Friday, December 18, 2015

Incarnation: why matter matters in theology

S.M. Hutchens, "Jesus Christ Come in the Flesh" (Touchstone, November 30, 2015):
If the old stories are true, what offends and angers Satan more than anything else is the act of God wherein spirit becomes incarnated.  He hated the creation of man not as a mere animal, but in no less than the image and likeness of God, who treacherously breathed the nephesh chayyah into this thing of dust.  The Serpent had his way with the first Adam in Eden, thinking to destroy him.  Most of all he hates the second Adam, that vessel of clay that has the spirit without measure, with whom he had his way at Calvary, once again thinking to destroy him, and through him all mankind.  The spirit clothed in flesh must be execrable filth to the rebellious who are in substance fastidiously pure spirit, and the Incarnation of God so inexplicable, so hateful, and so enraging, that they cannot bring themselves to confront it as reality, thus providing a way that their loyalties, and those of their followers, can be tested right through the veil of their deceit and self-representation as angels of light.  (Do not look for mere hatred of the West at the deepest spiritual stratum of Islam, but of what the West stands for in the offended mind of its Principalities.)
We can easily understand the old and rather simple heresies–Gnosticism, Docetism, and the like–where a denial was clear, but have difficulty seeing those of our own day because they are more subtle and indirect.  Classical liberal theology, for example, does not deny outright the Incarnation or the Passion or the bodily resurrection of the flesh of Jesus, but treats these as stories for those with a pre-scientific view of reality (that is, who believe they really happened), and regards these beliefs about the flesh of Christ not as referring to actual events with cosmic and eternal significance, but mere symbols of abstract virtues like hope, courage, patience and renewal.  To identify the articles of the Creed, however, as “pre-scientific” is another way of calling them false when presented as statements of historical truth. 
Likewise the egalitarians, in their preoccupation with the equality of the sexes, eliminate the cosmic and eternal significance of the sex of Christ by consistently emphasizing that it was his generic humanness and not his male humanness–that is, the actual flesh of his incarnation–that signifies, thus identifying their ideology as another Satanic attack on Jesus Christ come in the flesh.  Both egalitarianism and theological liberalism refuse to make the required positive confession of the whole truth of the reality.  The First Epistle of John tells us an actual denial is not necessary for identification of the spirit of Antichrist, only an inability or refusal to confess.  The most effective ways to do this require the assistance of religion.
If the old stories are true, what offends and angers Satan more than anything else is the act of God wherein spirit becomes incarnated.  He hated the creation of man not as a mere animal, but in no less than the image and likeness of God, who treacherously breathed the nephesh chayyah into this thing of dust.  The Serpent had his way with the first Adam in Eden, thinking to destroy him.  Most of all he hates the second Adam, that vessel of clay that has the spirit without measure, with whom he had his way at Calvary, once again thinking to destroy him, and through him all mankind.  The spirit clothed in flesh must be execrable filth to the rebellious who are in substance fastidiously pure spirit, and the Incarnation of God so inexplicable, so hateful, and so enraging, that they cannot bring themselves to confront it as reality, thus providing a way that their loyalties, and those of their followers, can be tested right through the veil of their deceit and self-representation as angels of light.  (Do not look for mere hatred of the West at the deepest spiritual stratum of Islam, but of what the West stands for in the offended mind of its Principalities.)
We can easily understand the old and rather simple heresies–Gnosticism, Docetism, and the like–where a denial was clear, but have difficulty seeing those of our own day because they are more subtle and indirect.  Classical liberal theology, for example, does not deny outright the Incarnation or the Passion or the bodily resurrection of the flesh of Jesus, but treats these as stories for those with a pre-scientific view of reality (that is, who believe they really happened), and regards these beliefs about the flesh of Christ not as referring to actual events with cosmic and eternal significance, but mere symbols of abstract virtues like hope, courage, patience and renewal.  To identify the articles of the Creed, however, as “pre-scientific” is another way of calling them false when presented as statements of historical truth.
Likewise the egalitarians, in their preoccupation with the equality of the sexes, eliminate the cosmic and eternal significance of the sex of Christ by consistently emphasizing that it was his generic humanness and not his male humanness–that is, the actual flesh of his incarnation–that signifies, thus identifying their ideology as another Satanic attack on Jesus Christ come in the flesh.  Both egalitarianism and theological liberalism refuse to make the required positive confession of the whole truth of the reality.  The First Epistle of John tells us an actual denial is not necessary for identification of the spirit of Antichrist, only an inability or refusal to confess.  The most effective ways to do this require the assistance of religion.
- See more at: http://touchstonemag.com/merecomments/2015/11/jesus-christ-flesh-2/#sthash.7OouvMvS.dpuf
