On to challenge number three. It sounds like it would be pretty hard to hard to deal with…
If man is not omniscient and God is omniscient, how can Jesus be fully God and fully man, since Jesus cannot be both omniscient and not omniscient at the same time? It seems to violate the law of non-contradiction.
The solution is actually simpler than you may imagine, and it comes from an unlikely source, the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle.
This material comes from Ron Nash’s excellent Life’s Ultimate Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy.
Aristotle was the first to make the distinction between necessary and merely general (or common) attributes (or essential and nonessential properties).
An essential property is one in which its loss causes the thing to stop being what it is. Roundness is an essential property of a basketball. If it’s not round, it’s not a basketball.
One can say that basketballs are an orange-brown color. This would generally be true, but not necessarily so. A blue (or any other color) basketball is still a basketball. Orange-brown color is a common property of basketballs, but it is not essential.
Human beings have many common properties—ten fingers, two legs, etc. But these properties are not essential to being human. One can lose a finger or a leg and still be fully human.
No human can run a mile in under one minute. If someone were born who could, he would be utterly unique. However, would he lose his claim to humanity? No.
Lack of omniscience or omnipotence are common human properties, but they are not essential properties. Just because it is highly unusual for a human being to possess omniscience, there is no reason to say that one stops being human because he does.
Jesus was fully human, but not merely human (as we are). Having Jesus’ divine attributes combined with His human attributes does not destroy His humanness.
So if I understand this right, you’re saying that it’s physically possible for the human brain to hold the entire knowledge of God? If so, science says that we only use about 10% of our brain power – so can we then say that God knows 90% more than man? 😉
What about omnipresence? Is that a general attribute of God?
Nope. I’m just saying that if someone were born who could (say Jesus of Nazareth), it wouldn’t disqualify him as human—albeit not merely human.
The contradiction would be to say that Jesus was merely human and Jesus was not merely human. But we are not saying that. Jesus was God AND man.
As far as omnipresence… Christ, as God, was omnipresent, since this is an essential attribute of God. Jesus’ human nature was not omnipresent. His human body filled a particular place in space.
I’m not saying that we can fully understand all of the metaphysical implications of the incarnation—just that the concept is not a logical impossibility.
I have always questioned exactly what omnipresence meant? Since God is spirit then he doesn’t have a physical form and as such isn’t really “present” anywhere.
I like to think of omnipresence as a sort of by-product of omniscience and omnipotence. If one truly knows everything and one is all-powerful so that he can truly interact with everything then in a sense he is everywhere. At least that makes more sense to me … I think the idea of omnipresence comes from anthropomorphic texts which are stated in “metaphorical” ways so that they make more sense to our human way of thinking rather than actually describing the way God is in a relationship with creation.
I haven’t really looked into this particular area much other than my own random thoughts so please feel free to prove me wrong on this.
Yeah, there are a number of God’s attributes that are easy to grasp on the surface level, but become more elusive as we try to apply more philosophical/metaphysical definitions. I’d include God’s eternality (does He experience time) and immutability (God is perfect and never changes and yet He acts) as tough ones to define.
I’ve got lot more study and thinking to do on those myself, but I tend to agree with your thought that omnipresence is probably an outflow of omniscience and omnipotence.
But however we cash it out, Jesus’ divine nature retained omnipresence.
What about immortality? Is that a general or essential attribute of the divine nature?
Immortality is something that humans also possess. When the physical body dies the spirit/soul continues to exist. Looked at in this way I do not think it causes a problem for the divine/human nature issue.
Here are a bunch of random thoughts (I am trying to catch up to the conversation). School is bearing down hard and I don’t have as much time to keep up.
Please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems to me that if Aristotle’s teaching is true on the hypostatic union, then we have a serious problem. Jesus’ humanity was more than merely an “accidental” or common property. It is important to see that humanity is an “essential” property to the Incarnation. Yet we must also keep the two natures distinct in our understanding to avoid heresy. The two do not become mixed into one nature. This biblical position was clarified at the Council of Chalcedon and it is reflected in the Westminster Confession of Faith, “So that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures, the Godhead and the manhood, were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion (8:2).” To say (as Aristotle seems to) that Jesus had a human nature, and even beyond that, a divine nature added to it, is to say that he really is not human at all. The humanity is confused with the divine and becomes dissolved (if you will). To borrow Aristotle’s terminology, it is “essential” that Jesus is both human and divine. To say that Jesus is not just merely human, connotes that he is humanity-plus divine. Whereas the biblical view is that the two should not be confused in such a way.
You can probably predict my response to the problem of applying metaphysical/philosophical definitions to biblical revelation: “Why do we need to?” Is it because we are presupposing autonomy?
God is omnipresent. That is what the Bible teaches. It goes a little farther than he knows what is going on at all times and is working through all things, though I believe you are right in seeing the connection. He is actually there.
“Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me” (Psalm 139:7-10).
As far as the question about immorality- God is not a creature. He IS life itself. He is the origin of life. He goes beyond immortal- he is eternal. Unlike us, God did not have a beginning. Immortality refers to not being subject to death, eternal means that God is without beginning or end.
I guess I’m not seeing the issue. Aristotle did not address the Jesus’ natures directly. He just made the distinction between common and essential properties. The only point is that lack of omniscience (or any of the other omni-s) is not an essential property of humanity. That fact that Jesus was omniscient did not disqualify him as truly human. I don’t see how that denies the essentialness of Christ’s humanity. Nothing in my point is meant to speak to the nature of the union of the two natures.
I don’t see how saying that Jesus is not merely human confuses the two natures. The alternative is to say that Jesus is merely human, which we would reject, no?
Eric,
First, let me say that I like Nash’s use of Aristotle to attempt to solve the philosophical problem of the incarnation. If I read it correctly, he is basically stating that there are essential properties to being God and essential properties to being human. Christ in the incarnation had both sets of essential properties so that is how he is both truly God and truly man.
I think this works at a high logical level (your example that being limited in knowledge is not an essential attribute of humanity), but I am not sure it works when you get down into the details. First, I do not think it is possible to actually determine which properties are essential to make someone human. For example, people with mental handicaps are still human though they cannot do much of what we consider normal “human” behavior. Those born without legs are still considered human though they do not have the normal human form.
Secondly, to me most descriptions of what it means to be human are descriptions of how we are like or not like the God in whose image we were created (i.e. we are physical, we are mortal, we are temporal, we have the capacity to love, we have personality, etc.). This also causes a problem for Nash’s argument because most of the properties then become a matter of degree (we have capacity for knowledge while God knows everything, we have the ability to manipulate and influence the world while God is omnipotent, etc) and not whether or not we possess them.
Jason, as a side note – I still think that the verses you used for omnipresence are more anthropomorphic in nature than actually descriptive. First, they take place in poetic language which is often more “metaphorical”. Second, even within the verses you cited God is shown to have a right hand which is holding them showing the anthropomorphic language of the verses. In the long run I think the implications from the verses are the same no matter which view of omnipresence one holds to. It just becomes a minor philosophical issue, which are usually the ones which are debated the most :). My view of omnipresence also doesn’t really fix the problem of the incarnation for most people since one of the biggest issues in the incarnation is how Jesus can be omniscient and still grow in knowledge (which is really outside the scope of Nash’s argument as well).
To turn from the philosophical issue to a more theological bent, I think it is interesting to think about why the Christ had to be truly human and truly divine. Obviously there are many off-shoots of Christianity which do not believe it is a requirement (Mormonism – that Jesus was more of a “demigod” or Jehovah’s Witnesses – that Jesus was the Archangel Michael). So, why did the Christ have to be both God and man?
Personally, one of my favorite reasons is seen in Jesus’ role as mediator. A mediator operates as someone who understands the positions of both parties involved so that an understanding between the two can be met. Only Jesus, the God-man, can truly mediate between the Father and humanity as only he can understand both positions – Job 9:32-33, 1 Tim 2:5.
Eric, my apologies, I think I understand now. I misunderstood the argument. I guess it is Greek to me. I often over think an issue, making it more complicated than it is. I do think that Matt has some good questions and seems to have exposed some weaknesses in the argument.
Matt, leaving aside your approach to interpreting the Psalms (I agree with the acknowledgement of genre and anthropomorphic language, but I don’t think that lessens the validity of the books’ teaching), there are many verses that teach omnipresence.
Jeremiah 23:23-24 says, “Am I a God at hand, declares the LORD, and not a God afar off? Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares the LORD. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares the LORD.”
Acts 17:27-28, “Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for “‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said, “‘ For we are indeed his offspring’.”
Even when the scripture speaks anthropomorphically to describe God, it doesn’t lessen the truth of the reality the language is seeking to convey. In order to use language for such a representation of God, it has to be presupposed that God transcends every limitation of time and space. The early church wrestled with the issue of God’s omnipresence, and many did believe in his omnipresence of will, but not of being. Therefore, I don’t mean to say that this is a simple matter, but the church began to develop the doctrine of God more fully as the ages continued. If you think about it, the concept of “space” itself presupposes the immensity of God. Herman Bavinck said it this way, “Space is a mode of existence that pertains to finite creatures, and not to the Infinite, not to God.” Space itself, as a reality, is sustained by God and does not limit him.
I agree with you about the doctrine of the mediator- what a great truth in the scriptures. It is very cool that it is found in Job, and Old Testament book.
Jason,
I do not know that I am fully convinced but I am definitely going to be rethinking my views on omnipresence. At the very least I am no longer fully convinced of my own view.
As a side note your bringing up space and creation made me realize that omnipresence cannot be an “essential” property of deity. By definition an “essential” property of God is something that he must have or he would not be God. The problem is that omnipresence requires creation, which in itself is not an “essential”. Thus omnipresence must be an “accidental” property. I am not sure if one can make an “essential” property based on a conditional one, “If God creates then he must be omnipresent”.
This doesn’t deny the classical definition of omnipresence, it just made me look at in the categories that Nash was suggesting and if you wanted to use his argument it would still work with that particular attribute. Though like I said in my previous post I still have some issues with Nash’s argument overall.
I like the discussion on omnipresence. Maybe I’ll dedicate a future post to it, and we can develop it further.
Just to clarify… You can pick any of the attributes of God that appear to disqualify Jesus from humanity and plug it into the scenario.
Also… I think the difficulty that Matt raises with defining what are essential properties of humanity only serves to strengthen the defense. The original objection is an affirmative one. The claim is made that the concept of fully God and fully man is logically impossible. We are pointing out that an assumption of the argument is that the lack of some divine attribute is essential to being human. It is the burden of the one making the claim to show how the limitation is essential to being human. If he cannot, then we have put down the objection.
In trying to catch up, where to start…. One thing we must remember in relationship to how the Church has historically approached this issue is that the Church Fathers were not so concerned with providing definition as to what the God-Man was in His makeup exclusively as much as they sought to describe what Jesus was not – “without conversion, composition, or confusion,” Council of Chalcedon. This is why Chalcedon was one of the council’s that received the nicknamed a “terminal council” since the subject matter was on the edge of human comprehendability (wow, I think I just coined a new word – hahaha). In other words, if the leadership moved to either side of the definition it would lead to earthy heresy or eternal damnation.
I think that is a wise approach to this level of subject matter as well. Defining what something is not helps set parameters as to what something is, but provides the needed flexibility that accommodates Divine mystery and human limitation.
Mr. Miller, where did you get the “terminal council” reference and what does that mean, i’ve never heard that? Also, could you clarify what you meant by saying that if the leadership moved to either side of the definition, it would lead to earthy heresy or eternal damnation?
Also, I agree with your last point. It is difficult for humans to understand such lofty concepts that reflect God, so unfortunately many of the Creeds tend toward defining God in terms of negative language (what he is not) rather than what he is. I am not sure how Chalcedon distinguishes itself in this way though.
I worry that this makes the notion of being human shallow. Don’t humans essentially have a first person experience that is unique but limited? I don’t think someone can be human in this way and be omniscient. We also know that in scripture depicts Jesus with certain limitations such as growing tired or needing sleep. Yet, Psalm 121:4 states that God doesn’t sleep. If being limited in this way is not an essential part of being human then why does Jesus have this limitation? Out of all the human limitations, doesn’t it make more sense to say that being human comes with at least some essential limitations that God by definition does not have?