Two Subjects vs. One Person

Speaker 1 0:01

we can already see that the issue of the Theodogos, that the title Theodogos, is primarily Christological. So it's not an optional extra, it's not some other branch of theology. It's directly related to the mystery of the person of Christ, who Christ is. And the keystone to Cyril's thought is 1 Corinthians, 8, 6, verse 6, which says but to us there is but one God, the Father of whom are all things and we in him, and one, lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things and we by him. So the key to St cyril's christology is unity, the oneness of god, and that christ is one. We've said several times along the way that one of saint Cyril's most important treatises is his work entitled that Christ is one. And we noted that the problem with Mopsuestia and also the problem with Nestorius was when they considered the mystery of Christ, was when they considered the mystery of Christ they seemed to think in terms of two subjects in one. So we would be encouraged by them to see Christ as the man in whom the Logos dwelt, and we refer to the analogies of the spirit of god in the temple. So the logos is, as it were, the spirit of god dwelling in the human temple of the man jesus, and we were also encouraged to think of christ in terms of christ putting on his humanity as clothing, as a garment. So the logos puts on his humanity. At any rate. What is happening here is that we're thinking in terms of two subjects in Christ, and I think we also mentioned that Mopsuestia's vision of Christ was two prosopas, two persons who appeared outwardly as one, but this outward manifestation was in fact the product of a prosopic union, in other words a union of two prosopo in christ to prosopo in Christ. So in Chalcedon in 451, which affirmed again the Christology of Saint Cyril of Alexandria but expressed it in terms of two natures, chalcedon said no, two natures in Christ, not two prosopo, but two natures. The divine nature of Christ, which is the content, if you will, of the divine hypothesis of the Son and Word of God, has grafted onto itself, or united more correctly to itself, to its hypostasis, in other words the human nature of Christ consisting of a human body and a reasonable and spiritual soul, but not a prosopon. In his second letter to Nestorius, cyril of Alexandria says that Scripture did not say that the Logos united the prosopon of a man to himself, but that he became flesh, and this is very important. So Metropolitan Callistos Ware tells us that we have two affirmations which we need to bear in mind Firstly, that in Christ, god and man become one, and the second affirmation is that the basis of this unity is the divine logos.

Speaker 1 5:13

Metropolitan Callistos had a wonderful way of clarifying seemingly complex questions and, with the benefit of his own clear thinking, he would lay out before you the essentials in such a way that you could approach them and you could begin to understand yourself. God rest his soul. So one of the Trinity became incarnate. We sing this in every divine liturgy homo no genisios ke logos tu padros, the only begotten Son and Word of God, being immortal and so forth, became incarnate. Became incarnate Is on disai ghi astriados.

One of the Trinity Became Incarnate

Speaker 1 6:08

One of the Holy Trinity became man, and this is something that we know purely by revelation, because we mentioned that, in fact, every action, every activity of the Most Holy Trinity is a unified action, or activity or energy. In other words, it involves the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And we asked ourselves the question when we were looking at the Trinitarian theology of the Cappadocian Fathers. Well then, how do we know of the distinctiveness, of the threefoldness of God? Wherein is that distinction revealed? Well, it's revealed precisely in the event of the incarnation, and we'll come back to that point, because St Cyril is the one who gives us language to refer to the incarnation. He's not the only one, but he does it in a brilliant way, again, in a very clear way, referring to the incarnation. He's not the only one, but he does it in a brilliant way, again, in a very clear way, referring to the incarnation.

Speaker 1 7:30

In the Old Testament, or in the Old Dispensation, as well as in the New, after the fact of the incarnation has taken place, we said that one of the Trinity became incarnate, taken place. We said that one of the Trinity became incarnate. So there is therefore a single subject, and that single subject vis-à-vis the Incarnation is none other than the Eternal Logos. Once again, st Cyril's second letter to Nestorius, in which he says that Scripture did not say that the Logos united the prosopon of a man to consciousness, the human prosopost. I'm not sure if we can define the hypothesis at all, but in inverted commas I think we can say the only center of consciousness is that of the divine logos. There is no other person in christ. Christ is the divine logos, enfleshed, incarnate, the Logos existing in a human way.

