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| Chapter V. How in virtue of the hypostatic union of the two natures in Christ the Word is rightly termed the Saviour, or incarnate man, and the Son of God.
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Chapter V.
How in virtue of the hypostatic union of the two natures
in Christ the Word is rightly termed the Saviour, or incarnate man, and
the Son of God.
And so it is clear that
through the mystery of the Word of God joined to man, the Word, which
was sent to save men, can be termed Saviour, and the Saviour, who was
born in the flesh, can through union with the Word be called the Son of
God; and so through the indifferent use of either title, since God is
joined to man, whatever is God and man, can be termed altogether
God.2456
| 2456 Cf. Hooker Eccl:
Polity., Book V. c. liii. § 4. “A kind of mutual commutation
there is whereby those concrete names, God and man, when we speak of
Christ, do take interchangeably one another’s room, so that for
truth of speech it skilleth not whether we say that the Son of God hath
created the world, and the Son of man by His death hath saved it, or
else that the Son of man did create, and the Son of God die to save the
world. Howbeit as oft as we attribute to God what the manhood of Christ
claimeth, or to man what His Deity hath right unto, we understand by
the name of God and the name of man neither the one nor the other
nature, but the whole person of Christ, in whom both natures
are.” The technical phrase by which this interchange of names is
described is the Communicatio idiomatum, and in Greek ἀντίδοσις. Cf.
Pearson on the Creed, Art. IV. c. i. | And so the same Apostle well adds the
words: “Whoever believeth that Jesus is the Son of God, God
abideth in him, and the love of God is perfected in
him.”2457
He tells us
that he believes, and declares that he is filled with
divine love, who believes that Jesus is the Son of God. But he
testifies that the Word of God is the Son of God, and thus means us
fully to understand that the only begotten Word of God, and Jesus
Christ the Son of God are one and the same Person. But do you want to
be told more fully that,—though Christ according to the flesh was
truly born as man of man,—yet in virtue of the ineffable unity of
the mystery, by which man was joined to God, there is no separation
between Christ and the Word? Hear the gospel of the Lord, or rather
hear the Lord
Himself
saying of Himself:2458
| 2458 De se
dicentem (Petschenig): Gazæus reads descendentem. |
“This,” says He, “is life eternal, that they may know
Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast
sent.”2459
You heard above
that the Word of God was sent to heal mankind: here you are told that
He who was sent is Jesus Christ. Separate this, if you
can,—though you see that so great is the unity of Christ and the
Word, that it was not merely that Christ was united with the Word, but
that in virtue of the actual unity [of Person] Christ may even be said
to be the Word.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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