It came in the Arian disputes, which for a century — to A.D. 451 — filled tlie Cnristian world and passed through several phases. Arius was incited to action by the teaching of Alexander the bishop of Alexandria, who tauglit the eternal generation of the Son (' there never was a time wlien He was not '). He maintained that as a fatlier must exist before his son, therefore the Son of God did not exist eternally with the Father ; that not being eternal He was created, but before time began ; that being created. He is in all things unlike the Father. The Council of Nica?a (A.D. 325), con- vened by the Emperor for tlie settlement of peace, decided against Arianism, and defined the authori- tative doctrine to be that the Son is ' of one sub- stance' [ousia) with the Father; that He was ' begotten, not made,' that ' there never was a time when He was not,' that 'He was not created.' The Nicene Creed was established largely by the brilliant advocacy of Athanasius, subsequently bishop of Alexandria. It was a signal triumph in favour of the essential Divinity of Christ as distinct from a merely moral likeness to God. There can be little doubt that Arian contentions propagated themselves over a \vide area ; and that partly through the ability of the Arian leaders to gather into association with themselves much floating dissatisfaction with the deeper currents discernible and now becoming dominant, and partly by the aid of political and secular methods. It is unques- tionably the case, however, that the Arian position had a vitality of its own which the Athanasian dogmatics never wholly quenched, and which has burst out again and again in subsequent thought. It is the natural standpoint of all minds that, in seeking to appreciate Christ, start from the idea of God rather than the fact of Christ ; its main interest is not religious but theistic, a theoretical deduction, not the statement of an inner experience. Athanasius met it on the basis of that Christian experience which initiated the problem, .and from the beginning had determined its development. His instinct was justified; for although the Arian agitation protracted itself all through tlie 4th cent., it was gradually deserted by the more religious adherents, whom the Athanasian divines took pains to conciliate by removing false impressions, by deepening their thought, and by popularizing it with illustrations.
The second great Council, that of Constantinople (A.D. 381), saw practically the death of Arianism. It reaffirmed the Nicene dogmas against various novelties, and especially that offshoot of Arianism which denied the Divinity of the Holy Ghost (Macedonians). The third Council, at 'Ephesus (in 431), and the fourth, at Chalcedon (in 451), dealt with other three consequences of Arian doctrine, known as the Nestorian, ApoUinarian, and Eutychian heresies. The three have reference to the constitution of Christ's Divine-human Pers Jesus Christ being Divine in the Nicene sense, what sense could He also at the same time be VOL. I.— 31
human? It had been determined tliat He was primarily Divine ; not a man like other men, who became Divine, but the personal Logos of God manifesting Himself through the human person with whom He had entered into union. Accord- ing to this view, He was necessarily two distinct natures, to one of which it seemed impossible to render all the significance of its proper functions, viz. the human nature. In particular, Was His knowledge limited? Had He a true body and a reasonable soul? Was His Person single? — pro- blems which enlisted the most earnest interest of Athanasius, tlie Gregorys, Cyril of Alexandria, Leo of Rome, and, above all, Augustine of Hippo. Briefly the answers were : (1) as to Christ's human knowledge, that omniscience belongs to the God- head of the Word, but that the human mind which the Word took was limited ; (2) as to Christ's body, that it was a true body, really born of Mary, and passible in the experiences of hfe ; (3) as to the union of the Divine and human natures, that these two were each perfect, without confusion, and united in one Person ; ' although He be God and man, He is not two but one Christ.' In the words of Chalcedon, He is—
Son,
Lord Jei
us Christ, the same being perfect in man- truly God and truly man, the same having a rational soul and a body, of one substance with the Father according to the Godhead, and the same being of one substance ^th us ac- cording to the manhood, in all things like unto us except sin . . . one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, only-begotten, acknow- ledged in two natures, without fusion, without change, without division, without separation ; the difference of the two natures having been in no wise taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and combining to form one person and one hypostasis.'
Or, in the words of the last of the great Creeds, the so-called 'Athanasian,' which fairly represents the theology of the 5tli century :
' He is not two, but one Christ ; One ; not bv conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking of the manhood into God ; One altogether ; not by contusion of substance, but by unity of