The Dogmatic
Controversies and the Ecumenical Councils in the East
A) Introduction:
Christianity in the ancient
times was not spared of many attacks of different natures. First there was the great persecution
(64-311) which produced great martyrs in the Church. Second, there was
religious laxity, which posed a threat to an authentic living of Christian life
after it experienced physical freedom. Third, there the surge of great
theological reflections and ideas which, if unguarded, would have also watered down
the great Christian conviction espoused by the Church. This third threat to the
orthodoxy or catholicity of Christian faith, was
focused on the questions of the real identity of Christ and the relationship of
the three Persons in the Trinity.
B) Early Christological Heresies:
1) Ebionites - Jewish
Christians who accepted the Gospel of Matthew. Jesus for them became human at
his baptism through the Holy Spirit
a)
Jesus is gifted with extraordinary prophetic gifts, but denied his
pre-existence and divine sonship.
b)
Jesus is the real son of Joseph. Some groups, however, would hold that Jesus is
the son of Mary and Holy Spirit; denied pre-existence.
2) Adoptionism - God
adopted the man Jesus as his son, at his baptism. His sonship is not
pre-existent.
3) Gnosticism - dualism of matter and spirit, of
good and evil, with two Christological postions:
a)
Jesus and Christ are two distinct persons. Incarnation happens when the Christ descended on the man Jesus at his
baptism and this same Christ left Jesus before the time of his passion.
b)
Jesus was mere human, and union with Christ is just temporary.
4) Docetism - this heresy
diminished the humanity of Jesus. The body of Jesus is only 'apparent', and
they denied the actions of Jesus improper to divinity, like getting angry,
hungry, feeling pain, etc.
5) Monarchianism - admits
the divinity of Jesus, but the Persons of the Trinity (Father, Son and Holy
Spirit) were just names of three different modes (Modalism)
Many early Christian writers fought against these heresies.
They are: 1) Clement of f) Origen g) Novatian
C) The 1st Ecumenical Councils,
Major Heresies, proponents, and the events surrounding them:
1)
§
This council was convoked by Constantine himself as he saw the
disintegration of the Church in the East. He later exiled Arius
and banned him from the Empire. The Church excommunicated him after he refused
to recant his heretical teaching.
§
It condemned Arianism: the Son is not equal
with the Father; therefore, not divine, but he is higher than any human being.
§
Arianisn started by Arius
(260-336), a priest of Baucalis,
§
He wrote: "Before he was
begotten or created or ordained or established, he did not exist [J. Pelikan, The
Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1971), pp. 192-193.]." Jesus for him is not true
God, lesser than God, but also greater than any human being.
§
The Nicene Fathers (bishops in the council) accepted the non-biblical
Greek term 'homoousios'
(the Son is 'of the same substance'
with the Father) - Jesus Christ, true God from true God against the Arians' 'homoiousios'
- The Son 'was like the Father' (a very vvague term).
2)
§
This Council was convened in order to re-condemn the Arian heresy as
well as to dogmatically define the Divinity of the Holy Spirit.
§
The followers of Macedonius, the Macedonians,
held that the Holy Spirit was merely a creature, thus not divine.
§
In answer: the Council Fathers added in the Nicene Creed "…and in
the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son ('filioque'),
who with the Father and the Son is together worshipped and together
glorified, who spoke through the prophets…"
§
Controversy: the East does not accept the 'filioque', since they believed that the
HS proceeds from the Father through
the Son not proceeds from the Father and
the Son.
The
Nicene-Constantinople Creed:
We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth of all that is seen
and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from
true God, begotten, not made, one in Being (homoousios)
with the Father. Through him all things were made. For us men and our salvation
he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the
Virgin Mary, and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius
Pilate; he suffered, died, and was buried. On the third day he rose again in
fulfillment of the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the
right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the
giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son (filioque).
With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken
through the Prophets. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We
acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the
resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.
Amen.
