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communicatio idiomatum - Coggle Diagram

- - - - The Christological method for preserving this vital truth while attributing attributes of one nature to the person of Christ is the communicatio idiomatum, which means communication of properties. Douglas Kelly states of this doctrine that the "communication of personal properties from each nature to the one person is of greatest consequence for Christ's working out of our salvation, in that it required both God and man together at one and the same time to accomplish this infinitely valuable feat." (Kelly 239)
        
        The Reformed understanding of this doctrine serves as a guardrail from blending the two natures into one, while at the same time guarding against the two natures being isolated from each other. It shows us how God is in relationship with his people not by shedding his transcendence for immanence, but by being both transcendent and immanent at the same time.
- - - - Reformed understanding is more in line with the earlier Catholic teaching than the Lutheran position. The Reformed understand the communicatio idiomatum to teach that the properties of the two natures coincide in the one person, and for that reason alone can they be attributed to the other nature. Furthermore, the property of one nature is not to be understood as being directly attributed to the other nature, but rather indirectly or mediately, through the one person in whom both natures hold together. (Kelly 239)
        
        One cannot say that humanity is deity, or that deity is humanity, which would be to imply a direct communication of one to the other. However, one can say that Christ is divine, and one can also say that Christ is man as this is indirect communication to the person. (Vos 61)
      - Vos prefers a common sharing instead of communicating, and Beeke defines it as a sharing or imparting of the properties. Beeke employs the phrase "fellowship of properties." (Beeke 850)
      - What it is not: deification of Christ's humanity.
  - - - Gregory Nazianzus famously said, ‘that which he has not assumed, he has not healed.’ (Wiebe 280)
        
        Athanasius helped to lay the groundwork by championing the concept of appropriations. Wiebe explains it by stating, "The divine Logos, without ceasing to be divine and without mixing or being confused with creatureliness is able genuinely to unite and ‘appropriate’ suffering and death." (Wiebe 284)
        
        Cyril spent time debating Nestorius, and thus emphasized the unity between God and his creatures. Cyril's argument hinges upon the hypostatic union and how that allows for the attributes true of the divine to be true of Christ at the same time as his humanity.
        
        both Athanasius and Cyril hold that the communications of the attributes occurs at the person level, and not a direct communication between the natures. (Wiebe 283)
        
        While not perfect, Cyril uses the analogy of the soul and body to explain two separate things while maintaining unity. Yet, this unity does not bring about confusion or total separation either. (Wiebe 285)
        
        Chalcedon
        
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        Likewise, if he ceases to be fully God, then idolatry is committed for worshipping a creature.
      - There is always a wrestling with God's relation and community with humanity. There are those such as Moltmann and kenoticist who believe that God must abandon his deity in order for their to be a union of relationship (Wiebe 279)
        
        Theologians such as Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas follow in the footsteps of Cyril, along with numerous early patristic writers, who affirm God's immutability and impassibility, which will not allow for this type of error. Instead, they rely on the communicatio idiomatum. (Wiebe 281)
        
        Therefore, the incarnation does not change God's being or attitude, rather it changes the creature by bringing man into union with the Trinity. (Wiebe 281)
        
        John Hick says that upholding Christ’s omniscience and ignorance, immutability and growth, omnipotence and passion, is comparable to a square circle. (Wiebe 278)
        
        Hick would be correct if the communication of properties was the nature level. That would breed contradiction where one is finite and infinite at the same time. Interestingly, this is the error that Luther makes through the Lutheran interpretation of the communicatio idiomatum.
  - - - The union that speaks of the divine and human nature of Christ united in one person (fomally adopted in Chalcedon)
    - - Frame: a collection of attributes. He notes that natures don't "do" anything. Likewise, attributes don't "do" anything. Only persons "do" things in accordance with their nature containing certain attributes. (Frame 891)
      - In the Creator/creature distinction, Jesus' divine nature is Creator, and his human nature is creature which is why Chalcedon doesn't allow the two natures to be confused or changed. (Frame 892)
    - - "the person of Christ is the same as the person of the Logos." (Vos 61)
        
