Theosis Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

"Indeed the mystery of Christ runs the risk of being disbelieved precisely because it is so incredibly wonderful."-- Cyril, the Pillar of Faith The concept and doctrine of kenosis as it was expounded in the writings of Origen,... more

"Indeed the mystery of Christ runs the risk of being disbelieved precisely because it is so incredibly wonderful."-- Cyril, the Pillar of Faith

The concept and doctrine of kenosis as it was expounded in the writings of Origen, Athanasius and Cyril in Alexandria, as with the early Desert Fathers. It was later included in a commentary by Gregory of Nyssa, and Hilary of Poitiers. Maximus the Confessor, a student of Origen calls it "an eternal movement of love." The kenosis of Christ was thus depicted in terms of these Trinitarian theologians.

This kenotic action whereby the gift of God was understood as the operation of love within the Trinity, the abandoning of one to the other; and salvation issued from a participation within this intra-Trinitarian procession made possible through the incarnation of Christ, the revelation of the true image of God the Father, revealed by all. We are deified and redeemed through the economy of love, distinctive nature of which is to give in a continuing act of kenosis.

Origen, De Princip., 1.II.8
But since He is called by the apostle not only the brightness of His glory, but also the express figure of His person or subsistence, it does not seem idle to inquire how there can be said to be another figure of that person besides the person of God Himself, whatever be the meaning of person and subsistence. Consider, then, whether the Son of God, seeing He is His Word and Wisdom, and alone knows the Father, and reveals Him to whom He will (to those who are capable of receiving His word and wisdom), may not, in regard of this very point of making God to be understood and acknowledg- ed, be called the figure of His person and subsistence; that is, when that Wisdom, which desires to make known to others the means by which God is acknowledged and understood by them, describes Himself first of all.

It may by so doing be called the express figure of the person of God. In order, however, to arrive at a fuller understanding of the manner in which the Savior is the figure of the person or subsistence of God, let us take an instance, which, although it does not describe the subject of which we are treating either fully or appropriately, may never-theless be seen to be employed for this purpose only, to show that the Son of God, who was in the form of God, divesting Himself (of His glory), makes it His object, by this very divesting of Himself, to demonstrate to us the fullness of His deity. For instance, suppose that there were a statue of so enormous a size as to fill the whole world, which on that account could be seen by no one; and that another statue were formed altogether resembling it in the shape of the limbs.

And in the features of the countenance, and in form and material, but without the same immensity of size, so that those who were unable to behold the one of enormous proportions, should, on seeing the latter, acknowledge that they had seen the former, because it preserved all the features of its limbs and countenance, and even the very form and material, so closely, as to be altogether not distinguishable from it; by some such similitude, the Son of God, divesting Himself of His equality with the Father. Showing to us the way to the knowledge of Him, is made the express image of His person: so that we, who were unable to look upon the glory of that marvelous light when placed in the greatness of His Godhead.

May, by His being revealed to us in brightness, has the means of beholding the divine light by looking upon the brightness. This comparison, of course, of statues, as belonging to material things, is employed for no other purpose than to show that the Son of God, though placed in the very insignificant form of a human body, in consequence of the resemblance of His works and power to the Father, showed that there was in Him an immense and invisible greatness, inasmuch as He said to His disciples, "He who sees Me, sees the Father also;" and, "I and the Father are one." And to these belong also the similar expression, "The Father is in Me, and I in the Father."

Athanasius, God became Man
The philosophers of Athanasius’ time viewed God as being a static entity who by His very nature could not change nor experience suffering. Athanasius argues for Christ as the incarnate Logos through tackling of the Platonic notions of God where the attributes of immutability and impassibility are paramount. In order to argue for the divinity of Christ, he had to have a strong defense against these notions. Athanasius asserts that the incarnation of Christ is a physical indwelling of the divine being of Christ in the body of Jesus and not an individual that only shows up that way.

Athanasius indicates that there is a purposeful lived experience in the Logos coming into humanity since humanity has forgotten who God is, accordingly every work of Jesus during his earthly ministry was acted to bring humanity into a revelation of the providence of God. Human race has made created things into objects of monolateral idolatrous worship, through enchanted irrationality, that could not recognize God. Christ being the visible icon of the invisible God points the Father in His works.

Athanasius confirms that although the Word dwells fully in Jesus human body and did have some acquired human limitations, none of which has reduced His divine person. Athanasius uses the notion of hunger to portray this. He declares that although Jesus Christ got hungry during His mundane life, He did not abstain from it because Christ being God would not be defeated by death through hunger. Similarly, theologians portray that Christ would be subdued by sickness as evidently confirmed by His miracles, demonstrating that Christ divine power over all ills.

It is fair to conclude that His divine nature protected Him from being susceptible to sickness. It is evident that Athanasius attempts to be confirm the nature of any limitations the Logos allows Himself to experience for the sake of human redemption, “Any physical weakness experienced by Jesus must be voluntarily assumed by the Word himself and not imposed upon Him against his own will." Athanasius asserts that if Christ experienced suffering for whatever reason, it is because He has allowed Himself to do so and not because it occurred for reasons outside of His control.

Those above notions express Athanasius elaboration on Kenosis in as pouring Himself out, explained to Pagan philosophers. C.S. Lewis wrote, "When I first opened his "De Incarnatione verbi Dei," I soon discovered by a very simple test that I was reading a masterpiece. . . only a master mind could, in the fourth century, have written so deeply on such a subject with such classical simplicity. Every page I read confirmed this impression. His approach to the Miracles is badly needed today, for it is the final answer to those who object to them as arbitrary and violations of the laws of nature

Cyril's Theology of the Divine Kenosis, by Paul Gavrilyuk
Having briefly surveyed various inadequate approaches to the Nestorian controversy, the author shows that the protection of the unqualified divine impassibility from being compromised by any involvement in suffering was at the heart of Theodore’s and and Nestorius’ christology. Nestorians charged Cyril with being an advocate of theopatheia. In response, Cyril developed a doctrine of God’s appropriation of human suffering and insisted upon the divine self-emptying in the incarnation.

Kenotic Economy, Balthasar to Barth
It is this abandonment in love which characterises kenosis that Balthasar's theology, as its economy, both preserve the condition for the possibility of ego emptying theology in its core, that "there is only one way to approach the Trinitarian life in God: manifested in divine perichoresis as God's kenosis in the theology of the covenant — and thence in the theology of the Cross — feeling our way back into the eternal mystery.

'This primary kenosis makes possible all other kenotic movement of God into the world; being simply its consequences. Here comes Karl Barth's understanding of kenosis, God's freedom to love is a self-giving not a giving up. The doctrine of kenosis outlines, then, the giving of the gift of life; a giving that cannot be given if the giving is not part of an economy that includes reception.