The Fallacy of the Doctrine of
Hypostatic Union
INTRODUCTION
The belief that Jesus Christ is
God-Incarnate, although unbiblical, gains a large following even today.
Proponents of this concept subscribe to a doctrine technically called the Hypostatic
Union, meaning that there are two natures - both human and divine,
subsisting in one person, the Lord Jesus Christ. For those who accept this
formula, Jesus of Nazareth is one and the same person as God and the Son, the
Second Person of Trinity. This concept was defined by the Council of Chalcedon
in 451 A.D. The creed reads:
Following, then, the holy Fathers,
we all with one voice teach that it should be confessed that our Lord Jesus
Christ is one and the Same Son, the Same perfect Godhead, the Same perfect
manhood, truly God and truly man, the Same [consisting] of a rational soul and
body; homoousios with the Father as to Godhead, excepted; begotten of
the Father before ages as to His Godhead, and in the last days and the same homoousios
with us as to his manhood; in all things like unto us, sin only excepted;
begotten of the Father before ages as to His Godhead, and in the last days, the
Same, for us and for our salvation, of Mary the virgin Theotokos as to
his manhood; One and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only begotten, made known in
two natures [which exist] without confusion, without change, without division,
without separation; the difference of the natures having been in no wise taken
away by reasons of the union, but rather the properties of each being
preserved, and [both] concurring into one Person remained faithful to
Chalcedonian orthodoxy. (Microsoft® Encarta® Reference® Library 2003).
THE PROBLEM OF THE HYPOSTATIC UNION
The problem with the Chalcedonian
concept of Christ is in the fact that the Council in effect merely asserted
that Jesus was "truly God and truly man" without attempting to say
how such a paradox is possible. Merely to assert that two different natures
coexisted in Jesus without confusion, without change, without division, without
separation, is to utter a form of words which as yet has no specified meaning.
The formula sets before us a "mystery" rather than a "clear and
distinct idea." Further, this is not a divine mystery but one that was
created by human beings meeting at Chalcedon in present-day Turkey in the
mid-fifth century (Hick 1993:48).
IT IS A CONCEPT THAT IS AGAINST THE
BIBLE
If Christ was one individual who was
truly God and truly man, then the properties and activities of either the human
or the divine nature might with equal truth be attributed to him. If God truly
became man, while remaining God, one might say of him that God was born of the
Virgin Mary, grew as a child, became an adult, and interestingly, God died on
the cross. For some, they were able to accept this impossibility that God died.
A Catholic Cathecism reports:
"Because Jesus is
one Person who lives in two distinct natures, one can truthfully say of the Son
of God whatever is the true of Him in either of His natures. He suffered and
died in His human nature, and He is God, and so we may say that God suffered
and died. This is literally true..."
(Lawler 1976:100)
Catholic and Protestant apologists
would go to distance in trying to defend a false doctrine by accepting without
any hesitation that the God of the universe died! This position greatly
contradicts or truly violates one of the innate attributes of God which is
immortality. The Bible says in 1 Timothy 1:17:
"Now the kings of ages,
immortal, invisible, the only God, be honour and glory for ever and ever.
Amen." (Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition).
THE DIVINE ATTRIBUTES
The Bible clearly defines the
attributes of God. He is immutable or unchanging (Malachi 3:6). The doctrine of
Incarnation which means that God took human form: that is, from being a pure
spirit, he became flesh and blood; violates the doctrine of God's immutability.
The biblical proof that even when Christ was here on earth, God did not change
his form and his true nature is clear from the teaching of Christ that God is
spirit (John 4:24), a being without flesh and bones (Luke 24:39). Apostle Paul
clarified that the eternal God is invisible (1 Timothy 1:17). If it is true
that Christ took a human form, the change from being a spirit to human being
entailed an enormous change and clearly demonstrates that the so called
Incarnation of God is going against the biblical teaching concerning the true
nature of God.
Secondly, the Bible teaches that the
true God is omniscient or all-knowing (1 John 3:20). If Christ was a God-Man on
earth, there should not be any limit to his knowledge since supporters of this
doctrine contend that Jesus remained God even though he became a man. If the
concept is true, proponents would have to accept that Jesus had two minds, one
human and one divine. A perplexing question which becomes a big dilemma for
them would be to explain which mind was in control during Christ's early life.
Was the human mind conscious that Jesus was God the Son incarnate? Where is the
dividing line between the divine mind and human mind? And what does it mean to
be divine? Part of the biblical answer is that being divine consist in being
the eternal, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent and self-existent creator of
everything that exists. Was the divine mind in full operation or it took a back
seat while human mind was operating?
If the answer would be "both
mind were operating simultaneously" then why would Jesus, as God the Son,
being omniscient, deny any knowledge of his second coming? (Matthew 24:36 NIV).
