Program / Course 9: Christology and Pneumatology / Lesson 1.4
What you will learn
- Name the main questions about Christ that the New Testament raises without fully answering.
- Explain why texts that seem to point in opposite directions created pressure for later doctrine.
- Describe how Christians have used the councils as a way of answering those questions.
- Explain why traditions differ on how far Scripture alone can settle them.
The big idea
The New Testament says that Jesus is a man and that he shares the identity of God. It also says that he prays to the Father, that he does not know the day of the end, and that the Father is greater than he. The writers leave these tensions in place and do not provide a technical vocabulary to resolve them. Later centuries had to ask how one person could be both, and what each statement means. That work produced the creeds and councils. Christians differ on whether Scripture alone could have answered the questions.
Key terms
- Subordination
- Language that places the Son below the Father in some way. It can refer to the Son’s role, or in some ancient views, to his being.
- Nature
- In later theology, what something is. Divine nature means what makes God God. Human nature means what makes someone human.
- Person
- In later theology, who someone is. The church came to say that Christ is one person with two natures.
- Firstborn
- A word used of Christ in Colossians 1:15. It can mean first in time, first in rank, or heir.
- Sola scriptura
- A Latin phrase meaning by Scripture alone. A Protestant principle that Scripture is the final authority in matters of faith.
- Tradition
- In Christian use, the teaching handed down in the church. Catholic and Orthodox Christians count it as a source alongside Scripture, in different ways.
- Council
- A gathering of bishops to settle questions of teaching. The councils of this course are the first seven that Catholic and Orthodox Christians both accept as ecumenical, a term explained in a later lesson.
Background
A careful reader of the New Testament will notice that its authors say things about Jesus that are hard to put side by side. These are not mistakes by the authors. They are what happens when people describe a single reality in different settings and for different purposes, without yet needing a technical language to organize them.
Later Christian theology grew out of these tensions. A new question would arise, someone would give an answer, and the church would judge whether the answer matched Scripture and the faith it had received. This lesson lists the main open questions, and the next module follows how they were handled.
Step-by-step explanation
Step 1: How can one person be human and divine?
The first question is the largest. The New Testament calls Jesus a man (1 Timothy 2:5) and gives him the title Lord and the name God (John 20:28). It never says how this works. Is there one self or two? Does one nature absorb the other? Does he stop being divine when he sleeps, or die, or weep?
Early Christians tried several answers. Some said the divine part was only apparently human. Others said he was an exalted man. Others said he had a human body but a divine mind in place of a human one. The councils eventually said he has two complete natures in one person. Module 2 follows the history.
Step 2: What does the Son’s relation to the Father mean?
Jesus says, “My Father is greater than I” (John 14:28). He prays to the Father, and he says, “I and my Father are one” (John 10:30). Colossians 1:15 calls him “the firstborn of every creature,” while the same chapter says all things were created through him.
Early readers of Proverbs 8, where Wisdom says the Lord created her at the beginning of his way, applied that passage to Christ. Whether that meant the Son was created became the question of the fourth-century dispute with Arius. The church answered that the Son is begotten, not made, and of the same being as the Father. Texts about subordination were then read as speaking of the Son’s role in the incarnation or of his relation as Son.
Step 3: What did the earthly Jesus know?
Mark 13:32 reports Jesus saying that of the day and hour no one knows, “neither the Son, but the Father.” Luke 2:52 says he grew in wisdom. Yet John’s Gospel says he knew what was in people (John 2:25) and Peter says “Lord, thou knowest all things” (John 21:17).
Later theologians gave different answers. Some said that Jesus, as man, had real limits of knowledge, though the Son was omniscient as God. Others held that his human soul had a special knowledge from God. Others spoke of a self-limitation of divine attributes. This course returns to the topic under kenosis.
Step 4: What did he will, and who suffered?
In Gethsemane Jesus prays: “not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). That raises the question whether he has two wills, human and divine, or one. On the cross he says, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34, quoting Psalm 22). Who is forsaken, and by whom?
Related questions follow. If God the Son died, did God suffer? If the Son suffered only in his human nature, is the suffering truly his? Acts 20:28 speaks of the church that God purchased with his own blood. These questions led to the fifth, sixth and seventh centuries of debate.
Step 5: Can Scripture alone settle these questions?
Traditions answer differently. Catholic and Orthodox teaching holds that the church, guided by the Spirit, has authority to state the meaning of Scripture, and that the seven ecumenical councils did so for Christology. Protestants hold that Scripture is the final authority, and most accept the early creeds because they judge them faithful to Scripture.
Critics outside these traditions, including some historians, say the councils added metaphysical language foreign to the New Testament. Defenders reply that the councils used new words only to protect what the New Testament already said. The disagreement is about method as much as about conclusions.
- Which of the open questions seems most pressing to you, and why?
- Is it fair to say the New Testament authors left a problem unsolved, or is it better to say they did not yet need to ask?
- How would you describe the difference between a nature and a person?
- What are the strengths and weaknesses of reading John 14:28 as speaking of the Son’s role?
- Which questions on the list are about knowledge, which about will, and which about suffering?
