chistory_christ2b
CHRISTOLOGY
The early centuries of the history of the Christian Church were marked by an unusual amount of speculation concerning the Person of Christ. The statements of Scripture raised many questions among thinkers and led to many attempts to give theological explanation of the doctrine of the incarnation. These speculations were affected in some instances by Jewish opinions and prejudicies held by certain members of the Christian community, but more frequently by one form or another of Greek philosophy. It is not surprising that various styles of errors appeared, and during those centuries were overthrown and declared hereries. Among the prominent heresies concerning the Person of Christ were the following:
1. Ebinonism, or the doctrine of the Ebionites, a Jewish sect which existed even the time of the apostles. This error arose from the mistaken Jewish preconception concerning the Messiah, and consisted in the denial of the divine nature of Christ.
2. Gnosticism, a name indicating the assumption of superior knowledge (Greek, gnosis, “knowledge”). The Gnostics claimed to have a secret knowledge concerning the true nature and destiny of the spiritual elect. Each Gnostic group had it own theory, but nearly all contrasted the soul, which is the true self and which endures through many lifetimes, with the body, in which the soul has somehow become entrapped. Each Gnostic system told a different story about how the soul had fallen into the body and how it could be freed. Gnosticism in its diverse forms received its stimulation and its guidance from Greek philosophy. In different ways, it denied the humanity of Christ, even to the extent of denying the reality of His human body.
3. Sabellianism, which at its bottom was a denial of the tri-personality of God, denied, accordingly, the existence of the Son of God, as a distinct person, before the incarnation. Sabellius, a presbyter of Ptolemais in the the middle of the third century, in order to avoid the semblance of Tritheism in the doctrine of the Church, taught that in the Godhead itself there is no distinction of Persons, but that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are only different manifestations of the One Supreme Deity, who assumed these names and corresponding functions for the purpose of redemption only (pros tas hekastote chreisa), revealing Himself under a different character (persona) as occasion required. Thus, the human natures in Christ was held to be only temporary.
4. Arianism denied that the Son of God was of the same essence as the Father, but held that the essence in both was similar. Hence, the conclusion was reached that Christ was created, though the greatest of all creatures. Arianism, in contrast with Sabellianism, so strongly distinguished the Persons as to “divide the substance”, subordinating the Son to the Father as the creature to the Creator, and the Holy Spirit to the Son. Both tended ultimately to the same result; that is, the unity of the Divine Being excluded any essential and eternal distinction of the Persons; but in Sabellianism this was attained by making the Persons merely dramatic parts which could be put on and off, and in Arianism by robbing the Second and Third Person of the proper attributes of Deity. The Arian heresy, after a long struggle, was expelled from the Church, and under the name of Unitarianism exists only in bodies external to the Church. Arianism labored, from the first, under the twofold absurdity of introducing a species of being intermediate between the Creator and the creature, and of teaching the union of two created beings in the one Person of Christ. In connection with this heresy was the fierce contention over the Greek words homoousios, “same substance”, and homoiousios, “similar substance”, to express the relation of the person of the Son of God to the person of God the Father. The controversy came to be expressed by these two Greek words: homoousias, was the Son of the same essence as the Father, or homoiousias, was the Son of similar essence as the Father? The Nicene creedal formula, saying that Son is homoousias with the Father, became the orthodox view, and Arianism was condemned.
