Catechism on the Incarnation
Before entering on the explanation of the following articles of the Creed, it will be well for us to have before our minds a clear idea of the great mystery of the Incarnation. As all mankind descend from Adam, all are involved in the consequences of his fall. We all come of a corrupt stock, and, being conceived and born in sin, the sentence of death is registered against us from the first moment of our existence.
Had not the divine goodness interposed in our behalf, we must have been for ever excluded from the kingdom of heaven. But the Eternal Son of God, the second Person of the Blessed Trinity, was moved with compassion towards us, and took to Himself a body and soul like ours, in the unity of His one Divine Person; and in this His human nature He offered Himself a sacrifice to God for our sins. He substituted Himself in our place, and of His own free will underwent the penalty which we had deserved by our transgressions. He poured out the last drop of His most precious blood on the Cross to redeem and save us.
To enter more fully into the nature of this divine mystery, we should consider the guilt from which we have been redeemed. The grievousness of an offence increases according to the dignity of the person offended, and to the claims which he possesses to our love and service. Thus, for example, if we show marked disrespect to an inferior or an equal, it would of course be wrong; but still it would be a pardonable offence compared with the crime of showing the same disrespect to our sovereign. But if that sovereign had heaped all kinds of favours upon us, and we were indebted to his royal bounty for everything which we possessed, our crime would be of the blackest dye. Applying this principle to God, who is infinitely exalted above the highest of His creatures, and whose claims to our love and service infinitely transcend all other claims, we see that an offence against Him is not merely incomparably greater than an offence against any creature, but it contains, so far as is possible, an infinite malice, because it is an offence against a Being of infinite goodness and holiness. When once, therefore, we had fallen into the guilt of sin, we incurred a debt of infinite satisfaction to the Divine Majesty. We could not of ourselves attempt to discharge the obligation which we had contracted, because, before we could appease the outraged justice of God, we must needs be free from sin, and because any satisfaction which we could offer would necessarily fall far short of our debt. It is commonly held that God might have granted us a free pardon, without requiring any satisfaction to be made to His offended majesty; but it seems more consonant with His infinite justice, and certainly displays in a more wonderful manner His infinite goodness and mercy to us, to accomplish our deliverance, and at the same time to make an act of reparation strictly adequate to the demands of His justice. God having therefore determined to exact an adequate atonement for the offence committed, it became necessary that one of the three Divine Persons should assume our nature, and make satisfaction for us. For as the offence was infinite, no merit of any mere creature would be sufficient; because no creature, however exalted, or however holy, could offer more than finite satisfaction. It was necessary, therefore, that our Redeemer should be at the same time God and man;—God, otherwise the satisfaction would not be infinite, and consequently would not be equal to the offence; and man, otherwise He could not immolate Himself for our ransom,—He could not suffer and die for us. The second Person of the Blessed Trinity, therefore, became man for us.
Since His Incarnation, He is perfect God and perfect man; that is, still retaining His divine nature in all its integrity, He took to Himself, in the unity of His one Divine Person, all that is required to constitute a perfect and complete human nature. He became in all things like us, excepting sin. He assumed a real body like ours, and not merely the outward semblance of a body, such as the appearances with which angels were sometimes clothed when they were sent to execute the commissions of God to men. He assumed a real soul like ours, and a human will; for otherwise His human nature would have been incomplete, and the satisfaction which He offered imperfect. For our Lord came to join unto Himself that humanity in which Adam had sinned, in order that He might heal in His own person all that had been vitiated in the person of Adam. Now, as the soul and the will had the chief share in the sin of the Fall, so likewise was it necessary that they should have the chief share in the act of reparation. Thus we learn from the sacred Evangelist, that the sufferings of our Saviour's passion and death commenced with His soul. "My soul," said He to His disciples, "is sorrowful even unto death" (S Matt. 26:38). And in the prayer which He made immediately afterwards He distinctly refers to His two wills: "My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from Me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou will" (St Matt. 26:39). As God He possesses the self-same will as His Father; and when His human will prompted Him to pray to be delivered from the bitterness of His passion, by an act of heroic resignation He immediately conformed it to His divine will: "Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou will." He suffered hunger and thirst, heat and cold, and was tired and wearied as we are by labour and fatigues. He had human affections like us. He loved with a special affection the virgin disciple St John. He compassioned the suffering and afflicted. He wept over the grave of Lazarus, and over the city of Jerusalem, whose destruction He foresaw. He has two natures, therefore, the divine and human; two wills and two distinct operations; but still He is one Christ,—one, not by the two natures being in any way blended together, nor by one absorbing the other, but, both remaining perfectly distinct, they are united by subsisting in the one Divine Person of the Word. As in man there is a spiritual substance mysteriously united to a material substance, so as to form but one person, so the divine and human natures, by means of the hypostatical or personal union, constitute the one Person of Christ, who is at the same time true God and true Man. "As the reasonable soul and the flesh," says the Athanasian Creed, "is one man, so God and man is one Christ." The existence of the two natures in Christ shows us how we are to explain the assertions of Holy Scripture respecting Him, which seem to contradict each other. Thus when our Lord says (St John 16:28), "The Father is greater than I," He speaks of His human nature; and when He declares (St John 10:30), "The Father and I are one," He speaks of His divine nature. For, as the Athanasian Creed says, He is "equal to the Father according to His Godhead, and less than the Father according to His manhood."
We shall now better understand the infinite value of the merits by which Jesus Christ repaired the honour of God, which had been outraged by our transgressions. The satisfaction which is made in atonement of an offence increases in value in proportion to the dignity of the person by whom it is offered. Thus, if we had suffered some dishonour, it would be a sort of reparation if a common person were to ask us to pardon the injury which we had received; but it would be a much greater reparation if a person raised high in dignity and authority were to interpose and entreat us to forgive the offence. That is, the honour which would accrue to us in having so distinguished a suitor for pardon, would more abundantly compensate the dishonour which we had received by the offence. Now, as in Jesus Christ the Person is of infinite dignity and majesty, the merit of every one of His actions was also infinite. We see, therefore, that any action or suffering of our Lord was in itself sufficient to redeem the world; but our redemption is in a special manner ascribed to His most precious blood and death on the cross. For it was fitting that we, who by sin had incurred the sentence of eternal death, should be rescued by the second Person of the Blessed Trinity, taking unto Himself our suffering humanity, and undergoing for us the death which we had deserved. The superabundant satisfactions of Christ, though not necessary for our redemption, are exceedingly advantageous: first, because they give greater honour and glory to God; and secondly, because they show forth in a more striking and more wonderful manner the immensity of the divine love towards us.
28.12.2011. 15:36