of Chalcedon,

since the Definition of the Faith which was agreed upon can thus be seen as a truly

ecumenical statement, as it involved both parts of the Church and empire.

Theologically, what Chalcedon sought to do and did accomplish was to find that

middle ground between the two extremes that we have already discussed-that between the

one nature theology of Eutyches and the two completely separate natures of Nestorius,

even though both theologies had already been condemned as heretical. So Chalcedon can

be seen as more of a theological-setting council, rather than just one meeting to address

and condemn a particular question. This is not to say that the Church was settled after

Chalcedon, as factions did arise according to their own particular desires they held even

before the council.29 One thing could be said that what Chalcedon did was to “boost” the

power and prestige of the Roman pope and the Western Church in general. As we will

see, it was Leo’s Tome, first presented but unread at Ephesus in 449,30 that set the

theological agreement and which defined what the Church catholic believes and

confesses concerning the two natures in Christ.

The Tome of Leo was the document that essentially laid the groundwork for what

later developed out of the council as The Definition of the Faith. Represented at

Chalcedon by delegates, the Tome was re-introduced and became the heart of what

Chalcedon declared to be doctrine and the faith. In essence, Leo is simply addressing the

29 Price & Gaddis, The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon: Volume One, 51-53. 30 Ibid, 29-30.

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heresy of Eutyches and so refers to him throughout the work. However, what makes this

such a monumental and important piece is that in the midst of writing against one man,

Leo finally spoke of just what it is that one must think “concerning the Incarnation of the

divine Logos, and ‘by these three sentences the machinations of almost all heretics are

destroyed.’”31 The full text of Leo’s Tome and The Definition is located in Appendix One

and Two at the end of the paper. I will use italics when quoting the texts of the two

documents themselves.

As we begin to look at the divine nature, we find Leo holding firm on the

complete nature holding intact in the man Jesus. Taking his words from Scripture, there is

nothing lost was the Word put on flesh.32 That the divine Person of the Son is the same as

it was before the man Jesus Christ was born; the only difference now is that the Son now

has the same human flesh and nature as that of every other person.33 It must then be fully

confessed, “He whom Herod impiously designs to slay is like humanity in its beginnings;

but he whom the Magi rejoice to adore on their knees is Lord of all.” As R.V. Sellers

states, “This birth in time in no way detracted from, in no way added to, that divine and

eternal birth.”34 In Jesus’ baptism by John, the voice of the Father that fell over those

gathered affirms the fact that what one finds in Christ is the complete Second Person of

the Triune God, “Now when he came to the baptism of John his forerunner, lest the fact

that the Godhead was covered with a veil of flesh should be concealed, the voice of the

31 Sellers, 228. 32 Tome, “Accordingly, the same who, remaining in the form of God, made man, was made man in the form of a servant. For each of the natures retains its proper character without defect; and as the form of God does not take away the form of a servant, so the form of a servant does not impair the form of God.” 33 Tome, “For…’God’ is not changed by the compassion [exhibited],” and He is the “same, truly Son of God, and truly Son of Man. God, inasmuch as ‘in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.’” 34 Sellers, 229.

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Father spake in thunder from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well

pleased.”

At the same time, Leo is just as emphatic about holding to the real, true and

complete human nature of Christ. Scripture and doctrine speaks of the realness of Jesus’

humanity, even as it speaks of His divine Sonship. So, Eutyches erred when he could not

see that “It was the Holy Ghost who gave fecundity to the Virgin, but it was from a body

that a real body was derived; and “when Wisdom was building herself a house,” the

“Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us,” that is, in that flesh which he assumed

from a human being, and which he animated with the spirit of rational life.” That it must

be believed that when Christ hungered or thirst and was weary, as Scripture attests to,

these were real and substantial things and the same which all mankind shares in.

Thus, “He assumed “the form of a servant” without the defilement of sin,

enriching what was human, not impairing what was divine: because that “emptying of

himself,” whereby the Invisible made himself visible, and the Creator and Lord of all

things willed to be one among mortals, was a stooping down in compassion, not a failure

of power.” His was a real human nature and was fully born, lived and died as any other

person does.35

In the same importance then, the Tome further attests to just what this union

means. Remember, Eutyches had confessed that in the union, there was only one nature

remaining and Nestorius said the two natures were there but completely separate. Leo,

however, sought to affirm both natures in a complete unified manner.36 This highlights

35 Tome, “The infancy of the Babe is exhibited by the humiliation of swaddling clothes. 36 Tome, “Accordingly while the distinctness of both natures and substances was preserved, and both met in one Person, lowliness was assumed by majesty, weakness by power, mortality by eternity; and, in order

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Leo’s attempts to find common ground between Alexandria and Antioch. Neither natures

are diminished nor ignored; both are sought to be retained in their fullness.

“Accordingly, on account of this unity of Person which is to be understood as existing in both the natures, we read, on the one hand, that “the Son of Man came down from heaven,” inasmuch as the Son of God took flesh from that Virgin of whom he was born; and on the other hand, the Son of God is said to have been crucified and buried, inasmuch as he underwent this, not in his actual Godhead; wherein the Only-begotten is coeternal and consubstantial with the Father, but in the weakness of human nature.”

So Leo uses soteriology to speak of just how these two natures are conjoined.

Many have tried to pit the two Eastern schools against each other on this account.

However, this is erroneous in the fact that they each were speaking of the same thing, just

coming to it from a different angle. Alexandria emphasizes the divine work in the

salvation of mankind and so used the idea of the communicatio idiomatum to speak how

the divine attributed and participated in the death and resurrection that brought

redemption. Antioch emphasized the very same thing, just making sure to speak of the

necessity of the human nature of Christ actually suffering the work of salvation. Leo,

therefore, takes both schools and unites them in a way that affirmed their respective

emphases and yet help clear up the problems that developed from them.

The two natures, then, were united in perfect harmony and unity.37 The Logos

descended from heaven to take upon the very nature, which had fallen into bondage and

corruption, and this was needed because it was only God who could overcome the very

problem of humanity. 38 In Christ, one finds a “new order,” not some kind of “third way”

to pay the debt of our condition, the inviolable nature was united to the passible, so that as the appropriate remedy for our ills, one and the same “Mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus,” might from one element be capable of dying and also from the other be incapable.” 37 Tome, “Each of the natures retains its proper character without defect; and as the form of God does not take away the form of a servant, so the form of a servant does not impair the form of God.” 38 Tome, “For we could not have overcome the author of sin and of death, unless he who could neither be contaminated by sin, nor detained by death, had taken upon himself our nature, and made it his own.”

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but an order in which “he who in his own sphere is invisible, became visible in ours; He

who could not be enclosed in space, willed to be enclosed; continuing to be before times,

he began to exist in time.” Note here: Leo keeps each nature within its own “sphere,” yet

refuses to place them apart or differentiate them. It is not that human nature has become

the divine nature or that the divine nature becomes human nature; but in Christ, one finds

the divine taking upon flesh so in order to redeem human nature back to the divine. So

yes, the Son of God was born; yet it is not that the divine can be said to be born. The

same is for the human nature: in death, it is not the divine that now dies, but human

nature does. Leo explains it thusly:

For although in the Lord Jesus Christ there is one Person of God and man, yet that whereby contumely attaches to both is one thing, and that whereby glory attaches to both is another; for from what belongs to us he has that manhood which is inferior to the Father; while from the Father he has equal Godhead with the Father. Accordingly, on account of this unity of Person which is to be understood as existing in both the natures, we read, on the one hand, that “the Son of Man came down from heaven,” inasmuch as the Son of God took flesh from that Virgin of whom he was born; and on the other hand, the Son of God is said to have been crucified and buried, inasmuch as he underwent this, not in his actual Godhead; wherein the Only-begotten is coeternal and consubstantial with the Father, but in the weakness of human nature. Wherefore we all, in the very Creed, confess that “the only-begotten Son of God was crucified and buried,” according to that saying of the Apostle, “for if they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of Majesty.”

So, the very heart of the Tome is what it means for Jesus to be fully divine and fully

human.39

One sees Leo’s theological exercises in the official statement of Chalcedon, The

Definition of the Faith. It begins with stating that the council’s primary confession is that

39 Tome, “For when God is believed to be both “Almighty” and “Father,” it is proved that the Son is everlasting together with himself, differing in nothing from the Father, because he was born as “God from God,” Almighty from Almighty, Coeternal from Eternal; not later in time, not inferior in power, not unlike him in glory, not divided from him in essence, but the same Only-begotten and Everlasting Son of an Everlasting Parent was “born of the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary.” This birth in time in no way detracted from, in no way added to, that divine and everlasting birth; but expended itself wholly in the work of restoring man, who had been deceived; so that it might both overcome death, and by its power “destroy the devil who had the power of death.”

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of the Creed of Nicaea-Constantinople. Doing this, they were saying the same as Leo in

attesting that what the Creed states: that Christ is of the same nature and substance of the

Father, co-equal in all majesty, power and supremacy and that He was born of the Holy

Spirit from the Virgin Mary. Here we see their holding to the distinct natures one does

find in Jesus Christ, “This wise and salutary formula of divine grace sufficed for the

perfect knowledge and confirmation of religion; for it teaches the perfect [doctrine]

concerning Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and sets forth the Incarnation of the Lord to

them that faithfully receive it.40

A term used here is important to understand this. That they affirm the use of

homoousios unites them with the previous work of theologians, especially with that of the

West. So Christ is, “perfect in Godhead and perfect in manhood, very God and very man,

of a reasonable soul and [human] body consisting, consubstantial with the Father as

touching his Godhead, and consubstantial with us as touching his manhood; made in all

things like unto us, sin only excepted.” Note how they speak of Christ-consubstantial

with both the Father according to His divinity and to mankind according to His humanity.

This seems to affirm both the Alexandrian and Antiochene work to stress Christ’s two

complete natures.41

40 Definition, “Following the holy Fathers we teach with one voice that the Son [of God] and our Lord Jesus Christ is to be confessed as one and the same [Person], that he is perfect in Godhead and perfect in manhood, very God and very man, of a reasonable soul and [human] body consisting, consubstantial with the Father as touching his Godhead, and consubstantial with us as touching his manhood; made in all things like unto us, sin only excepted; begotten of his Father before the worlds according to his Godhead; but in these last days for us men and for our salvation born [into the world] of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God according to his manhood.” 41 Sellers, 212-213. “As we have seen, at the very heart of the doctrine of Apollinarius and Cyril is the conception that he who existed ‘without flesh’ exists ‘in flesh’ in Jesus Christ; in fact, Cyril uses the same expressions which appear in the Chalcedonian confession, speaking of Jesus Christ as, ‘the Same, at once both God and man’ (ο αυτος Θεος τε οµος και ανθρωπος), as ‘perfect in Godhead and perfect in manhood,’ and as homoousios with us, while remaining homoousios with the Father. The Antiochene, even

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Key here is the “famous” four adverbs of Chalcedon.42 “This one and the same

Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son [of God] must be confessed to be in two natures,

unconfusedly, immutably, indivisibly, inseparably [united], and that without the

distinction of natures being taken away by such union, but rather the peculiar property of

each nature being preserved and being united in one Person and subsistence, not

separated or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son and only-begotten, God

the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ.” When we look at this, we see that desire to hold both

the unity and separation in a healthy tension. There is one Jesus Christ, begotten of the

Father who is united within this One born of the Virgin. He hold each nature fully in His

own Person and being. The four adverbs stress this beyond measure.

So the Jesus Christ is true God and true Man, being unconfused in that neither

nature loses its qualities and essence in the incarnation, contra to Apollinarius and

Eutyches. Each nature is immutable, unable to change from what the natures are. This

Jesus is indivisible in His two natures, highlighting, against Nestorius and Theodoret, that

one cannot ascribe something happening to Christ as happening to either His divine or

human nature. And we find Christ to be inseparably united, affirming the communicatio

idiomatum that what happens to the one nature happens to the other.

Thus we find Chalcedon seeking to reject both the extremes we have already

mentioned. There are both natures in the Man Jesus Christ-His divinity does not consume

the humanity He received from Mary, nor is His humanity and divinity two separate

natures within the Person so that one can attribute each according to the work. Instead, in

if their teaching is not so clear-cut as that of the Alexandrians, uphold the same doctrine; and of course this part of the Chalcedonian statement is based on an Antiochene document.” 42 For a brief article on the four adverbs of Chalcedon, see Martin H. Scharlemann, “The Case for Four Adverbs: Reflections on Chalcedon,” Concordia Theological Monthly, Vol. 28, No. 12 (December 1957).

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Christ we are able to see both natures in the work He does. Christ dies according to His

human nature, even as the divine nature, taking on the attributes of the human, dies and

Christ rises over the grave as His human nature is worked upon by the divine to defeat

death. It is as Sellers says, “Chalcedon allow the enquirer into the Person of the Logos

made flesh to see his Godhead and his manhood as ‘two’, each in it ‘ownness.’”43

Part Three: Luther

“For from the beginning of Christ’s conception, on account of the union of the two natures, it has been correct to say, ‘This God is the Son of David, and this Man is the Son of God.’ The first is correct because His Godhead was emptied and hidden in the flesh. The second is correct because His humanity has been completed and translated to divine being. But even though it is true that He was not made the Son of God, but only the Son of Man, nevertheless, one and the same Person has always been the Son and is the Son of God even then.”44

So summarizes just where Luther stands in the context of the doctrine of Christology and

the two natures in Christ. “Christ is the subject of theology,” was something he said and

so we find Christ and just who He is and what He did at the center of so much of what he

had to say to the Church.45

Of course, since Christ was the center of Luther’s theological talk, it is near

impossible to gain a systematic compilation of his thoughts. So much of his writings,

hymns, letters and sermons are filled with “Christ-talk” and he flows in and out of

speaking about Christ in a way that can make it a bit difficult to gain a hold of all of what

he says about Him. This is exacerbated since Luther was first and foremost a professor of

43 Sellers, 219. 44 Martin Luther, American Edition of Luther's Works. Edited by Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut T. Lehmann. 55 vols. (Philadelphia and St. Louis: Fortress Press and Concordia Publishing House, 1957-1986.), Vol. 25:147. Hereafter, LW. 45 Franz Posset. Luther’s Catholic Christology: According to His Johannine Lectures of 1527. (Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 1988), 20. This quote comes from WA TR 2:242, 4.

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the Old Testament at the Wittenberg University, so he was immersed in the Bible and

found Christ anywhere and everywhere.46

Since Luther believed and confessed Jesus Christ so completely, the best way to

gain an understanding of Luther’s thought is to view just in what way he did teach his

belief. This is best done by taking Luther for who he was: a pastor and theologian, and

not a systematician. That his theology is going to come across in a different manner

because his first concern and primary vocation was that to teach and preach the faith to

those in the classroom of the university and sitting in the pews of the congregations.

The first thing to consider to gain an appreciation for Luther’s thoughts on Christ

is to understand that when speaking of Christology, he would rarely do it in an abstract

manner, but tied the person of Christ to His work. For him, Christology is wrapped up in

soteriology because Christ was given for no other reason than to save a world in bondage

to sin, death and the power of the devil. We see this in Luther’s love for the phrase, “for

you” in making people understand just what Christ was given for. One is drawn to his use

of that in the Lord’s Supper section in the Small Catechism. So Marc Leinhard asserts,

“Christology and soteriology are inseparable one from the other.”47

And what soteriology shows us is how Luther considered just how the Person

Jesus Christ was. Here Luther was in agreement with the early church and Chalcedon.

The incarnation is the entrance of the eternal Son of God into the world. It is a

46 Ibid, 146. “In a table talk of 1531 Luther suberbly characterized John and Paul in regard to Christology: ‘John the evangelist describes Christ as God a priori. Paul, however, a posteriori and from the effect.” This bit shows just how much Luther saw Christ being spoke of in the pages of the Holy Scriptures. 47 Marc Lienhard, Luther: Witness to Jesus Christ, Stages and Themes of the Reformer’s Christology. Translated by Edwin H. Robertson. (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1982), 177.

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“manifestation of the deity of God, free, holy and jealous.”48 He takes the words of St.

Paul from Philippians 2 seriously, seeing here the humiliation of the Son into the human

person of Jesus Christ.49 Christ “put on” humanity so to draw close to humanity in order

that they made be saved in His death and resurrection.

Thus the incarnation is finally for the faith of those whom Christ came to redeem.

As one believes that Christ died and rose for them, they receive the benefits of the work

of God becoming man.50 This is why philosophy cannot justify the incarnation, because

as philosophy says the finite cannot contain the infinite, faith lives upon something

different than pure thought, but upon the words of Scriptures and the preaching of the

church.51

This is an important point-Luther can speak of it using philosophical terms. The

incarnation is not “located at the level of accidentia [but] in the unity with humanity in

Jesus Christ, the divinity is like the substantia.”52 Here is where we find him using the

language of Cyril and speak of a hypostatic union between the two natures. It is a

“personal union” between the two; the two distinct essences of the natures are not

collapsed into each other, but a genuine union took place were there is just the one Person

in two natures.53 Luther especially liked to use an illustration from the church fathers to

48 Ibid, 157. 49 Ibid, 52. Leinhard makes the important distinction that for Luther, the idea of kenosis doesn’t mean that Christ completely divested Himself of His divine nature. Francis Pieper makes it clear that this theory must be carefully thought about and spoken of because one could fall into the error of Christ losing some of the divine attributes in the incarnation. This would be an interesting study within itself. (Francis Pieper, Christian Dogmatics: Volume Two. [Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1951], 105-107, 206.) 50 Posset, 206. “The incarnation of Christ, soterologically understood, is the reason why the believer’s spiritual birth is possible.” 51 Leinhard, 326-327. 52 Ibid, 328. 53 Ibid, 219.