5. Apollinarianism, assuming the Platonic distinction between body (soma), animal soul (psuche), and rational soul or mind (nous), as three distinct element in man, viewed Christ as having a human body and an animal soul, but not a human rational soul, as the seat of rationality and intelligence, Instead of a human rational soul, the divine Word of God took its place and was the divine nature in Christ. Thus Christ was not completely human. Early in the fourth century, Apollinaris, Bishop of Laodicea, a man of piety and ability, and highly esteemed even by those who disagreed with him, propounded the theory of the Person of Chirst which bears his name. Apollinaris was a strong opponent of Arius but arrived at a similar view of the Person of Chirst as Arius. Arius appears to have held that the human nature of Christ consist merely of His body, with which the Word entered into union, so that He had no human soul. And he was driven to this by the exigency of his position. For since the Logos of Arius was a created being, and the soul of Christ, if He had one, must also have been created, the absurity would arise of two created intelligences in one Person, a thing that is inconceivable. But if the manhood of Christ consists merely of a body, this difficulty is evaded. Apollinaris borrowed a part of his antagonist’s theory, but with the view of effectually guarding against his conclusions. He assumed the Platonic tripartite view of man’s nature, according to which man is composed of body, animal soul, and rational soul. Allowing Christ the possession of an animal soul, he made the Logos take the place of the rational soul. His motive was to obviate the Arian conception of Christ, in investing the rational soul with the attribute of unchangeableness, and consequent sinlessness. And no doubt his theory does this effectually. But his theory stands or falls with the validity of Platonic tripartite division. After many years of controversy, Apollinarianism was condemned at the Council of Constantinople, A.D. 381, and its author deposed from his bishopric.
The study of these heresies of early Church history is especially important and valuable because many of the errors of modern times, such as Socinianism, Uniitarianism, and Rationalism, are simply these ancient and oft-refuted heresies revived. It would be a mistake to suppose that during those centuries the faith of the Christian Church was reduced to confusion. On the contrary, the Church was clarifying its faith in Christ as the Son of God who became man for the salvation of man.
As correct and true is the Chalcedonian definition of Christ’s person, it did not really solve the problem of Christology: what is the relation of the divine and human in Christ? The Chalcedonian definition stated the double premise of Apostolic Christology, that is, that Christ as a person was indivisiby one and that He was simultaneously fully divine and fully human. But it did not state how this was possible. It did not provide a real solution to the problem of the person of Christ: how was it possible for Jesus Christ to be one divine Person in two Natures?
Our historical analysis of the views leading up to the Chalcedonian definition has shown us that the attempts to solve this problem were formulated within the Greek philosophical understanding of man as a rational animal; that is, that man has two parts: a rational soul and an animal body. This is the underlying assumption in the all of the historical attempts to relate the human to the divine in Christ. But this Greek philosophical understanding of man is not the Biblical understanding of man. Let us examine the problem of the nature of man in order to state and clarify the Biblical understanding of man. Then the problem of person of Christ can be successful solved. According to the Biblical view, man is a created personal being in a created physical world and is as such a union of spirit (person or self) and body (physiologial organism).
“Then the Lord God formed man of the dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul [nephesh]” (Gen. 2:7 KJV).
When God breathed into the nostrils of the body of man the breath of life, He created man’s spirit and man became a living soul. The soul of man is the union of this created spirit and the body formed from the dust of the ground. Thus man is a dipartite being having two parts, spirit and body; the soul is not a third part of man but is the union of man’s created spirit and his body. Man’s soul as the union of spirit and body is the expression of the human spirit or person in and through the body. Thus, man is neither a dipartite being having two parts of a body and soul, nor the Platonic tripartite being having a body, a animal soul, and rational soul, nor a tripartite being having three parts of a body, soul, and spirit; but man is a dipartite being having a body and spirit with the soul, both the rational and animal soul, as the union of the spirit and the body. The spirit of man is his person, his self.
What is a person? A person may be defined as a being (an existent) that is self-determining, not determined, who has freedom, free will, the ability to choose. Now within the self, existence is known in the act of decision. To exist is to decide. This is particularly apparent in those momentous passionate decisions of a crisis. In fact, every act of decision, whether in a great crisis or not, is the place where existence can be found. The act of decision itself is also an act of existence. That is, to be is to choose. This was partially apprehended in Descartes’ phrase: cognito ergo sum; I think, therefore I am. Descartes saw that the act of thinking or even doubting is to exist. For one to think or doubt he had to exist. However, since he sought to fit this into an Greek philosophical scheme of thought, Descartes did not recognize that thinking and doubting are basically acts of decision. Not only to think or doubt but to decide is to exist. Any act of decision is an act of existence: decerno ergo sum, I choose, therefore I am. A person therefore should be defined as a being (an existent) that is self-determining, not determined, who has freedom, free will, the ability to choose. A person is to be distinguished from a non-person, a thing, an “it,” which is a being that is determined, not self-determining, that has no freedom, no free will, no ability to choose. Thus the existence of a person is found in his ability to choose, to make decisions.
