Dogma (Baccalaureate

9 Dogma: Christology

9. (a)  How do we explain the salvific event of the Incarnation and of the paschal Mystery of Jesus Christ, Son of God and the Savior of all when other religious adherents believe that they have their own saving figures? (b) How do we are to make or reinterpret (not merely verbally repeating) of the essential elements of the Christological Mystery in the dogmatic formulations of the ancient Councils or Creeds? (c) How do we confess Jesus Christ as the unique and universal Savior in the context keeping the conformity with the Sacred Scripture, Tradition and Teaching of the Church? (d)   How do we know that the study of Jesus Christ not simply academic or historical knowledge but it is faith knowledge?

Introduction: Jesus Christ is the Savior of All. It is a great challenge for us as other religious adherents believe that they have their own saving figures.  However, it is not simply academic or historical knowledge but faith knowledge that makes a strong conviction to claim Jesus as Savior of All.  It was affirmed with the fullness of time when the salvific event of the Incarnation took place in human history. The entire description will elaborate how Jesus is the savior of all keeping the conformity with the Sacred Scripture, Tradition and Teaching of the Church

Salvefic Event: Jesus’ coming as Savior of the world is not at all in a sudden or abrupt event but it continues through the human history. At the fullness of time it came into being when “Logos” (Jn.1:1) became Incarnated but ‘born, not of the will of the flesh or of will of man, but of God’ (Jn.1:13). God the Father began the saving actions which men experienced from the very beginning of his fall. Men experienced these saving actions of God which continuously helped human being to believe that there will be one who will redeem the fallen men to not partially but fully and eternally.  So we see that how this saving mission finally reveals Jesus as the Savior of the world. We find it in Genesis 3:15 that “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he shall strike your head, and you shall strike his heel.  It comes in truth though the coming of God’s only begotten Son Jesus Christ.  He came and dealt the crushing blow to the Devil, triumphing over him by giving His life on the cross. “Through Him God was please to reconcile Himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven. (Col. 1:15).

Jesus’ Salvefic Event and other religious Believe: Christian faith focuses not on the something, but on someone who relates to us, the Person of Incarnated Word, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Through Him, we got right to call almighty God as Father. God in Christian faith is Triune God. So our God is the God of relationship who entered into the human history, a history of salvation in which at the fullness of time He gave His only begotten Son, Jesus of Nazareth. Many prophets spoke about Him in the various time of the human history. “Look the young woman is with child and shall bear a Son, and shall name Him Immanuel which means God is with us”(Isa.7:14). Jesus laid down His life on the cross for the salvation mankind and through His resurrection He showed man the eternal life to be united with God. So in our Christian faith there is always hope of eternal life which is an unending works of Holy Spirit throughout the Church. It is one single way that the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus manifested the divine will of God.  However, the believers of other faith have their own religious savior. In Christian view for this notion is that the salvation act is a mystery of God.  Though the other religious faith proclaims their own savior, the self revelation of God through His son Jesus Christ is unique. The following discussion will reveal that truth through the comparative studies of the major religion.   

Hinduism: It is religion of many gods and goddess known as ‘Sanata Dharma’ (Ancient Religion). It is based on personal experience and realization of the Absolute. There is no revealer God. In Hinduism, there is no incarnation but rebirth which is determined by the good or evil deeds he has done in his present existence. Here the criterion is good deeds of the person. In Christianity, God took the initiative and confirmed human salvation through His Son Jesus Christ. “Not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins faith, we believe in the resurrection of the body and life” (1 Jn. 4:10).

Judaism: A religion of Jewish people. The main belief is that the whole history of Israel revealed the God of covenant as the only savior, with the result that monotheism became the fundamental dogma of Judaism that “I am the Lord, and besides me there is no savior” (Is.43:10-12). They do not accept Jesus as the savior but they believe that the savior according to their Scripture (OT for Christian) will come one day for them as they are the chosen nation of God.  The coming of the is not vague but contentious revelation reaches toward the fullness of time in ‘but when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,  in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children” (Gal.4:4-5).