Speaker 1 9:15

So this is where we began to say that Saint Cyril and I'm taking this breakdown of how St Cyril works this out from Metropolitan Callistos who, with great clarity, says first, we see, there is the theme in Cyril of the two births of the Logos, of the two births of the Logos. Secondly, we're coming back to the title Theodogos. Thirdly, there is the concept of appropriation. Fourth, the mystery of kenosis. Fifth, the question of nature, physis, and there is also a question regarding human psychology, human psychology in the theological sense, so psychologia referring to psyche, the soul, the human soul of Christ. Let's take each one of these in turn to elaborate upon them briefly for the sake of greater clarification.

Two Births of the Divine Logos

Speaker 1 10:38

So, the two births what do we mean when we say that we see two births of the Logos in Saint Cyril? Saint Cyril is referring to the fact that the Divine Logos was begotten twice, before and after the incarnation. Before the incarnation, we have the pre-incarnate word, the asarcos logos. After the incarnation, we have the incarnate word, or the enfleshed word, the ensarcos logos. So, outside of time, before the incarnation, the logos is born in a divine way of the father with no mother, of the Father with no mother. Within time, the Logos is born in a human way, of the Virgin Mary, with no father, but the same one. The same Logos is the subject, and Saint Cyril always refers to the person of the Logos, the hypostasis of the Logos. You'll notice that what Saint Cyril is doing, in fact, he's applying hypostasis to the mystery of Christ, to Christology. In that sense, he's continuing the work of the great Cappadocian fathers.

Speaker 1 12:18

So what about Theodogos? What about the term that we already mentioned? Well, perhaps we could just add briefly to that as well that in the incarnate Christ, the divine Logos is the unique subject. And so it's necessary, therefore, to confess Emmanuel, god with us, to be God in truth, and for the Holy Virgin to be the mother of God according to the flesh, for she is the mother of the person of God, the Word made flesh, and for this reason, the Holy Virgin is not the mother of a nature, she is the mother of a person, the divine person of the Logos made man, who united to himself our human nature. And also for this reason, anthropotokos is simply wrong, precisely because Anthropotokos treats Christ's humanity as a second, separate subject and, as such, denies the unity, the oneness of Christ's person. With this in mind, therefore, anyone who says Christodokos should also be willing to say Theodokos. So Theodokos is not an optional title, a title of devotion, but an expression of the unity of the person of Christ, and this is very important.

Appropriation and Divine Self-Emptying

Speaker 1 14:24

Next, we have the concept of appropriation, eikiosis. We've been talking about this all the time. Really, egosis, appropriation is making something one's own. So this is precisely what takes place christ takes our human nature and makes it his own.

Speaker 1 14:50

At the, the incarnation, god the Word appropriates humanity or makes it his own, and for this reason, god the Word, is truly born and truly suffers. Of course, god cannot suffer. As God in his divine nature, he is impassable beyond suffering, and Saint Cyril knows this and accepts it. He says that God as God, transcends suffering. But at the incarnation, the Word, the Logos, is involved in suffering. God in his nature doesn't suffer, but the person of the divine Logos does suffer according to the flesh, katasarka in the flesh, according to the flesh, the point being that God appropriates that which does not belong to him in his own nature. This is why we refer to him as the bridge which unites the created to the uncreated, and for this reason, the mystery is that he suffered impassibly epathen apathos. He suffered epathen, apathos, without suffering.

Speaker 1 16:29

And the basic idea behind the insistence of both aspects of this mystery of the suffering servant is that if God himself did not die and rise, then there could be no healing. Which takes us back to a famous phrase in St Gregory the Theologian in St Gregory the Theologian, that which is not assumed cannot be healed. So it was by assuming, by taking into himself, by appropriating our human nature, that he healed it. The healing took place by virtue of the fact that he made our human nature his own To a proslipton, geatherabipton. That which is not assumed cannot be healed. Assumed cannot be healed. But Christ did heal us, and he healed us by means of his incarnation.