“I choose, therefore, I am”, not, “I think, therefore, I am”. To be is to choose, not just to think or to perceive. Man’s reason is a function and an expression of his will. This freedom of decision of man, not his reason, is what distinguishes man from the rest of creation; this is what gives to man his existence as a person or self and to his reason that human and personal character. Now a careful analysis of decision reveals that every act of decision involves three elements:
(a) the agent making the decision,
(b) the alternatives to be decided between, and
(c) a criterion to decide by.
This third element of every decision, the criterion by which the choice is made, means that every human decision involves a reference to a criterion in or beyond the self. In other words, behind every human decision as to what a person should do or think, there must be a reason. That is, the choice between the alternatives is made with reference to some criterion of choice, and choice cannot be made without this reference.
Now the criterion of a choice must be also chosen, and that choice is made with reference to an ultimate criterion, an ultimate reason for the choice of the criterion. That is, the ultimate reason for any decision, practical or theoretical, must be given in terms of some particular criterion, an ultimate reference or orientation point in or beyond the self or person making the decision. This ultimate criterion is that person’s god. In this sense, every man must have a god, that is, an ultimate criterion of decision. Thus in the very exercise of his freedom-of-decision, man shows that he is such a being that must necessarily appeal to an ultimate criterion, a god. In fact, his every uncoerced decision implies this ultimate criterion. Since decisions involve a reference to an ultimate criterion beyond the self, to a god, the Bibical view of man is that he is a religious animal, a being who must have a god.
According to the Greek thinkers, Reason, the universal and necessary, is the divine or God. The divine, according to the Greek conception of reality, is that which is not subject to change, decay or death; the gods in Homer are “immortals.” The divine, therefore, cannot be known through the senses because that which is known through the senses is a world characterized by change, decay or death. But since the objects of reason are always and everywhere the same, the divine can be known through reason. This eternal, unchanging realm of the Ideas, the Universals, the objects of Reason, are the divine. Both Plato and Aristotle held reason to be divine. God is the divine or eternal realm of the Ideas in Plato’s philosophy, or he is a self-thinking thought of Aristotle’s philosophy. But since the concepts of God and man are correlatives, the Greek concept of man reflects the image of this god. Since reason is god, man viewed in the light of this god, is a rational animal. Reason is the divine part of man. This view of man is the underlying assumption in the all of the historical attempts to relate the human to the divine in Christ. This Greek view of man is the cause of the problem of the nature of Christ.
This is not the Biblical view of man or of God. God is not Reason, the universal and necessary. And Ultimate reality is not the universal and the necessary. That is, Reason is not God. God is a person (or more accurately, three persons) whose existence is not in His reason but in His unlimited sovereign free decision and will; it is not the universal ideas in God’s mind that determine how or why God will create man and the world, but His unlimited sovereign will (Rev. 4:11). Since reason is a function of the will, God is rational and His reason is a function of His will. Thus the world that God has chosen to create is rational.
Man is also a person (or more accurately, a spirit [person] in a body – see Gen. 2:7) whose existence is also to be found, not in his reason, but in his limited free will and decision. And since decisions involve a reference to an ultimate criterion in or beyond the self, to a god, the Bibical view of man is that he is a religious animal, a being who must have a god. Reason is not the divine part in man but is a function of the will of the person. To be is to choose, not to think or to know. Knowledge and reason depend upon a prior decision as to what is real. It is upon decision that any knowledge finally depends.
The first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, used their freedom of choice to disobey God and choose a false god, wisdom and knowledge; that is, Reason. The basic sin is turning from the true God and to faith in a false god of some kind; it is idolatry. Sin is any choice contrary to ultimate allegiance or faith in the true God (Rom. 14:23). The consequence of Adam’s sin was death (Gen. 2:16-17): physical death (the separation of their spirits from their bodies) and spiritual death (the separation of their spirits from God). In other words, they lost their fellowship with God and with each other (Gen. 3:7-8) and their dominion over creation. But even though they have fallen from the image of God, they still are persons and still have the freedom of choice.