It would appear then that an all-knowing God lied in the front of his disciples
while doing lecture on his second coming. That would make him a pretender and a
pathological liar of the highest caliber!
The Bible emphasizes that God is
omnipresent or ubiquitous (Psalm 139:8-10). This poses a problem to those who
support the idea that Jesus, as a God on earth, exist in heaven as the Second
Person of the Trinity due to his being omnipresent God. How could one reconcile
this idea with the biblical teaching that Christ had to ascent to heaven and be
seated at the right hand of God if he was there previously? The idea of
ascension suggests that he was not there yet prior to his ascension. Another
intriguing situation that remains unsolved is the idea that if Jesus had a
preexistence before his incarnation and dwelt on earth as both human and
divine, how can the one undivided self be at once unlimited (in heaven) and
limited (on earth)?
When proponents of Chalcedonian
creed are shown of biblical records that manifest the apparent construction of
a being who is God and yet lack the attributes of God, all that they can do is
to offer analogies which fail to reach the key issue, and then appeal to
mystery. As one Catholic author state:
"The Incarnation, for example,
is not understood by any moral intelligence. The Incarnation means that God
became man. How this was accomplished we do not know...we believe ... not
because we understand this mystery..." (Scott: 1927:10).
Thus, even if one were to grant the
possibility of God becoming incarnate as a physically human being who is
(always or sometimes) conscious of being divine, and thus eternal, omnipotent
and omniscient, still this would not be the Jesus of the Bible. If Jesus was
God-Man on earth, how would one reconcile the statements of Christ
recorded in the Scriptures that prove his glaring differences with the Father?
He emphatically taught that the "Father is greater than I!" (John
14:28). Was he an inferior God compared to the Father when he was here on
earth? What becomes of the Catholic doctrine that the Father and the Son are
equal if one is greater than the other?
How would one reconcile the divinity
of Christ with his prayer in which he didactically emphasized to his disciples
that they should recognize his Father in heaven as the only one true God (John
17:1-3)? Would a God on earth be praying to another God other than himself? If
that was the case, one God would be here on earth and another was in heaven -
the One whom the God-Man was praying to. The truth is, Jesus prayed to God and
was conscious that he was doing the will of the Father (Matthew 26:39).
It is true that God became a man and
he retained his divine nature while he was on earth, then why is there a need
for him to be "anointed by God with the Holy Spirit and power? Why
would the Scriptures say that "God was with him" if it is true that
he was a God on earth? (Acts 10:38).
The Bible does not mention of a
divine nature within Christ which comprises the other half of his person.
Instead, it emphatically asserts that 'God was in Christ" (2 Corinthians
5:19). Jesus Himself said so on numerous occasions (John 10:38; 14:10-11;
17:21). Apostle Peter echoed the same point when said the "how God
anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went
about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was
with Him" (Acts 10:38). God, who is a separate entity from Christ, is with
him by means of the Holy Spirit.
This fact was also clarified by
Peter in his sermon during the day of Pentecost, in which he stressed that
"Listen to these words, fellow Israelites! Jesus of Nazareth was a man
whose divine authority was clearly proven to you by all the miracles and
wonders which God performed through him" (Acts 3:33 TEV). Again, it is not
the divine nature of Christ that performed the miracles but God himself, an
omnipotent being who is distinct from Christ. It was Him who proved the divine
authority of Jesus by the miracles that He performed through him.
If the assertion that the Son is one
substance with the Father in regards to his Godhead, then Christ would not have
said, "the Father did not leave me alone" (John 8:29). His statement
affirms the biblical fact that He and the Father are not of one substance (cf.
Luke 24:39). This was reinforced by his admittance that "the Father is
greater than I" (John14:28). Would an intelligent mind accept the concept
of hypostatic union and disregards these unequivocal statements of Jesus
concerning the true God?
Thus, Chalcedonian Christology is a
humanly devised hypothesis, and a defective hypothesis cannot be save by dubbing
it as a divine mystery.
Unless otherwise noted, all
Scripture references were taken from the New King James Version.
REFERENCES
Grillmeier Aloys, S.J., Christ in
Christian Tradition, Volume 1, Second Revised Edition, translated by John
Bowden, John Knox, Anlanta (1975)
Hick, John, The Methaphor of God
Incarnate, Christology in a Pluralistic Age, Westminster/John Knox Press,
Louisville, Kentucy (1993)
Lawler, Ronald, ed., The Teaching
of Christ: A Catholic Catechism for Adults, Our Sunday Visitor, Inc.,
Huntington, Indiana (1976)
Microsoft® Encarta® Reference®
Library 2003). 1993-2002 Microsoft Corporation, All rights reserved
Scott, Martin J., S.J., Things
Catholics Are Asked About, P.J. Kennedy & Sons, New York (1927)
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