Speaker 1 18:00

Next, we have genesis, or kenosis, to pronounce it the English way, which is based on Latin pronunciation, by the way. So genesis, we said that in the act of appropriation, implies the restriction of God to include man, whereas Saint Cyril's understanding of appropriation contains the idea of divine love as ecstatic, as ecstatic, so going out of oneself in love to the other. So for Saint Cyril, god, the words self-emptying his genesis, rather than signifying that God is making room for man, means that God himself is appropriating human experience and becoming the subject of the measures, the medra of humanity. And in this sense we are placed before yet another great mystery and paradox that God, in his incarnation, in his genesis and appropriation of our human nature, transcends even himself. This is his ecstatic love. He goes out of himself in love towards his creature. So nature.

Natural vs. Hypostatic Union

Speaker 1 19:48

Firstly, saint Cyril will speak of two natures. Before the Incarnation, christ is said to be from two natures ek, thio, physion. After the Incarnation, however, the two natures may be distinguished only by contemplation, says Saint Cyril Theoria moni, says Saint Cyril Theoria moni. Now, we should note that for Antioch, during this period, physis is synonymous with usia two natures, two essences, two physis, two usia in Christ. For Alexandria, physis is probably best understood as hypostasis. So when Saint Cyril says mia physis tu Theou logo se sarcomeni, one nature of God made flesh, he means, and in fact it's clear from the context mia fisis tu Theou logo right. So one nature of God, the Word, who is God, the Word, the hypostasis of God, the Word. Who is God, the Word, the hypostasis of God, the Word. So it's the thesis, and the hypostasis of God, the Word.

Speaker 1 21:20

Cesar Comeni refers to the enfleshed human nature of Christ which is united to the divine hypostasis. After the union, saint Cyril speaks of one nature and he also uses the phrase natural union. Actually, the phrase natural union he uses before the outbreak of the Nestorian controversy. After the outbreak of the Nestorian controversy he prefers to use the term hypostatiki enosis, hypostatic union. Let's come back to that next time because I don't want to rush. So it's an important point. Let me come back to that next time because I don't want to rush through it. It's an important point.

Speaker 1 22:23

Let me just finish today by saying is physiki enosis wrong? No, it's perfectly correct, because what Saint Cyril is referring to is the fact that christ, united to his divine nature, our human nature. But his divine nature is the very same nature of god the father and of god the holy spirit as well, because he is one in nature, one in. He is one in nature, one in essence. Thesis and usia at this point are synonyms. So he is one in physis or usia with god the father and god the holy ghost.

Speaker 1 23:19

So why does he prefer to use hypostatic union after the outbreak of the Nestorian controversy in 430? It is simply because it is more specific. Hypostatic union refers to the specific hypostasis which became flesh, which became incarnate. So, as we said natural union, physiki, enosis, is not wrong because he is God, holy and truly and perfectly God. But it does not specify that it is the second hypostasis of the Holy Trinity, uniquely and solely who became flesh. And this brings us back to that point. How do we know of the threefoldness of god, the distinctiveness of god that we see in the divine economy culminating in the incarnation, that the protagonist, the one who became flesh, is none other than the second hypothesis of the holy trinity, the son and eternal word of god.

Only God Himself Could Heal Us

Speaker 1 24:56

All right, so the basic idea is what Saint Athanasius said Only God could save, only God himself could heal. Now the Arians disagreed with that and they said that well, god saved us through a lesser being, the Son, but Saint Athanasius insisted that only God himself could actually heal us. It was necessary for God himself to truly become man, not by appearance only, but to truly make his own our human nature, and by doing so, that's where the healing takes place. We mentioned St Gregory the Theologian, where the healing takes place. We mentioned St Gregory the Theologian.

Call to Action and Closing

Speaker 1 26:07

So the understanding of salvation is fundamentally different. Notice that, first of all, it's about healing. Secondly, that that healing can only take place when our human nature becomes the human nature of the very God himself when he takes it upon himself, when he grafts it upon himself. That's where the healing takes place. Salvation is not some power that God zaps us with through an intermediate creature. It's the very fact that he took the human nature, that it came into existence the very moment it was conceived in his mother's womb. That's where the salvation took place. It's very important, but that's the basic idea. Please subscribe to our channel and share with your friends. Click on the notification bell and on the join button below our video and become a friend or reader of the Mount Tabor Academy. Support our drive to introduce the theology and spiritual life of the Orthodox Church to the wider community.