3)
§
This Council was convoked in order to clearly define the two natures of
Christ - divine and the human. As a consequence, it declared the dogma of the
Divine Motherhood of Mary. The main proponent of this Council was St. Cyril,
Patriarch of Alexandria.
§
Heresy: Nestorius, Patriarch of
Constantinople, taught that in Christ there were not only two nature (human and
divine), but also two persons.
§
Consequences of his heresy:
1) Jesus' natures are distinct and separated
2) There is no Incarnation of Jesus - in incarnation, the divine became human, and so they are united but distinct. For Nestorius, divine and human natures of Jesus are divided.
4) There will be two Jesus existing: one is divine Jesus, the other is human Jesus.
5) Mary is not the 'Mother of God' (Theotokos); she is just the 'Mother of Christ' (Christotokos), the human being
§
Answer to the heresy: For this reason the Council of Ephesus
proclaimed:
1) In Christ, there is
one Person (the Son of God), who has Divine nature from all eternity and a
human nature from the moment he assumed at the Incarnation.
2) Christ's
human and divine natures are distinct but united, so that when Jesus was born
of the Virgin Mary, God was also born; when
Jesus wept, God wept; when Jesus died on the cross,
God also died.
3) Mary,
the mother of the Incarnate Word, can then rightfully be called the Mother of God (Theotokos)
4)
§
Pope Leo and Emperor Marcian convoked this
Council in order to assert the Catholic doctrine against the heresies of Eutyches and Monophysitisms (one substance).
§
Heresy: Christ has only one Person
(divine) and only one nature (divine). The human nature became absorbed to the
divine nature on being united to it. Thus, it remained one nature.
§
Answer of the Council: the Council Father clearly defined terms:
1) 'hypostatic union' - the Council proclaimed the
Doctrine of 'Hypostatic Union' (i.e, there are two natures,
the Divine and human, joined to each in the One Divine Person of the God the Son).
D) The Summary of the Church's Christological Doctrines:
d.1) At the time appointed by God, the
only Son of the Father, the eternal Word, that is, the Word and substantial
Image of the Father, became incarnate; without losing his divine nature he has
assumed human nature.
d.2)
Jesus
Christ is true God and true man, in the unity of his divine person; for this
reason he is the one and only mediator between God and men.
d.3)
Jesus
Christ possesses two natures, one
divine and the other human, not confused, but united in the one person of God's Son.
d.4)
Christ,
being true God and true man, has a human intellect and will, perfectly attuned
and subject to his divine intellect and divine will, which he has in common
with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
d.5)
The
Incarnation is therefore the mystery of the wonderful union of the divine and
human natures in the one person of the Word.
Sources:
Bokenkotter, Thomas. A Concise History of the Catholic Church (New York: Image Books, 1977).
Franzen, August and John Dolan. A History of the Church, trans. Peter Becker (Montreal: Palm Publishers, 1965).
Lapple, Alfred. The Catholic Church, A Brief History, trans. Peter Heinegg (New York: Paulist Press, 1982)
Notes on Church History (Don Bosco Center of Studies, 2000-2001).
Notes on Patrology (Don Bosco Center of Studies, 2000-2001).
Synthesis papers of Rev. Gerry Martin, 2002, unpublished.
Websites:
http://www.memorare.com/liturgy/theology.html
http://clawww.lmu.edu/faculty/fjust/John/Patristics-Councils.html
"We confess that one and the same Christ, Lord, and only-begotten Son, is to be acknowledged in two natures without confusion, change, division or separation. The distinction between the natures was never abolished by their union, but rather the character proper to each of the two natures was preserved as they came together in one person (prosopon) and one hypostasis."
"What he was, he remained and what he was not, he assumed", sings the Roman Liturgy. And the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom proclaims and sings: "O only-begotten Son and Word of God, immortal being, you who deigned for our salvation to become incarnate of the holy Mother of God and ever-virgin Mary, you who without change became man and were crucified, O Christ our God, you who by your death have crushed death, you who are one of the Holy Trinity, glorified with the Father and the Holy Spirit, save us!"