[lbo-talk] Christ and Politics (was more on the econ Nobel)

[Paul]

Strictly speaking, I suppose the phrase is "dual nature" of Christ (rather 
than "hybrid" nature), no?  But IIRC, this is from the Council of Nicaea 
(325 AD), expelling the Gnostics from Christianity (the Gnostics held to 
only a divine and not a human form since material forms are lower than 
spiritual ones) .  The Council of Chalcedon (125 years later) took on the 
attempt to back pedal a bit, by expelling the Monophosites (Armenian, 
Coptic Christians, etc) who argue for a "dual form" but a single "divine 
nature".  Later there was another split with the Nestorians (Assyrians, 
Persian, East Syrian and probably Maronite Christians) who accepted the 
dual form and nature but tried to split these into almost two entities.

As I understand it, these theological debates (with the expulsions and 
subsequent repressions) reflected enormous strife that was as much 
political and cultural as it was theological. "The East" (Egypt, the 
Levant, N. Africa, etc) has always been more influenced by the spirituality 
emanating from Persia and India which denigrates the material.  The western 
Greek tradition is (partly) the reverse.  Christianity, being established 
in both regions settled into a difficult-to-explain compromise.

The repeated challenges to the Catholic-Orthodox versions of Christ reflect 
partly the Eastern philosophical climate - but also very much their 
resentment and rebellion from rule by Rome and then Byzantium.  The 
rebelliousness of the wealthy sophisticated eastern provinces were perhaps 
the major political struggles in early Christendom and so became no small 
question in the dogma.

After experiencing brutal and unrelenting repression from Byzantium these 
dissident churches may have welcomed the Arab conquers and some historians 
feel this split played a key role in propelling the Muslim conquest.  And, 
indeed, for the next 1000 years these Churches benefited from relative 
toleration by their Islamic rulers -- very different than what they were 
receiving from rule by fellow Christians in Europe.  In the 18th and 19th 
century, with the rise of Europe, some of these churches reached 
accommodative arrangements, entering the Catholic Church as autonomous 
units (sometimes, as in the case of the Maronites, revising the most 
contentious of their tenets on the dual nature of Christ).

Paul

At 05:18 PM 10/13/2005 -0500, you wrote:
>They did say fully God, as well as fully human.  But humanity
>and divinity are not two examples of personalities.  The Greek
>philosophers at Chalcedon knew that they couldn't say that God
>and man are two of anything.  There is no category to which
>they both belong (not even being or "things").  God and the
>universe don't add up to two (two what?).  That's why the
>Incarnation isn't an example of hybridity -- like a mule or an
>ape-man. --CGE
>
>---- Original message ----
> >Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 17:02:37 -0400
> >From: Shane Mage <shmage at pipeline.com>
> >Subject: RE: [lbo-talk] more on the econ Nobel
> >To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> >
> >C.G. Estabrook wrote:
> >>Your residual Catholicism is getting a bit rusty, Doug.  The
> >>council of Chalcedon (451 CE) specifically rejected the notion
> >>that Christ was a hybrid. "Fully human," they said...
> >
> >But they also said "fully God," n'est-ce-pas?  Today we would say
> >"fully dual-personalitied."
> >
> >Shane Mage
> >
> >"Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not
> >consent to be called
> >Zeus."
> >
> >Herakleitos of Ephesos