If the old stories are true, what offends and angers Satan more than anything else is the act of God wherein spirit becomes incarnated.  He hated the creation of man not as a mere animal, but in no less than the image and likeness of God, who treacherously breathed the nephesh chayyah into this thing of dust.  The Serpent had his way with the first Adam in Eden, thinking to destroy him.  Most of all he hates the second Adam, that vessel of clay that has the spirit without measure, with whom he had his way at Calvary, once again thinking to destroy him, and through him all mankind.  The spirit clothed in flesh must be execrable filth to the rebellious who are in substance fastidiously pure spirit, and the Incarnation of God so inexplicable, so hateful, and so enraging, that they cannot bring themselves to confront it as reality, thus providing a way that their loyalties, and those of their followers, can be tested right through the veil of their deceit and self-representation as angels of light.  (Do not look for mere hatred of the West at the deepest spiritual stratum of Islam, but of what the West stands for in the offended mind of its Principalities.)
We can easily understand the old and rather simple heresies–Gnosticism, Docetism, and the like–where a denial was clear, but have difficulty seeing those of our own day because they are more subtle and indirect.  Classical liberal theology, for example, does not deny outright the Incarnation or the Passion or the bodily resurrection of the flesh of Jesus, but treats these as stories for those with a pre-scientific view of reality (that is, who believe they really happened), and regards these beliefs about the flesh of Christ not as referring to actual events with cosmic and eternal significance, but mere symbols of abstract virtues like hope, courage, patience and renewal.  To identify the articles of the Creed, however, as “pre-scientific” is another way of calling them false when presented as statements of historical truth.
Likewise the egalitarians, in their preoccupation with the equality of the sexes, eliminate the cosmic and eternal significance of the sex of Christ by consistently emphasizing that it was his generic humanness and not his male humanness–that is, the actual flesh of his incarnation–that signifies, thus identifying their ideology as another Satanic attack on Jesus Christ come in the flesh.  Both egalitarianism and theological liberalism refuse to make the required positive confession of the whole truth of the reality.  The First Epistle of John tells us an actual denial is not necessary for identification of the spirit of Antichrist, only an inability or refusal to confess.  The most effective ways to do this require the assistance of religion.
- See more at: http://touchstonemag.com/merecomments/2015/11/jesus-christ-flesh-2/#sthash.7OouvMvS.dpufIf the old stories are true, what offends and angers Satan more than anything else is the act of God wherein spirit becomes incarnated.  He hated the creation of man not as a mere animal, but in no less than the image and likeness of God, who treacherously breathed the nephesh chayyah into this thing of dust.  The Serpent had his way with the first Adam in Eden, thinking to destroy him.  Most of all he hates the second Adam, that vessel of clay that has the spirit without measure, with whom he had his way at Calvary, once again thinking to destroy him, and through him all mankind.  The spirit clothed in flesh must be execrable filth to the rebellious who are in substance fastidiously pure spirit, and the Incarnation of God so inexplicable, so hateful, and so enraging, that they cannot bring themselves to confront it as reality, thus providing a way that their loyalties, and those of their followers, can be tested right through the veil of their deceit and self-representation as angels of light.  (Do not look for mere hatred of the West at the deepest spiritual stratum of Islam, but of what the West stands for in the offended mind of its Principalities.)
We can easily understand the old and rather simple heresies–Gnosticism, Docetism, and the like–where a denial was clear, but have difficulty seeing those of our own day because they are more subtle and indirect.  Classical liberal theology, for example, does not deny outright the Incarnation or the Passion or the bodily resurrection of the flesh of Jesus, but treats these as stories for those with a pre-scientific view of reality (that is, who believe they really happened), and regards these beliefs about the flesh of Christ not as referring to actual events with cosmic and eternal significance, but mere symbols of abstract virtues like hope, courage, patience and renewal.  To identify the articles of the Creed, however, as “pre-scientific” is another way of calling them false when presented as statements of historical truth.
Likewise the egalitarians, in their preoccupation with the equality of the sexes, eliminate the cosmic and eternal significance of the sex of Christ by consistently emphasizing that it was his generic humanness and not his male humanness–that is, the actual flesh of his incarnation–that signifies, thus identifying their ideology as another Satanic attack on Jesus Christ come in the flesh.  Both egalitarianism and theological liberalism refuse to make the required positive confession of the whole truth of the reality.  The First Epistle of John tells us an actual denial is not necessary for identification of the spirit of Antichrist, only an inability or refusal to confess.  The most effective ways to do this require the assistance of religion.
[Hat tip to JM]

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