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speak of the union. He uses the term enhypostasis to emphasize just what the incarnation

resulted in. That in Christ, “a humanity [is] united indissolubly to the divine

hypostasis.”54 There can be seen no separation between the two natures now, nor can you

speak of them in different terms and workings in the life of Christ.

At the same time, however, Luther was very adamant that philosophy must be

tempered and in fact, must at times give way to theology. This is where we find Luther

becoming that Biblical scholar and pastor to the students he taught and people he

preached to on a regular basis. A couple of examples of this are found in two different

disputations that Luther produced. The first is from January 11, 1539, The Disputation

Concerning the Passage: “The Word was Made Flesh (John 1:14), which is found in

volume 38 of the American Edition of Luther’s Works and the second is the Disputation

on the Divinity and Humanity of Christ, which was offered in February 27, 1540. This

work, translated into English by Christopher B. Brown, can be accessed at on the internet.

It is included in Appendix three.

In the Disputation Concerning the Passage: “The Word was Made Flesh, we get

an understanding of how Luther considered the use of philosophy in the midst of

theology with the very second thesis presented, “In theology it is true that the Word was

made flesh; in philosophy the statement is simply impossible and absurd.”55 Luther here

is making a careful distinction between theology and philosophy-that there are at times

54 Ibid, 230-235. 55 LW 38:239.

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when they are incapable of being complimentary. This is so because as he says,

“Philosophy deals with visible matters, but theology deals with invisible ones.”56

It’s not that theology and philosophy necessarily don’t talk about the same

things.57 But the difference lies in that theology’s entire emphasis is about God and man’s

relation to Him. In dealing with the idea that the Word became flesh, the difference then

lies in the fact that with philosophy this is impossible because philosophy’s attributes of

God cannot be held within humanity. Only God is omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent,

etc., and to be man means, by nature and definition, not to be or hold those qualities.

However, the theology behind John 1:14 says just that-in this man Jesus Christ, is found

the God who is God with all divine attributes.

Thus, Luther notes that a difference lies with the use of grammar-that while

theology and philosophy can and do speak the same words; they are using those words,

often, in completely different ways. This is where the communicatio idiomatum comes

into play for Luther. He explicates this in Argument 4: Every man is a creature. Christ is

a man. Therefore, Christ is a creature. First, Luther points out two things are going on

here, a major and minor premise. Since philosophy declares that to be a man means that

one is not God, and since a man is a creature and by nature God is not, then when one

speaks of the Word becoming flesh, then you must be saying that, in His nature, Christ is

nothing more than a creature and not God. And the confusion that this brings about,

Luther says is found in the use of the word “man:” philosophy uses it one-way and

56 LW 38:249. 57 LW 38:248. “We say that theology does not contradict philosophy because the latter speaks only about matrimony, obedience, chastity, liberality, and other virtues.”

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theology another. Therefore, one must learn to “use” grammar differently when you deal

with theology:

“And I simply say: If a distinction is made, the meaning of the word is not the same. We ought to rely upon the word alone. Oecolampadius says beautifully that ‘man’ has another meaning here than in the [genealogical] tree of Porphyry. He should rather have said that it is a commination of properties. The philosopher does not say that God is man or that man is God and the son of God. But we say that man in God, and we witness to this by the word of God without a syllogism, apart from philosophy; philosophy has noting to do with our grammar. You should note this because ‘man’ is and should mean something beyond what it means in the [genealogical] tree of Porphyry, even if it is truly said that God was made man, as they and I say. For here it means something greater and more comprehensive.” 58

We continue to see this line of thinking in the Disputation on the Divinity and

Humanity of Christ from 1540. (Again, I will quote the text in italics since it is located in

the appendix). In the very first argument, “A human person is one thing, a divine person

another. But in Christ there are both divinity and humanity. Therefore there are two

persons in Christ.” Luther responds, “There is a fallacy of composition and division. In

the major premise you divide the human nature and the divine; in the minor premise you

join them. This is a philosophical solution; but we are speaking theologically. I deny the

consequence, for this reason, that in Christ the humanity and the divinity constitute one

person. But these two natures are distinct in theology, with respect, that is, to the natures,

but not with respect to [secundum] the person.”

What we see here is that Luther refuses to allow the use of words in philosophy

define what is being said theologically. Luther binds himself to the work of Chalcedon

and the faith of the Church and insists that at times, what is said in the Church must be

thought of and used different than in the academy. So, because theology says there are

not two persons in the one nature of Jesus, but that there are two natures in the one

58 LW 38:246-247.

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person, when one speaks of Christ’s two natures, one must speak of them as united, yet

separate-and all at the same time.59

Another example of this is found in Argument 4: A word is not a person, Christ is

the Word. Therefore Christ is not a person. “I prove the major premise, that a word and

a person are different, Luther responds, “This is a new expression, which was formerly

unheard of in the world. Christ is not a mathematical or physical word, but a divine and

uncreated word, which signifies a substance and a person, because the divine Word is the

divinity. Christ is the divine Word. Therefore he is the divinity, that is, a substantial

person [ipsa substantia et persona]. Philosophically, “word” means a sound or an

utterance, but speaking theologically, “Word” signifies the Son of God. This, Aristotle

would not admit, that “Word” signifies true God [plenum Deum}.

Again, we find here that important need to distinguish how one is “speaking,”

either theologically or philosophically. Luther says it in Argument 7, When we must

speak carefully, there is most need of grammar. In theology, we must speak carefully,

Therefore the Holy Spirit has his own grammar. Luther here is not saying that philosophy

doesn’t have its place; just that it must stay in its place for it is be any benefit to theology.

Theology is a completely different and new way of speaking in the world and this is true

59 Disputation on the Divinity and Humanity of Christ. In Argument two, Luther states, From eternity he was not man; but now being conceived by the Holy Ghost, that is, born of the Virgin, God and man are made one person, and the same things are truly said of God and man [sunt eadem praedicata Dei et hominis]. Here the personal union is accomplished. Here the humanity and divinity are joined [Da gehet’s ineinander humanitas et divinitas]. The union holds everything together [Die unitas, die helt’s]. I confess that there are two natures, but they cannot be separated.

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because theology is speaking about something, God, that is, in His own nature and

substance, beyond the created means of this world.60

One sees this in the way Luther speaks of the incarnation. Historically speaking,

Luther takes an Alexandrian position when speaking of Christ’s human nature. And so he

makes a distinction in what exactly was the human nature Christ made His own. He does

this by speaking to the need to understand the term homo not as philosophy does, in the

manner of it meaning a person who exists within themselves, but theologically, which see

the term more in the understanding of the entirety of humanity. So, Luther says, “The

man Christ is a divine person who assumed human nature.”61 If one sought to hold to a

philosophical view, then the human nature Christ assumed would make of Him two

persons-one divine and one human.

But Luther was right at home with what was agreed upon at Chalcedon in his

doctrine of the two natures. However, where Luther takes it was out of the abstract and

into the concrete to make it understandable. For him, the two natures in Christ are not

important according to the terminology or comprehension, but in the work it achieves for

the salvation of mankind. In Christ, one finds the Godhead at work to redeem man from

sin and death. His divinity, in assuming our flesh, locates Himself within our sphere and

so was placed in the same condemnation and death. However, unable to retain Him

because of His divinity, as Christ rose triumphant on Easter, so now humanity can share

in life of God. The God-Man Jesus Christ is necessary, not for God, but for humanity

60 Ibid. So Luther says in Theses 23, Thus it must be that the words man, humanity, suffered, etc., and everything that is said of Christ, are new words. 61 Leinhard, 330.

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because He is the only place where the world can find, experience and comprehend the

eternal Godhead.62

Key to Luther here is a brief discussion on his belief and use of the communicatio

idiomatum. Theodore Tappert offers what is a nicely systematized outline of Luther’s

understanding of this concept:

1. The properties of one nature are ascribed to the whole person of the

Godhead.

2. The person of Christ acts through both natures, each contributing what

is particular to itself.

3. The properties of the divine nature are communicated to the human.63

Franz Posset speaks of this concept of being the central aspect to all understanding of

Luther’s Christology,64 and K.O Nilsson speak of it being the heart of all Luther’s

theology and a “matter of utmost importance.”65

It is the communicatio idiomatum that Luther saw was the primary work of

protecting and defining that Chalcedon did for the Church. He saw that as the council

dealt with the heresies of Euytches and Nestorius, they were finally calling to the

62 Ibid, 229. Here we will find the idea of the ubiquity of Christ important later on, as we discuss the two natures in Luther’s sacramental theology. 63 Paul C. Empie and James I McCord, ed. Marburg Revisited: A Reexamination of Lutheran and Reformed Traditions. (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1966), 57. 64 Posset, 249. 65 K.O. Nilsson. Simul: Das Miteinander von Göttlichlem und Menschlichem in Luthers Theologie. (Forschungen zur Kirchen und Dogmengeschichte 17. Göttingen, 1996), as noted in Leinhard, 355. Nilsson says, “It is the communicatio idiomatum by which Luther’s whole system of theological thought stands or falls. The communicatio must not be understood as an accessory, more or less important, to the main theological structure. This is a matter of the utmost importance in understanding Luther. The communicatio is not a doctrine in itself which one might derive by careful and diligent study from the thought of Luther about the unity of Christ’s person and work. The doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum is not merely a consequence of the unity in Christ, but an expression of this unity itself and the whole basis on which, according to Luther, life and happiness rests.”

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forefront that their ideas were definicient on the basis of their refusal to hold to the reality

and concretness of both natures in Christ.66 That what Chalcedon did was to assert

totality of both natures at work in and through Christ and to give the Church language to

speak of this through this concept of the work of the attributes thorugh the other.

What the communicatio meant for Luther was to wholly take the confession that

Jesus is God and Man in its logical and linguistic plain sense readings. If you cannot

speak of Christ being totally and at all times both God and man in His ownself, then you

really are confessing two natures and two persons of Christ. Again, this shows Luther’s

use of the concrete and not abstract thinking. In this way, he is confessing the “four

adverbs” of Chalcedon that we spoke of before. If those are to be true, then one has to be

ready to speak of them in their totality when speaking of Christ.

Of course, this has led to some accusing Luther of holding toward a Monophysite,

Apollinarianism or even Docetic theology.67 Some have seen Luther’s ability to speak of

God suckling at Mary’s breast or that on the cross, God died, as failing to distinguish

between the two natures. However, to accuse Luther of such failings is to miss just what

he was trying to express when he spoke like this. In fact, he was trying to protect Christ

from being separated again into the ancient heresies because of the temptation to

philosophize by some or to diminish the plain sense of Scripture by others. Instead, one

must realize that in Luther, he is at home holding to the tension what such a confession of

66 LW 41:108-109. “I shall give you my ideas; if I hit the mark, good-if not, the Christian faith will not fall herewith. Eutyches’ opinion is also (like that of Nestorius) in error concerning the idiomata, but in a different way. Nestorius does not want to give the idiomata of humanity to the divinity in Christ, even though he maintains that Christ is God and man. Eutyches, on the other hand, does not want to give the idiomata of divinity to the humanity, though he also maintains that Christ is true God and true man. 67 See Siggins, 215-216; Leinhard, 230, 344; Harold O. J. Brown, Heresies: Heresy and Orthodoxy in the History of the Church. (Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers, 2003), 315-317.

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the two natures in Christ brings and is willing to live within the complexity and mystery

of just how this union of the divine and human took place and was held in the Person of

Jesus Christ.68

So for Luther, what the communicatio idiomatum does is to allow one to speak of

Christ; creating a phrase that reflects his work, “philosophically theological.” As Martin

Chemnitz, whose work The Two Natures in Christ became an important work in

systematizing Lutheran theology during the next generation of Lutheran theologians after

Luther, quotes Luther substantially in describing what the communicatio idiomatum is:

“We must be careful that we do not divide this one person into two and on the other that we do not fuse into one the two distinct natures in the one person. For we must retain the difference of the two natures in the wonderful unity of the person, for just as the two natures have been joined together or united in the one person of the Son of God, so also in our common manner of speaking in the church we apply the terms (or as we popularly call them predications [statements]) which are attributed to the natures also to the complete person. We commonly refer to this practice as the communication of attributes, that is, we apply what is proper to one nature by itself in the abstract to the whole person in the concrete, as when we make the correct and true statement that the manhood in born of the Virgin Mary and crucified by the Jews. These predications are correctly attributed to the Son of God, and thus it is correct to say that the Son of God is born of the Virgin and crucified by the Jews, because God and man are one person, the one Christ, the Son of God and the Son of the Virgin…We say that God was crucified and put to death for us, that He has redeemed us by His blood, for there is one person consisting of God and man, a divine and a human nature joined together to form one person, for Christ in reality is both God and man. Therefore, what He did, suffered, or spoke as a man He also truly did, suffered, and spoke as the eternal God. And again, what He did and spoke as God He also did and spoke as man. For He is the same Son of both the eternal God and the human Virgin, one undivided person, but with a distinction of natures.” 69

To summarize his theology is to say that Luther did not stray from what was

decided at in the councils of the Church and, for our question, at Chalcedon. His theology

was that of what was offered up by Leo and in The Definition of the Faith and he doesn’t

68 Leinhard, 378-379. 69 Martin Chemnitz, The Two Natures in Christ.” Translated by J.A.O. Preus. (Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2007), 190-191.

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go any further than it.70 So we find him rejecting all the heresies that gave rise to the

calling of the ancient councils. Against Arius, he held to the homoousios that made the

union of Christ to the Father as inseparable and unchanging as did the hypostatic union of

the divine and human in Himself. Mary was fully the Theotokos, as Nestorius refused to

do, for in the incarnation God Himself was born and each properties of the natures

participates with the other. And for him, Jesus Christ held two whole and distinct but

united natures within Himself, contra to what Apollinarius and Eutyches sought to teach.

As we have already said and shown, Luther never would simply leave philosophy

or theology in its abstract means. That if the heart of Lutheran theology, to quote Gerhard

Forde, is that “theology is for proclamation,” then to see just why Luther did what he did,

one can look at a portion of his work and find the means in which Luther sought to use

what he believed in a way that served the Church and those he taught or preached. And

one of the best places to see this is to look at Luther’s writings concerning the Lord’s

Supper. We will do this by looking a four different works, That These Word of Christ,

“This is My Body,” etc., Still Stand Firm Against the Fanatics, Confession Concerning

Christ’s Supper, The Marburg Colloquy & Marburg Articles and Brief Confession

Concerning the Holy Sacrament. We will look at them in the chronological order in

which they were written.

This is a good place to view Luther’s work because it is in the Sacrament that the

doctrine of the two natures in Christ becomes a very concrete means where philosophy

and theology meets in the life of the Church. One of Luther’s most formable opponents

he battled with during his life was that of those he labeled as the “Sacramentarians,”

70 Leinhard, 23. “We have seen so far the extent to which the Christology of the ancient church can be considered as a source of the thought of Martin Luther.”

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those, following primarily upon the work of Ulrich Zwingli, who believed that in the

Lord’s Supper, the bread and wine merely “represented” or “symbolized” the Body and

Blood of Christ, whereas Luther held, following the general thought (although there was

a great difference) of the Roman Church, as well as with, as Luther contended, the entire

Church catholic. For Zwingli, the benefit one received came through a spiritual sense,

where one is able to share in the forgiveness that Christ bestows through His divine

Sonship.

In 1527, Luther responding publically that which had been taking place since

1524, where more than two dozens of writings had been published attacking Luther’s

doctrine on the Supper.71 What Luther does in to defend the doctrine of the Real Presence

in the Supper is to take one right back to what was declared to be the orthodox faith at

Chalcedon. What took place in the incarnation, Luther asked? Since what he was being

challenged upon was the philosophical inability for Christ’s true and substantial Body

and Blood to be physically located in the bread and wine of the Supper, what Luther says

is that to disbelieve that is to finally to disbelief the reality of the incarnation. That the

real battle, Luther showed, was really the battle of the two natures in Christ.

So, in this work he showed that the Church does truly believe in the reality of the

two natures in the incarnation. He asks, mockingly, “When the Virgin Mary was bodily

pregnant with the Son of God and carried Jesus Christ our Lord nine months in her

womb, and then as a mother brought him bodily into the world, as our Creed and Gospels

say, did she also carry and bear Christ’s flesh bodily in and through her flesh?”72 He hits

71 LW 37:5. Pages 8-11 of this volume lists the writings that Luther was indirectly responding in his piece. 72 LW 37:82

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here the heart of the two natures doctrine-that the man Jesus Christ is also the Son of

God. That, he is making the point, that when one speaks of Christ, one must believe that

you are speaking of the very real man He was; that one cannot separate the divine and

human in Christ unless you want to join in with all the heretics who either denied one

nature or the other or sought to keep them separate.

