Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T05:43:30.155Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Divine holiness and the explanation of Christ's impeccability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 February 2020

MARK C. MURPHY Open the ORCID record for MARK C. MURPHY [Opens in a new window]
MARK C. MURPHY*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, 20057, USA
*
e-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Supposing that Christ is impeccable – that, necessarily, Christ does not sin – what explains that impeccability? While there have been multiple theories of how the operations of Christ's human will could be fully free while Christ's sinlessness is nevertheless guaranteed, such accounts cannot be exploited to provide the requisite explanation. And not all of the divine purposes sufficient for becoming incarnate would also be sufficient to explain why Christ must be sinless. We should instead explain Christ's impeccability normatively, in terms of the reasons that God has to respond appropriately to God's own perfection by refraining from taking on a human nature with a will that ever opposes the divine will. Such reasons are reasons of divine holiness.

Type
Original Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 57 , Issue 4 , December 2021 , pp. 683 - 702
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adams, Marilyn McCord (1999a) Horrendous Evils and the Goodness of God (Ithaca: Cornell University Press).Google Scholar
Adams, Marilyn McCord (1999b) What Sort of Human Nature? Medieval Philosophy and the Systematics of Christology (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press).Google Scholar
Adams, Marilyn McCord (2004) ‘Cur Deus homo? Priorities among the reasons’, Faith and Philosophy, 21, 141–158.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aquinas, Thomas (1975) Summa Contra Gentiles, Pegis, Anton (tr.) (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press).Google Scholar
Aquinas, Thomas (1981) Summa Theologiae, Fathers of the English Dominican Province (trs) (New York: Christian Classics).Google Scholar
Crisp, Oliver (2007) Divinity and Humanity: The Incarnation Reconsidered (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crisp, Oliver (2009) ‘Was Christ sinless or impeccable?’, in God Incarnate: Explorations in Christology (London: T&T Clark), 122–136.Google Scholar
DeWeese, Garrett (2007) ‘One person, two natures: two metaphysical models of the Incarnation’, in Sanders, Fred & Issler, Klaus (eds) Jesus in Trinitarian Perspective (Nashville: B&H Publishing), 114–153.Google Scholar
Flint, Thomas P. (2001) ‘“A death he freely accepted”: Molinist reflections on the Incarnation’, Faith and Philosophy, 18, 3–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frankfurt, Harry (1969) ‘Alternate possibilities and moral responsibility’, Journal of Philosophy, 66, 829–839.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freddoso, Alfred (1986) ‘Human nature, potency, and the Incarnation’, Faith and Philosophy, 3, 27–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kyle, Brent G. (2017) ‘Hiddenness, holiness, and impurity’, Religious Studies, 53, 239–259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merricks, Trenton (2007) ‘The word made flesh: dualism, physicalism, and the Incarnation’, in van Inwagen, Peter & Zimmerman, Dean (eds) Persons: Human and Divine (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 281–300.Google Scholar
Molina, Luis de (1988) On Divine Foreknowledge: Part IV of the Concordia, Freddoso, Alfred (tr.) (Ithaca: Cornell University Press).Google Scholar
Morris, Thomas V. (1986) Logic of God Incarnate (Eugene: Wipf & Stock).Google Scholar
Murphy, Mark C. (2011) God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, Mark C. (2017) God's Own Ethics: Norms of Divine Action and the Argument from Evil (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, Mark C. (2018) ‘Holy, holy, holy: Divine holiness and divine perfection’, Religious Studies.Google Scholar
Newman, John Henry (1995) Apologia pro Vita Sua (New York: Penguin).Google Scholar
Otto, Rudolf (1923) The Idea of the Holy: An Inquiry into the Non-Rational Factor in the Idea of the Divine and Its Relation to the Rational, Harvey, John W. (tr.) (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Pawl, Timothy (2016) In Defense of Conciliar Christology: A Philosophical Essay (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pawl, Timothy (2019) In Defense of Extended Conciliar Christology: A Philosophical Essay (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pawl, Timothy (2020) ‘The metaphysics of the Incarnation: Christ's human nature’, in Marschler, Thomas & Schärtl, Thomas (eds) Herausforderungen und Modifikationen des klassischen Theismus (Münster: Aschendorff), 1–18.Google Scholar
Scotus, John Duns (n.d. 1) Ordinatio III, d. 1–17, Peter L. P. Simpson (tr.), <https://www.aristotelophile.com/Books/Translations/Scotus%20Ordinatio%20III%20dd.1-17.pdf>..>Google Scholar
Scotus, John Duns (n.d. 2) Ordinatio IV, d. 43–49, Peter L. P. Simpson (tr.), <https://www.aristotelophile.com/Books/Translations/Scotus%20Ordinatio%20IV%20d.43-49.pdf>..>Google Scholar
Tanner, Norman SJ (1990) Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils (Washington: Georgetown University Press).Google Scholar
Thompson, Michael (2008) Life and Action: Elementary Structures of Practice and Practical Thought (Cambridge: Harvard University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar