David Efrid’s post on Mysterianism has got me thinking of the problems that surround the orthodox doctrine of the Incarnation. Until recently I had not given much philosophical thought to the doctrine of the Incarnation. However, when I did begin to consider the doctrine from a philosophical perspective I was stunned by the number of contradictions that present themselves. I am sure there are plenty of things I should have read regarding this topic and I am sure many of you will be happy to point them out to me. So I would like to layout the problem for the doctrine of the Incarnation, and why I think it is contradictory, and then perhaps I can get some feedback as to how orthodox Christians can extract themselves from this problem.
The most basic version of the doctrine of the Incarnation states that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and Jesus Christ is God the Son. Hence, Jesus Christ has both a divine nature and a human nature referred to as hypostatic union. This hypostatic union is not a bit of one nature and a bit of another, but one in which Jesus Christ is fully divine and fully human in one person. I take a divine nature to be one that includes the various �O� attributes such as omniscience, uncreated, and eternal. Human nature might be a bit sketchier but I think we could say in consists of finite attributes such as limited knowledge, a point of creation, and a time of death. (I can already see where some will disagree here.)
In the long history of belief in the Incarnation certain boundaries have emerged for the orthodox Christian (OC) such that the OC must hold guard against sliding into various heretical beliefs. The OC will want to avoid Monophysitism which is the belief that the two natures are thoroughly combined into one nature. There are various versions of monophysitism some suggesting that one nature is absorbed by the other, or that a unique third nature is created. In a similar vein the OC must skirt Apollinarianism which is the belief that though Jesus Christ was a man he did not have a human mind but a divine mind. Further the OC must also shun Nestorianism which holds that the two natures of Jesus Christ are two distinct persons closely united. There are other heresies such as Docetism, but I think these are sufficient for the present.
At this point it looks like there is clearly little wiggle room for the OC. The OC must embrace a version of the Incarnation that appears to contain multiple contradictions, for the incarnate must be a single identity that is uncreated and created, omniscient and having limited knowledge, atemporal and temporal, omnipotent and having finite powers. Yet the attributes necessary for divinity are irreconcilable with those attributes required for humanity when restricted to a single individual. With so many logical contradictions it seems to me that the doctrine of the Incarnation cannot be true.
After thinking through the above I am also considering whether the doctrine is so incoherent that an individual could not actually hold it as a belief. This is of course a much stronger argument that will have to wait for another time.
So far as I am aware, Peter van Inwagen has presented the best solution to this problem. He suggests that we could understand the relation between Jesus and The Father to be an instance of relative identity and not strict identity. He doesn't argue that it is the relation expressed in the creeds, only that if it is, then no contradiction can be derived from them.
The workings of RI Logic have been worked out by different authors, for exposition and counterarguments, look at Rea, Geach, Hawthorne and vanInwagen.
The concept of "nature" confusing-Greek,Hebrew,Modern Western etc. Peter.
Christian-
I have read several papers, including Rea's, that employ relative identity to address the apparent contradiction of the Trinity, but I haven’t seen anyone employing RI to explain the Incarnation. I must confess that after reading Richard Cartwright’s essay "On the Logical Problem of the Trinity" (Philosophical Essays) I am dubious of RI’s ability to solve these kinds of problems. However, if you have a specific reference where I can find the relevant RI/Incarnation stuff in van Inwagen’s work I would be appreciative.
Matthew--I don't think van Inwagen's work contains the standard reference work on the Incarnation. Instead, the standard is Tom Morris' book The Logic of God Incarnate. The examples of contradictions you cite have fairly standard rejoinders. Distinguish between being merely human, subject to the limitations each of us experience, and being fully human. There is, at least, no logical problem with a human being having omniscience, or any of the other properties you cite (except perhaps atemporality, which has no justification from perfect being considerations anyway), since being human does not entail having these limitations (even if being merely human, such as we are, does entail that).
The harder questions concern the metaphysics of dual-nature-hood. Morris has some interesting ideas here, too, but they are not as persuasive as some of the other parts of the book.
Matthew, I think the piece Christian is talking about is "Not by Confusion of Substance But by Unity of Person" found in PvI's "God, Knowledge, & Mystery: Essays in Philosophical Theology." I haven't read it, but it looked interesting.
As to Christ's dual natures: I don't think they need be contradictory or incoherent. It could be that Christ chose to limit certain divine attributes when he assumed human nature. By choosing to limit his omnipotence, omniscience, etc. he could be said to have the necessary divine attributes modally while still fully human. The benefit of looking at it this way is that one wouldn't have to say that Christ is omnipotent and not omnipotent at the same time and in the same sense. By choosing to function humanly (finitely), his "O" attributes are set aside but still accessible by another choice. It doesn't seem implausible that Christ could have, at any time, decided he'd had enough and reassumed his divine attributes, even if that included shedding his human body and nature.
I haven't thought through this fully, but it seems to work. The key idea is that contradiction is avoided by saying that Christ assumes his human attributes by choice, but that he still has his divine attributes modally--he could be omniscient and so forth by choosing to be so. The power to choose to be omnipotent and omniscient is not in conflict with human limitations; it's just that most people don't have those kinds of options.
Not that it matters much; Jon Kvanvig's account of Morris' objections seems to take care of the problem pretty well.
Actually, I take that last bit back. I'm not sure the OC position has embodied-Christ as omnipotent and omniscient. In that case, Morris' standard objections (at least those Jon mentioned) wouldn't be relevant for dealing with Matthew's concerns. Hmmm.
John Hawthorne was working on the relative identity issue too, I think for an entry in the Oxford Handbook on Metaphysics or something with a similar name. I'm not sure it's been published yet. He found some problems with van Inwagen's approach, which he'd basically adapted from Geach, at least with the Trinity issue. I think van Inwagen had to go more on his own for the Incarnation paper. I have notes somewhere on what John Hawthorne said you have to say to have a workable relative identity view. It was pretty weird in the end.
Have you read the piece in Reason for the Hope Within? That's the only thing I've read on the Incarnation by a philosopher, and I didn't see any immediate problems with it.
On the question of omni properties, one can't simply affirm that Christ lacked those properties. On the usual understanding of divinity, these properties are not only characteristics of God, but essential characteristics of God. If so, nothing can be God while lacking them.
There are some complications here, but at least the simple kenotic theory that Christ "emptied himself" of these great-making properties won't work.
Here's a good condition of adequacy on an account of the dual natures: figure out the essential properties of being human and being divine, and if nothing could have both sets of essential properties, then the doctrine is incoherent. If they are coherent, then there isn't any logical problem with the doctrine.
This point is important, because it is very easy to point to properties God has that humans don't. That's relevant only if the properties are essential, for otherwise there's no reason to suppose that an entity has to have those properties in order to be either divine or human.
Thanks for all the helpful responses!
I was pleased when I arrived home from work today to find my copy of Reason for the Hope Within? had been delivered. I just finished reading Tom Senor’s essay “The Incarnation and the Trinity” which in part seems to run similar to what Jon has said. The idea that being fully human does not include several things I took to be rather essential is rather discomfiting. It leaves me wondering what we mean when we say humanity. Tom Senor seems a bit hesitant in the essay saying “The potential problem, then, is that while the malleability that we found in the concept of humanity might allow us to affirm the divinity and humanity of Christ, we might end up with an account of the Incarnation in which the Incarnate God’s ability to our condition, to “know it from the inside” as it were, is seriously imperiled.” He goes on to warn against falling into Apollinarianism, which is where this line of reasoning seems to lead. Senor ends by saying that the ball is now in the objector’s court. So I will have to give the essay some more consideration while I wait for Morris’ The Logic of God Incarnate. I am sure I will serve up a volley in the near future. :)
Reading Jeremy’s review of van Inwagen’s God Knowledge & and Mystery I see that he does not seem to think that the arguments will work. I would like to implore him to tell more.
Paul-
Thanks for the reference. Your suggested solution sounds like kenoticism which is the belief in the self-empting of God. Tom Senor makes mention of kenoticism in his essay as a possible option for replying to the objector. The problem for kenoticism is that if God truly emptied himself of divine attributes it seems that he is no longer fully divine, or possibly even not divine at all. I think I will have to set kenoticism aside for now because it does not look like a route that is open to the OC since I think the OC wants to maintain Christ’s omniscience and omnipotence.
I'm not going to be able to find my notes very easily. It's quite technical, and I wouldn't be able to reconstruct it. There are huge problems with relative identity, and you have to introduce a couple logical strictures to avoid them. John Hawthorne thinks he might have come up with a way, but it involves saying things Geach and van Inwagen didn't want to have to say.
Matthew--
If you take my course this fall, you'll read the relevant parts of the Morris book.
Tom
I look forward to it! Little did I realize when I talked to you how much work you have done on the Incarnation question. I felt fairly silly when Reason for the Hope Within? arrived.
(For those of you wondering what I am talking about I met Tom in person a couple of weeks ago. He asked me what I was interested in. I told him I had been thinking about the problem of the Incarnation and that it did not make sense at all. I imagine that I had quite a rant. Tom was real nice and never mentioned the several papers he has written on the topic. As these things turn out it seems that Tom’s line of reasoning runs counter to mine. I have to give Tom credit for not being a self-promoter and being so charitable. Needless to say I felt mildly embarrassed when I learned of all his work.)
I hope I'm not jutting into a conversation here. I've read a bit on the Incarnation, and the best work I've found so far is Aquinas' treatise on it (Part 3 of the Summa Theologica). There he defines a PERSON as an individual hypostasis (or substance, in the sense of Aristotle's primary substance) of rational nature (as defined by Boethius). Since both humans and God are rational, Jesus Christ can be both at the same time.
I should point out that we generally think of a person (or any individual substance) as having only one nature. This means that every individual has one most essential "form" in which one exists -- or in more modern terms, the relation between all of that individual's attributes which allow him or her to carry out operations that are normal for that nature. Laughing would be an example of an operation peculiar to human nature. Nevertheless, there is nothing that requires us to say that everything must have only one nature. One person could have two natures. That is exactly what Aquinas proposes.
Once this is allowed, the "contradictory" attributes of Christ (eg., omniscient vs. limited in knowledge) are no longer contradictories, but simply opposites which apply to the different "parts" (i.e. natures) of Christ's one person. Just as we wouldn't say that it is "contradictory" to say someone is both hot and cold, when one of their hands is hot and the other cold, so these attributes are not contradictory in Christ, since we are attributing them to different natures (either the divine or the human nature). This is called "reduplication" (Eleonore Stump has an article on this, but I find her examples unsatisfactory).
An excellent (but difficult) book on this topic is Richard Cross's recent "The Metaphysics of the Incarnation".
The big problem for me is answering the dileema of what happened on the cross. When Christ exclaimed "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" was Christ as Man forsaken by the Trinity (Father, Second Person of the Trinity and the Holy Spirit) or was Christ (in both His divine and human natures) separated by the Father? The attributes of God (at least, according to Aquinas) requires that no separation ever take place in the Godhead but the Council of Chalcedon requires that no separation takes place between the two natures of Christ. Here appears to be some confusion - for me at least.
Sam