One of the interesting methods Luther takes to speak of this connection between

the two natures in Christ and the Lord’s Suppers is to use the objections of the

Sacramentarians against them. They said they could not believe in the real presence of

Christ in the Supper because Christ Himself had said “It is the Spirit who gives life; the

flesh is no help at all” (John 6:63). Luther turns this around and asks that if Christ meant

“flesh” in its complete and forever sense, then “Christ’s flesh, bodily conceived, borne

and handled, is of no avail….For if his flesh is not present in the sacrament for the reason

that flesh is of no avail, neither is it in his mother’s womb, precisely for the same reason

that it is of no avail. The reasoning is the same in both instances.”73

Thus, Luther is saying, if the flesh of Christ was real within His very own self,

then the meaning of the words He spoke in John cannot mean what they mean

philosophically, but must be taken in a different manner when it came to the confession

that Christ real Body and Blood was present in the Sacrament. That if the flesh is no help

at all, then Christ’s sacrificing Himself upon the cross is no help at all for mankind. His

opponents cannot have it both ways-Christ’s flesh cannot be true in Himself and not the

Sacrament since on the one hand, in the incarnation, one cannot separate Christ’s divine

73 LW 37:82

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and human natures and, if that is true, then one cannot thus separate Him even after His

resurrection and ascension.

Therefore, as Luther continued in his 1528 work, Confession Concerning Christ’s

Supper, when one desires to speak theologically, then they must remember to read the

words theologically he says. That in the Supper, to read the words, “This is My body,”

must be read according to what they are saying and what they are meaning according to

ones theological confession. The Sacramentarians erred when they said they believe

Christ when He says in John 6:63 that the flesh is no help at all, but then refused to

believe Jesus’ further words during the Last Supper. That words cannot be believed to be

“true” in one point and than simply “metaphorically” in another unless you want to open

yourself up to the charge, for example, that the person who was born in Luke 1, John the

Baptist, must be understood to have a different body than the person who was born in

Luke 2.

Here Luther attacks the idea of an alloeosis being used by Zwingli. An alloeosis

is the idea that when something is said about the deity of Christ, which after all belongs

to the humanity, doesn’t really mean it applies to the deity but only to the humanity (the

same goes in the reverse). It is the use of a trope, a matter of simply speaking, where one

nature is in fact referring only to the other. So, Luther said, if in the Supper the “body”

Jesus was speaking of is only His divine nature which now resides at the right hand of the

Father, then what one has is a Christ whose human nature can be questioned as being

only a type or shadow of what is real. One ends up, as with Nestorius, with a separated

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Christ who must either be God or man but cannot be both since to say so would to make

each nature hold in its substance what it is not.74

So, Luther insists, “Thus we have two unions, the one natural and the other

personal, which teach us that identical predication is not contrary to Scripture, nor is it

contrary for two distinct beings to be called one being…Therefore it is entirely correct to

say, if one points to the bread, ‘This is Christ’s body,’ and whoever sees the bread sees

Christ’s body, as John says that he saw the Holy Spirit when he saw the dove.”75 Christ

must be fully God and fully man, at all times and in all places now, after His incarnation

because to say otherwise, the incarnation is not truly what it says it is and you end up

with a Christ who is either fully God or fully man, but not both.76

Luther, in his own words at the Marburg Colloquy, would “know of no God

except him who became man.”77 We see here Luther’s insistence of holding reason and

philosophy separate from theology, especially when you are seeking to speak about

matters of faith. He would not abide by Zwingli and his ilk, to divide Christ in any way,

before or after His incarnation or ascension.78 Instead Luther would abide only with a

74 LW 37:209-214 75 LW 37:298-300 76 LW 37:223. “You must place this existence of Christ, which constitutes him one person with God, far, far beyond things created, as far as God transcends them; and on the other hand, place it as deep in and as near to all created things as God is in them. For he is one indivisible person with God, and wherever God is, he must be also, otherwise our faith is false.” 77 LW 38:82 78 LW 38:29. So it was reported that Oecolampadius said, “In all things Christ has been made like us; as he is of one substance with the Father in his divinity, so he is of one substance with us in his humanity. In this there is agreement, that Christ is present; and as he is in heaven [according to his divinity and humanity], so he is in the Supper [according to his divinity].”

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theology that held the two natures in the unity and completeness, which had been taught

through the ages.79

Therefore, we find in Luther using the theology of the Lord’s Supper to speak

concerning the events of the Church in the past and what the councils had decided. He

would frequently connect ancient heresies and heretics to contemporaries of his, showing

the people that one must always be on the guard against false teachings, even when it

might not be directly connected with the ancient discussions. The old Nestorian heresy

Luther saw as the basis of Zwingli’s refusal to confess the bodily presence of Christ in

the Sacrament and he would accuse Casper Schwenckfeld of falling prey to that of what

Eutyches taught.

So, Luther pointed out that like Nestorius, when Zwingli taught that Christ could

not be bodily in the Sacrament because His human nature resided in heaven and that

which is human cannot be affected upon by the divine, he was in error because of the

failure to hold to the communicatio idiomatum because in the incarnation, Christ’s two

natures are so united, that one cannot separate them in any matter-and that continues now

into the Sacrament.80 Thus through the power of the divine power of Christ’s Godhead,

He is also bodily present as well.81

79 LW 38:292. “For this is how it was taught under the papacy, how we still accept and teach it, and how it was accepted in the true ancient Christian church of fifteen hundred years ago (for the pope did not institute or invent the sacrament, as the fanatics themselves also must admit, although they want to make it papistical): When you receive the bread from the altar, you are not tearing an arm from the body of the Lord or biting off his nose or a finger; rather, you are receiving the entire body of the Lord; the person who comes after you also receives the same entire body, as does the third and the thousandth after the thousandth one forever and ever. In the same way when you drink the wine from the chalice, you are not drinking his entire blood; so, too, does the done who follows you even the thousand times thousandth one, as the words of Christ clearly says: “Take, eat; this is my body” [Matt. 26:26].” 80 LW 41:100-106. “I too have been confronted by Nestorius who fought me very stubbornly, saying that the divinity of Christ could not suffer. For example Zwingli too wrote against me concerning the saying,

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With Schwenkfeld, Luther pointed that he taught like that of Eutyches, that in the

incarnation even Christ’s human nature was no longer a created substance, but everything

was glorified through the union with the divine. So even the divine nature died in the

crucifixion, instead of what was confessed that just the human nature truly died since

only human nature is finite.82

What we find, therefore, is Luther, in addressing the ideas and theologies which

were part of the conversation in his day, found a voice in which to criticize and show

them for this failures in the language the church had been using since this problems were

address in the past. That Luther saw it best to refute ideas which fell for the same ancient

errors, by addressing them according to how it affected the church at the local and

personal level.

Conclusion

As we have worked our way through the basics of the theological discussions that

took place, primarily, around the production of The Definition of the Faith at the Council

of Chalcedon, we have found that the doctrine of the two natures in Jesus Christ to be an

important and crucial theological declaration to be made, and to be made rightly. That the

history of the Christian Church is that because it has deemed this understanding to be

central to the confession it has made concerning Christ because, it gets the heart of just

who this man was that we confess to be Savior and God and how it was that in His birth,

‘The Word became flesh.’ He would simply not have it that ‘became’ should apply to ‘Word.’ He wanted it to read, ‘The flesh was made word,’ because God could not become anything.” 81 LW 38: 301. “The holy Christian church and we with them…that Christ’s body is not present locally [localiter] (like straw in a sack) in the sacrament, but definitively [definitive]. That is, he is certainly there, not like straw in a sack, but yet bodily and truly there.” 82 Chemnitz, 274, 396, 403. In fact, this has given rise to some, primarily following the Finnish school of Luther studies, to declare that man is deified through their participation with Christ in justification. However, it seems as though this thought would have more in line with Schwenckfeld than Luther.

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death and resurrection, mankind finds it to be redeemed and saved from the

condemnation of our sin.

And we have found in this history is that the Church’s theological assertions

developed by addressing particular problems it found with what some were teaching as

they were trying to comprehend it. Not that those who were later proven to be heretics

were seeking to destroy the Church and her faith; in fact, they were seeking to bring

understanding to that which was being discussed and needed to be decided. They were

not horrible people; just people who developed wrongful ideas and thoughts and were

disposed by the greater insight and reflecting of the larger Church.

Martin Luther shared in this work as he sought to discuss and proclaim the clear

Gospel and Biblical faith in his time. His was a theology that was right at home with the

entire Church and he sought in his pastoral and academic work to continue to proclaim

the saving message of Christ and Him crucified and raised for the salvation of all the

world.

We find Luther, though, attempting to take what was decided at councils and

often taught within the classroom and make it available to the people who simply were

seeking to find hope in the midst of the struggles of their life. This is where Luther

shines-his education and knowledge of the Bible and theology was second to none. But

his gift was also that of a pastor and so he sought to address that which was confronting

the Church in his day with showing just what it is the Church believes and why certain

ideas and peoples were needed to be rejected.

And one can even understand why Luther was at times rather caustic in his

language and polemics. For one can excuse, to a point, someone like Apollinarius,

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Nestorius or Eutyches which we covered in this paper-they at least were addressing

something that hadn’t completely debated and were attempting to give a definition to

what the Church believes. But, as Luther found, people like Zwingli or Schwenckfeld had

the benefit of the past and should have, at least, known better and confessed the orthodox

faith. And this is why Luther was so adamant at times-he knew the danger of heretical

ideas weren’t simply fodder for the classroom, but was at the heart of what the person

sitting in the pew needed to know, and if they were taught wrong, they were in danger of

believing wrongly.

It is for this why it is necessary to study these issues still in our day and why

taking Luther’s example is helpful for the work of the academy and Church. For as the

heart of the faith is that Jesus Christ is none other Immanuel, God with us, and that as He

took upon our flesh, He did so in order to submit Himself to the power of sin, death and

the devil on our behalf, in order to save and redeem us in His death and to give us the

hope and promise for forgiveness, life and salvation in His resurrection. As one ponders

these things, to know speak that in the Man who laid down His life is finally the very

God of all things, one begins to comprehend the depth of the grace, love and mercy this

God has for His creation and to grasp that He has gathered us through the power of the

Holy Spirit into the Church for no other reason than that we might so believe in such a

thing for our everlasting salvation.

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Appendix One

The  Tome  of  St.  Leo.  (Labbe  and  Cossart,  Concilia,  Tom.  IV.,  col.  343;  also  Migne,  Pat.  Lat.,  Tom.  LIV.  

[Leo.  M.  Opera,  Tom.  I.]  col.  756.)  

Leo  [the  bishop]  to  his  [most]  dear  brother  Flavian.  

Having  read  your  Affection’s  letter,  the  late  arrival  of  which  is  matter  of  surprise  to  us,  and  having  gone  through  the  record  of  the  proceedings  of  the  bishops,  we  have  now,  at  last,  gained  a  clear  view  of  the  scandal  which  has  risen  up  among  you,  against  the  integrity  of  the  faith;  and  what  at  first  seemed  obscure  has  now  been  elucidated  and  explained.    By  this  means  Eutyches,  who  seemed  to  be  deserving  of  honour  under  the  title  of  Presbyter,  is  now  shown  to  be  exceedingly  thoughtless  and  sadly  inexperienced,  so  that  to  him  also  we  may  apply  the  prophet’s  words,  “He  refused  to  understand  in  order  to  act  well:    he  meditated  unrighteousness  on  his  bed.”    What,  indeed,  is  more  unrighteous  than  to  entertain  ungodly  thoughts,  and  not  to  yield  to  persons  wiser  and  more  learned?    But  into  this  folly  do  they  fall  who,  when  hindered  by  some  obscurity  from  apprehending  the  truth,  have  recourse,  not  to  the  words  of  the  Prophets,  not  to  the  letters  of  the  Apostles,  nor  to  the  authority  of  the  Gospels,  but  to  themselves;  and  become  teachers  of  error,  just  because  they  have  not  been  disciples  of  the  truth.    For  what  learning  has  he  received  from  the  sacred  pages  of  the  New  and  the  Old  Testament,  who  does  not  so  much  as  understand  the  very  beginning  of  the  Creed?    And  that  which,  all  the  world  over,  is  uttered  by  the  voices  of  all  applicants  for  regeneration,  is  still  not  grasped  by  the  mind  of  this  aged  man.    If,  then,  he  knew  not  what  he  ought  to  think  about  the  Incarnation  of  the  Word  of  God,  and  was  not  willing,  for  the  sake  of  obtaining  the  light  of  intelligence,  to  make  laborious  search  through  the  whole  extent  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  he  should  at  least  have  received  with  heedful  attention  that  general  Confession  common  to  all,  whereby  the  whole  body  of  the  faithful  profess  that  they  “believe  in  God  the  Father  Almighty,  and  in  Jesus  Christ  his  only  Son  our  Lord,  who  was  born  of  the  Holy  Ghost  and  the  Virgin  Mary.”    By  which  three  clauses  the  engines  of  almost  all  heretics  are  shattered.    For  when  God  is  believed  to  be  both  “Almighty”  and  “Father,”  it  is  proved  that  the  Son  is  everlasting  together  with  himself,  differing  in  nothing  from  the  Father,  because  he  was  born  as  “God  from  God,”  Almighty  from  Almighty,  Coeternal  from  Eternal;  not  later  in  time,  not  inferior  in  power,  not  unlike  him  in  glory,  not  divided  from  him  in  essence,  but  the  same  Only-­‐begotten  and  Everlasting  Son  of  an  Everlasting  Parent  was  “born  of  the  Holy  Ghost  and  the  Virgin  Mary.”    This  birth  in  time  in  no  way  detracted  from,  in  no  way  added  to,  that  divine  and  everlasting  birth;  but  expended  itself  wholly  in  the  work  of  restoring  man,  who  had  been  deceived;  so  that  it  might  both  overcome  death,  and  by  its  power  “destroy  the  devil  who  had  the  power  of  death.”    For  we  could  not  have  overcome  the  author  of  sin  and  of  death,  unless  he  who  could  neither  be  contaminated  by  sin,  nor  detained  by  death,  had  taken  upon  himself  our  nature,  and  made  it  his  own.    For,  in  fact,  he  was  “conceived  of  the  Holy  Ghost”  within  the  womb  of  a  Virgin  Mother,  who  bore  him  as  she  had  conceived  him,  without  loss  of  virginity.  But  if  he  (Eutyches)  was  not  able  to  obtain  a  true  conception  from  this  pure  fountain  of  Christian  faith  because  by  his  own  blindness  he  had  darkened  for  himself  the  brightness  of  a  truth  so  clear,  he  should  have  submitted  himself  to  the  Evangelist’s  teaching;  and  after  reading  what  Matthew  says,  “The  book  of  the  generation  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  Son  of  David,  the  Son  of  Abraham,”  he  should  also  have  sought  instruction  from  the  Apostle’s  preaching;  and  after  reading  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans,  “Paul,  a  servant  of  Jesus  Christ,  called  an  Apostle,  separated  unto  the  gospel  of  God,  which  he  had  promised  before  by  the  prophets  in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  concerning  his  Son,  who  was  made  unto  him  of  the  seed  of  David  according  to  the  flesh,”  he  should  have  bestowed  some  devout  study  on  the  pages  of  the  Prophets;  and  finding  that  God’s  promise  said  to  Abraham,  “in  thy  seed  shall  all  nations  be  blessed,”  in  order  to  avoid  all  doubt  as  to  the  proper  meaning  of  this  “seed,”  he  should  have  attended  to  the  Apostle’s  words,  “To  Abraham  and  to  his  seed  were  the  promises  made.    He  saith  not,  ‘and  to  seeds,’  as  in  the  case  of  many,  but  as  in  the  case  of  one,  ‘and  to  thy  seed,’  which  is  Christ.”    He  should  also  have  apprehended  with  his  inward  ear  the  declaration  of  Isaiah,  “Behold,  a  Virgin  shall  conceive  and  bear  a  Son,  and  they  shall  call  his  

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name  Emmanuel,  which  is,  being  interpreted,  God  with  us;”  and  should  have  read  with  faith  the  words  of  the  same  prophet,  “Unto  us  a  Child  has  been  born,  unto  us  a  Son  has  been  given,  whose  power  is  on  his  shoulder;  and  they  shall  call  his  name  Angel  of  great  counsel,  Wonderful,  Counsellor,  Strong  God,  Prince  of  Peace,  Father  of  the  age  to  come.”    Now  when  he  came  to  the  baptism  of  John  his  forerunner,  lest  the  fact  that  the  Godhead  was  covered  with  a  veil  of  flesh  should  be  concealed,  the  voice  of  the  Father  spake  in  thunder  from  heaven,  “This  is  my  beloved  Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased.”    Possibly  his  reason  for  thinking  that  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  was  not  of  our  nature  was  this—that  the  Angel  who  was  sent  to  the  blessed  and  ever  Virgin  Mary  said,  “The  Holy  Ghost  shall  come  upon  thee,  and  the  power  of  the  Highest  shall  overshadow  thee,  and  therefore  also  that  holy  thing  which  shall  be  born  of  thee  shall  be  called  the  Son  of  God;”  as  if,  because  the  Virgin’s  conception  was  caused  by  a  divine  act,  therefore  the  flesh  of  him  whom  she  conceived  was  not  of  the  nature  of  her  who  conceived  him.    But  we  are  not  to  understand  that  “generation,”  peerlessly  wonderful,  and  wonderfully  peerless,  in  such  a  sense  as  that  the  newness  of  the  mode  of  production  did  away  with  the  proper  character  of  the  kind.    For  it  was  the  Holy  Ghost  who  gave  fecundity  to  the  Virgin,  but  it  was  from  a  body  that  a  real  body  was  derived;  and  “when  Wisdom  was  building  herself  a  house,”  the  “Word  was  made  flesh,  and  dwelt  among  us,”  that  is,  in  that  flesh  which  he  assumed  from  a  human  being,  and  which  he  animated  with  the  spirit  of  rational  life.    