Buddhism: It is the personal experience of Buddha and based on Tripitake (three baskets). According to Buddhism, there is no Supreme Being, no revelation and no revealer God. It focuses on right living, right thinking and self denial which will enable the soul to reach Nirvana, a state of release from earthly and bodily pain sorrow etc where we believe in revelation and eternal life.  

Islam: A monotheistic religion of the orthodoxy that there is no God but Allah. Allah is One in Person, One in His Works. This religious belief is established by Mohammad (570-632 AD) who claimed Himself as the last prophet and bearer of recitation of Quran. The Quran for Islam is the last and most universal revelation. The faith of Islam differs in many ways with the faith of Christianity. Mohammad never claimed himself as the Son of God whereas Jesus claimed Himself with full authority that He is the Son of God. Prophets of the different time spoke about Jesus which includes history of long preparation whereas no indication is found about Mohammad in the Quran. The Quran a holy book of Islam denies the incarnation. It says God is One, Eternal and was not begotten (Quran 112:3). For Mohammad there is no redeemer, no need for redemption, no original sin but in Christianity we strongly believe in Incarnation and Jesus is the Person of Incarnated Word. “Mohammad never claimed himself more than man, prophet whereas Jesus is the Messiah. In Christianity, there is a concrete faith and hope of eternal life which is proved by Jesus’ Death and Resurrection.

 The teaching of the Second Vatican Council: In the declaration of Nostra Aetate proclaims that the Catholic Church rejects nothing that is true and holy in these religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all men. Indeed, she proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ ‘the way, the truth, and the life’ (Jn.14:6), in whom men may find the fullness of religious life, in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself. The following also help to understand how Jesus Christ is the son of God and savior of all.

Birth: Jesus’ birth took place in this world in a miraculous way. St. John in his gospel, identifies Jesus’ preexistence as the “Logos” (Jn.1:1) which became Incarnated but ‘born, not of the will of the flesh or of will of man, but of God’ (Jn.1:13). 

Speech: Jesus used an authority in His speech which has been expressed in most often of His saying ‘I’. His speech in different situation expresses that He is God. He said ‘very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was I am’ (Jn.8:58).

Miraculous Acts:  Jesus performed many miraculous acts in His three years preaching which had been ever found before in human history. The divine nature in Jesus has been manifested clearly in His miraculous power. We see that raising Lazarus from dead (Jn.11:1-44), Feeding the five thousand (Mk.6:30-44), walk on the water (Mt.14:22-23) are the concrete examples that expresses uniquely Jesus as God.  

Resurrection: The resurrection of Jesus is a unique and eminent event in the human history.       It is never possible for a man to be resurrected unless God present Himself or intervenes there. Here is a clear indication that Jesus was uniquely God. His apostle Thomas seeing the resurrected Christ cried out saying, ‘My Lord and my God!’ (Jn. 20:28). Another way the Bible teaches that Jesus is God is by showing that He has all of the attributes of God. He knows everything (Jn. 4:29), is everywhere (Mt.18:20 ;) has all power ( Lk.7:14-15), depends on nothing outside of Himself for life (Jn.14:6 ), rules over everything ( Rev.19:16) never began to exist and never will cease to exist (John 1:1; 8:58), and is our Creator (Colossians 1:16). In other words, everything that God is, Jesus is. For Jesus is God. 

Ascension and His Second Coming: The Ascension implies Jesus' humanity being taken into Heaven. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (Item 668) states: Christ's Ascension into heaven signifies his participation, in his humanity, in God's power and authority. This event of Jesus clearly states the divinity of Jesus that He is truly God. It is also found in the biblical narrative that an angel tells the watching disciples that Jesus' second coming will take place in the same manner as His ascension.  So the Church from early time till now is “looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus” (Titus 2:13). Thus all these descriptions clearly reveals that Jesus is the son of God and savior of all.

