A Point of Agreement with Trinitarians

Many attempts to refute trinitarian thinking do so by also denying what’s called the “hypostatic union,” a doctrine which makes two central claims about the nature of Christ.

  • Jesus is truly God. He possesses an uncreated, divine nature which predates the existence of the universe.
  • Jesus is truly Man. He possesses a created, human nature with everything needed to make him truly human (e.g. a distinct human body, soul, and will etc.)

In trinitarian thinking, these two natures exist as a single, united person. The idea is that Jesus is not two persons in one body, but rather one person with two natures. John MacArthur writes on this subject,

In AD 325, the Council of Nicaea affirmed Scripture’s revelation of Jesus being truly God. Then in AD 451, the Council of Chalcedon agreed that Jesus was at the same time human and divine, involving a “hypostatic union” of two natures without confusion, without change, without division, and without separation. The Apostles’ Creed (fifth century AD) thus states, “I believe in… Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.” In other words, the hypostatic union consists of the two natures of Christ in one theanthropic (God-man) person. This union maintains Christ’s deity undiminished and in his humanity unexalted…

While the human nature the Son of God received in his incarnation allows him to experience humanity, he does not exist as two persons. He is but one person with two natures—the divine and the human.

— John MacArthur, Biblical Doctrine, Chapter 4

Trinity Berean as a site advances an alternative to the trinity called the pattern, so the framing of Christ and the godhead will be substantially different in various ways. Yet the hypostatic union of God and man in Christ is an important point of agreement between trinitarian and pattern christology, aside from one element regarding human personhood that will be discussed below.

But the essential idea — that Jesus is truly God and truly man united together in one person — is not only a point of agreement, but the necessary foundation for the pattern’s stand against the trinity in its view of the sonship of Christ. The trinity claims that Jesus is the Son of God on account of his divine nature proceeding from the Father in an eternal process of begetting. The pattern claims that Jesus is the Son of God on account of his human nature being created in the image and likeness of God, and his faithful obedience as a son in that role. Without a belief in two natures for Christ, the pattern has no foundation from which to challenge the trinity’s interpretation of his sonship, because there would be only one nature to consider as a potential source.

Jesus is Truly God and Truly Man

The idea that Jesus is truly God is taught throughout the old and new testaments (Psa 45:6-7, Isa 9:6, Mar 1:2-3, Jhn 8:58, Col 1:19, etc.). Perhaps the simplest proof of his transcendent divinity (that he is the uncreated source of all things, not just a lesser deity) is that Jesus is attributed with the creation of the universe.

The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. (Act 17:24-25)

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. (Heb 1:1-3a)

In Jesus, we have the creator of the world entering into it to become its redeemer, making him twice the owner of all things. Because Jesus is truly God, he owns the world by virtue of the fact that he made it. Because Jesus is truly man — specifically the son of God who died to redeem it from destruction — he also owns the world by right of inheritance (Heb 1-2). By uniting both God and man in the person of Christ, the world can be restored to God through the work of Christ, “that God may be all in all.” (1Co 15:28)

The concept of Jesus being “truly” God and “truly” man emphasizes that the union of the two natures does not alter or hybridize them in any way.

  • Concerning his divinity, Jesus is truly transcendent over all creation, being unaffected in his divinity by the creation that he made, and to which he united himself. Had he never created the universe, Jesus would still exist in his divinity as he is today, simply without the addition of his human nature (Psa 102:24-27).
  • Concerning his humanity, Jesus possesses everything that it means to be truly human. He has a created body (Luke 24:36-46), a created soul (Heb 5:7), a human mind with limited knowledge (Mar 13:32), and human desires with the capacity to be tempted (Heb 4:15) — all united with a divine nature possessing unlimited knowledge (Psa 139:1-4, Mar 2:6-8), and which is unable to be tempted with sin (Jas 1:13).

Is Jesus Truly Man, Though?

To this point in the article, orthodox trinitarians should be in complete agreement with pattern christology. However, we’ll look briefly at one point of disagreement concerning what is meant when we say that Jesus is truly man. Patternists see a subtle contradiction between the trinity proper, and the trinitarian framing of the person of Christ. While affirming in their christology that Jesus is truly man, the trinitarian view of the godhead necessarily denies that Jesus is a truly human person, because his personhood comes exclusively from his divine nature.

Simply put, trinitarian christology denies a plurality of persons within the god-man. While there are two natures, there are not two persons. Rather, the natures are united into a single, indivisible person who essentially wields divine and human powers and capacities as necessary. Because this united person exists before and independent of creation, it means that Jesus’ personhood exists from eternity past as a property of his divine nature, the divine person of the Son.