- What is the strongest argument you can make for and against the claim that the councils added new ideas?
Examples
Mark 13:32
This verse is often cited in debates both ways. Those who think the Son is a lesser being use it as a sign of limited knowledge. Those who defend full divinity read it as speaking of what he knew in his human mind or what he was sent to make known. Both groups agree the verse is hard.
The cry from the cross
Mark’s account gives Jesus’s words in Aramaic and then translates them: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Readers have taken this to show real abandonment, a quotation of a psalm that ends in trust, or both. Interpreters differ and the verse is a good test of method.
A constructed analogy
A student compares the situation to reading a recipe that says both “bake until golden” and “remove while pale.” Each line is true in its place. Later cooks must decide when each applies. (A constructed illustration, and imperfect, as all analogies in this field are.)
Different perspectives
Catholic
The Catholic Church holds that Scripture, tradition and the teaching office of the church together convey God’s word. It counts the Christological councils as authoritative explanations of what Scripture already means.
Orthodox
The Orthodox Church holds that Scripture is interpreted within the life of the church, especially the Fathers and the seven councils. It treats the councils as a witness to the faith of the apostles and not as new teaching.
Protestant
Protestant churches in the Reformation tradition hold that Scripture is the final norm. Most accept the creeds of Nicaea and Chalcedon because they believe these summarize what Scripture teaches. Some Protestants, including some Anabaptist and restorationist groups, are more cautious about creeds.
Non-Trinitarian Christians
Groups such as Unitarians and Jehovah’s Witnesses read the same texts as showing that the Son is distinct from and subordinate to God. They argue that the councils imposed later ideas. Other Christians reject that reading.
Historians
Historians of doctrine generally describe the councils as part of a development, and ask both what continued from the New Testament and what was new. Their conclusions differ with their own assumptions about authority and revelation.
Why it matters
Knowing what Scripture leaves open helps a student see why the fourth and fifth centuries mattered. It also guards against two mistakes: thinking the councils invented problems from nothing, and thinking the New Testament already contains the full later vocabulary.
Common misunderstandings
Misunderstanding: The councils were arguments about words that nobody needed.
Correction: Each council responded to a real dispute about how to read texts that were already in use. Words were chosen to exclude readings that the majority thought undid something central, such as the real humanity of Christ or his real divinity.
Misunderstanding: Everything the councils said is directly in the Bible.
Correction: Terms like homoousios and hypostasis do not appear in Scripture. Defenders say the content is biblical, and the words are tools for stating it. Critics doubt whether the terms fit. Be clear which claim is being made.
Misunderstanding: Christians have always agreed on how to answer these questions.
Correction: They agreed on a good deal and disagreed on much. Some churches did not accept Chalcedon, and some traditions differ on Christ’s knowledge and the suffering of God. Later lessons describe both the agreements and disagreements.
Knowledge check
Name three questions about Christ that the New Testament raises but does not fully answer.
Examples include how one person can be both human and divine, how the Son is related to the Father given texts like John 14:28, what the earthly Jesus knew, how many wills he had, and who suffered on the cross. A good answer names three and gives one verse for each.
Why did Proverbs 8 matter in the fourth century?
Early Christians read the figure of Wisdom in Proverbs 8, who says the Lord created her at the beginning, as a title of Christ. Arius used this to argue that the Son was created. His opponents said the Son is begotten, not made. The text became a test case for how to read passages across the Testaments.
How do Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant approaches to these questions differ?
Catholic and Orthodox Christians count the councils as authoritative interpretations of Scripture, in the life of the church. Most Protestants hold Scripture as the final authority but accept the early creeds as faithful summaries. All three accept the Chalcedonian formula, though they ground it somewhat differently.
Why is it unfair to say the New Testament simply contradicts itself on Jesus?
The authors speak from different settings and purposes and do not set out a system. Statements about his humility, knowledge or prayer may be about his human life, his role as Son, or both. Whether the later explanations are right is a separate question. A fair reading allows that the texts leave work to be done.
Think it through
- What do you do with a text that seems to point away from your own view?
- Is it comforting or troubling that Scripture leaves some questions open?
- How much authority should later councils have in reading earlier texts?
- Which of the five questions would you most like the course to answer?
Independent assignment
An honest list of difficulties
In your own notebook, write 400 to 600 words. Choose three New Testament texts that you find hard to fit together in what they say about Jesus. For each, quote or cite it, state in one sentence what seems to pull in different directions, and write down one possible way a thoughtful reader might reconcile it and one reason that reading might fail. Keep the list; you will return to it at the end of the course. Do not send this to anyone.
Further study
- J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines Read the opening chapters on the development of doctrine.
- Council of Nicaea (325) and Council of Constantinople (381), The Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed Read the article on Christ slowly and mark each phrase that answers a question from this lesson.
- Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine (5 volumes) A history of how doctrine developed. Use it selectively for the early centuries.
- Mark 13:32 Neither the Son, but the Father.
- John 14:28 My Father is greater than I.
- Colossians 1:15 Firstborn of every creature.
- Luke 22:42 Not my will, but thine, be done.
- Mark 15:34 My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?