        Wiebe provides a strong understanding of the person of Christ using Chalcedon. He says that Christ's person is a single subject, comprised of two non-accidental natures, that are never confused, changed, separated, or divided, but rather remain intact, distinct, and complete as the incarnate Son of God. (Wiebe 280)
        
        The genus majestaticum refers to when that which belongs to the human nature is only due to its connection with the person of the Mediator because he is personally united with the Logos. (Vos 62)
        
        The genus humilitativum refers to when that which belongs to the divine nature is only due to its connection with the person of the Mediator who is also a man. (Vos 62)
      - Charles Hodge states the person of Christ "is the koinonos, or partaker of the attributes of both natures, so that whatever may be affirmed of either nature may be affirmed of the person." (Hodge 392)
        
        Ursinus plaed subsistence at the core of differentiating “nature” and “person,” by "suggesting that the only thing that may be rightly predicated of the person is the nature itself, in its entirety." (Hay 13)
    - - the teaching that Christ's divine nature act outside of the boundaries of the capacity of his human nature (Beeke 855). This means that though the person of Christ is located in one locale, the divinity of the Logos is omnipresent (both in Christ and outside of him). The ominpresence of the Logos is not contained in the person of Christ.
    - - Richard Muller states that this is the mistake that the Lutherans make that would ascribe the glory due only to the Creator to the creature as well in the case of the Mediator. (Muller 548)
- - - - Acts 20:28
      - 1 Corinthians 2:8
      - 1 Corinthians 15:47
      - Romans 5:10
      - Romans 8:32
      - Hebrews 5:8-9
      - Acts 3:15
    - - divine ominpresence
        
        John 3:13
        
        Luther used this as a proof text for the ubiquity of Christ's body
      - power to forgive sins
        
        Matt. 9:6, Mark 2:10, Luke 5:24)
      - eternal divine sonship
        
        Matt 16:13, 16
      - judgement upon the world
        
        John 5:27, Matt. 19:28)
      - divine glory
        
        John 17:3
      - divine omnipotence
        
        Matt. 26:64
      - Divine worship
        
        Phil. 2:7-11
  - - - Likewise, if he is human, how can he know the thoughts of men?
- - - - The Lutheran view is that there is a direct communication of properties from one nature to the other. The indirect communication understood in the Reformed tradition is seen as unnecessary.
        
        To understand how this came about, one must look no further than Martin Luther and his view on the Eucharist. Luther approaches the words of institution with a literalist approach so that he risen body was understood as ubiquitous. (Kelly 240)
        
        The implications of this type of interpretation is that Christ's human nature is exalted above the status of normal humanity. (Kelly 240)
        
        Luther speaks more to this on pg 240 of Kelly (see footnote)
        
        John Brentz, an important Lutheran theologian understood the communicatio idiomatum to mean that the two natures of Jesus were somehow merged in a common person, and therefore the divine properties extended to the human nature. (Kelly 240)
        
        Another leading Lutheran theologian, Martin Chemnitz, didn't go as far as Brentz. He believed that Christ's human nature is indeed localized. He advocated that the communicatio idiomatum was not a permanent extension of the divine attributes to the human nature, but instead that the divine nature could use the human nature in modes that exceed human limitation. (Kelly 241)
        
        Three important Lutheran concepts
        
        The genus idiomaticum - reciprocal communication of characteristics where the properties of one nature belong to the whole person. This allows a person to say that "God died." (Kelly 241)
        
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        genus maiestaticum - a communication of the divine majesty to the human flesh which is then assumed by Christ. In this, Lutherans make clear that there is no reciprocal action where the divine is humbled by the communication of properties to the human nature. (Kelly 241)
        
        Genus apotelesmaticum - is the cooperation of two natures in redemption's work. (Kelly 241)
        
