The Orthodox Christ in the Modern World, Part 2

An Introduction to the Thought of E. L. Mascall, Part 2 of 3

The Second Union of Natures in the Word Made Flesh

The solution that came out of Nicaea provoked the controversy that led up to Chalcedon. It is only when the Son’s equality to the Father is admitted that one arrives at the next problem of their relation and of the relation between the two natures. In terms of a via media, this second union he calls “unconfused union.” The implication being that at one extreme is such a divorce of the two natures that we conceive of two persons, whereas at the other is such a confusion of the two natures that one is absorbed in the other. The former is Nestorianism and the latter Eutychianism (or monophysitism).

Two main premises help us, and these can come from a careful reading of the biblical data. First, human nature does not simply mean bodily nature, but also the human soul; second, John does not say that the Word united flesh to himself, but rather that the Word became flesh. The incarnate nature was a creation. 

We must examine Mascall’s idea of the humanity of Christ, as it becomes the real link between the theological reflection and the destiny of mankind. The body of Jesus was made naturally in the womb of Mary, while the soul was “created by God and infused into his body” yet this is not to be taken in the “crude creationist”1 sense of having no hereditary connection to the bodily line. The Person of this human nature was uncreated, not a separate person, but the pre-existent Word.

Now how should we understand the active relationship between the atemporal God and the Word made flesh in space and time? Returning, first, to his metaphysical distinction between infinite and finite being:

“Just because of its radically dependent and non-self-sufficient character, finite being is open to fresh influxes of creative power which will elevate and transform it, but not destroy it.”2

Grace, in general, and the Incarnation, in particular, are philosophically justified in this way. Second, Mascall examines a variety acts of the divine Person in the human nature.3 The word Theandric4 is used to describe these operations and activities. 

Arriving at the depths of Christological reflection here, we must avoid Nestorianism; but we must avoid it in a way that does not land us in Apollinarianism. To put it in credal language: How should we affirm that Christ has a “reasonable soul” without demanding that “soul” and “person” are logically coextensive? If we cannot, then we must choose our heresy. What Mascall suggests is that the lack of a second (human) person in the Son is not a denial of any psychological faculty, since “Person” is a metaphysical ascription.5 The human nature inheres in the Word, and thus, in the most important sense, has more of person than any other human. And he elicits more help from the past to make his case.

As perichoresis was the climax of the mature Trinitarianism by the eighth century, so Leontius’ idea of enhypostates achieved the same in Christology. What does this word mean? If we can agree that hypostases refers to the essence of the person, then to be “in” (en), in this case, refers to the incarnate Christ being in the Person of the Son. It is not that the independent person, Jesus, reached out to both the divine and human natures and united them “in Him,” as if his person was a third substance. This is where his previous distinction is so applicable:

“The Person of the Word and his divine nature are … really identical and only logically distinct … The divine Person and the human nature, on the other hand … are not absolutely identical.”6

So the human nature was neither its own hypostates, nor was it ahypostasis, but rather inheres in the divine logos. 

If one is inclined to a more “Western” way to sail between Apollinarius and Nestorius, Mascall draws back on his Thomism again to solve this matter. God is the one for whom to exist is his essence. To exist is to be in pure act. It follows that this divine actuality is what moves all personal actions. Consequently the human thoughts and decisions of the Son require no separate human person (initiating actor) since the Word is the ultimate Being-in-act. Human nature in the Son is complete in every respect and yet the acting Subject is the uncreated, eternal Word.

The Third Union of the Church with Christ

This union begins in Mascall’s via media on salvation. He calls it “defied creaturehood,” and anyone familiar with the doctrine of theosis will know his basic proof text and roughly where he is going with it. This balanced doctrine will steer between the undue exaltation of nature and the undue limitations on grace. He naturally goes right to 2 Peter 1:4 and “partakers in the divine nature.” Words like “deification” and “divinization” have also been used almost universally by the fathers.

“Not by nature, but by adoption,” said Augustine;7 and St. John of the Cross added that, “the substance of the soul … is God by participation in God.”8 Such statements appear about as clear as mud to modern readers. Mascall quotes Augustine again to the clearer effect that this does not involve any destruction of the creaturely status or ontological becoming of the divine. Hence the balanced name: deified creaturehood. One must often add layers of commentary to get to this point.

At this point Mascall begins to use the label “mysticism” in a way that is neutral to the brand that is often joined at the hip with rationalism for looking inward for light, as well as the brand that has long been scorned by rationalists as “anyone who believes in angels and ghosts and such.”

There are many understandable reasons to cast out the mystic. In non-Christian mysticism, it is elitism. The “higher road” is the only way. In Catholic mysticism, he argues, the Christian experience is revealed to the individual “with particular intensity and vividness,”9 but any are welcome and none are forced (nor can anyone force it).

But in the end, says the Christian, all who receive saving grace will be deified. The mystic is simply the one who consciously reflects upon what all Christians possess. 

What makes this third union so complex is that it is really a confluence of the doctrines of salvation, church, and final destiny. And what makes it so controversial is that Mascall most clearly distinguishes himself from Reformed theology at this point, yet does so by landing at least some of his blows against a straw man. 

When it comes to nature and grace per se, his Reformed antagonists are Barth and Brunner. The latter being the more moderate of the Neo-Orthodox who rejected Luther’s view of the image as mere relic,10 and Barth’s more extreme denial even of the relic. To be fair, many who call themselves Reformed really do appropriate the doctrine of total depravity with a scorched-earth Gnosticism. There must be being and participation at the common and special grace levels.

In spite of its pious sound, there can be no “gulf” between Creator and creature, lest the creature should cease to exist. Mascall uses the word “interpenetration” to describe God’s giving grace to the dependent without confusing the two. How then do we conceive of the “connection” that graciously preserves nature?

The solution out East was to distinguish between divine essence and energies. What is the goal? It is to find a category whereby we may take seriously the promise of 2 Peter 1:4 without either degrading God or consuming the creature. A question immediately arises. How is this not guilty of the very “third thing” or “intermediary” brought up about all pagan views? How does it not make the same mistake that we see made today, of separating God’s essential ontology from some “relational” or “covenantal” ontology? 

Mascall turns to how grace is causal to nature. Several Thomas quotations highlight the impossibility that the creature could contribute to the First Cause of grace, yet Mascall seems not to want to focus there and insists only to speak of sanctifying grace. Grace is the entire first cause, yet always works to and through man’s nature and faculties. The Westminster Divines would agree entirely, as would Bavinck.

We may also say that other unions emerge within this third: as the church is united to Christ, so also is the humanity of each participating in the life of God. Thus when God and man are reconciled, so are the individual and the communal. Mascall turns in this direction with an illuminating description of the church as “the sphere of the New Humanity, of human beings remade by incorporation into Christ.”11

______________________

1. Christ, the Christian, and the Church, 2.

2. The Openness of Being, 16.

3. Via Media, 98.

4. Via Media, 109.

5. Via Media, 103.

6. Christ, the Christian, and the Church, 20.

7. Via Media, 122.

8. Via Media, 122.

9. Via Media, 135.

10. Via Media, 136-37.

11. Christ, the Christian, and the Church, 135.