The descendants of Adam are born not in the image of God but in the image of Adam, the man of dust, the old man, and as such are subject to death, physical and spiritual. Death has been inherited by all men (Rom. 5:12). And since they have been born into the world spiritually dead, alienated from God, not knowing personally the true God, and since they must have a god, an ultimate criterion of decision, they choose a false god as their God and thereby sin (Gal. 4:8). The creation, man himself, contains a knowledge about the true God which leaves them without excuse for the sin of idolatry (Rom. 1:19-20). But this knowledge is about the true God and is not a personal knowledge of the true God which comes from an encounter and fellowship with God.
As Christianity spread thoughout the Roman world, the Biblical view of reality came into conflict with the Greek view of reality. The difference between these two views of reality is most clearly seen in their views of man. Attempts were made to resolve this conflict and the difference in their views of man by trying to synthesize these two views of reality.
| Hebrew-Christian | Medieval Synthesis | Greek-Roman | |
|---|---|---|---|
| God | Creator | Supernatural – Grace | The rational |
| World | Created | Natural – Nature | The non-rational |
| Man | spirit (person) & body | spirit (moral) & soul (rational) & body (animal) | mind (rational) & body (non-rational) |
Ultimate reality is not the universal and necessary and this Reason is not man’s ultimate criterion but the sovereign will of the Creator who made all things and has revealed Himself in Jesus Christ. This basic incompatibility between the Greek and Biblical view of God and man explains the conflict between Greek philosophy and the Christian faith and the failure of the attempted synthesis of these divergent points of view by Augustine and Aquinas. All attempts to synthesize the classical Greek view of God and man with the Biblical view will fail. Worst of all, the Biblical view of God and man will be obscured and misunderstood.
And this is what happened in the early church as it sought to explain the relation of the divine and human in the God-man Jesus Christ. They misunderstood the rational soul of man as the third part of man, the spirit and body being the other two parts. But the rational soul of man is not the third part of man, but is the expression of man’s spirit or person in and through his body (see Gen. 2:7). Thus the Biblical view of man is that man is a dipartite being having a body and a spirit (or person) with the soul as the union of a spirit and the body. Hence, man is neither the Greek view of man as a dipartite being having two parts of a body and rational soul, nor the Platonic tripartite being having a body, a animal soul, and rational soul, nor the view of the Christian synthesis of man as a tripartite being having three parts of a body, a soul, and a spirit, where the soul is considered the animal soul and the spirit was considered to be the mind, the rational soul of the Greek view. The Biblical view of man is that his soul is not a third part of man but that his soul, both the rational and animal soul, is the expression of his spirit or person in and through his body, and thus the union of his spirit and his body.
In the incarnation, the divine Word, the Son of God, took the place, not of the human soul (psuche), but of the human spirit (pneuma) in the man Jesus. His human soul is the union of His divine spirit (His Person) and His human body. Thus Jesus is one person with two natures; His divine nature is the divine Word, the Son of God, and His human nature is His human soul and His human body where His human soul is the expression of His one divine spirit or person in and through His human body.
This view of the incarnation is not the Word-Flesh Christology of Apollinarianism. In the late A.D. 300, an Alexandrian, named Apollinaris, Bishop of Laodicea, tried to explain how the Word of God became flesh, a human being. He assumed that man was a dipartite being having two parts, a body and a rational soul. Now in the incarnation, the Word of God took on a human body, and thus Christ had a human body, but the divine Logos took the place of the human rational soul. Apollinaris wrote,
“The Word became flesh without assuming a human mind; a human mind is subject to change and is the captive of filthy imaginations; but He was a divine mind, changeless and heavenly.” [1]
Theodore of Mopsuestia, the great leader of the theologians at Antioch, accused Appollinars of contradicting Scripture. The New Testament describes Christ as “afraid” and “growing in wisdom” (Luke 2:52). Now these statements apply to Christ’s mind: “It is obvious that the body did not grow in wisdom.” Therefore, unless the Apollinarians claimed that during Jesus’ boyhood the divine Logos grew in wisdom — a view which “not even these men are so impudent as to maintain in their wickedness” [2] — they must acknowledge that Christ had a human mind, not just a human body.