Accordingly  while  the  distinctness  of  both  natures  and  substances  was  preserved,  and  both  met  in  one  Person,  lowliness  was  assumed  by  majesty,  weakness  by  power,  mortality  by  eternity;  and,  in  order  to  pay  the  debt  of  our  condition,  the  inviolable  nature  was  united  to  the  passible,  so  that  as  the  appropriate  remedy  for  our  ills,  one  and  the  same  “Mediator  between  God  and  man,  the  Man  Christ  Jesus,”  might  from  one  element  be  capable  of  dying  and  also  from  the  other  be  incapable.    Therefore  in  the  entire  and  perfect  nature  of  very  man  was  born  very  God,  whole  in  what  was  his,  whole  in  what  was  ours.    By  “ours”  we  mean  what  the  Creator  formed  in  us  at  the  beginning  and  what  he  assumed  in  order  to  restore;  for  of  that  which  the  deceiver  brought  in,  and  man,  thus  deceived,  admitted,  there  was  not  a  trace  in  the  Saviour;  and  the  fact  that  he  took  on  himself  a  share  in  our  infirmities  did  not  make  him  a  partaker  in  our  transgressions.    He  assumed  “the  form  of  a  servant”  without  the  defilement  of  sin,  enriching  what  was  human,  not  impairing  what  was  divine:    because  that  “emptying  of  himself,”  whereby  the  Invisible  made  himself  visible,  and  the  Creator  and  Lord  of  all  things  willed  to  be  one  among  mortals,  was  a  stooping  down  in  compassion,  not  a  failure  of  power.    Accordingly,  the  same  who,  remaining  in  the  form  of  God,  made  man,  was  made  man  in  the  form  of  a  servant.    For  each  of  the  natures  retains  its  proper  character  without  defect;  and  as  the  form  of  God  does  not  take  away  the  form  of  a  servant,  so  the  form  of  a  servant  does  not  impair  the  form  of  God.    For  since  the  devil  was  glorying  in  the  fact  that  man,  deceived  by  his  craft,  was  bereft  of  divine  gifts  and,  being  stripped  of  his  endowment  of  immortality,  had  come  under  the  grievous  sentence  of  death,  and  that  he  himself,  amid  his  miseries,  had  found  a  sort  of  consolation  in  having  a  transgressor  as  his  companion,  and  that  God,  according  to  the  requirements  of  the  principle  of  justice,  had  changed  his  own  resolution  in  regard  to  man,  whom  he  had  created  in  so  high  a  position  of  honour;  there  was  need  of  a  dispensation  of  secret  counsel,  in  order  that  the  unchangeable  God,  whose  will  could  not  be  deprived  of  its  own  benignity,  should  fulfil  by  a  more  secret  mystery  his  original  plan  of  loving  kindness  toward  us,  and  that  man,  who  had  been  led  into  fault  by  the  wicked  subtlety  of  the  devil,  should  not  perish  contrary  to  God’s  purpose.    Accordingly,  the  Son  of  God,  descending  from  his  seat  in  heaven,  and  not  departing  from  the  glory  of  the  Father,  enters  this  lower  world,  born  after  a  new  order,  by  a  new  mode  of  birth.    After  a  new  order;  because  he  who  in  his  own  sphere  is  invisible,  became  visible  in  ours;  He  who  could  not  be  enclosed  in  space,  willed  to  be  enclosed;  continuing  to  be  before  times,  he  began  to  exist  in  time;  the  Lord  of  the  universe  allowed  his  infinite  majesty  to  be  overshadowed,  and  took  upon  him  the  form  of  a  servant;  the  impassible  God  did  not  disdain  to  be  passible  Man  and  the  immortal  One  to  be  subjected  to  the  laws  of  death.    And  born  by  a  new  mode  of  birth;  because  inviolate  virginity,  while  ignorant  of  concupiscence,  supplied  the  matter  of  his  flesh.    What  was  assumed  from  the  Lord’s  mother  was  nature,  not  fault;  nor  does  the  wondrousness  of  the  nativity  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  as  born  of  a  Virgin’s  womb,  imply  that  his  nature  is  unlike  ours.    For  the  selfsame  who  is  very  God,  is  also  very  man;  and  there  is  no  illusion  in  this  union,  while  the  lowliness  of  man  and  the  loftiness  of  Godhead  meet  together.    For  as  “God”  is  not  changed  by  the  compassion  [exhibited],  so  “Man”  is  not  consumed  by  the  dignity  [bestowed].    For  

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each  “form”  does  the  acts  which  belong  to  it,  in  communion  with  the  other;  the  Word,  that  is,  performing  what  belongs  to  the  Word,  and  the  flesh  carrying  out  what  belongs  to  the  flesh;  the  one  of  these  shines  out  in  miracles,  the  other  succumbs  to  injuries.    And  as  the  Word  does  not  withdraw  from  equality  with  the  Father  in  glory,  so  the  flesh  does  not  abandon  the  nature  of  our  kind.    For,  as  we  must  often  be  saying,  he  is  one  and  the  same,  truly  Son  of  God,  and  truly  Son  of  Man.    God,  inasmuch  as  “in  the  beginning  was  the  Word,  and  the  Word  was  with  God,  and  the  Word  was  God.”    Man,  inasmuch  as  “the  Word  was  made  flesh,  and  dwelt  among  us.”    God,  inasmuch  as  “all  things  were  made  by  him,  and  without  him  nothing  was  made.”    Man,  inasmuch  as  he  was  “made  of  a  woman,  made  under  the  law.”    The  nativity  of  the  flesh  is  a  manifestation  of  human  nature;  the  Virgin’s  child-­‐bearing  is  an  indication  of  Divine  power.    The  infancy  of  the  Babe  is  exhibited  by  the  humiliation  of  swaddling  clothes:    the  greatness  of  the  Highest  is  declared  by  the  voices  of  angels.    He  whom  Herod  impiously  designs  to  slay  is  like  humanity  in  its  beginnings;  but  he  whom  the  Magi  rejoice  to  adore  on  their  knees  is  Lord  of  all.    Now  when  he  came  to  the  baptism  of  John  his  forerunner,  lest  the  fact  that  the  Godhead  was  covered  with  a  veil  of  flesh  should  be  concealed,  the  voice  of  the  Father  spake  in  thunder  from  heaven,  “This  is  my  beloved  Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased.”    Accordingly,  he  who,  as  man,  is  tempted  by  the  devil’s  subtlety,  is  the  same  to  whom,  as  God,  angels  pay  duteous  service.    To  hunger,  to  thirst,  to  be  weary,  and  to  sleep,  is  evidently  human.    But  to  satisfy  five  thousand  men  with  five  loaves,  and  give  to  the  Samaritan  woman  that  living  water,  to  draw  which  can  secure  him  that  drinks  of  it  from  ever  thirsting  again;  to  walk  on  the  surface  of  the  sea  with  feet  that  sink  not,  and  by  rebuking  the  storm  to  bring  down  the  “uplifted  waves,”  is  unquestionably  Divine.    As  then—to  pass  by  many  points  —it  does  not  belong  to  the  same  nature  to  weep  with  feelings  of  pity  over  a  dead  friend  and,  after  the  mass  of  stone  had  been  removed  from  the  grave  where  he  had  lain  four  days,  by  a  voice  of  command  to  raise  him  up  to  life  again;  or  to  hang  on  the  wood,  and  to  make  all  the  elements  tremble  after  daylight  had  been  turned  into  night;  or  to  be  transfixed  with  nails,  and  to  open  the  gates  of  paradise  to  the  faith  of  the  robber;  so  it  does  not  belong  to  the  same  nature  to  say,  “I  and  the  Father  are  one,”  and  to  say,  “the  Father  is  greater  than  I.”    For  although  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  there  is  one  Person  of  God  and  man,  yet  that  whereby  contumely  attaches  to  both  is  one  thing,  and  that  whereby  glory  attaches  to  both  is  another;  for  from  what  belongs  to  us  he  has  that  manhood  which  is  inferior  to  the  Father;  while  from  the  Father  he  has  equal  Godhead  with  the  Father.    Accordingly,  on  account  of  this  unity  of  Person  which  is  to  be  understood  as  existing  in  both  the  natures,  we  read,  on  the  one  hand,  that  “the  Son  of  Man  came  down  from  heaven,”  inasmuch  as  the  Son  of  God  took  flesh  from  that  Virgin  of  whom  he  was  born;  and  on  the  other  hand,  the  Son  of  God  is  said  to  have  been  crucified  and  buried,  inasmuch  as  he  underwent  this,  not  in  his  actual  Godhead;  wherein  the  Only-­‐begotten  is  coeternal  and  consubstantial  with  the  Father,  but  in  the  weakness  of  human  nature.    Wherefore  we  all,  in  the  very  Creed,  confess  that  “the  only-­‐begotten  Son  of  God  was  crucified  and  buried,”  according  to  that  saying  of  the  Apostle,  “for  if  they  had  known  it,  they  would  not  have  crucified  the  Lord  of  Majesty.”    

But  when  our  Lord  and  Saviour  himself  was  by  his  questions  instructing  the  faith  of  the  disciples,  he  said,  “Whom  do  men  say  that  I  the  Son  of  Man  am?”    And  when  they  had  mentioned  various  opinions  held  by  others,  he  said,  “But  whom  say  ye  that  I  am?”  that  is,  “I  who  am  Son  of  Man,  and  whom  you  see  in  the  form  of  a  servant,  and  in  reality  of  flesh,  whom  say  ye  that  I  am?”    Whereupon  the  blessed  Peter,  as  inspired  by  God,  and  about  to  benefit  all  nations  by  his  confession,  said,  “Thou  art  the  Christ,  the  Son  of  the  living  God.”    Not  undeservedly,  therefore,  was  he  pronounced  blessed  by  the  Lord,  and  derived  from  the  original  Rock  that  solidity  which  belonged  both  to  his  virtue  and  to  his  name,  who  through  revelation  from  the  Father  confessed  the  selfsame  to  be  both  the  Son  of  God  and  the  Christ;  because  one  of  these  truths,  accepted  without  the  other,  would  not  profit  unto  salvation,  and  it  was  equally  dangerous  to  believe  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  to  be  merely  God  and  not  man,  or  merely  man  and  not  God.    But  after  the  resurrection  of  the  Lord—which  was  in  truth  the  resurrection  of  a  real  body,  for  no  other  person  was  raised  again  than  he  who  had  been  crucified  and  had  died—what  else  was  accomplished  during  that  interval  of  forty  days  than  to  make  our  faith  entire  and  clear  of  all  darkness?    For  while  he  conversed  with  his  disciples,  and  dwelt  with  them,  and  ate  with  them,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  handled  with  careful  and  inquisitive  touch  by  those  who  were  under  the  influence  of  doubt,  for  this  end  he  came  in  to  the  disciples  when  the  doors  were  shut,  and  by  his  breath  gave  them  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  opened  the  secrets  of  Holy  Scripture  after  bestowing  on  them  

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the  light  of  intelligence,  and  again  in  his  selfsame  person  showed  to  them  the  wound  in  the  side,  the  prints  of  the  nails,  and  all  the  flesh  tokens  of  the  Passion,  saying,  “Behold  my  hands  and  my  feet,  that  it  is  I  myself;  handle  me  and  see,  for  a  spirit  hath  not  flesh  and  bones,  as  ye  see  me  have:”    that  the  properties  of  the  Divine  and  the  human  nature  might  be  acknowledged  to  remain  in  him  without  causing  a  division,  and  that  we  might  in  such  sort  know  that  the  Word  is  not  what  the  flesh  is,  as  to  confess  that  the  one  Son  of  God  is  both  Word  and  flesh.    On  which  mystery  of  the  faith  this  Eutyches  must  be  regarded  as  unhappily  having  no  hold,  who  does  not  recognise  our  nature  to  exist  in  the  Only-­‐begotten  Son  of  God,  either  by  way  of  the  lowliness  of  mortality,  or  of  the  glory  of  resurrection.    Nor  has  he  been  overawed  by  the  declaration  of  the  blessed  Apostle  and  Evangelist  John,  saying,  “Every  spirit  that  confesseth  that  Jesus  Christ  has  come  in  the  flesh  is  of  God;  and  every  spirit  which  dissolveth  Jesus  is  not  of  God,  and  this  is  Antichrist.”    Now  what  is  to  dissolve  Jesus,  but  to  separate  the  human  nature  from  him,  and  to  make  void  by  shameless  inventions  that  mystery  by  which  alone  we  have  been  saved?    Moreover,  being  in  the  dark  as  to  the  nature  of  Christ’s  body,  he  must  needs  be  involved  in  the  like  senseless  blindness  with  regard  to  his  Passion  also.    For  if  he  does  not  think  the  Lord’s  crucifixion  to  be  unreal,  and  does  not  doubt  that  he  really  accepted  suffering,  even  unto  death,  for  the  sake  of  the  world’s  salvation;  as  he  believes  in  his  death,  let  him  acknowledge  his  flesh  also,  and  not  doubt  that  he  whom  he  recognises  as  having  been  capable  of  suffering  is  also  Man  with  a  body  like  ours;  since  to  deny  his  true  flesh  is  also  to  deny  his  bodily  sufferings.    If  then  he  accepts  the  Christian  faith,  and  does  not  turn  away  his  ear  from  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel,  let  him  see  what  nature  it  was  that  was  transfixed  with  nails  and  hung  on  the  wood  of  the  cross;  and  let  him  understand  whence  it  was  that,  after  the  side  of  the  Crucified  had  been  pierced  by  the  soldier’s  spear,  blood  and  water  flowed  out,  that  the  Church  of  God  might  be  refreshed  both  with  a  Laver  and  with  a  Cup.    Let  him  listen  also  to  the  blessed  Apostle  Peter  when  he  declares,  that  “sanctification  by  the  Spirit”  takes  place  through  the  “sprinkling  of  the  blood  of  Christ,”  and  let  him  not  give  a  mere  cursory  reading  to  the  words  of  the  same  Apostle,  “Knowing  that  ye  were  not  redeemed  with  corruptible  things,  as  silver  and  gold,  from  your  vain  way  of  life  received  by  tradition  from  your  fathers,  but  with  the  precious  blood  of  Jesus  Christ  as  of  a  Lamb  without  blemish  and  without  spot.”    Let  him  also  not  resist  the  testimony  of  Blessed  John  the  Apostle,  “And  the  blood  of  Jesus  the  Son  of  God  cleanseth  us  from  all  sin.”    And  again,  “This  is  the  victory  which  overcometh  the  world,  even  our  faith;”  and,  “who  is  he  that  overcometh  the  world,  but  he  that  believeth  that  Jesus  is  the  Son  of  God?    This  is  he  that  came  by  water  and  blood,  even  Jesus  Christ;  not  in  water  only,  but  in  water  and  blood;  and  it  is  the  Spirit  that  beareth  witness,  because  the  Spirit  is  truth.    For  there  are  three  that  bear  witness—the  Spirit,  the  water,  and  the  blood;  and  the  three  are  one.”    That  is,  the  Spirit  of  sanctification,  and  the  blood  of  redemption,  and  the  water  of  baptism;  which  three  things  are  one,  and  remain  undivided,  and  not  one  of  them  is  disjoined  from  connection  with  the  others;  because  the  Catholic  Church  lives  and  advances  by  this  faith,  that  Christ  Jesus  we  should  believe  neither  manhood  to  exist  without  true  Godhead,  nor  Godhead  without  true  manhood.    But  when  Eutyches,  on  being  questioned  in  your  examination  of  him,  answered,  “I  confess  that  our  Lord  was  of  two  natures  before  the  union,  but  after  the  union  I  confess  one  nature;”  I  am  astonished  that  so  absurd  and  perverse  a  profession  as  this  of  his  was  not  rebuked  by  a  censure  on  the  part  of  any  of  his  judges,  and  that  an  utterance  extremely  foolish  and  extremely  blasphemous  was  passed  over,  just  as  if  nothing  had  been  heard  which  could  give  offence:    seeing  that  it  is  as  impious  to  say  that  the  Only-­‐begotten  Son  of  God  was  of  two  natures  before  the  Incarnation  as  it  is  shocking  to  affirm  that,  since  the  Word  became  flesh,  there  has  been  in  him  one  nature  only.    But  lest  Eutyches  should  think  that  what  he  said  was  correct,  or  was  tolerable,  because  it  was  not  confuted  by  any  assertion  of  yours,  we  exhort  your  earnest  solicitude,  dearly  beloved  brother,  to  see  that,  if  by  God’s  merciful  inspiration  the  case  is  brought  to  a  satisfactory  issue,  the  inconsiderate  and  inexperienced  man  be  cleansed  also  from  this  pestilent  notion  of  his;  seeing  that,  as  the  record  of  the  proceedings  has  clearly  shown,  he  had  fairly  begun  to  abandon  his  own  opinion  when  on  being  driven  into  a  corner  by  authoritative  words  of  yours,  he  professed  himself  ready  to  say  what  he  had  not  said  before,  and  to  give  his  adhesion  to  that  faith  from  which  he  had  previously  stood  aloof.    But  when  he  would  not  consent  to  anathematize  the  impious  dogma  you  understood,  brother,  that  he  continued  in  his  own  misbelief,  and  deserved  to  receive  sentence  of  condemnation.    For  which  if  he  grieves  sincerely  and  to  good  purpose,  and  understands,  even  though  too  late,  how  properly  the  Episcopal  authority  has  been  put  in  motion,  or  if,  in  order  to  make  full  satisfaction,  he  shall  condemn  viva  voce,  and  under  his  own  

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hand,  all  that  he  has  held  amiss,  no  compassion,  to  whatever  extent,  which  can  be  shown  him  when  he  has  been  set  right,  will  be  worthy  of  blame,  for  our  Lord,  the  true  and  good  Shepherd,  who  laid  down  his  life  for  his  sheep,  and  who  came  to  save  men’s  souls  and  not  to  destroy  them,  wills  us  to  imitate  his  own  loving  kindness;  so  that  justice  should  indeed  constrain  those  who  sin,  but  mercy  should  not  reject  those  who  are  converted.    For  then  indeed  is  the  true  faith  defended  with  the  best  results,  when  a  false  opinion  is  condemned  even  by  those  who  have  followed  it.    But  in  order  that  the  whole  matter  may  be  piously  and  faithfully  carried  out,  we  have  appointed  our  brethren,  Julius,  Bishop,  and  Reatus,  Presbyter  (of  the  title  of  St.  Clement)  and  also  my  son  Hilarus,  Deacon,  to  represent  us;  and  with  them  we  have  associated  Dulcitius,  our  Notary,  of  whose  fidelity  we  have  had  good  proof:    trusting  that  the  Divine  assistance  will  be  with  you,  so  that  he  who  has  gone  astray  may  be  saved  by  condemning  his  own  unsound  opinion.    May  God  keep  you  in  good  health,  dearly  beloved  brother.    Given  on  the  Ides  of  June,  in  the  Consulate  of  the  illustrious  men,  Asterius  and  Protogenes.    

