Sunday, January 29, 2006
Athanasius -- On The Incarnation
Athanasius (4th century AD)
On the Incarnation stands as meeting point between the Apologists and the theologians of the Councils.
Against the Heathens attacks the absurdity of popular paganism; defends on rational grounds a unified and orderly universe as the work of one Creator, who rules it by his Logos. But, man has abused his privilege of freedom by turning away to irrationality.
On the Incarnation picks up from here. Shows how the Word through whom we were made is also the Redeemer by whom we are reclaimed.
3-fold action: (1) Life giving power of the Word heals our illness of soul and body.
(2) The Word’s teaching by word and deed restores us to true knowledge of God.
(3) His sacrifice pays the debt of justice which man could never pay.
“He became man so that we might become divine.”
—Also wrote Life of Antony about the hermit monk who he met when he was older.
On The Incarnation: http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/history/ath-inc.htm
Creation and the Fall—Writing to Macarius; the Word’s becoming man, “that mystery which the Jews traduce, the Greeks ignore, but we adore.” “He has been manifested in a human body for this reason only, out of the love and goodness of His Father, for the salvation of us men”
—Creation is renewed (saved) by the same Word who made it in the beginning.
—Things are different; the sun and moon, foot and hand, are not the same. Therefore, creation was not spontaneous, it must have had a Creator.
—God created all existence. Through the Word, Jesus Christ, he made everything out of nothing.
—Humans, of all creatures, received a special grace: the impress of His own image and a share in the Word.
—God secured this grace by making it conditional upon 2 things: law and a place—he put the man and woman in Paradise and gave them one rule, do not eat the fruit of the tree of life.
—We blew it (i.e. Adam and Eve disobeyed), and because of this, the Word had to become man.
—God wanted us to remain good, but we disobeyed, “having turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising, had come inevitably under the law of death.”
—Things got worse, and people started doing all types of sins—wars, killing, sexual perversions, etc.
The Divine Dilemma and Its Solution in the Incarnation—We have a dilemma:
(1) On one hand, “It would, of course, have been unthinkable that God should go back upon His word and that man, having transgressed, should not die.”
(2) On the other hand, “it was equally monstrous that beings which once had shared the nature of the Word should perish and turn back again into non-existence through corruption.”
—Why wouldn’t repentance be good enough? Because, it was more than a trespass, it was a corruption of human nature. Grace was needed. For this purpose, “the incorporeal and incorruptible and immaterial Word of God entered our world.”
—The Word did not just become embodied or appear to be human, he took a real human body, a pure body in the womb of a virgin untainted by intercourse with man.
—Since our bodies are corruptible to death, and God is not, He took a body, and became a body, so that he could surrender his body unto death, in our place.
—Being God, He cannot remain dead, and thus rises from the dead. We too, die in Him, and rise in Him because of Him.
The Divine Dilemma and Its Solution in the Incarnation—continued—Because of our limitations, we cannot come to know God on our own.
God reveals himself to us through Jesus Christ, since it is only through perceiving and apprehending our Maker can we be happy.
—Men have turned themselves away from God. They created false idols, invented false gods to worship, honored created things rather than the creator, and they traced the cause of everything to the stars with no need of God.
—3 ways open to know God: (1) look up to the Heavens, ponder knowledge
(2) converse w/ holy men who knew about God
(3) follow the law
Should God let these men just turn away and revert to brutes? No, then he would have been better off never having raised them from brute level in the first place.
Could God have left the task to holy men to save men? No. Even the best of men are sinners, so how can those blinded help others?
—God became Man so that men, no longer comprehending God above, might see God in the world. He stayed around and performed works awhile before dying and rising so that man could contemplate this.
—The Word is both present as a particular human body and outside controlling the universe and being in all things.
—He was not defiled by being in a body. Rather, he sanctified the body by being it it.
—His miracles prove that he is not mere man, but also God, the one who controls nature.
The Death of Christ (19-25)—Christ’s bodily death, as much as His other acts, reveals that He is God and Son of God.
—He surrenders his life in our place, on our behalf, to pay the debt that must be paid.
—“two opposite marvels took place at once: the death of all was consummated in the Lord's body; yet, because the Word was in it, death and corruption were in the same act utterly abolished.”