Apollinaris offered a compromise. The human mind, he explained, is composed of parts. Its lower elements feel fears and emotions, while reason dwells in its highest part. Christ had not only a human body but also the lower parts of the human mind; the divine Logos replaced only the human reason. Theodore responded that the real problem concerned salvation, and there this compromise did not help. Since Christ saved humanity by uniting it with divinity, only those parts of us which have been united with divinity in Christ will be saved. Therefore, if Christ lacked a human reason, then human reason has not been united with divinity in Christ and will not be saved. In the words of Gregory of Nazianzus,
“If anyone has put his trust in Him as a Man without a human mind, he is really bereft of mind, and quite unworthy of salvation.
For that which He has not assumed He has not healed; but that which is united to His Godhead is also saved.” [3]
Appollinars’ theory of the Person of Christ clearly assumes the Platonic tripartite distinction between body (soma), animal soul (psuche), and rational soul or mind (nous), as three distinct element in man, Thus he viewed Christ as having a human body and an animal soul, but not a human rational soul, as the seat of rationality and intelligence, Accordingly, instead of a human rational soul, the divine Word of God took its place and was the divine nature in Christ. Thus Christ was not completely human.
This is not the Biblical understanding of man presented here. The Biblical view of man is that man is a dipartite being having a body and a spirit (or person) with the soul as the union of a spirit and the body. Hence, man is neither the Greek view of man as a dipartite being having two parts of a body and rational soul, nor the Platonic tripartite being having a body, a animal soul, and rational soul, nor the view of the Christian synthesis of man as a tripartite being having three parts of a body, rational soul, and spirit. The Biblical view of man is that his soul is not a third part of man but that his soul, both the rational and animal soul, is the expression of man’s spirit in and through his body, and thus the union of his spirit and his body.
In the incarnation, the divine Word, the Son of God, took the place, not of the human soul (psuche), but of the human spirit (pneuma) in the man Jesus. His human soul, both the rational and animal soul, is the union of His divine spirit and His human body. Thus Jesus is one person with two natures; His divine nature is the divine Word, the Son of God, and His human nature is His human soul and His human body where His human soul is the expression of His one divine spirit or person through His human body.
Did Jesus have a human spirit? The answer is “No” and “Yes”. No, the divine Word of God took the place the human created spirit in the God-man Jesus. And yes, the Word of God took upon Himself the limitations of a created human spirit. As Paul indicates in Phil. 2:5-8:
“5 Have this mind among yourselves, which you have in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of man.
8 And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
That is, in Jesus, the Word of God took the place of the created human spirit, but he took upon Himself the limitations of that human spirit; “he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being in the likeness of man.” Thus Jesus was the Word of God made flesh (John 1:14), that is, a divine person or spirit in a human body with all its limitations. but without sin.
The purpose of the incarnation of the Son of God is salvation. Since salvation is basically from death to life, Christ on the cross entered into our death, both spiritually and physically, in order that man can be made alive with Christ in His resurrection. By faith, we can then say: His death is my death and His resurrection is my resurrection. On the cross, Christ died both spiritually and physically. His body died physically on the cross when He gave up His spirit (Matt. 27:50; John 19:30). His spirit was separated from His body. But before He died physically, He died spiritually.