Linked  from:  http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xi.vii.html  

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Appendix Two

The  Definition  of  Faith  of  the  Council  of  Chalcedon.  (Labbe  and  Cossart,  Concilia,  Tom.  IV.,  col.  562.)    

The  holy,  great,  and  ecumenical  synod,  assembled  by  the  grace  of  God  and  the  command  of  our  most  religious  and  Christian  Emperors,  Marcian  and  Valentinian,  Augusti,  at  Chalcedon,  the  metropolis  of  the  Bithynian  Province,  in  the  martyry  of  the  holy  and  victorious  martyr  Euphemia,  has  decreed  as  follows:    

Our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ,  when  strengthening  the  knowledge  of  the  Faith  in  his  disciples,  to  the  end  that  no  one  might  disagree  with  his  neighbour  concerning  the  doctrines  of  religion,  and  that  the  proclamation  of  the  truth  might  be  set  forth  equally  to  all  men,  said,  “My  peace  I  leave  with  you,  my  peace  I  give  unto  you.”    But,  since  the  evil  one  does  not  desist  from  sowing  tares  among  the  seeds  of  godliness,  but  ever  invents  some  new  device  against  the  truth;  therefore  the  Lord,  providing,  as  he  ever  does,  for  the  human  race,  has  raised  up  this  pious,  faithful,  and  zealous  Sovereign,  and  has  called  together  unto  him  from  all  parts  the  chief  rulers  of  the  priesthood;  so  that,  the  grace  of  Christ  our  common  Lord  inspiring  us,  we  may  cast  off  every  plague  of  falsehood  from  the  sheep  of  Christ,  and  feed  them  with  the  tender  leaves  of  truth.    And  this  have  we  done  with  one  unanimous  consent,  driving  away  erroneous  doctrines  and  renewing  the  unerring  faith  of  the  Fathers,  publishing  to  all  men  the  Creed  of  the  Three  Hundred  and  Eighteen,  and  to  their  number  adding,  as  their  peers,  the  Fathers  who  have  received  the  same  summary  of  religion.    Such  are  the  One  Hundred  and  Fifty  holy  Fathers  who  afterwards  assembled  in  the  great  Constantinople  and  ratified  the  same  faith.    Moreover,  observing  the  order  and  every  form  relating  to  the  faith,  which  was  observed  by  the  holy  synod  formerly  held  in  Ephesus,  of  which  Celestine  of  Rome  and  Cyril  of  Alexandria,  of  holy  memory,  were  the  leaders,  we  do  declare  that  the  exposition  of  the  right  and  blameless  faith  made  by  the  Three  Hundred  and  Eighteen  holy  and  blessed  Fathers,  assembled  at  Nice  in  the  reign  of  Constantine  of  pious  memory,  shall  be  pre-­‐eminent:    and  that  those  things  shall  be  of  force  also,  which  were  decreed  by  the  One  Hundred  and  Fifty  holy  Fathers  at  Constantinople,  for  the  uprooting  of  the  heresies  which  had  then  sprung  up,  and  for  the  confirmation  of  the  same  Catholic  and  Apostolic  Faith  of  ours.    

The  Creed  of  the  three  hundred  and  eighteen  Fathers  at  Nice.    

We  believe  in  one  God,  etc.  

Item,  the  Creed  of  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  holy  Fathers  who  were  assembled  at  Constantinople.    

We  believe  in  one  God,  etc.  

This  wise  and  salutary  formula  of  divine  grace  sufficed  for  the  perfect  knowledge  and  confirmation  of  religion;  for  it  teaches  the  perfect  [doctrine]  concerning  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost,  and  sets  forth  the  Incarnation  of  the  Lord  to  them  that  faithfully  receive  it.    But,  forasmuch  as  persons  undertaking  to  make  void  the  preaching  of  the  truth  have  through  their  individual  heresies  given  rise  to  empty  babblings;  some  of  them  daring  to  corrupt  the  mystery  of  the  Lord’s  incarnation  for  us  and  refusing  [to  use]  the  name  Mother  of  God  (Θεοτόκος)  in  reference  to  the  Virgin,  while  others,  bringing  in  a  confusion  and  mixture,  and  idly  conceiving  that  the  nature  of  the  flesh  and  of  the  Godhead  is  all  one,  maintaining  that  the  divine  Nature  of  the  Only  Begotten  is,  by  mixture,  capable  of  suffering;  therefore  this  present  holy,  great,  and  ecumenical  synod,  desiring  to  exclude  every  device  against  the  Truth,  and  teaching  that  which  is  unchanged  from  the  beginning,  has  at  the  very  outset  decreed  that  the  faith  of  the  Three  Hundred  and  Eighteen  Fathers  shall  be  preserved  inviolate.    And  on  account  of  them  that  contend  against  the  Holy  Ghost,  it  confirms  the  doctrine  afterwards  delivered  concerning  the  substance  of  the  Spirit  by  the  One  Hundred  and  Fifty  holy  Fathers  who  assembled  in  the  imperial  City;  which  doctrine  they  declared  unto  all  men,  not  as  though  they  were  introducing  anything  that  

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had  been  lacking  in  their  predecessors,  but  in  order  to  explain  through  written  documents  their  faith  concerning  the  Holy  Ghost  against  those  who  were  seeking  to  destroy  his  sovereignty.    And,  on  account  of  those  who  have  taken  in  hand  to  corrupt  the  mystery  of  the  dispensation  [i.e.  the  Incarnation]  and  who  shamelessly  pretend  that  he  who  was  born  of  the  holy  Virgin  Mary  was  a  mere  man,  it  receives  the  synodical  letters  of  the  Blessed  Cyril,  Pastor  of  the  Church  of  Alexandria,  addressed  to  Nestorius  and  the  Easterns,  judging  them  suitable,  for  the  refutation  of  the  frenzied  folly  of  Nestorius,  and  for  the  instruction  of  those  who  long  with  holy  ardour  for  a  knowledge  of  the  saving  symbol.    And,  for  the  confirmation  of  the  orthodox  doctrines,  it  has  rightly  added  to  these  the  letter  of  the  President  of  the  great  and  old  Rome,  the  most  blessed  and  holy  Archbishop  Leo,  which  was  addressed  to  Archbishop  Flavian  of  blessed  memory,  for  the  removal  of  the  false  doctrines  of  Eutyches,  judging  them  to  be  agreeable  to  the  confession  of  the  great  Peter,  and  as  it  were  a  common  pillar  against  misbelievers.    For  it  opposes  those  who  would  rend  the  mystery  of  the  dispensation  into  a  Duad  of  Sons;  it  repels  from  the  sacred  assembly  those  who  dare  to  say  that  the  Godhead  of  the  Only  Begotten  is  capable  of  suffering;  it  resists  those  who  imagine  a  mixtureSo  or  confusion  of  the  two  natures  of  Christ;  it  drives  away  those  who  fancy  his  form  of  a  servant  is  of  an  heavenly  or  some  substance  other  than  that  which  was  taken  of  us,  and  it  anathematizes  those  who  foolishly  talk  of  two  natures  of  our  Lord  before  the  union,  conceiving  that  after  the  union  there  was  only  one.    

Following  the  holy  Fathers  we  teach  with  one  voice  that  the  Son  [of  God]  and  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  to  be  confessed  as  one  and  the  same  [Person],  that  he  is  perfect  in  Godhead  and  perfect  in  manhood,  very  God  and  very  man,  of  a  reasonable  soul  and  [human]  body  consisting,  consubstantial  with  the  Father  as  touching  his  Godhead,  and  consubstantial  with  us  as  touching  his  manhood;  made  in  all  things  like  unto  us,  sin  only  excepted;  begotten  of  his  Father  before  the  worlds  according  to  his  Godhead;  but  in  these  last  days  for  us  men  and  for  our  salvation  born  [into  the  world]  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  the  Mother  of  God  according  to  his  manhood.    This  one  and  the  same  Jesus  Christ,  the  only-­‐begotten  Son  [of  God]  must  be  confessed  to  be  in  two  natures,  unconfusedly,  immutably,  indivisibly,  inseparably  [united],  and  that  without  the  distinction  of  natures  being  taken  away  by  such  union,  but  rather  the  peculiar  property  of  each  nature  being  preserved  and  being  united  in  one  Person  and  subsistence,  not  separated  or  divided  into  two  persons,  but  one  and  the  same  Son  and  only-­‐begotten,  God  the  Word,  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  as  the  Prophets  of  old  time  have  spoken  concerning  him,  and  as  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  hath  taught  us,  and  as  the  Creed  of  the  Fathers  hath  delivered  to  us.    

These  things,  therefore,  having  been  expressed  by  us  with  the  greatest  accuracy  and  attention,  the  holy  Ecumenical  Synod  defines  that  no  one  shall  be  suffered  to  bring  forward  a  different  faith  (ἑτέραν  πίστιν),  nor  to  write,  nor  to  put  together,  nor  to  excogitate,  nor  to  teach  it  to  others.    But  such  as  dare  either  to  put  together  another  faith,  or  to  bring  forward  or  to  teach  or  to  deliver  a  different  Creed  (ἕτερον  σύμβολον)  to  as  wish  to  be  converted  to  the  knowledge  of  the  truth,  from  the  Gentiles,  or  Jews  or  any  heresy  whatever,  if  they  be  Bishops  or  clerics  let  them  be  deposed,  the  Bishops  from  the  Episcopate,  and  the  clerics  from  the  clergy;  but  if  they  be  monks  or  laics:    let  them  be  anathematized.    

After  the  reading  of  the  definition,  all  the  most  religious  Bishops  cried  out:    This  is  the  faith  of  the  fathers:    let  the  metropolitans  forthwith  subscribe  it:    let  them  forthwith,  in  the  presence  of  the  judges,  subscribe  it:    let  that  which  has  been  well  defined  have  no  delay:    this  is  the  faith  of  the  Apostles:    by  this  we  all  stand:    thus  we  all  believe.    

Linked  from:  http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xi.xiii.html

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Appendix Three

Disputation  On  the  Divinity  and  Humanity  of  Christ,  February  27,  1540  conducted  by  Dr.  Martin  Luther,  1483-­‐1546.  Translated  from  the  Latin  text  WA  39/2,.92-­‐121v  by  Christopher  B.  Brown                                                                                The  Theses  Theological  Disputation                          1.    This  is  the  catholic  faith,  that  we  confess  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  true  God  and  man.                      2.    From  this  truth  of  the  double  substance  and  the  unity  of  the  person  follows  the  communication  of  attributes  [communicatio  idiomatum],  as  it  is  called.                    3.    So  that  those  things  which  pertain  to  man  are  rightly  said  of  God,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  those  things  which  pertain  to  God  are  said  of  man.                      4.    It  is  true  to  say:    This  man  created  the  world,  and  this  God  suffered,  died,  was  buried,  etc.                      5.    But  these  are  not  correct  in  the  abstract  (as  it  is  said)  of  human  nature  [in  abstractis  humanae  naturae].                      6.    For  it  cannot  be  said,    Christ  is  thirsty,  a  servant,  dead;  therefore  he  is  thirst,  servitude,  death.                      7.    Wherefore  this  [statement]  too  is  condemned:    Christ  is  humanity,  even  though  it  is  said:    Christ  is  divinity.                      8.    Even  though  man  and  humanity  are  otherwise  synonyms,  as  are  God  and  divinity.                      9.    In  the  divine  predicates  or  attributes  there  is  not  a  difference  of  this  kind  between  the  concrete  and  the  abstract.                      10.    Even  though  both  the  scriptures  and  many  fathers  do  not  distinguish  between  the  concrete  and  the  abstract  in  many  predicates  of  human  nature.                      11.    The  Symbol  [the  _Te  Deum_  ]  proclaims,  "When  thou  tookest  man  upon  thee  to  deliver  him"  [Tu  ad  liberandum  suscepturus  hominem],  and  Augustine  often  does  the  same.                      12.    Although  the  normal  way  of  speaking  (as  it  seems)  would  be:    "When  thou  tookest  humanity,  or  human  nature  upon  thee  to  deliver  it."                    13.    Thus  some  are  not  afraid  to  say:    Christ  is  a  creature,  since  a    errantly  it  is  said  that  Christ  was  created.                      14.    And  John  1  says:    "The  Word  was  made  flesh,"  when  in  our  judgment  it  would  have  been  better  said,  "The  Word  was  incarnate,"  or  "made  fleshly."                      15.    It  is  rightly  taught,  that  in  this  matter  the  manner  of  speaking  preserved  in  the  scriptures  and  in  the  orthodox  fathers  should  prevail.                      16.    Or  rather,  many  things  are  allowed  even  to  the  fathers  who  are  agreed  to  be  orthodox,  which  we  should  not  imitate.                      17.    Wherefore  in  this  matter  we  should  beware  of  etymology,  analogy,  [logical]  consequence,  and  examples.                      18.    Just  as  in  grammar  certain  heteroclite  nouns  and  irregular  verbs  are  not  subject  to  etymology,  analogy,  or  example.                      19.    And  generally,  in  every  sort  of  subject  and  art,  practice  often  dictates  against  the  rule.                      20.    Nonetheless  it  is  certain  that  with  regard  to  Christ  [in  Christo]  all  words  receive  a  new  signification,  though  the  thing  signified  is  the  same  [in  eadem  re  significata].                      21.    For  "creature"  in  the  old  usage  of  language  [veteris  linguae  usu]  and  in  other  subjects  signifies  a  thing  separated  from  divinity  by  infinite  degrees  [infinitis  modis].                      22.    In  the  new  use  of  language  it  signifies  a  thing  inseparably  joined  with  divinity  in  the  same  person  in  an  ineffable  way  [ineffabilibus  modis].                      23.    Thus  it  must  be  that  the  words  man,  humanity,  suffered,  etc.,  and  everything  that  is  said  of  Christ,  are  new  words.                      24.    Not  that  it  signifies  a  new  or  different  thing,  but  that  it  signifies  in  a  new  and  different  way  [nove  et  aliter],  unless  you  want  to  call  this  too  a  new  thing.                      25.    Schwenkfeld  and  his  frog-­‐and-­‐mouse  warriors  [batarchomyomachis]    foolishly  scoff  [when  we  say]  that  Christ  according  to  his  humanity  is  called  a  creature.                      26.    A  man  without  learning  [or]  training,  and  moreover  without  common  sense,  does  not  know  how  to  distinguish  between  words  with  more  than  one  meaning  [vocabula  aequivoca].                      27.    For  those  who  say  that  Christ  is  a  creature  according  to  the  old  use  of  language,  that  is,  by  himself  [separatam],  were  never  Christians.                      