Thus for the consistent trinitarian, Jesus is a divine person with a divine nature, who at the point of the incarnation added to himself an impersonal human nature. That human nature must not bring with it human personhood; otherwise there would be two persons in the god-man rather than one, an idea which trinitarians deny in their rejection of nestorianism. The trouble is that human personhood comes from the very fact that we are humans, created in the image and likeness of the personal God (Gen 1:26-27). So anyone who is truly human should be a distinctly personal being; otherwise he is not truly and fully in the image of God.

Fortunately scripture provides us with plenty of evidence that Jesus does have a plurality of persons interacting within his united nature, involving interplay between a human and divine will, human and divine desires, etc. So this is a problem in trinitarian christology, not scripture. The pattern resolves the one problem that trinitarians see in nestorianism through the biblical concept of composite personhood, the idea that multiple persons can unite to become and act as one composite person (Gen 2:21-24).

A full treatment of the issue is left for a later article, but I mention it here to be clear that when I use the term “hypostatic union” on this site, I simply mean to summarize the idea that Jesus is truly God and truly man. Other theological baggage that comes from the trinity’s framing of Jesus’ two natures may or may not be implicit in the term; I’ve heard it used with a range of meanings. At our current moment in history, “hypostatic union” is the only summary term in English that I’m aware of to describe the two-nature concept, so I use it simply to mean what trinitarians and patternists (supposedly) agree on, that Jesus is truly God and truly man.

In the next article, we’ll look at the two natures of Christ to answer the question of why Jesus is called the Son of God. Trinitarians claim that he is the Son because of his divine nature. Patternists argue that he is the Son because of his human nature.

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Pattern Christology

Jesus has two natures — an uncreated divine nature, and a created human nature.

Jesus is truly God, meaning that his divine nature predates the existence of the universe, and has all of the attributes of monotheistic, biblical divinity (omniscience, omnipotence etc.). He is not a lesser, created god, but rather exists eternally before and outside of time as the one true God.

Jesus is truly man, meaning that his human nature is truly descended from Adam. From the moment of conception onward, he has (and forever will have) a human body comprised of matter and energy, and a human soul with its own distinct intellect and will. He is not a mirage or apparition; he truly lived a real, human life among us, while simultaneously possessing and displaying his divinity through miraculous works and words of life.

Like the title “son of man,” the title “son of God” describes Jesus’ created, human nature. Adam, Jesus, and the Christian are all described as sons of God because we are in the form/image/likeness of God. Both divine and human activities are ascribed to Jesus through both titles, because of their contextual meaning (Jesus is a particular son of man who is divine; Jesus is a particular son of God who is divine). But the title “son of God” fundamentally describes his human nature and human relationship to God.

At least one scripture exists that describes Jesus as having a father/son relationship with God prior to his incarnation as a man. If Jesus’ sonship is through his humanity, then this presents a challenge to pattern christology, because his human relationship with God predates his existence as a man.

Trinitarians turn to Jesus’ divinity to explain this preincarnate sonship. Patternists, on the other hand, maintain that he was the son of God through a “preincarnate hypostatic union” (union of God and creature) known as the angel of the Lord. Prior to the incarnation, Jesus was truly God, and truly angelic (or at least a true creature). This allows the person of the son to exist from the moment that God first created light, without compromising his true divinity.

Like trinitarians, patternists believe that Jesus has two natures that together form a single person. Unlike trinitarians, we also affirm that each nature is distinctly personal, and that Jesus can behave as a single unified person, or as two distinct persons (often identified as the Father and the Son). Scripture shows us that Jesus has a human mind and human will that are distinct from his divine mind and divine will. This implies that Jesus’ human and divine natures are distinctly personal.

Pattern christology therefore agrees with both orthodox christology (belief in a single person), and nestorianism (belief in two distinct persons). This is not a contradiction, because scripture supports the idea of two (or more) persons becoming and behaving as one person.

God dwells in Jesus as a human temple, similar to how he dwells in a Christian, but with a few differences. First, Jesus is described as God incarnate, and we are not. Second, God dwells in Christ through the divine person of the Word, whereas he dwells in the Christian through the divine person of the Holy Spirit.

These two temples correspond to the two persons in the godhead. God is a composite union of two persons who are one, the Word and the Spirit. The term “Father” is used to denote the godhead as a whole, the composite union of Word and Spirit. Thus it is accurate to say that the Father (God) dwells in Christ through the Word, and the Father (God) dwells in the Christian through the Spirit.