Reinterpretation of the Christological Mystery in the Dogmatic Formulations:  There were controversies concerning the Christological mystery in the dogmatic formulation. It is found in  declaration of Nicaea and Chalcedon that formulates the classical Christological doctrine. In 325 the First Council of Nicaea defined the persons of the Godhead and their relationship with one another. Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God, God from God, Light from Light. The Council of Chalcedon in 451 issued a formulation of the being of Christ that of two natures, one human and one divine. This is called the doctrine of the hypostatic union. It is however, we also need to recognize some deficiencies of the classical Christological tradition and to explore proposals for its reinterpretations.

Jesus is Fully Human: Jesus was fully human like all other human beings,.  He is like us all respects, with exception of being ‘without sin’ (Heb. 4:15).   If we acknowledge that confession of the full humanity of Jesus is necessarily implies that among other things, his intellectual and physical limitations, his experience of the full range of emotion including joy, anger, grief and compassion, and his suffering and death, we thereby refuse to go the way of the Docetists who were embarrassed by all this.  In their view, humanity was only an ‘appearance’ he really did not suffer or die. What is important for us to note that if God in Jesus Christ does not enter into solidarity with the hell of our human condition, we remain without deliverance and without hope. For the classical Christological tradition, full humanity of Jesus is the precondition of the inclusiveness of his salvation. Thus the reinterpretation appeared as Jesus is indeed fully human, but he is a new humanity. The intimacy of his relationship with God and his solidarity with sinners and the oppressed are new and offensive. It is a new humanity grounded in God’s grace is the point of the biblical and creedal affirmation that Jesus was “conceived by the Holy Spirit” and “born of the virgin Mary”. Conceived by the holy Spirit insists that God’s grace is uniquely at work in and through his human life by the power of the Holy Spirit. Born of the virgin Mary signifies that salvation comes not from humanity’s own inherent possibilities but from God.     

Jesus is Fully Divine: The classical creeds declare the divinity of Jesus Christ without reservation and do so in faithfulness to New Testament witness: “God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself” (2 Cor. 5:19). It means that that what Jesus does and suffer is at the same time the doing and suffering of God. The preaching of Jesus is t more than the word of prophet; in his preaching God decisively addresses to us. Jesus does not simply announce the coming of reign of God; the reign of God is embodied in his person and work. When Jesus forgives sinners, this is not just the pardon offered but human being, it is also God’s forgiveness expressed and enacted in his human being. Jesus’ companionship with the poor, oppressed and sick is not just a caring human being’s companionship with suffering fellow creatures; it is God’s solidarity with these people made concrete in what this human being does and suffers. Jesus’ passion and death for us is not just martyrdom of another innocent victim in an unjust world; it is also God’s suffering, God’s taking death into being of God and overcoming it there for our salvation. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is not the victory of a solitary human being over death; it is God’s victory over sin and death for us all in the raising of this man Jesus.  This is how the reinterpretation of the essential elements of the Christological Mystery in the dogmatic formulations of the ancient Councils or Creeds reveals the affirmation that Jesus is fully human and divine in the point to the mystery of unity of his person. Thus Jesus is one person with two nature-divine and human.

