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 INCARNATION

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INCARNATION

thought the two natures were intermingled into one. Others are said to have worked out some sort of a conversion of the human into the Divine. All were condemned by the Council of Chalcedon (451). This Fourth General Council of the Church defined that Jesus Christ remained, after the Incarnation, "per- fect in Divinity and perfect in humanity . . . con- substantial with the Father according to His Divinity, consubstantial with us according to His humanity . . . one and the same Christ, the Son, the Lord, the Only begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures not intermingled, not changed, not divisible, not sepa- ral)le" (see Denzinger, n. 14S). By this condemnation of error and definition of truth, the dogma of the In- carnation was once again saved to the Church. Once again a large portion of the faithful of the Oriental Church were lost to their mother. Monophysitism resulted in the national Churches of Syria, Egypt, and Armenia. These national Churches are still heretic, although there have in later times been formed Catho- lic rites called the Catholic Syriac, Coptic, and Ar- menian rites. The Catholic rites, as the Catholic Chaldaic rite, are less nvunerous than the heretic rites.

(:i) One would suppose that there was no more room for heresy in the explanation of the mystery of the nature of the Incarnation. There is always room for heresy in the matter of explanation of a mystery, if one does not hear the infallible teaching body to whom and to whom alone Christ entrusted His mys- teries to have and to keep and to teach them till the end of time. Three patriarchs of the Oriental Church gave rise, so far as we know, to the new heresy. These three heresiarchs were Sergius, the Patriarch of Con- stantinople, Cyrus, the Patriarch of Alexandria, and .Vthanasius, the Patriarch of Antioch. St. Sophro- nius, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, remained true and delated his fellow patriarchs to Pope Honorius. His successor in the see of Peter, St. Martin, bravely con- demned the error of the three Oriental patriarchs, who admitted the decrees of Nica'a, Ephesus, and Chalcc- ilon; defended the union of two natures in one Divine Person; but denied that this Divine Person had two wills. Their principle was expressed by the words, Iv Bi'K'qiia Kal fila ivipyeia, by which they would seem to have meant one will and one activity, i. e. only one principle of action and of suffering in Jesus Christ and that one principle Divine. These heretics were called Monothelites. Their error was condemned Ijy the Sixth General Council (the Third C'ouncil of Con- stantinople, 6S0). It defined that in Christ there were two natural wills and two natviral activities, the Divine and the human; and that the human will was not at all contrary to the Divine, but ratlier perfectly sulijpct thereto (Denzinger, n. 291). The Emperor Constaiis sent St. Martin into e.\ile in Cher.sonesus. We have trace of only one body of Monothelites. The Maronites, founded aljout the monastery of John Maron, were converted from Monothelism in the time of the Crusades and have been true to the Faith ever since. The other Monothelites seem to have been absorberl in Monophysitism, or in the schism of the Byzantine Church later on.

The error of Monothelism is clear from the Scrip- ture as well as from tradition. Christ did acts of adoration (John, iv, 22), humility (Matt., xi, 29), reverence (Heb., v, 7). These acts are those of a human will. The Monothelites denied that there was a human will in (^hrist. .lesus prayed: "Father, if Thou wilt, remove this chalice from me; but yet not my will, but thine be done" (I.uke. xxii, 42). Here there is question of two wills, the Father's and Christ's. The will of Christ was subject to the will of the Father. " .\s the Father hath given nie commandment, so do I" (John, xiv,:U). He became obeilient even unto death (Phil., ii, 8). The Divine will in Jesus could not have been subject to the will of the Father, with which will it was really identified.

(4) Thus far we have that which is of Faith in this matter of the nature of the Incarnation. The human and Divine natures are united in one Divine Person so as to remain that exactly which they are, namely, Divine and human natures with distinct and perfect activities of their own. Theologians go farther in their attempts to give some account of the mystery of the Incarnation, so as, at least, to show that there is therein no contradiction, nothing that right reason may not safely adhere to. This union of the two natures in one Person has been for centuries called a hypostatic union, that is, a union in the Divine Hy- postasis. What is an hj-postasis? The definition of Boethius is classic: rationalis natura indiridua sub- stantiii (P. L., LXIV, 1.343), a complete whole whose nature is rational. This book is a complete whole; its nature is not rational; it is not an hypostasis. .\n hypostasis is a complete rational individual. St. Thomas defines hypostasis as fiubstantia cum ultimo complemento (III, Q. ii, a. 3, ad 2 ni)^ a sub- stance in its entirety. Hypostasis superadds to the notion of rational substance this idea of entirety; nor does the idea of rational nature include this notion of entirety. Human nature is the principle of human activities; but only an hypostasis, a person, can exercise these activities. The Schoolmen discuss the question whether the hypostasis has anything more of reality than human nature. To understand the discussion, one must needs be versed in scholastic philosophy. Be the case as it may in the matter of human nature that is not united with the Divine, the human nature that is hypostatically united with the Divine, that is, the human natiirc that the Divine Hypo.stasis or Person a.ssumes to Itself, has certainly more of reality united to it than the human nature of Christ would have were it not hypostatically united in the Word. The Divine Logos identified with Divine nature (Hypostatic Union) means then that the Divine Hypostasis (or Person, or Word, or Logos) appropriates to It.self human nature, and takes in every respect the place of a human person. In this way, the human nature of Christ, though not a human person, loses nothing of the perfection of the perfect man; for the Divine Person supplies the place of the human.

It is to be remembered that, when the Word took Flesh, there was no change in the Word; all the change was in the Flesh. At the moment of conception, in the womb of the Blessed Mother, through the force- fulness of Gotl's activity, not only was the human soul of Christ created but the Word assumed the man that was conceived. When God created the world, the world was changed, that is, it passed from the state of nonentity to the stale of existence; and there was no change in the Logos or Creative Word of tiod the Father. Xor was there change in that Logos when it began to terminate the human nature. A new rela- tion ensued, to be sure; but this new relation implied in the Logos no new reality, no real change; all new reality, all real change, was in the human nature. Anyone who wishes to go into this very intricate question of the manner of the Hypostatic Union of the two natures in the one Divine Personality may with great profit read St. Thomas (III, q. iv, a. 2); Scotus (in III, Dist. i); (De Tncarnatione, Disp. II, sec. 3); Gregory of Valentia (in III, D. i, q. 4). Any modern text book on theology will give various opinions in reganl to the way of the union of the Person assuming with the nature assumed.

III. Effects of the Incarnation. — (1) On Christ Himxnlf.—.\. On the Body of Christ.— Did union with the Divine nature do away with all bodily inperfec- tions? The Monophysites were split up into two parties by this question. Catholics hold that, before the Resvirrection, the Body of Christ was subject to all the boihly weaknesses to which human nature unassumed is universally subject; such are hunger,