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28.    But  rather  everyone  vehemently  denies  that  Christ  is  a  creature  in  this  way,  which  the  Arians  taught.                      29.    It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  Schwenkfeld  is  barking  into  an  empty  darkness  [in  vacuum  chaos]  against  his  own  dreams  of  the  creature  in  Christ.                      30.    And  forgetting  himself,  the  man  concedes  that  God  was  made  flesh,  though  he  has  not  yet  dared  to  deny  that  flesh  is  a  creature.                    31.    But  Eutyches  dwells  hidden  in  such  heretics,  ready  someday  to  deny  that  the  Word  was  made  flesh.                      32.    They  make  a  show  of  conceding  that  the  Word  was  made  flesh,  ready  someday  to  deny  it,  when  the  theater  is  darkened,  after  it  is  denied  that  there  is  a  creature  in  Christ.                      33.    In  these  ineffable  matters,  therefore,  this  [rule]  must  be  kept,  that  we  interpret  the  teachings  of  the  fathers  (as  is  necessary)  in  a  suitable  way  [commode].                      34.    It  is  wicked,  when  you  know  that  the  sense  of  someone's  teaching  is  Christian  [pium]  and  sound,  to  make  up  an  error  out  of  words  ineptly  spoken.                      35.    For  there  were  never  any  fathers  or  doctors  who  never  spoke  in  an  improper  way,  if  you  want  to  scoff  at  their  teachings.                      36.    [Coelius]  Sedulius,  the  very  Christian  poet,  writes:    "The  blessed  author  of  the  world  /  Put  on  a  lowly  servant's  form"  [Beatus  auctor  seculi  servile  corpus  induit],  and  so  through  the  entire  church.                    37.    Although  nothing  more  heretical  could  be  said  than  that  human  nature  is  the  clothing  of  divinity.                      38.    For  clothing  and  a  body  do  not  constitute  one  person,  as  God  and  man  constitute  one  person.                      39.    And  yet  Sedulius'  thought  was  very  Christian  [piissime],  as  his  other  hymns  abundantly  prove.                      40.    For  the  same  reason  that  common  saying  would  be  heretical:    The  whole  Trinity  worked  the  incarnation  of  the  Son,  as  two  girls  dress  a  third,  while  she  at  the  same  time  dresses  herself.                      41.    Thus  certain  scholastics,  who  think  that  the  union  [habitudinem]  of  divinity  and  humanity  is  like  the  union  [unioni]  of  form  with  matter,  could  not  be  defended.                      42.    Others  on  the  other  hand  [who  think  that]  the  union  [habitudinem]  is  similar  to  [the  union  of]  matter  to  form,  speak  much  more  ineptly,  if  they  are  strictly  judged.                      43.    Nor  could  that  [image]  be  maintained,  in  which  the  divinity  is  compared  to  fire  and  the  humanity  to  iron,  even  though  it  is  a  very  beautiful  image.                      44.    Nor  could  that  [image]  be  tolerated  which  Athanasius  puts  forward:    "As  the  reasonable  soul  and  flesh  is  one  man,  so  God  and  man  is  one  Christ."                      45.    For  all  deny  that  Christ  is  "composed"  [of  two  natures]  though  they  affirm  that  he  is  "constituted."                      46.    But  none  have  spoken  more  awkwardly  [insulsius]  than  the  Nominalists  [Moderni],  as  they  are  called,  who  of  all  men  wish  to  seem  to  speak  most  subtly  and  properly.                      47.    These  say  that  the  human  nature  was  sustained  or  "supposited"  by  the  divine  nature,  or  by  a  divine  supposite.                      48.    This  is  said  monstrously  and  nearly  forces  God  as  it  were  to  carry  or  bear  the  humanity.                      49.    But  all  of  them  think  [sapiunt]  in  a  correct  and  catholic  way,  so  that  they  are  to  be  pardoned  their  inept  way  of  speaking.                      50.    For  they  wished  to  utter  something  ineffable,  and  then  every  image  limps  and  never  (as  they  say)  runs  on  all  four  feet.                      51.    If  [anyone]  is  not  pleased  by  this  or  does  not  understand  it,  that  Christ  according  as  he  is  a  man  is  a  creature  [Christus  secundum  quod  homo  est    creatura],  the  grammarian  consoles  him.                      52.    Let  him  who  has  learned  to  discuss  the  same  matter  in  various  ways  be  commanded  to  speak  as  simply  as  possible.                      53.    As  the  Ethiopian  is  white  according  to  [secundum]  his  teeth,  the  grammarian  could  speak  otherwise  thus:    The  Ethiopian  is  white  with  respect  to  his  teeth  [albus  dentibus],  or  "white  of  tooth"  [alborum  dentium].                      54.    But  if  this  is  unpleasing,  let  him  say:    The  Ethiopian  has  white  teeth,  or  the  teeth  in  the  Ethiopian  are  white,  or,  most  simply,  the  Ethiopian's  teeth  are  white.                      55.    Since  in  all  these  forms  of  speech  the  author  wishes  to  signify  the  same  thing,  it  is  useless  to  seek  an  argument  over  words.                    56.    Thus  since  these  forms  of  speech-­‐-­‐Christ  according  as  he  is  a  man  [secundum  quod  homo],  or  according  to  his  humanity  [secundum  humanitatem],  or  with  respect  to  his  humanity  [humanitate],  or  by  his  humanity  [per  humanitatem],  or  in  his  humanity  [in  humanitate]-­‐-­‐mean  nothing  else  than  that  he  has  a  creature  or  has  assumed  a  human  creature,  or,  

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what  is  simplest,  the  humanity  of  Christ  is  a  creature,  the  false  logicians  [pravilogicales]  are  to  be  condemned,  who  give  different  meanings  to  different  grammatical  forms  of  expression  of  the  same  matter.                      57.    Therefore  heresy  lies  in  meaning  [sensu],  and  not  in  words,  as  St.  Jerome  rightly  said  when  he  was  provoked  by  his  calumniators.                    58.    Otherwise  Moses  would  be  the  greatest  of  heretics,  for  he  recounts  the  Decalogue  itself  in  different  forms  in  Exodus  20  and  Deuteronomy  5.                    59.    On  the  other  hand,  anyone  with  a  wicked  meaning,  even  if  he  shall  speak  aptly  and  brandish  the  Scripture  itself,  is  not  to  be  tolerated.                    60.    For  Christ  did  not  permit  the  demons  to  speak  when  they  testified  that  he  was  the  Son  of  God,  as  if  they  were  transfiguring  themselves  into  angels  of  light.                      61.    Such  is  the  simplicity  and  the  goodness  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  that  his  agents  [homines  sui],  when  they  speak  falsely  according  to  grammar,  speak  the  truth  according  to  the  sense.                      62.    Such  is  the  craftiness  and  the  wickedness  of  Satan,  that  his  agents  [homines  sui],  while  they  speak  truly  according  to  grammar,  that  is,  as  to  the  words,  speak  lies  according  to  theology,  that  is,  according  to  the  sense.                      63.    Here  it  may  be  said:    If  you  are  lying,  even  in  what  you  say  truly,  you  lie;  on  the  other  hand,  if  you  are  speaking  the  truth,  even  in  what  you  say  falsely,  you  speak  the  truth.                      64.    This  is  what  it  means  to  be  a  heretic:    one  who  understands  the  Scriptures  otherwise  than  the  Holy  Spirit  demands.    

The  Disputation    of  the  Reverend  Father  Herr  Doctor  Martin  Luther  concerning  the  divinity  and  humanity  of  Christ.    In  the  year  1540,  the  28th  day  of  February.                                                                            Preface    The  reason  for  this  disputation  is  this,  that  I  desired  you  should  be  supplied  and  fortified  against  the  future  snares  of  the  devil,  for  a  certain  man  has  put  forth  a  mockery  against  the  Church.    I  am  not  so  much  troubled  that  an  unlearned,  unskilled,  and  altogether  ignorant  man  seeks  praise  and  a  name  for  himself,  as  that  the  men  of  Lower  Germany  are  troubled  by  his  inept,  foolish,  ignorant,  unlearned,  and  ridiculous  mocking.    May  you  preserve  this  article  in  its  simplicity,  that  in  Christ  there  is  a  divine  and  a  human  nature,  and  these  two  natures  in  one  person,  so  that  they  are  joined  together  like  no  other  thing,  and  yet  so  that  the  humanity  is  not  divinity,  nor  the  divinity  humanity,  because  that  distinction  in  no  way  hinders  but  rather  confirms  the  union!    That  article  of  faith  shall  remain,  that  Christ  is  true  God  and  true  man,  and  thus  you  shall  be  safe  from  all  heretics,  and  even  from  Schwenkfeld,  who  says  that  Christ  is  [not]  a  creature,  and  that  others  teach  falsely,  though  he  does  not  name  those  who  teach  wrongly.    This  is  the  malice  of  the    devil:    he  implicates  us  as  well  as  the  papists,  but  he  names  no  one.    If  he  were  to  say  such  things  to  me,  I  would  answer:    You  are  lying,  [when  you  imply  that]  we  say  that  Christ  is  not  the  Lord  God.    For  our  writings  cry  out  in  answer  [to  your  charge].    That  wicked  man  perceives  that  he  cannot  survive  if  he  comes  into  the  light,  therefore  he  works  secretly  among  women  under  secret  names  [tectis  nominibus].    But  I  am  not  troubled  that  he  thus  seeks  to  make  a  name  for  himself  and  works  secretly,  but  more  by  the  fact  that  better  theologians  are  not  moved  by  these  frivolous  calumnies  to  say  to  him:    "You,  wicked  man,  are  a  liar!    We  do  not  say  that  Christ  is  merely  a  creature,  but  that  he  is  God  and  man  in  one  person.    The  natures  are  joined  personally  in  the  unity  of  the  person.    There  are  not  two  sons,  not  two  judges,  not  two  persons,  not  two  Jesuses,  but  because  of  the  undivided  union  [unitam  coniunctionem]  and  the  unity  of  the  two  natures  there  is  a  communication  of  attributes,  so  that,  what  is  attributed  to  one  nature  is  attributed  to  the  other  as  well,  because  they  are  one  person."    If  these  [articles]  are  held  fast,  Arius  falls  along  with  all  heretics,  but  Schwenkfeld  works  secretly  like  the  tooth  of  the  serpent,  who  bites  secretly  so  that  he  cannot  be  accused.    Therefore  we  are  now  holding  this  disputation  so  that  you  may  learn  the  substance  and  manner  of  speaking  [res  et  phrases]  of  Scripture  and  the  Fathers.    It  is  an  incomprehensible  thing,  such  as  not  even  the  angels  can  grasp  and  comprehend,  that  two  natures  should  be  united  in  one  person.    Therefore,  so  that  we  may  grasp  this  in  some  small  measure,  God  has  given  us  patterns  of  speech  [formulas  loquendi]:  that  Christ  is  God  and  man  in  one  person,  and  there  are  not  two  persons,  but  two  natures  are  united  in  one  person,  so  that  what  is  done  by  the  human  nature  is  said  also  to  be  done  by  the  divine  nature,  and  vice  versa.    Thus  the  Son  of  God  died  and  was  buried  in  the  dust  like  everyone  else,  and  the  son  of  Mary  ascended  into  heaven,  is  seated  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Father,  etc.    We  are  content  with  these  models  [formulis].                    Finally,  we  must  observe  

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the  manner  of  speaking  [phrases]  of  the  holy  Fathers.    But  if  they  have  sometimes  spoken  ineptly  [incommode],  it  is  to  be  rightly  interpreted,  not  abused,  as  the  papists  do,  who,  having  twisted  the  words  of  the  Fathers,  abuse  and  allege  them  in  defense  of  their  idolatries,  purgatory,  and  good  works,  whereas  [the  Fathers]  thought  correctly  concerning  these  things,  as  many  of  their  sayings  testify  with  clearer  and  more  apt  expression.    St.  Augustine  indeed  teaches  much  concerning  good  works  in  many  places  and  praises  both  good  works  and  those  who  perform  them.    But  in  his  Commentary  on  the  Psalms,  he  says,    "Have  mercy  on  me;  that  is,  'I  shall  be  troubled,  but  not  troubled  greatly,  for  I  have  trusted  in  the  Lord.'"    Here  he  pleads  none  of  those  good  works  before  God.    And  again  in  another  place  he  says,  "Woe  to  man,  however  praiseworthy  he  may  be,  etc."    Such  is  the  sinful  and  sacrilegious  man  who  twists  the  correct  sayings  of  the  Fathers.    But  we  learn  to  agree  with  the  sayings  of  the  Fathers;  or  if  we  cannot  agree  with  them,  we  forgive  them,  for  no  man  can  be  so  wise  that  he  does  not  sometimes  stumble  and  fall,  especially  in  speaking,  where  it  is  easy  to  slip.    Schwenkfeld  does  not  see  this,  and  so  when  he  hears  the  Fathers  say  that  Christ  according  to  his  humanity  is  a  creature,  at  once  he  seizes  on  the  saying  and  twists  it  and  abuses  it  for  his  own  purposes.    Even  if  the  Fathers  say  that  Christ  according  to  his  humanity  is  a  creature,  this  could  in  any  event  be  tolerated;  but  Schwenkfeld  wickedly  twists  it:    "Therefore  Christ  is  simply  a  creature."    Why,  wicked  man,  do  you  not  add  that  Christ  according  to  his  divinity  is  the  Creator?    Therefore  he  was  created!    But  he  does  not  add  this,  because  he  says,  "I  can  let  my  conscience  be  deluded  in  this  way.    Therefore  I  have  omitted  it"-­‐-­‐that  is,  I  have  done  wickedly!    He  employs  a  fallacy  of  composition  and  division.    This  is  the  hidden  tooth  of  the  serpent    and  the  true  sacrifice  of  the  devil  among  the  papists  as  well.    For  they  too  work  secretly,  twist  the  words  of  the  Fathers,  and  omit  those  things  which  seem  to  weaken  their  own  cause,  as  Schwenkfeld  also  does.    Before  the  learned  he  deals  deceitfully  and  seeks  glory,  but  among  his  own  he  says:    "Oh,  what  wickedness  of  the  papists,  what  blasphemies  of  the  Lutherans!    They  say  that  Christ  is  a  creature,  even  though  he  was  not  created."    This  is  [sheer]  wickedness  rather  than  force  or  power  [of  argument].    He  should  have  added,  that  we  say  that  Christ  is  a  creature  according  to  his  humanity,  and  the  creator  according  to  his  divinity.                    Schwenkfeld  is  to  be  refuted  thus:    Humanity  is  a  creature.    Therefore  Christ  is  a  man  and  a  creature.    And  then  he  says  that  the  redeemer  of  the  human  race  cannot  be  a  creature,  sit  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Father,  etc.,  be  the  seed  of  Abraham;  but  the  consequence  is  to  be  denied.                                                                            Disputation  of  Dr.  Martin  Luther  against  Schwenkfeld        I.    Argument:    A  human  person  is  one  thing,  a  divine  person  another.    But  in  Christ  there  are  both  divinity  and  humanity.    Therefore  there  are  two  persons  in  Christ.    Response:    This  is  the  fallacy  of  composition  and  division.    In  the  major  premise  you  divide  the  human  nature  and  the  divine;  in  the  minor  premise  you  join  them.    This  is  a  philosophical  solution;  but  we  are  speaking  theologically.    I  deny  the  consequence,  for  this  reason,  that  in  Christ  the  humanity  and  the  divinity  constitute  one  person.    But  these  two  natures  are  distinct  in  theology,  with  respect,  that  is,  to  the  natures,  but  not  with  respect  to  [secundum]  the  person.    For  then  they  are  undivided  [indistinctae],  but  two  distinct  natures,  yet  belonging  to  an  undivided  person  [indistinctae  personae].    There  are  not  two  distinct  persons,  but  what  is  distinct  is  undivided  [sed  sunt  distinctae  indistinctae],  that  is,  there  are  distinct  natures,  but  an  undivided  person.      II.    Argument:    Christ  was  not  a  man  before  the  creation  of  the  world.    Therefore  it  is  not  rightly  said  that  the  man  Christ  created  the  world.    Or  thus:    When  the  world  was  created,  Christ  did  not  create  it  as  a  man  [tamquam  homo].    Therefore  it  is  not  rightly  said  that  a  man  created  the  world.    Response:    There  is  the  communication  of  attributes;  and  moreover  [this  is]  a  philosophical  argument.    This  stands:    The  natures  are  distinct,  but  after  that  communication,  there  is  a  union,  that  is,  there  is  one  person,  not  two  persons.    But  that  person  is  God  and  man,  one  and  the  same  person,  who  was  before  the  creation  of  the  world;  even  though  he  was  not  man  born  of  the  Virgin  Mary  before  the  world,  nonetheless  he  was  the  Son  of  God,  who  is  now  man.    Thus,  for  example,  when  I  see  a  king  in  purple  and  crowned  on  his  throne,  I  say,  "This  king  was  born  of  a  woman,  naked  and  without  a  crown."    How  can  this  be,  and  yet  he  sits  on  a  great  throne  crowned  and  clothed  in  purple?    But  these  things  he  put  on  after  he  was  made  king,  and  yet  nonetheless  he  is  one  and  the  same  person;  and  so  too  here  in  Christ  God  and  man  are  joined  in  one  person  and  must  not  be  distinguished.    But  it  is  true  that  Christ  created  the  world  before  he  was  made  man,  and  yet  such  a  strict  unity  exists  that  it  is  impossible  to  

