Hypostatic Union

Hypostatic union (from the Greek word hypostasis, meaning "person, subsistence") is a technical term in Christian theology employed in mainstream Christology to describe the union of Christ's humanity and divinity in one hypostasis or individual personhood.

The most basic explanation for the hypostatic union is Jesus Christ being both fully God and fully man. He is both perfectly divine and perfectly human and has two complete distinct nature at once.

The Athanasian Creed recognized this doctrine and affirmed its importance by saying, "He is God from the essence of the Father, begotten before time; and he is human from the essence of his mother, born in time; completely God, completely human, with a rational soul and human flesh; equal to the Father as regards to divinity, less than the Father as regards humanity. Although he is God and human, yet Christ is not two, but one. He is one, however, not by his divinity being turned into human flesh, but by God's taking humanity to himself. He is one, certainly not by blending his essence, but by the unity of his person. For just as one human is both rational soul and flesh, so too the one Christ is both God and human."

The Greek term hypostasis had come into use as a technical term prior to the Christological debates of the late fourth and fifth centuries. In pre-Christian times, Greek philosophy (Stoicism) used the word. Some occurences of the term hypostasis in the New Testament foreshadow the later, technical understanding of the word. Although it can translate literally as "substance," this has been a cause of some confusion; accordingly the New American Standard Bible translates it as "subsistence." Hypostasis denotes an actual, concrete existence, in contrast to abstract categories such as the Platonic ideas.

In Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments, the dual nature of Christ is explored as a paradox, i.e., as "the ultimate paradox," because God, understood as a perfectly good, perfectly wise, perfectly powerful being, fully became a human, in the Christian understanding of the term: burdened by sin, limited in goodness, knowledge, and understanding. This paradox can only be resolved, Kierkegaard's believed, by a leap of faith away from one's understanding and reason towards belief in God.

As the precise nature of this union is held to defy finite human comprehension, the hypostatic union is also referred to by the alternative term "mystical union."

x--------x

This post is sponsored by Burberry.

Comments

Mariology

Mariology is the theological study of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Mariology seeks to relate doctrine or dogma about Mary to other doctrines of the faith, such as those concerning Jesus and notions about redemption, intercession, and grace. Mariology aims to place the role of the historic Mary in the context of scripture, tradition and the teachings of the Church on Mary. In terms of social history, Mariology may be broadly defined as the study of devotion to and thinking about Mary throughout the history of Christianity. There exist a variety of Christian (and non-Christian) views about Mary as a figure ranging from the focus on the veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Roman Catholic Mariology to criticisms of "mariolatry" as a form of idolatry. The latter would include certain Protestant objections to Marian devotion. There are also more distinctive approaches to the role of Mary in Lutheran Marian theology and Anglican Marian theology. As a field of theology, the most ...

Stoichiometry

Stoichiometry refers to the relationship between the quantities of reactants and products before, during, and following chemical reactions. Stoichiometry was founded on the law of conservation of mass where the total mass of the reactants equals the total mass of the products, leading to the insight that the relations among qualities of reactants and products typically form a ratio of positive integers. This means that if the amounts of separate reactants are known, then the amount of the product can be calculated. Conversely, if one reactant has a known quantity and the quantity of the products can be empirically determined, then the amount of other reactants can also be calculated. This is illustrated in this example, where the balanced equation is: CH4 + 2O4 -----> CO2 + 2H2O Here, one molecule of methane reacts with two molecules of oxygen gas to yield one molecule of carbon dioxide and two molecules of water. This particular chemical...

Ecology

Ecology is the study of the relationships among living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps with the closely related sciences of biogeograohy, evolutionary biology, genetics, ethology, and natural history. Ecology is the branch of biology, and is the study of abundance, biomass, and distribution of organisms in the context of the environment. It encompasses life processes, interactions and adaptations; movement of materials and energy through living communities; successional development of ecosystems; cooperation, competition, and predation with and between species; and patterns of biodiversity and its effect on ecosystem processes. Ecology has practical applications in conservation biology, wetland management, natural resource management (agroecology, agriculture, forestry, agroforestry, fisheries, mining, tourism), urban planning (urban e...

Search This Blog