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| Another Class of Heretics Refuted. They Alleged that Christ's Flesh Was of a Finer Texture, Animalis, Composed of Soul.
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Chapter X.—Another Class
of Heretics Refuted. They Alleged that Christ’s Flesh Was of a
Finer Texture, Animalis, Composed of Soul.
I now turn to another class, who are equally wise
in their own conceit. They affirm that the flesh of Christ is
composed of soul,7080
| 7080 Animalem:
“etherialized; of a finer form, differing from gross, earthy
matter” (Neander). | that His soul
became flesh, so that His flesh is soul; and as His flesh is of soul,
so is His soul of flesh. But here, again, I must have some reasons. If,
in order to save the soul, Christ took a soul within Himself, because
it could not be saved except by Him having it within Himself, I see no
reason why, in clothing Himself with flesh, He should have made that
flesh one of soul,7081
as if He could not
have saved the soul in any other way than by making flesh of it. For
while He saves our souls, which are not only not of
flesh,7082
but are
even distinct from flesh, how
much more able was He to secure salvation to that soul which He took
Himself, when it was also not of flesh? Again, since they assume it as
a main tenet,7083
that Christ came
forth not to deliver the flesh, but only our soul, how absurd it is, in
the first place, that, meaning to save only the soul, He yet made it
into just that sort of bodily substance which He had no intention of
saving! And, secondly, if He had undertaken to deliver our souls by
means of that which He carried, He ought, in that soul which He carried
to have carried our soul, one (that is) of the same condition as
ours; and whatever is the condition of our soul in its secret nature,
it is certainly not one of flesh. However, it was not our soul which He
saved, if His own was of flesh; for ours is not of flesh. Now, if He
did not save our soul on the ground, that it was a soul of flesh which
He saved, He is nothing to us, because He has not saved our soul. Nor
indeed did it need salvation, for it was not our soul really, since it
was, on the supposition,7084
a soul of flesh.
But yet it is evident that it has been saved. Of flesh, therefore, it
was not composed, and it was ours; for it was our soul that was
saved, since that was in peril of damnation. We therefore now
conclude that as in Christ the soul was not of flesh, so neither could
His flesh have possibly been composed of soul.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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