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say  different  things  [of  the  divinity  and  the  humanity].    Therefore  whatever  I  say  of  Christ  as  man,  I  also  say  rightly  of  God,  that  he  suffered,  was  crucified.    Objection:    But  God  cannot  be  crucified  or  suffer.    Response:    This  is  true,  when  he  was  not  yet  man.    From  eternity  he  has  not  suffered;  but  when  he  was  made  man,  he  was  passible.    From  eternity  he  was  not  man;  but  now  being  conceived  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  that  is,  born  of  the  Virgin,  God  and  man  are  made  one  person,  and  the  same  things  are  truly  said  of  God  and  man  [sunt  eadem  praedicata  Dei  et  hominis].    Here  the  personal  union  is  accomplished.    Here  the  humanity  and  divinity  are  joined  [Da  gehet's    ineinander  humanitas  et  divinitas].    The  union  holds  everything  together  [Die  unitas,  die  helt's].    I  confess  that  there  are  two  natures,  but  they  cannot  be  separated.    This  is  accomplished  by  the  union  [unitas],  which  is  a  greater  and  stronger  union  [coniunctio]  than  that  of  soul  and  body,  because  soul  and  body  are  separated,  but  never  the  immortal  and  divine  nature  and  the  mortal  human  nature  [in  Christ],  but  they  are  united  in  one  person.    That  is  to  say,  Christ,  the  impassible  Son  of  God,  God  and  man,  was  crucified  under  Pontius  Pilate.    Objection:    Again,  what  is  immortal  cannot  become  mortal.  God  is  immortal.    Therefore  he  cannot  become  mortal.    Response:    In  philosophy,  this  is  true.      III.    Argument:    God  knows  all  things.    Christ  does  not  know  all  things.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  God.                    I  prove  the  minor  premise  from  Mark,  where  Christ  says  that  he  does  not  know  the  last  day.    Response:    The  solution  is  that  Christ  there  speaks  after  a  human  manner,  as  he  also  says:    "All  things  have  been  given  to  me  by  the  Father."    Often  he  speaks  of  himself  as  if  simply  of  God,  sometimes  simply  as  of  man.    The  Father  does  not  will  that  the  human  nature  should  have  to  bear  divine  epithets  [ut  humana  natura  debeat  gerere  dicta  divina],  despite  the  union,  and  yet  sometimes  [Christ]  speaks  of  himself  as  of  God,  when  he  says,  "The  Son  of  Man  will  be  crucified."    To  be  crucified  is  a  property  of  the  human  nature,  but  because  there  are  two  natures  united  in  one  person,  it  is  attributed  to  both  natures.    Again,  "Whoever  believes  in  the  Son  has  eternal  life."    There  he  speaks  of  the  divine  nature.    Or  again,  "They  crucified  the  Lord  of  glory,"  where  he  speaks  of  the  property  of  the  humanity.      IV.    Argument:    A  word  is  not  a  person.    Christ  is  the  Word.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  a  person.                    I  prove  the  major  premise,  that  a  word  and  a  person  are  different.    Response:    This  is  a  new  expression,  which  was  formerly  unheard  of  in  the  world.    Christ  is  not  a  mathematical  or  physical  word,  but  a  divine  and  uncreated  word,  which  signifies  a  substance  and  a  person,  because  the  divine  Word  is  the  divinity.    Christ  is  the  divine  Word.    Therefore  he  is  the  divinity,  that  is,  a  substantial  person  [ipsa  substantia  et  persona].    Philosophically,  "word"  means  a  sound  or  an  utterance,  but  speaking  theologically,  "Word"  signifies  the  Son  of  God.    This,  Aristotle  would  not  admit,  that  "Word"  signifies  true  God  [plenum  Deum].      V.    Argument:    Christ  beseeches  the  Father  to  hear  him.    Therefore  he  is  not  God.                    I  prove  the  consequence,  for  he  who  seeks  to  be  heard,  seeks  the  honor  of  one  who  is  superior.    Response:    This  is  done  because  of  the  property  of  the  human  nature.    Question:    It  is  asked,  whether  this  proposition  is  true:    The  Son  of  God,  the  creator  of  heaven  and  earth,  the  eternal  Word,  cries  out  from  the  Cross  and  is  a  man?    Response:    This  is  true,  because  what  the  man  cries,  God  also  cries  out,  and  to  crucify  the  Lord  of  glory  is  impossible  according  to  the  divinity,  but  it  is  possible  according  to  the  humanity;  but  because  of  the  unity  of  the  person,  this  being  crucified  is  attributed  to  the  divinity  as  well.    V  [b].    Argument:    If  Christ  were  true  God,  of  the  same  essence  with  the  Father,  the  Scripture  would  not  teach  that  he  received  all  things  from  the  Father.    But  Scripture  so  says.    Therefore  he  is  not  true  God.    I  respond  to  the  minor  premise:    This  [pertains  to]  his  ministry  and  humanity.    For  in  divinity  he  is  equal  in  power  with  the  Father.      VI.    Argument:    Everything  that  is  born  begins  to  be,  or,  everything  that  is  born  has  a  beginning.    Christ  was  born.    Therefore  he  began  to  be.    He  is  a  creature,  and  is  not  from  eternity.    Response:    I  concede  this,  with  a  distinction.    In  philosophy  this  is  true,  but  not  in  theology.    The  Son  is  born  eternal  from  eternity;  this  is  something  incomprehensible.    [But]  this  belongs  to  theology.    For  the  Holy  Spirit  has  prescribed  models  for  us;  let  us  walk  in  that  cloud.      VII.    Argument:    When  we  must  speak  carefully,  there  is  most  need  of  grammar.    In  theology,  we  must  speak  carefully.    Therefore  the  Holy  Spirit  has  his  own  grammar.    Response:    The  Holy  Spirit  has  his  own  grammar.    Grammar  is  useful  everywhere,  but  when  the  subject  is  greater  than  can  be  comprehended  by  the  rules  of  grammar  and  philosophy,  it  must  be  left  behind.    In  grammar,  analogy  works  very  well:    Christ  is  created.    Therefore  Christ  is  a  creature.    But  in  theology,  nothing  is  more  useless.    Wherefore  our  eloquence  must  be  restrained,  and  we  must  remain  content  with  the  patterns  prescribed  by  the  Holy  Spirit.    We  do  not  depart  [from  grammar]  without  necessity,  for  the  subject  is  

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ineffable  and  incomprehensible.    A  creature,  in  the  old  use  of  language,  is  that  which  the  creator  has  created  and  distinguished  from  himself,  but  this  meaning  has  no  place  in  Christ  the  creature.    There  the  creator  and  the  creature  are  one  and  the  same.    Because  there  is  an  ambiguity  in  the  term  and  men  hearing  it  immediately  think  of  a  creature  separate  from  the  creator,  they  therefore  fear  to  use  it,  but  it  may  be  sparingly  used  as  a  new  term,  as  once  Augustine  spoke,  moved  by  the  greatest  joy:    "Is  this  not  a  marvelous  mystery?    He  who  is  the  Creator,  wished  to  be  a  creature."    This  is  to  be  forgiven  the  holy  Father,  who  was  moved  by  surpassing  joy  to  speak  thus.    He  speaks,  however,  of  the  unity,  not  of  a  separation,  as  the  grammar  implies,  and  yet,  as  I  have  said,  this  kind  of  speech  is  to  be  used  sparingly,  and  our  joy  must  be  restrained,  lest  it  give  birth  to  errors.    And  the  Fathers  are  to  be  forgiven,  because  they  spoke  thus  because  of  surpassing  joy,  wondering  that  the  Creator  was  a  creature.    It  is  not  permissible  to  use  such  words  among  the  weak,  because  they  are  easily  offended,  but  among  the  learned  and  those  firmly  rooted  in  this  article,  it  does  not  matter  how  you  speak,  and  I  am  not  harmed  if  you  say:    Christ  is  thirst,  humanity,  captivity,  creature.    VIII.    Argument:    Your  fourteenth  and  eighteenth  propositions  are  contradictory.    Therefore  they  are  not  to  be  approved.    Response:    Such  contradictions  do  not  take  place  between  equivocal  terms,  but  between  terms  of  the  same  meaning.    But  "creature"  has  a  double  signification.    IX.    Argument:    No  creature  ought  to  be  worshipped  [adoranda].    Christ  ought  to  be  worshipped.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  a  creature.    Response:    Thus  Schwenkfeld  argues.    This  is  indeed  one  of  his  absurdities,  and  he  errs  with  respect  to  the  communication  of  attributes.    The  humanity  joined  with  the  divinity  is  worshipped;  the  humanity  of  Christ  is  worshipped,  and  not  falsely,  for  it  is  inseparable  from  the  divinity  and  the  addition  of  this  posessive,  "of  Christ,"  answers  the  objection.    Thus  Christ  speaks  in  John  14.    Philip  asks  Christ  to  show  him  the  Father,  because  with  the  eyes  of  the  flesh  he  sees  nothing  but  flesh,  and  Christ  then  responds:    "Have  I  been  with  you  so  long,  etc.?    He  who  sees  me,  sees  the  Father."    Christ  says  that  [Philip]  sees  the  Father,  when  he  sees  [Christ],  because  he  sees  the  humanity  and  the  divinity  united  in  one  person.    Therefore  he  says,  "Do  you  not  know,  that  the  Father  is  in  me  and  I  in  the  Father?"    Therefore  it  is  said  that  he  who  touches  the  Son  of  God,  touches  the  divine  nature  itself.    The  old  theologians  went  to  astounding  lengths  [mirabiliter  se  cruciarunt]  in  answering  this  question  of  whether  the  humanity  is  to  be  worshipped,  and  they  established  three  ways  [species]  in  which  the  humanity  may  be  adored:    Dulia,  when  Peter  and  Paul  and  all  the  other  saints  are  adored;  hyperdulia,  when  the  Virgin  Mary  is  adored,  and  here  they  included  the  humanity  of  Christ,  and  called  [this  worship]  hyperdulia  as  well;  and  latria,  when  Christ  is  worshipped  with  regard  to  his  divinity  [cum  relatione  et  divinitate].    Christ  clearly  dissolves  [the  distinction,  for]  whoever  worships  the  humanity  of  Christ  here  no  longer  adores  a  creature  (for  this  is  what  is  meant  by  the    union  of  natures),  but  the  Creator  himself,  for  the  unity  is  what  is  fundamental  [quia  fundamentum  est  in  unitate].      X.    Argument:    Every  man  is  corrupted  by  original  sin  and  has  concupiscence.    Christ  had  neither  concupiscence  nor  original  sin.    Therefore  he  is  not  a  man.    Response:    I  make  a  distinction  with  regard  to  the  major  premise.    Every  man  is  corrupted  by  original  sin,  with  the  exception  of  Christ.    Every  man  who  is  not  a  divine  Person  [personaliter  Deus],  as  is  Christ,  has  concupiscence,  but  the  man  Christ  has  none,  because  he  is  a  divine  Person,  and  in  conception  the  flesh  and  blood  of  Mary  were  entirely  purged,  so  that  nothing  of  sin  remained.    Therefore  Isaiah  says  rightly,  "There  was  no  guile  found  in  his  mouth";  otherwise,  every  seed  except  for  Mary's  was  corrupted.      XI.    Argument:    If  Christ  is  a  creature  only  according  to  his  humanity,  and  is  not  called  a  creature  _simpliciter_,  then  it  follows  that  something  remains  which  is  not  united  in  Christ  by  nature  [manere  quod  non  uniatur  in  Christo  natura],  and  that  there  is  in  Christ  something  which  is  not  divine.    Response:    There  is  an  equivocation  in  the  term  "_simpliciter_."    It  is  impossible  that  Christ  is  merely  a  creature  according  to  his  humanity,  for  this  destroys  the  divinity.    This  is  Schwenkfeld's  objection.    Christ  is  not  a  creature  _simpliciter_.    Christians  indeed  say  that  Christ  according  to  his  humanity  is  a  creature,  but  they  immediately  add  that  Christ  according  to  his  divinity  is  the  Creator,  etc.    Therefore  the  human  nature  is  not  to  be  spoken  of  apart  from  the  divinity.    The  humanity  is  not  a  person,  but  a  nature.    XI  [a].    Argument:    No  one  can  dispute  that  flesh  is  a  creature.    Christ  was  made  flesh.    Therefore  he  is  a  creature.    Response:    With  respect  to  his  humanity  [ad  humanitatem]  Christ  was  made  flesh.    XI  [b].    Argument:    Whatever  is  subject  to  death,  is  not  God.    Christ  was  subjected  to  death.    Therefore  he  is  not  God.    Response:    Because  of  the  communication  of  attributes,  this  thing  which  is  proper  to  the  human  nature  is  shared  [commune]  with  the  divine.    XII.    Argument:    "Man"  

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and  "humanity"  have  the  same  meaning.    Therefore  it  is  rightly  said  that  Christ  is  humanity.    Response:    This  is  not  conceded,  but  rather  that  Christ  is  man,  because  this  is  a  concrete  term  with  personal  signification,  whereas  an  abstract  signifies  the  mode  of  nature,  or  naturally,  so  that  therefore  it  is  false  that  Christ  is  human  nature,  that  is,  humanity,  or  that  Christ  is  humanity.    Aristotle  says  that  abstract  terms  refer  to  nature,  and  concrete  terms  to  a  person.    XII  [a].    Argument:    Whatever  belongs  [inest]  to  something,  can  be  predicated  of  it.    Humanity  belongs  to  Christ.    Therefore  Christ  is  humanity.    Response:    To  "belong"  is  to  inhere  to  a  subject.    Whiteness  inheres  to  John.    Therefore  John  is  whiteness.    But  this  does  not  follow  in  the  abstract.    But  I  concede  it  in  the  concrete:    Whiteness  inheres  to  John,  therefore  he  is  white.    Humanity  belongs  to  Christ,  therefore  he  is  a  man.      XIII.    Argument:    Paul  says:    Christ  was  made  a  curse.    Therefore  by  the  same  principle  it  could  be  said:    Christ  was  made  humanity.    Response:    Rather  than  analogy,  we  must  follow  the  guidance  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  as  he  himself  prescribes,  so  we  must  speak.    That  Christ  was  made  a  curse  for  us,  there  signifies  something  truly  concrete,  that  is,  Christ  was  made  a  sacrifice,  a  victim  for  us.      XIV.    Argument:    The  manner  of  speaking  [idioma]  used  by  Holy  Scripture  must  be  used  by  us  rather  than  any  other.    Scripture  never  says:    This  man  created  the  world;  God  suffered.    Therefore  we  ought  not  to  speak  thus.    Response:    The  question  is  whether  certain  forms  of  speech  [formae]  of  the  Fathers  are  to  be  retained  apart  from  Scripture.    I  answer,  that  it  is  permissible  to  use  them,  when  they  do  not  disagree  with  Holy  Scripture  in  meaning.    For  error  lies  not  in  the  will,  but  in  the  meaning.    When  there  are  words  which  produce  error,  they  must  be  avoided;  but  if  they  give  no  occasion  for  error,  it  does  not  matter  if  you  say  "a  man  created  the  world,"  if  only  the  meaning  is  sound.      XV.    Argument:    Moses  says,  "The  Lord  your  God  is  one  God."    Therefore  Christ  cannot  be  true  God.    Response:    What  Moses  says,  that  God  is  one,  in  no  way  contradicts  us.    For  we  too  say  that  there  is  one  God,  and  not  many,  but  that  unity  of  substance  and  essence  has  three  distinct  persons,  as  the  nature[s]  of  Christ  are  united  in  one  person.    When  therefore  it  is  said  that  "the  divinity  died,"  then  it  is  implied  that  the  Father  too  and  the  Holy  Spirit  have  died.    But  this  is  not  true,  for  only  one  person  of  the  divinity,  the  Son,  is  born,  dies,  and  suffers,  etc.    Therefore  the  divine  nature,  when  it  is  take  for  a  person,  was  born,  suffered,  died,  etc.,  and  this  is  true.    We  must  therefore  make  a  distinction.    If  you  understand  by  "divine  nature"  the  whole  divinity  or  the  unity,  then  the  assertion  is  false,  because  Christ  alone  is  not  the  whole  Trinity,  but  only  one  person  of  the  Trinity.    Therefore  there  is  only  one  God.    Here  we  preach,  insofar  as  it  is  possible,  that  these  three  persons  are  one  God  and  one  essence.    But  we  believe  that  these  things  are  incomprehensible;  if  they  could  be  comprehended,  there  would  be  no  need  to  believe  them.      XVI.    Argument:    Whatever  consists  of  soul  and  flesh  is  a  creature.    Christ  consists  of  a  soul  and  flesh.    Therefore  he  is  a  creature.                    I  prove  the  major  premise  from  the  Athanasian  Creed.    Response:    Christ  does  not  consist  of  a  soul  and  flesh,  but  of  humanity  and  divinity.    He  assumed  human  nature,  which  consists  of  soul  and  flesh,  and  in  the  Creed,  man  must  be  construed  with  rational  soul.      XVII.    Argument:    There  is  nothing  accidental  in  God.    To  assume  humanity  is  an  accident.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  God.    Response:    In  philosophy  this  is  true;  but  in  theology  we  have  our  own  rules.    When  we  portray  the  union  so  that  the  divinity  in  Christ  is  as  it  were  a  substance,  but  his  humanity  as  it  were  an  accidental  quality,  like  whiteness  or  blackness,  this  is  not  said  properly  or  aptly,  but  we  speak  thus  so  that  it  can  be  understood  in  some  way.    But  that  unity  of  the  two  natures  in  one  person  is  the  greatest  possible,  so  that  they  are  equally  predicated,  and  communicate  their  properties  to  the  person,  as  if  he  were  solely  God  or  solely  man.      XVIII.    Argument:    Only  God  is  good.    Christ  does  not  wish  to  be  called  good.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  God.                    I  prove  the  minor  premise  from  Matthew  19:    "Why  do  you  call  me  good?    No  one  is  good,  but.  .  .,"  etc.    Response:    Christ  speaks  there  according  to  the  capacity  of  the  man  asking  the  question:    "You  say  that  I  am  good,  and  yet  you  do  not  believe  that  I  am  God.    Therefore  you  do  not  rightly  call  me  good."    Or  thus:    Christ  wished  to  speak  according  to  his  humanity.      XIX.    Argument:    Propositions  15  and  16  are  contradictory.    Therefore  they  cannot  be  true.    Response:    The  Fathers  sometimes  erred  [labantur]  in  judgment,  and  sometimes  speak  correctly.    Therefore  we  must  not  change  them  everywhere.    Thus  Bernard  sometimes  spoke  very  ineptly  and  improperly,  as  if  he  were  a  heretic.    But  when  a  serious  matter  was  at  stake,  and  he  was  speaking  with  God,  then  [as  if]  he  were  Peter  or  Paul  himself.    Therefore  the  Fathers  are  to  be  imitated  where  they  have  spoken  