—He allowed Himself to die because that was the reason he had taken a body, and preventing death would impede the Resurrection.
—His death had to be public, otherwise no one would have believed his Resurrection. They would have just thought he never died and was lying.
The Resurrection (26-32)—He waited until the 3rd day to rise so that no one could accuse Him of not really being dead.
—He waited one whole day to show that He was truly dead, then rose on the 3rd day, because if he waited any longer, people might have forgotten about Him.
—Death is now conquered. We no longer fear it, but rather despise it and face it head on.
Refutation of the Jews (33-40)—Jews who disbelieve that the Word would become man are misreading their own Scriptures.
—Athanasius uses ambiguous Scripture passages to “prove” that Jesus’ life, death, and Resurrection were foretold.
—He says Jesus is the only one who fits all the prophecies, i.e. being born of a virgin, by his stripes we are healed, etc, etc.
—Old Testament figures performed some of the prophecies some of the time, e.g. Elijah raised a dead man. But, no one fulfilled all the prophecies other than Jesus.
Refutation of the Gentiles (41-45)—The Gentiles argue it is unfitting for the Word to take a body, to take on human nature. Athanasius says, if it is fitting for the Word to create the world and enter into it to provide it with light and movement, etc, then why would it be out of bounds for the Word to take a body?
—Why become man instead of something more majestic like the moon or sun? The Word came not to show off, but to heal and teach suffering men.
—Further, nothing had erred from the path that God had made for it, from its purpose, except for man, who did stray.
Why not save man through an act of His will, like creation? He created from His will alone because there is no existence yet. But, man fell in existence, therefore he used the tools of existence, a human body, to save man.
Refutation of the Gentiles continued (46-55)—Athanasius explains that Christ is greater than all the pagan gods and idols that people have worshipped.
-More proof of Christ is the growing number of Christians and the shrinking number of evil pagan rites.
Conclusion (56-57)—To understand these truths and come to faith, we first must make ourselves right in God’s eyes. Just as you need to wipe your eyes first before looking at sunlight, or visit a city first in order to see it, we must cleanse our lives and imitate the saints to understand the minds of sacred writers.
On the Incarnation stands as meeting point between the Apologists and the theologians of the Councils.
Against the Heathens attacks the absurdity of popular paganism; defends on rational grounds a unified and orderly universe as the work of one Creator, who rules it by his Logos. But, man has abused his privilege of freedom by turning away to irrationality.
On the Incarnation picks up from here. Shows how the Word through whom we were made is also the Redeemer by whom we are reclaimed.
3-fold action: (1) Life giving power of the Word heals our illness of soul and body.
(2) The Word’s teaching by word and deed restores us to true knowledge of God.
(3) His sacrifice pays the debt of justice which man could never pay.
“He became man so that we might become divine.”
—Also wrote Life of Antony about the hermit monk who he met when he was older.
On The Incarnation: http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/history/ath-inc.htm
Creation and the Fall—Writing to Macarius; the Word’s becoming man, “that mystery which the Jews traduce, the Greeks ignore, but we adore.” “He has been manifested in a human body for this reason only, out of the love and goodness of His Father, for the salvation of us men”
—Creation is renewed (saved) by the same Word who made it in the beginning.
—Things are different; the sun and moon, foot and hand, are not the same. Therefore, creation was not spontaneous, it must have had a Creator.
—God created all existence. Through the Word, Jesus Christ, he made everything out of nothing.
—Humans, of all creatures, received a special grace: the impress of His own image and a share in the Word.
—God secured this grace by making it conditional upon 2 things: law and a place—he put the man and woman in Paradise and gave them one rule, do not eat the fruit of the tree of life.
—We blew it (i.e. Adam and Eve disobeyed), and because of this, the Word had to become man.
—God wanted us to remain good, but we disobeyed, “having turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising, had come inevitably under the law of death.”
—Things got worse, and people started doing all types of sins—wars, killing, sexual perversions, etc.
The Divine Dilemma and Its Solution in the Incarnation—We have a dilemma:
(1) On one hand, “It would, of course, have been unthinkable that God should go back upon His word and that man, having transgressed, should not die.”
(2) On the other hand, “it was equally monstrous that beings which once had shared the nature of the Word should perish and turn back again into non-existence through corruption.”
