CHAPTER I THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST I. STATE OF THE QUESTION.-Having given a full dogmatic demonstration of the Divinity of Jesus Christ in our treatise on the Trinity,' we here cor.fine ourselves to showing how that demonstration is to be regarded for the purposes of Christology. In our treatise on the Blessed Trinity we had merely to establish the fact that there are Three Divine Persons in one Divine Nature, viz.: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. That the Son of God became man did not concern us there. In expounding the dogma of the Trinity, therefore, it would not have been necessary to deal with the historic fact of the Incarnation were it not for the circumstance that nearly all the Scriptural and Patristic texts which can be adduced to prove the existence of the Divine Logos (λόγος ἄσαρκος) are based on the existence of Jesus Christ as the Godman or Word Incarnate (Λόγος ἔνσαρκος). St. John the Evangelist, in describing the Logos as He existed before all time in His eternal Godhead,2 did not fail to add the significant statement: ' And the 1 Pohle-Preuss, The Divine Trinity, pp. 63-96, St. Louis 1912. 2 John I, 1 sqq. Cfr. J. H. New man, Tracts Theological and Ecclesiastical, pp. 228 sq., new ed., London 1895. ΙΟ Word was made flesh." Following his example the Fathers invariably identified the Divine Logos, or Son of God, with Jesus of Nazareth. Accordingly, nearly all the texts which can be gathered from Patristic literature in favor of the dogma of the Divine Trinity, have a Christological as well as a Trinitarian bearing. In other words, the Scriptural and Patristic teaching on the Divinity of Christ proves the existence of a Second Person in the Blessed Trinity (and therefore the dogma of the Trinity) quite as clearly and stringently as the Scriptural and Patristic teaching on the Incarnation of the Logos demonstrates the dogma of Christ's Divinity. It is due to this close interrelation of the two dogmas that the fundamental Christological thesis with which we are here concerned has really, for the most part, been already established in the treatise on the Divine Trinity.* Generally speaking, the Divinity of Christ may be demonstrated either dogmatically or apologetically. The dogmatic argument rests on the inspiration of Holy Scripture and the dogmatic validity of the evidence furnished by Tradition. The apologetic argument has a much broader basis. It is both historical and philosophical. It takes the Bible as a genuine and credible document and from it, in connection with pagan and Jewish sources, proves that Jesus Christ is true God. 3 Καὶ ὁ Λόγος σάρξ ἐγένετο. John I, 14. 4 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, The Divine Trinity, 1. c. For the apologetic argument in proof of Christ's Divinity we may refer the reader to any approved text-book of Christian Apologetics.5 The dogmatic argument, as we have already noted, is set forth with considerable fulness in our own treatise on the Divine Trinity. We will merely recapitulate it here. 2. THE DOGMATIC ARGUMENT.-Holy Scripture teaches that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He is true God and the Divine Logos. With this teaching Ecclesiastical Tradition is in perfect accord. The contrary doctrine was rejected as heretical very early in the Church's history, and we may therefore truly say that modern Rationalism stands condemned at the bar of Primitive Christianity. a) The Scriptural doctrine concerning the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity culminates in these three propositions: (1) Christ is truly and properly the Son of God, consubstantial with the Father; therefore (2) He is not an ordinary man, but true God as well as man; (3) "Logos" is merely another name for the Second Person of the Divine Trinity, who became incarnate in Jesus Christ. 5 For instance, Devivier-Sasia, Christian Apologetics, or A Rational Exposition of the Foundations of Faith, Vol. I, pp. 33 sqq., San José, Cal., 1903. Cfr. also Bougaud-Currie, The Divinity of Christ, New York 1906; Hettinger-Bowden, Revealed Religion, pp. 130 sqq., 2nd ed., London s. a.; P. Schanz, A Christian Apology, 4th ed., New York s. a.; O. R. Vassall-Phillips, The Mustard Tree. An Argument on Behalf of the Divinity of Christ, London 1912. a) The Biblical argument for the Divinity of Christ rests upon the fact that Scripture describes and declares Him to be really and truly the Son of God. How absolutely conclusive this argument is, appears from the desperate efforts made by contemporary Rationalists and Modernists to weaken its force by attributing to Christ a divine sonship wholly foreign to that meant by the inspired writers. Thus Harnack writes: "The Gospel, as Jesus proclaimed it, has to do with the Father only and not with the Son." According to this Rationalist theologian "the whole of the Gospel is contained" in the formula: "God and the soul, the soul and its God." But did not Christ Himself put His Divine Sonship prominently in the foreground-so much so that our belief in the existence of the Father as the First Person of the Blessed Trinity, in its last analysis really rests upon this emphatic self-assertion of the Son? Harnack cannot deny that "this Jesus who preached humility and knowledge of self, nevertheless named himself, and himself alone, as the Son of God." But he prefers to call this astonishing fact a psychological riddle and pleads ignorance of its meaning. "How he [Jesus] came to this consciousness of the unique character of his relation to God as a Son . . . is his secret, and no psychology will ever fathom it." 10 To solve this enigma, if 6 A. Harnack, Das Wesen des Christentums, p. 91, Leipzig 1902 (English translation, What is Christianity? by T. B. Saunders, 2nd ed., p. 154, London 1908). 7 Ibid., p. 90 (English translation, p. 153). 8 8 Cfr. Pohle-Preuss, The Divine Trinity, pp. 44. 9 Das Wesen des Christentums, p. 81 (English translation, p. 139). 10 Ibid., p. 81 (English translation, p. 138). Harnack's theory were true, would be the business of psychiatry rather than of psychology, for in that case Jesus Christ was either a fool or a knave. Unwilling to take either horn of the dilemma, Harnack can find no other way out of the difficulty than the assumption that 66 The sentence' I am the Son of God' was not inserted in the Gospel by Jesus himself, and to put that sentence there side by side with the others is to make an addition to the Gospel." 11 It is difficult to imagine a more frivolous asseveration. Even the superficial reader can easily see that to obliterate this sentence would be to take away an essential part of the Gospel. Cfr. John IX, 35 sqq.: "Dost thou believe in the Son of God? He answered, and said: Who is he, Lord, that I may believe in him? And Jesus said to him: Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee." 12 11 To realize the hollowness of Harnack's contention we need but reflect that Jesus suffered torture and death deliberately and with a solemn oath in confirmation of His claim that He was the Son of God.18 66 13 The appellation "Son of man," 14 which Jesus applied to Himself with predilection, and which in no wise detracts from His other name, “ Son of God," was no doubt designed to safeguard the doctrine of His humanity against future errors, such as that of the Docetae.15 We should remember, however, that in calling Him 11 Ibid., p. 92 (English translation, p. 156). 12 On the teaching of St. John and St. Paul concerning the Logos, see Pohle-Preuss, The Divine Trinity, pp. 88 sqq., St. Louis 1912; on that of St. Paul in particular, F. Prat, La Théologie de Saint Paul, Vol. II, pp. 67 sqq., 165 sqq., Paris 1912; D. Somerville (Prot.), St. Paul's Conception of Christ, Edin burgh 1897. Cfr. also H. P. Liddon, The Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, pp. 311 sqq., 454 sqq., and J. Lebreton, Les Origines du Dogme de la Trinité, pp. 291 sqq., 364 sqq., 495 sqq., 515 sqq., Paris 1910. 13 Pohle-Preuss, op. cit., pp. 54 sqq. 14 ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. |