“And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, ‘Eli, Eli, la’ma sabach-tha’-ni?’ that is, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?'” (Matt. 27:46)
This cry was misunderstood by the bystanders as a calling upon Elijah (Matt. 27:47-49). But it was not a calling on Elijah, but it was His spirit as the Son of God calling upon God His Father. He had entered into our spiritual death inherited from Adam and His spirit was separated from God His Father. This spiritual death was not a non-existence of His spirit, but was a separation between His spirit as the Son of God from God His Father. This is only time in all eternity that He as the Son of God was separated from God His Father. It happened because He had entered on the cross into our spiritual death inherited from Adam (Rom. 5:12; I Cor. 15:21-22). This raises the problem of how is this possible. As it was expressed by those who mocked Him, saying
“He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliever him now, if he desires him; for he said, ‘I am the Son of God.'” (Matt. 27:42)
How can God die? The obvious answer is “No, God cannot die.” Then how could the Son of God die? And if Jesus dies, then how can he be the Son of God? As Greeks understood the divine, the gods are immortal; they never die. Then how could the Son of God die? Now their understanding of God as immortal was based on their understanding of God as unchanging in His being, therefore He could not change by dying. And they argued that God does not change because He is timeless. But Biblical God does not change because He is timeless, but because He keeps His promises. The prophet Malachi says for God,
“6For I, the Lord, do not change; therefore you, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed. 7From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes, and have not kept them. Return to Me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord of hosts. (Malachi 3:6-7 NAS)
If Israel turns from their sins, then they will not be consumed because the Lord God is unchanging in keeping His promises not to destroy them if they will return to Him. Thus the Biblical God is unchanging, not because He is a timeless unchanging super-It, but because the Biblical God, who keeps His promises, is three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, who are without beginning or end. The Biblical God has time, but His time has no beginning nor end. His time is an absolute time, not like our created time which has a beginning.
“In the beginning God created heaven and earth.” (Gen. 1:1) The beginning of the heaven and earth was also the beginning of created time. When God created the heaven and earth, God created our time. But God’s time was not created; it never started nor will it end; it is absolute without beginning or end. God created the heavens and earth by an act of His will. As those in heaven sang,
“Worthy art thou, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for thou didst create all things, and by thy will they exist and were created.” (Rev. 4:11)
God is three Persons by whose will all things were created and do exist. Now an act of the will, a choice, involves time: the time before the choice, the now of the choice, and the time after of the choice. Since God as three persons makes choices, and since an act of the will, a choice, involves time, then God must have time in which They exercises His will.
Thus this will of God means that God has time, but it is not a created time with a beginning, but absolute time without beginning or end; it is eternal. In this absolute time, God makes decisions and changes do occur. Thus God is both changing and unchanging. So the Greek philosophical distinction between what is God and what is not-God is false that God is unchanging in contrast to what is not-God is changing. Biblically, God is distinguished from what is not-God by His act of Creation by which He as the Creator made decision to create all things, and by His will “they exist and were created.” (Rev. 4:11)
And in eternity God also made the decision for the Son of God to become a man and to die on the cross for the salvation of men. So this once in all eternity, at the cross, the Son of God died spiritually by being separated from God the Father. He did not cease to exist, but He entered into our spiritual death and His personal relationship to God His Father was broken and He was temporarily separated personally from God His Father. And He died physically when His spirit was separated from His body.
“Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, ‘Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit!’ And having said this he breathed his last.”
(Luke 23:46; compare Mark 15:37)
or as the Gospel of John said, “When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, ‘It is finished’; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” (John 19:30)
or as the Gospel of Mathew said, “And Jesus cried again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit.” (Matt. 27:50)
His spirit did not cease to exist, but was released from His body when His body died physically; Jesus “yielded up his spirit” to His Father into whose hands He had commited His spirit. As He died physically, His spirit was separated from His body, but His spirit did not cease to exist. But He did not remain in this spiritual and physical death; God the Father raised the Son of God from the dead, not only physically from the dead, but also spiritually from the dead. And thus God provided for us salvation from death to life, both spiritually and physically.
ENDNOTES
[1] Apollinaris, Letter to the Bishops Exiled at Diocaesarea 2;
quoted by G. L. Prestige, Fathers and Heretics
(London: S.P.C.K., 1948), p. 111.
This and next two footnotes are taken from
William C. Packer, A History of Christian Theology, an introduction
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1983), p. 87,
footnotes 24, 25, and 26, respectively.
[2] Quoted in R. A. Norris, Manhood and Christ
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. 204.
[3] Gregpry of Nazianzus, Letter 101, to Cledonius the priest,
against Apollinaris, translated by Charles Gordon Browne and James Edward Swallow, in
ASelect Library of nt Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 2nd Series, Vol. 7
(Christian Literature Co., 1894), p. 440.
The text of this and the previous paragragh is taken from
William C. Packer, A History of Christian Theology, an introduction
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1983), pp. 80-81,