—Why wouldn’t repentance be good enough? Because, it was more than a trespass, it was a corruption of human nature. Grace was needed. For this purpose, “the incorporeal and incorruptible and immaterial Word of God entered our world.”
—The Word did not just become embodied or appear to be human, he took a real human body, a pure body in the womb of a virgin untainted by intercourse with man.
—Since our bodies are corruptible to death, and God is not, He took a body, and became a body, so that he could surrender his body unto death, in our place.
—Being God, He cannot remain dead, and thus rises from the dead. We too, die in Him, and rise in Him because of Him.
The Divine Dilemma and Its Solution in the Incarnation—continued—Because of our limitations, we cannot come to know God on our own.
God reveals himself to us through Jesus Christ, since it is only through perceiving and apprehending our Maker can we be happy.
—Men have turned themselves away from God. They created false idols, invented false gods to worship, honored created things rather than the creator, and they traced the cause of everything to the stars with no need of God.
—3 ways open to know God: (1) look up to the Heavens, ponder knowledge
(2) converse w/ holy men who knew about God
(3) follow the law
Should God let these men just turn away and revert to brutes? No, then he would have been better off never having raised them from brute level in the first place.
Could God have left the task to holy men to save men? No. Even the best of men are sinners, so how can those blinded help others?
—God became Man so that men, no longer comprehending God above, might see God in the world. He stayed around and performed works awhile before dying and rising so that man could contemplate this.
—The Word is both present as a particular human body and outside controlling the universe and being in all things.
—He was not defiled by being in a body. Rather, he sanctified the body by being it it.
—His miracles prove that he is not mere man, but also God, the one who controls nature.
The Death of Christ (19-25)—Christ’s bodily death, as much as His other acts, reveals that He is God and Son of God.
—He surrenders his life in our place, on our behalf, to pay the debt that must be paid.
—“two opposite marvels took place at once: the death of all was consummated in the Lord's body; yet, because the Word was in it, death and corruption were in the same act utterly abolished.”
—He allowed Himself to die because that was the reason he had taken a body, and preventing death would impede the Resurrection.
—His death had to be public, otherwise no one would have believed his Resurrection. They would have just thought he never died and was lying.
The Resurrection (26-32)—He waited until the 3rd day to rise so that no one could accuse Him of not really being dead.
—He waited one whole day to show that He was truly dead, then rose on the 3rd day, because if he waited any longer, people might have forgotten about Him.
—Death is now conquered. We no longer fear it, but rather despise it and face it head on.
Refutation of the Jews (33-40)—Jews who disbelieve that the Word would become man are misreading their own Scriptures.
—Athanasius uses ambiguous Scripture passages to “prove” that Jesus’ life, death, and Resurrection were foretold.
—He says Jesus is the only one who fits all the prophecies, i.e. being born of a virgin, by his stripes we are healed, etc, etc.
—Old Testament figures performed some of the prophecies some of the time, e.g. Elijah raised a dead man. But, no one fulfilled all the prophecies other than Jesus.
Refutation of the Gentiles (41-45)—The Gentiles argue it is unfitting for the Word to take a body, to take on human nature. Athanasius says, if it is fitting for the Word to create the world and enter into it to provide it with light and movement, etc, then why would it be out of bounds for the Word to take a body?
—Why become man instead of something more majestic like the moon or sun? The Word came not to show off, but to heal and teach suffering men.
—Further, nothing had erred from the path that God had made for it, from its purpose, except for man, who did stray.
Why not save man through an act of His will, like creation? He created from His will alone because there is no existence yet. But, man fell in existence, therefore he used the tools of existence, a human body, to save man.
Refutation of the Gentiles continued (46-55)—Athanasius explains that Christ is greater than all the pagan gods and idols that people have worshipped.
-More proof of Christ is the growing number of Christians and the shrinking number of evil pagan rites.
Conclusion (56-57)—To understand these truths and come to faith, we first must make ourselves right in God’s eyes. Just as you need to wipe your eyes first before looking at sunlight, or visit a city first in order to see it, we must cleanse our lives and imitate the saints to understand the minds of sacred writers.
# posted by SeanPatrick @ 9:57 AM 