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and  thought  rightly,  but  where  they  have  spoken  or  even  thought  improperly,  they  are  to  be  tolerated  and  properly  interpreted,  as  the  papists  do  who  force  even  [the  Fathers]  to  come  to  their  opinion.      XX.    Argument:    The  same  thing  cannot  be  predicated  of  God  and  man.    Therefore,  etc.    Response:    This  is  a  philosophical  argument.    There  is  no  relation  between  the  creature  and  the  Creator,  between  the  finite  and  the  infinite.    But  we  not  only  establish  a  relation,  but  a  union  of  the  finite  and  the  infinite.      Aristotle,  if  he  had  heard  or  read  this,  would  never  have  been  made  a  Christian,  for  he  would  not  have  conceded  this  proposition,  that  the  same  relation  belongs  to  the  finite  and  the  infinite.      XXI.    Argument:    If  it  is  rightly  said  that  Christ  is  thirsty  and  dead,  it  is  also  rightly  said  that  he  is  thirst  and  death,  for  it  is  said  in  the  Psalm  itself:    "I  am  a  worm,  and  scorn,  and  despite,"  and  not  "I  am  scorned."    Therefore  by  the  same  principle,  it  seems  that  it  should  be  said  that  Christ  is  death  and  thirst.    Response:    Analogy  or  etymology  does  not  hold  here.    And  as  I  have  said,  we  must  retain  the  patterns  prescribed  by  the  Holy  Spirit,  especially  among  the  weak;  among  strong  Christians,  it  does  not  matter  how  you  speak,  as  before  me,  since  I  am  not  still  being  taught  such  things,  being  already  acquainted  with  them.    [But]  among  those  who  are  to  be  taught,  we  must  refrain.    As  long  as  the  heart  does  not  err,  the  tongue  will  not  err;  our  stammering  has  been  a    roved  by  the  Holy  Spirit.    But  among  those  who  are  to  be  taught,  we  must  speak  modestly,  properly,  and  aptly.      XXII.    Argument:    If  that  which  is  worse  is  said  of  Christ,  so  too  must  that  which  is  better  be  said.    Death  is  better  than  sin.    Therefore  if  Christ  is  called  sin,  he  is  even  better  called  death.    Response:    The  analogy  does  not  hold.    Those  who  teach  are  given  the  task  of  teaching  aptly,  properly,  and  clearly,  so  that  they  may  capture  their  hearers,  who  are  otherwise  offended.    He  who  knew  no  sin  was  made  sin,  that  is,  captivity,  damnation.      XXIII.    Argument:    The  Nicene  Creed  is  undoubtedly  [maxime]  catholic.    The  opinion  of  Schwenkfeld  agrees  with  the  Nicene  Creed.    Therefore  it  is  true.                    I  prove  the  minor  premise,  because  it  is  said  [in  the  Creed]  that  Christ  is  begotten,  not  made.    But  every  creature  is  made.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  a  creature.    Response:    "Begotten"  refers  to  the  divinity,  but  Schwenkfeld  confounds  the  two  natures.      XXIV.    Argument:    Paul  says  that  Christ  was  found  in  condition  [habitu]  as  a  man.    Therefore  the  humanity  in  Christ  is  an  accident;  that  is,  Christ  is  man  accidentally,  and  not  by  virtue  of  substance.    Response:    The  Greek  term  is  _schema_,  that  is,  figure,  form,  or  bearing,  that  is,  "condition"  signifies  that  he  walked  and  lay  down  like  any  other  man.    Paul  wishes  to  demonstrate  that  he  was  a  true  man,  who  suffered  and  spoke  as  a  man.    Propositions  concerning  the  accidents  of  man  and  God  in  Christ  are  immodest  [non  sunt  castae],  therefore  they  are  to  be  spoken  of  sparingly,  and  we  must  take  our  stand  on  the  unity.    This  is  so  closely  joined  that  in  the  whole  nature  of  things  no  similar  example  can  be  given.    The  closest  similarity  is  the  nature  of  man.    For  as  this  consists  of  two  distinct  parts,  that  is,  soul  and  flesh,  thus  the  person  of  Christ  consists  of  two  natures  united,  although  the  soul  is  at  last  separated  from  the  flesh  when  man  dies.      XXV.    Argument:    (M.  Vitus  Amerbach)    I  ask  the  reason  why  Christ  is  man  and  not  humanity.    Response:    Because  "man"  includes  the  person,  and  "humanity"  does  not.                    I  now  argue  the  point  thus:    Man  is  humanity;  either  they  are  synonyms  or  they  are  not.    If  they  are  synonyms,  the  seventh  proposition  is  false,  whence  the  proposition  that  Christ  is  humanity  is  condemned,  even  though  it  is  said  that  Christ  is  divinity.    [Again:]    If  it  is  not  false,  then  the  eighth  proposition  is  invalid:    "Though  otherwise  man  and  humanity  are  synonyms,  like  God  and  divinity."    Response:    Synonyms  are  predicated  interchangeably  of  the  same  substance,  for  such  is  the  nature  of  synonyms.    If  they  are  synonyms,  they  must  be  predicated  of  the  same  subject.    They  are  called  synonyms  because  they  signify  the  same  thing  _simpliciter_  in  all  respects.    Thus  man  and  humanity  are  synonyms  _simpliciter_  in  philosophy,  but  in  theology  they  are  not.    Against  the  solution:    Synonyms  are  of  the  same  nature  and  signification.    Man    and  humanity  are  not  of  the  same  nature.    Therefore  they  are  not  synonyms.    You  [vos]  have  said  that  humanity  signifies  only  a  form  in  matter,  not  joined  with  a  subject.    But  man  is  a  subject.    Therefore  they  are  different.    Response:    In  philosophy  they  are  synonyms  _simpliciter_,  having  the  same  signification,  but  not  in  theology,  for  here  is  one  man  to  whom  no  one  is  similar.    Here  man  in  the  concrete  signifies  human  nature,  because  he  is  a  person,  but  humanity  does  not  signify  a  person.    Therefore  [these  terms]  differ  in  theology  and  philosophy.    If  it  were  said  that  the  divine  person  assumed  a  man,  that  is,  a  human  person,  it  would  follow  that  there  were  two  persons,  but  this  is  intolerable.    Therefore  it  is  rightly  said  that  the  Word  assumed  human  nature.    [Again:]    "Thou  tookest  man  upon  thee  to  deliver  him."    Response:    Man  is  taken  in  an  

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abstract  sense.    "Man,"  when  it  is  said  of  Christ,  is  a  personal  name,  now  that  the  person  has  assumed  the  person.      XXVI.    Argument:    I  ask  whether  a  holy  thing  and  holiness,  or  a  good  thing  and  goodness,  are  the  same?    Response:    There  is  a  great  difference  between  concrete  terms  and  abstract  ones,  as  between  a  white  thing  and  whiteness,  between  substance  and  accident.    These  are  not  synonyms,  for  a  accident  can  either  be  present  or  absent.    On  the  contrary:    Both  a  good  thing  and  goodness  are  accidents,  as  are  a  man  and  humanity.    Response:    As  far  as  accidents  are  concerned,  they  are  not  synonymous.      XXVII.    Against  [propositions]  11  and  12.    "Thou  tookest  man  upon  thee  to  deliver  him."  But  strictly  speaking  [proprie],  God  either  assumed  human  nature  or  humanity  or  man.    But  strictly  speaking  he  did  not  assume  humanity  or  human  nature.    Therefore  he  assumed  a  man,  because  humanity  is  an  abstract  and  signifies  only  a  form,  but  human  nature  signifies  matter,  that  is,  flesh  and  soul.    But  God  strictly  speaking  did  not  assume  flesh  and  a  soul,  nor  flesh  alone  or  a  soul  alone,  but  a  man,  which  is  the  general  and  most  appropriate  term  in  this  matter.    Therefore  I  say  that  he  assumed  a  whole  man  [integrum  hominem],  not  simply  humanity  or  a  part  thereof.    Response:    When  humanity  is  used,  as  above,  as  a  philosophical  term,  it  is  the  same  as  man,  but  in  theology  it  does  not  signify  a  person,  as  "man"  signifies  a  person,  that  is,  a  particular  person,  [if  we  were  to  say]  that  the  Son  of  God  assumed  a  man.    If  it  were  said  that  the  divine  person  assumed  a  human  nature,  that  is,  a  person,  then  there  would  be  two  persons,  which  we  do  not  concede.    For  there  are  not  two  substances,  etc.                    "Thou  tookest  man  upon  thee  to  deliver  him."    Here  everyone  answers  that  man  is  here  taken  abstractly,  that  is,  as  "humanity,"  which  is  not  subsistent,  but  assumed.    "Man,"  however,  does  not  signify  something  assumed,  but  an  existing  person.    Therefore  "man"  has  a  different  signification  with  regard  to  Christ.    Christ  is  a  man,  that  is,  the  divine  person  which  assumed  human  nature,  for  the  person  did  not  assume  a  person.    In  philosophy  there  is  no  difference  between  man  and  the  union  of  a  soul  and  flesh,  but  in  theology  there  is  a  great  difference.    For  in  Christ,  humanity  signifies  the  assumed,  not  subsistent,  human  nature.    But  "man"  signifies  a  subsistent  person.      XXVIII.    Argument:    Just  as  it  is  rightly  said  that  Christ  is  created,  so  too  it  is  rightly  said  that  Christ  is  a  creature.    "Creature"  [creatura]  does  not  signify  an  action,  but  a  thing  produced  by  a  creator,  but  it  is  nevertheless  an  abstract  term.    Response:    We  concede  to  the  Fathers,  after  their  fashion,  that  Christ  is  called  a  creature;  but  because  among  the  untrained  "creature"  always  signifies  something  separated  from  the  Creator,  this  is  not  well  done.    But  when  we  call  Christ  a  creature,  we  understand  the  divine  person  which  assumed  human  nature.    Nor  is  the  creature  in  Christ  the  subject  [suppositum],  not  even  according  to  philosophy,  but  something  assumed.    Christ,  being  created,  is  not  separated  from  God.    Therefore  he  is  not  a  creature  in  the  old  sense  of  the  word.      XXIX.    Argument:    Two  contraries  cannot  exist  in  the  same  subject  [duo  disparata  non  possunt  esse  in  eodem].    God  and  man  are  contraries.    Therefore  they  cannot  exist  in  the  same  subject.    Response:    Christ  was  corruptible  and  mortal,  because  he  died,  but  not  according  to  his  birth  [secundum  generationem].    Aristotle  did  not  understand  the  corruption  of  human  nature,  wherefore  he  attributed  our  corruption  to  the  elements,  as  in  other  created  things.    But  the  fall  of  Adam  is  the  cause  of  death.    For  Adam  was  composed  of  the  elements,  [and  yet]  intended  [conditus]  for  eternal  life.    If  he  had  not  fallen,  there  would  have  been  a  perpetual  harmony  of  the  elements  and  no  corruption.    XXX.    Argument:    Athanasius  says:    Such  as  is  the  Father,  such  is  the  Son.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  created.    Response:    He  speaks  of  the  divinity  of  Christ,  [but]  the  Word,  which  is  God,  became  incarnate.    XXX  [a].    Again:    Contraries  must  be  eliminated  [contraria  sunt  e  medio  tollenda].    Your  third  and  sixth  propositions  are  clearly  contrary.    The  third  states  that  those  things  which  pertain  to  man  are  rightly  said  of  God,  and  those  things  which  pertain  to  God,  of  man.    The  sixth,  that  it  is  not  permissible  to  say  that  since  Christ  is  thirsty,  a  slave,  dead,  therefore  he  is  thirst,  slavery,  death.    Therefore  these  propositions  must  be  eliminated.    Response:    In  the  third  proposition  we  are  speaking  in  the  concrete,  but  in  the  sixth  in  the  abstract.    Again:    This  is  the  catholic  faith,  that  we  confess  one  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  true  God  and  man.    Therefore,  neither  God  the  Father  nor  the  Holy  Spirit,  since  "one"  excludes  both  God  the  Father  and  the  Holy  Spirit.    Response:    One  God,  and  threefold  [trinum]  in  Trinity,  nor  do  we  deny  the  Trinity.    For  there  is  one  God,  but  three  persons,  nor  yet  are  they  separated  from  each  other.    Again:    The  Word  was  made  flesh.    But  flesh  is  a  creature.    Therefore  the  Word,  that  is,  God,  was  made  a  creature.    Response:    John  says  concerning  Christ  that  he  was  made  flesh,  that  is,  that  he  assumed  human  nature,  while  otherwise  he  remained  God.    Again:    

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They  think  rightly  who  say  that  Christ  is  [not]  a  creature  according  to  his  humanity,  as  Schwenkfeld.    Response:    They  are  all  wrong  who  call  Christ  a  creature  _simpliciter_.      XXXI.    Argument:    God  is  a  spirit.    Christ  is  not  a  spirit.    Therefore,  etc.    Response:    In  Christ  there  are  two  natures:    the  divine,  which  is  spirit,  and  the  human,  which  has  flesh  and  bones.    Christ  according  to  his  humanity  is  a  creature,  and  Christ  according  to  his  divinity  is  God,  so  closely  joined  together  [coniunctissime  etiam]  that  the  two  natures  are    one  person.      XXXII.    Argument:    He  who  makes  something  cannot  be  the  same  as  the  thing  which  he  makes.    Christ  is  the  Creator.    Therefore  he  cannot  be  a  creature.    Response:    We  join  the  Creator  and  the  creature  in  the  unity  of  the  person.    The  worthless  Schwenkfeld  [reproaches]  us  for  teaching  that  Christ  is  only  a  creature.    He  wants  to  be  holy  when  he  stirs  up  that  sect  and  says  that  Christ  in  glory  is  not  a  man.    Therefore  neither  will  he  be  God  or  worthy  of  worship.    He  means  a  pure  creature  apart  from  the  divinity.    He  reproaches  good  men  without  naming  them.    None  say,  as  you  claim,  that  Christ  is  purely  a  creature,  but  a  serpent  is  easily  hidden.      XXXIII.    Argument:    The  divinity  in  Christ  felt  no  pain.    God  is  divinity.    Therefore  he  did  not  feel  pain  on  the  Cross,  and  consequently  he  did  not  suffer.    Response:    [Because  of]  the  communication  of  attributes,  those  things  which  Christ  suffered  are  attributed  also  to  God,  because  they  are  one.    Our  adversaries  want  to  divide  the  unity  of  the  person,  but  we  will  [not]  concede.    We  join  or  unite  the  distinct  natures  in  one  person.    XXXIII  [a].    Argument:    Whatever  is  subject  to  death,  is  not  God.    Christ  was  subjected  to  death.    Therefore  Christ  is  not  God.    Response:    [First,]  there  is  the  communication  of  attributes,  and  the  argument    is  a  philosophical  one.    [Again:]    Scripture  does  not  say:    "This  man  created  the  world;  God  suffered."    Therefore  these  expressions  are  not  to  be  used.    Response:    Error  resides  not  in  words,  but  in  the  sense;  although  Scripture  does  not  put  forward  these  words,  it  nevertheless  has  the  same  sense.    XXXIII  [b].    Argument:    No  creature  creates.    Christ  is  a  creature.    Response:    [This  is  true]  understanding  creature  in  a  philosophical  way.    But  creature  is  said  of  Christ  theologically.    Christ  is  the  Creator.    Again:    Paul  [writes]  to  the  Galatians:    God  sent  his  Son,  born  of  a  woman.    Therefore  God  is  a  creature.    Response:    The  argument  is  true  according  to  the  humanity.        End  [of  the  Disputation  on  the  Divinity  and  Humanity  of  Christ]    Linked  from:  http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/wittenberg/luther/luther-­‐divinity.txt  

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Bibliography Bayer, Oswald. Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation. Translated by Thomas H. Trapp. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008. Brown, Harold O.J. Heresies: Heresy and Orthodoxy in the History of the Church. Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers, 2003. Chemnitz, Martin. The Two Natures in Christ. Translated by J.A.O. Preus. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2007. Christian Classics Ethereal Library. “The Definition of Faith of the Council of Chalcedon.” From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 14. Philip Schaff, editor. Accessed November 19, 2013. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xi.xiii.html Christian Classics Ethereal Library. “The Tome of St. Leo” From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 14. Philip Schaff, editor. Accessed November 19, 2013. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xi.vii.html Clayton, Paul B, Jr. The Christology of Theodoret of Cyrus: Antiochene Christology from the Council of Ephesus to the Council of Chalcedon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Empie, Paul C., and James I. McCord, ed. Marburg Revisited: A Reexamination of Lutheran and Reformed Traditions. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1966. English Standard Version (ESV) of the Holy Bible. Wheaton: Good News Publishers, 2001. Gonzalez, Justo, L. The Story of Christianity: Complete in One Volume. The Early Church to the Present Day. Peabody: Prince Press, 2001. Hall, Christopher A. Learning Theology with the Church Fathers. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2002. Hardy, Edward R, ed. Christology of the Later Fathers. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006. Kelly, J.N.D. Early Christian Doctrines. Peabody: Prince Press, 2003. Lienhard, Marc. Luther: Witness to Jesus Christ, Stages and Themes of the Reformer’s Christology. Translated by Edwin H. Robertson. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1982. Lohse, Bernhard. A Short History of Christian Doctrine: From the First Century to the Present. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.

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