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Christological Controversy: 1 Athanasius and Arius.

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Presentation on theme: "Christological Controversy: 1 Athanasius and Arius."— Presentation transcript:

1 Christological Controversy: 1 Athanasius and Arius

2 Question Why did Christology matter so much? Why couldn’t they agree to disagree? Does Christology still matter today?

3 Questions for your reading How does the author use scripture?  Which verses? What does he claim they mean?  Is he interpreting well? Does the author represent his opponent accurately?  Does he insult his opponent? Who is the Son: how is he the same as the Father or different from the Father? What does this have to do with salvation?  Why does this Son have to be like or different from the Father to be the Savior?

4 Background: Stages of debate Early Christian experience (30s-100s)  Paul: Jesus’ message actualized in resurrection  Jesus is Lord; God is one  “Sing hymns to Christ as to a god” (Pliny’s letter) Reflection on experience (100s-200s)  Logos is divine but subordinate “Second in command” (Justin Martyr)  Jesus is truly human, suffered (Irenaeus, et al)

5 Christological Controversy New stage Breaks out 310s and 320s: why? Question: If Jesus really suffered, how could he be God, too?  Accepts that Jesus’ suffering is central for salvation  Accepts that God cannot suffer or change Central figures: Arius and Athanasius

6 Arius Priest from Alexandria, Egypt Taught that Christ was divine but not exactly like God the Father: “There was [a time] when he was not”  Why was this controversial?  What are the implications?

7 Arian claims “Creed”: one God, begotten Son  Anti-Marcion, Valentinus, Sabellius  Three “hypostases” (persons) Son not eternal (“was not before he was begotten”)  Son is the highest of creatures  Son is agent of creation Son is divine but lesser than Father  Son could change and suffer, unlike Father

8 Council of Nicea (325) First “ecumenical” council Reflects major turning point of Constantinian Christianity  Council called by emperor: What does this suggest about church-state relations?  Another example: Donatist controversy: why did Constantine intervene in 316? Major conclusion: Son is “of one substance” (homo-ousios) with the Father  Doctrine is a middle ground between extremes of Sabellian modalism and “adoptionism” (Paul of Samosata)  Arius condemned, but his supporters persisted for centuries  Source of the first part of the Nicene creed (finished at Council of Constantinople in 381) New questions arose, debated at later councils

9 Athanasius (ca. 300-373) Author of Life of Antony Bishop in Alexandria: 328-335, 337-339, 346-356, 361- 363, 363-365, 366-373  But deacon in 325; secretary for Bishop Alexander at Nicea Major opponent of Arius Big idea: Son is “one in being with the Father” (Greek: homoousios)  Son is equal to Father, not subordinate  Son exists eternally with Father  Son/Logos suffered “in the flesh”: is this good enough? Is Christ, the Word made flesh, really human?

10 Argument, Orations Against the Arians, Book 3 Refute arguments of Arians  Insult their piety  Recount their biblical arguments Son distinct from Father Jesus confesses ignorance Jesus prayed to Father Jesus forsaken by Father on cross  Arian argument: If Jesus is God, how could he be human [=suffer]? Presupposition: divinity cannot suffer or change

11 Athanasius’ response Son is eternal with Father  Like the radiance of the light Scripture gives a “double account” of Christ (87)  Logos: “Always has been God and is the Son”  Flesh: Eternal Logos became a human being (88), did not merely enter into one. What is the difference?  Christ (one subject) experienced things proper to Logos and proper to flesh  Acts proper to one can be predicated of the other  So, the Logos suffered “in the flesh” and when the flesh suffered, the Logos “was not apart from it”

12 Salvation Logos bore human weakness, sins, but was not harmed  Liberated humanity from “properties of flesh”  Destroyed passions  Transferred human origin and weakness from Adam (mortal) to Logos (immortal)  Adage: What was not assumed was not healed Union of divine and human in himself divinized humanity  Adage: God became human that humans might become God


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