III. CHRISTIANITY
The Christian conception of deity derived from two
traditions: Hebrew and Greek. The factors that molded
it after the fusion of these traditions, and that gave
to it is peculiar distinction, were various, and were
related to certain historical situations. An appreciation
of these factors is essential for understanding the com-
plex theology in which the Christian doctrine of God
was eventually embodied.
The original Christian movement, centered on Jesus
of Nazareth, was one of a number of Messianic move-
ments that took place in Palestine during the first six
decades of the first century (Figure 5). These move-
ments resulted from the reaction of the Jews, who
believed that Israel should be a theocracy, to the im-
position of Roman rule in A.D. 6. So far as the purpose
of Jesus can be made out from the problematic evi-
dence of the Gospels, it would appear that he sought
to prepare his fellow Jews for the establishment of the
Kingdom of God. This aim was inspired by current
Jewish apocalyptic hopes which have already been
described. The achievement of his aim would have
involved the abolition of Roman rule. The execution
of Jesus by the Romans was, therefore, the inevitable
penalty inflicted by them on one whom they thus
adjudged to be guilty of sedition. After his crucifixion,
the disciples of Jesus continued to believe that he was
the Messiah, and that he would soon return with su-
pernatural power “to restore the kingdom to Israel”
(Acts of the Apostles 1:6). His death at the hands of
the Romans was regarded as a martyrdom for Israel,
and it was interpreted in terms of the Suffering Servant
of Yahweh, described in Isaiah 53:1ff. The background
of this belief was Judaism, with its strong monotheistic
tradition. Hence, although he was recognized as the
Messiah, Jesus was regarded as being essentially human
in origin and nature.
The Apostle Paul was responsible for introducing
a fundamentally different evaluation of Jesus and his
crucifixion. Paul had not been an original disciple of
Jesus; and although he was a Jew, he was of the
Diaspora and familiar with Greco-Roman culture. For
reasons too complicated to describe here (cf. Brandon
[1962], pp. 211-16), Paul believed that God had com-
missioned him to preach a “gospel” specially designed
for the Gentiles, and one which radically differed from
the gospel of the original disciples of Jesus. In his
gospel Paul presented Jesus as a preexistent, divine
being, whom God had sent into the world for the
salvation of mankind. Paul envisaged the human race
as enslaved by the demonic powers that controlled the
planets (Galatians 4:3-4). To rescue its members from
their state of perdition, this preexistent “Lord of glory”
had been incarnated in the person of the human Jesus.
The demonic powers (
archontes), not recognizing his
true nature, crucified him (I Corinthians 2:7-8). Their
error cost them their dominion over mankind; for they
could not hold their divine victim, who rose to life
again. Through ritual assimilation to Christ, in his
death Paul taught that Christians shared, at baptism,
in Christ's resurrection to a new immortal life (Romans
6:3ff.).
Paul, accordingly, presented Jesus Christ as the di-
vine Savior of mankind, who had provided the means
of salvation by his incarnation, vicarious death, and
resurrection. This interpretation became the estab-
lished form of Christianity owing to the disappearance
of the original Jewish Christian community in the
Roman destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. Paul, how-
ever, had not defined the relationship between God
and Christ, but had referred to the latter by various
titles, the implications of which he did not discuss. A
title of frequent use was that of “Son of God,” which
implied a unique filial relationship.
Christian thinkers soon became aware of the prob-
lem involved in the divinization of Christ, if the basic
principle of monotheism, which Christianity had in-
herited from Judaism, were to be maintained. The
problem was, in effect, twofold. If Christ were divine
in an absolute sense, yet distinct from God, there were
thus two gods, and Christianity was a form of ditheism,
not monotheism. On the other hand, if the filial rela-
tionship were literally interpreted, then God the Father
would be the progenitor of God the Son. But the logic
of this relationship meant that Christ would not be
fully God, since there must have been a time when
he “was not” and God the Father alone existed.
The problems thus involved in the divinization of
Christ led to the great Arian controversy, which con-
vulsed the Church in the fourth century. A solution
was found, and imposed by imperial decree, at the
Council of Nicaea in 325. Christ was proclaimed as
coequal and coeternal with God the Father; and the
Greek term homoousios (“of like substance”) was used
to define his relationship to the Father in a manner
such as was thought to describe his essential and un-
qualified divinity, while preserving his distinction as
the Son. In the definition of orthodox belief at Nicaea,
brief mention was also made of belief in the Holy
Spirit. This belief stemmed from certain passages in
the New Testament which presented the Holy Spirit
as a divine entity distinct from the Father and the Son.
In the so-called Constantinopolitan Creed (ca. 381), the
belief received official definition, thus making the
orthodox conception of the Godhead a Trinity com-
prising God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Spirit. The doctrine is carefully stated in the Atha-
nasian Creed or the Quicunque Vult, which dates be-
tween 381 and 428: “And the Catholic faith is this:
That we worship one God in Trinity, Trinity in Unity;
neither confounding the Persons: nor dividing the Sub-
stance.”
This Trinitarian conception of the Deity was essen-
tially the product of Christian soteriology. Paul's inter-
pretation of Christ's death as a divinely planned means
to save mankind from spiritual perdition necessitated
the deification of Jesus, and hence the problem of his
relation to God. The hypostatization of the Holy Spirit,
which in many scriptual contexts seems to be an at-
tribute or aspect of God, completed the process. It is
to be noted in this connection that since Christianity
developed in the world of Greco-Roman culture, its
doctrine of God was thought out by men educated in
Greek metaphysics, and officially defined in terms
drawn from the categories of Greek philosophical
thought.
The establishment of the Trinitarian conception of
the Deity as Christian orthodoxy has endured to the
present day. During the Middle Ages much effort was
devoted to the philosophical justification and statement
of the doctrine of God. Most notable was Anselm's
ontological argument in his Monologion and Abelard's
exposition of the Trinity in the Theologia summi boni
(ca. 1120). Thomas Aquinas (ca. 1225-74), the most
renowned exponent of medieval theology, whose
thought was influenced by Aristotle, significantly de-
fined God inter alia, as primum movens immobile
(“First Unmoved Mover”), and actus purus (“Pure
Act”). But such metaphysical definitions were not un-
derstood by ordinary Christians, and the popular idea
of God is to be found concretely depicted in medieval
iconography. Thus, in statues and pictures, God the
Father was shown as a venerable old man, crowned
with a kind of papal tiara: he holds God the Son,
represented crucified, while God the Holy Spirit in the
form of a dove radiating light, emanates from Him.
But though reference to the Trinity has always been
frequent, Christian liturgy, art, and literature attest to
a preoccupation with God the Son, whose incarnated
form could be more easily visualized and had the
greater emotional appeal.
The soteriological character of Christianity has also
provided an abiding problem for its conception of God.
It finds expression in the basic tension between the
doctrine of divine predestination and human free will.
It is significant that the Church has never officially
defined how Christ's death is accepted by God as an
atonement or propitiation for human sin.