        Iron and fire illustration: When an iron is placed in the fire, it begins to glow with fiery attributes, while maintaining its natural attributes. The problem with this illustration lies in the fact that it is one creaturely property being transformed by another creaturely property. His divine simplicity means that to have one attribute, it to have it all, or to have his essence (Beeke 852)
        
        The Lutherans make three arguments from Scripture. First, God's Word teaches that Jesus was raised a position of all power. They argue that this cannot be speaking of the divine nature because that truth already applied to the divine. As true as that is, the reference is speaking to Jesus as the mediator, and not his human nature. (Beeke 852)
        
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        Those who are Reformed would charge this Lutheran position of confusing the Creator/creature distinction by attributing the divine attribute such as omnipresence in the eucharist to the human nature. There is also a contradiction at work. For, his human nature has a beginning point when he took on flesh, and yet it is also eternal because of the communication of the divine nature to the human.
        
        They might respond by saying that the Reformed make the mistake of setting the two natures in close proximity, but with no real interaction.
        
        The Reformed thinker should respond by saying that interaction is not an appropriate term for natures. Natures don't act. However, persons act, and the Reformed hold a view where Christ's person acts according to his two natures.
        
        In addition, if the human nature takes on the divine attributes it is no longer a true human nature, and Christ cannot be our representative. If this is not the case, then Christ is a "third thing" somewhere in between divine and human. (Kelly 242)
- - - - Reformed
        
        Zwingli opposed Luther's view because he was convinced that Christ was located in Heaven, and could not be present with the elements. This led to his memorial view of the sacrament.
        
        Spiritual presence
        
        Christ is currently bodily present in a real location (the right hand of God). Therefore, because omnipresence only applies to the divine nature, Christ cannot physically be present in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper.
        
        John 14:2-4, 28; 16:7, 16; Acts 1:11 (Christ speaks of departure)
        
        In response to Luther's thinking Calvin writes of Christ in the Institues, "For we affirm his divinity so joined and united with his humanity that each retains its distinctive nature unimpaired, and yet these two natures constitute one Christ."
        John Calvin,, 482.
        
        By faith united with Christ in Heaven by the power of the Spirit.
      - Lutherans
        
        Real presence
        
        his human nature becomes a partaker of the omnipresence of his divine nature.
        Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, with a History and Critical Notes: The History of Creeds, vol. 1 (New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1878), 285–286.
        
        He adopted the scholastic distinction of three kinds of presence: 1. Local or circumscriptive (material and confined—as water is in the cup); 2. Definitive (local, without local inclusion or measurable quantity—as the soul is in the body, Christ’s body in the bread, or when it passed through the closed door); 3. Repletive (supernatural, divine omnipresence). He ascribed all these to Christ as man, so that in one and the same moment, when he instituted the holy communion, he was circumscriptive at the table, definitive in the bread and wine, and repletive in heaven, i. e., every where.
        Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, with a History and Critical Notes: The History of Creeds, vol. 1 (New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1878), 287.
        
        Luther consistently denied the literal meaning of Christ’s ascension to heaven, and understood the right hand of God, at which he sits, to be only a figurative term for the omnipresent power of God
        Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, with a History and Critical Notes: The History of Creeds, vol. 1 (New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1878), 287.
        
        Melanchthon, in his later period, decidedly opposed the ubiquity of Christ’s body, and the introduction of ‘scholastic disputations’ on this subject into the doctrine of the eucharist. He wished to know only of a personal presence of Christ, which does not necessarily involve bodily presence. He also rejected the theory of the communicatio idiomatum in a real or physical sense, because it leads to a confusion of natures, and admitted with Calvin only a dialectic or verbal communication. Luther’s Christology leaned to the Eutychian confusion, Melanchthon’s to the Nestorian separation of the two natures.
        Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, with a History and Critical Notes: The History of Creeds, vol. 1 (New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1878), 288.
        
        Due to the communicatio idiomatum, when one partakes of the Lord's supper, they are partaking in the real body of Christ which is in/under the elements. This is possible from a literal interpretation of the words of institution (Matt. 26:26)
- - - - First, we saw... Second.