Jesus Christ as the unique and universal Savior in the context keeping the conformity with the Sacred Scripture, Tradition and Teaching of the Church: Jesus Christ is unique and universal savior which has been solemnly professed through the conformity with the Sacred Scripture, Tradition and Teaching of the Church. Here it is discussed in the following points.  It is the inspired word of God that proclaims the Jesus as the unique and universal Savior. We see it both in Old Testament and New Testament. In Old Testament the promise of salvation was first announced with first fall of Adam and Eve. It is the first gospel of the coming of the unique savior. We find it in Genesis 3:15 that “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he shall strike your head, and you shall strike his heel.  It comes in truth though the coming of God’s only begotten Son Jesus Christ.  He came and dealt the crushing blow to the Devil, triumphing over him by giving His life on the cross. Through Him God was please to reconcile Himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven. (Col. 1:15). In the course of time God made covenant with Abraham and Moses where the coming of the savior was reaffirmed Covenant history begins with God’s call to Abraham. God promised to make Abraham the father of many nations to bless his descendants and make them His own special people -- in return, Abraham was to remain faithful to God and to serve as a channel through which God's blessings could flow to the rest of the world (Gen. 12:1-3). It was solemnly ratified on Mount Sinai with Moses as mediator between God and Men. This description of the expectation is more clearly pronounced through the prophets of the different time in different situation. In Isaiah, Jesus was described “Immanuel (Isa7:14)” God with us, “mighty God” (Isa.9:6-7). It was predicted in the OT that the messiah would be the “Son of David” (2 Sam.7:12-13), “sit as refiner and purifier” (Mal.3:3). In Zechariah 12:l0, Jehovah says that they will “look upon me whom they have pierced and mourn for him as one mourns for an only son”. This is how we can know about Jesus which was written many years ago of His birth and it became true at the fullness of time.  In New Testament, its clearest teaching is in John 1:14: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.” St. Paul very clearly said the aim of the birth of the Son  of Father in the following way “ who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,  but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,  so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,  and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”( Phil.2:6-11). Final salvation or the saving work of Christ’s got the full meaning only when He laid down His life for us. St. Paul states that “Christ’s sacrifice once for all” (Heb.10:12). Death is not the end of everything. There is resurrection which assurers our eternal life that was band for the sins of first Adam. The resurrection of Jesus is a unique and eminent event in the human history.  It is never possible for a man to be resurrected unless God present Himself or intervenes there. Here is a clear indication that Jesus was uniquely God. His apostle Thomas seeing the resurrected Christ cried out saying, ‘My Lord and my God!’ (Jn. 20:28). Another way the Bible teaches that Jesus is God is by showing that He has all of the attributes of God. He knows everything (Jn. 4:29), is everywhere (Mt.18:20 ;) has all power (Lk.7:14-15), depends on nothing outside of Himself for life (Jn.14:6 ), rules over everything (Rev.19:16) never began to exist and never will cease to exist (John 1:1; 8:58), and is our Creator (Colossians 1:16). In other words, everything that God is, Jesus is. For Jesus is God.  Tradition is what handed down from Christ the Lord by to the apostles who handed on, by the spoken word of their preaching, by the example they gave, by the institutions they established, what they themselves had received - whether from the lips of Christ, from his way of life and his works, or whether they had learned it at the prompting of the Holy Spirit.  Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, then, are bound closely together, and communicate one with the other. For both of them, flowing out from the same divine well-spring, come together in some fashion to form one thing, and move towards the same goal. This is now the teaching of the Church which by its sanctifying work The Church, in her doctrine, life and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes that Jesus is unique and universal Savior.

 The study of Jesus Christ not simply academic or historical knowledge but it is a faith knowledge:

Faith in Jesus Christ is not just knowing about him but trusting in him and being ready to follow him as the way, the truth and the life. It is simply to say that the biblical witness and the proclamation of the Church do not intend simply to inform us about the fact that a man named Jesus once lived a noble life, talked precious truth and died a tragic death. When reference is made in the Bible and the Church proclamation to Jesus, it is to declare that his life, message, death and resurrection are “for us”, “for many”, “for all” (Mk 10:45; Rom 5:8, 8:32; 1 Cor 15:22). The real point of Christology therefore, is neither curiosity not to engage in idle speculation; it is to affirm that in this Jesus God is decisively present and graciously active for the salvation of the world.

Conclusion: The entire discussions come to the final point that Jesus is the savior of the world. The existence of the different religious faith in some way reveals the truth of the ultimate God who is the way, truth and life. This truth is the incarnated word Jesus Christ who ensured the salvation of the human being through his passion, death and resurrection. This is the faith of the Church which is being continued throughout the human history. This faith becomes more evident, concrete and unique by the reinterpretation of the classical Christological doctrine.