Latin/Orthodox Catholic: Original Sin (Jesus Christ, priest, moral, reject)

[No*s]

We both agree Christ's body did not see corruption. Was that because He inherited flesh that hadn't been tainted by corruption, or because He healed it? He didn't get sick as a child, but was this so because He inherited a body that coudln't or because His being God destroyed the corruption?

We know that he was subject to hunger and the tensions it puts on the body. We know that He suffered. We know that He died. All these things are results of the fall in the way they were encountered. However, He overcame every one. He didn't sin in the desert. He died, but He rose with an incorrupt body. Jesus had no sin, not because the flesh He took didn't have sin, but because His union with it destroyed the sin just like His death destroys death.

On this point, it is precisely His union with our flesh that causes sin, corruption, and death to lose its teeth, because He divinizes the body. Christ had to encounter the corruption we inherited for Adam for the exact same reason He had to die: so that He could destroy it. After all, what is death other than the ultimate manifestation of sin? Christ was subject to the ultimate corruption, but He did not sin, and it couldn't hold Him.

This, BTW, that I've been asserting is incompatible with Nestorianism, who talked about two natures in such a way that he avoided ever having God in contact with matter. That was the ultimate result of denying the title of Theotokos. That's also why the Council has to word things the way they did when they specified "He had no sin," because this was a quick and easy objection of Nestorius.

Now, in me, I affirm the person of Christ inherited everything we inherited, but it had no power over Him, and He conquered it (and lived a perfect life without sin). If I have a soteriology that Christ trampled down death by death, and that He banished corruption by cleansing it with His own divine nature, then the soteriology requires Christ to come into contact with that very corruption and death, to literally be human exactly as every other human is, and to die (which is a form of corruption passed down from Adam). In doing this, corruption and death are destroyed.

The faith is full of this sort of thing. Christ is the one Who never sleeps that slept, the immortal that died, the uncreated that was born, the impassible who hungered, and so on. He was also the incorruptible Who submitted to the powers of corruption, and thus, destroyed it.

I hope that clears that up. It in no way violates the councils, but it also requires a soteriology in which Mary inherits corruption while living a life of purity (by the grace of God) and never choosing to sin.

[Scott1]

ok..... I'm getting close to understanding, but I need a bit more clarification.

Let's review:

1. A consequnce of sin is bodily corruption that leads to death.
2. Jesus had no sin, and lived a perfect life.
3. Christ's body did not see corruption.
4. Christ died.

Is the transmission of sin biological or supernatural?
I assume you believe it is a biological consequence of original sin..... so, Mary needed to have a corrupt nature to pass along that sin to Christ...... and at the moment of the incarnation, the divinity of Christ would then defeat sin (as we both affirm that Christ's body did not see corruption/sin)..... but yet Christ died.

How/Why? Death is a consequence of sin, yet Christ was sinless.... and died anyhow.

Thanks for the help,
Scott

[No*s]

Yes, you have the basic cycle down. On its transmission, I really don't have much grounds to speculate, but I've always assumed it was both biological and supernatural, just as we are both biological and supernatural. I can't answer that concretely though

Why did Christ die, because He willingly assumed our humanity and in order to completely conquer sin, He had to subject Himself to the fullest consequence of it. He died because He chose to. Sin couldn't take Him in life, because He cleansed it simply by virtue of Who He was. When He died, He brought Himself down to the very lowest point that sin could take us, and just as He made a spectacle of it in life, by going to death, He completely beat death and sin.

So to put this another way, while He had no sin, He willingly accepted the consequences of sin, and when He did, He destroyed it. So, basically, Christ willingly came down and became man and assumed our nature, and cleansed it. Every day from His birth He cleansed sin, and then, when He died, He willingly "let" death have Him so that death would be completely defeated.

I can understand confusion on this point. I'm not the best one at explaining it, and the subject can seem weird in its own right .

[Scott1]

Originally Posted by No*s

Why did Christ die, because He willingly assumed our humanity and in order to completely conquer sin,

So, why does Mary have to have a sinful nature if the transmission of sin to Christ was not biological.... but a supernatural CHOICE made by Christ?

[No*s]

Originally Posted by SOGFPP

So, why does Mary have to have a sinful nature if the transmission of sin to Christ was not biological.... but a supernatural CHOICE made by Christ?

Christ assumed death willingly, but He had to deal with our problem. The whole way along, He dealt with corruption. He assumed our flesh, conquered illness, everything. If He didn't have any contact with our condition, then He wouldn't have done His work. His death was in the same fashion as ours, so we know that if we use death as an analogy, He conquered our corruption in the same way.

Even when we point out it was a supernatural choice made by Christ, the fact can't lesson that Christ died just like us, and conquered death by accepting the consequences of our sin and thus purifying it. Why would there be a need for Christ to do death differently than other corruption? It would seem to mandate the same approach with or without a choice, which would require Mary to have the corruption we inherited. Choice didn't lesson the death of Christ, so I doubt it would lesson the need for His contact with our corruption elsewhere .

EDIT:

Also, remember that we make a distinction between inherited sin and "he had sin." A child is born with an imperfect nature and thus needing a savior, but the child has no sin yet. It'll come along shortly. We believe Christ healed His nature by becoming human, and Mary by the grace of God lived a sinless life. That, however, doesn't change her condition as a member of the human race, but it does allow us to say that she is without sin.

[Scott1]

OK the problem I have with this comes from this teaching:

468 After the Council of Chalcedon, some made of Christ's human nature a kind of personal subject. Against them, the fifth ecumenical council, at Constantinople in 553, confessed that "there is but one hypostasis [or person], which is our Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Trinity." Thus everything in Christ's human nature is to be attributed to his divine person as its proper subject, not only his miracles but also his sufferings and even his death: "He who was crucified in the flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ, is true God, Lord of glory, and one of the Holy Trinity."

Is this an Orthodox council?

If so, what gives?

[No*s]

Originally Posted by SOGFPP

OK the problem I have with this comes from this teaching:

468 After the Council of Chalcedon, some made of Christ's human nature a kind of personal subject. Against them, the fifth ecumenical council, at Constantinople in 553, confessed that "there is but one hypostasis [or person], which is our Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Trinity." Thus everything in Christ's human nature is to be attributed to his divine person as its proper subject, not only his miracles but also his sufferings and even his death: "He who was crucified in the flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ, is true God, Lord of glory, and one of the Holy Trinity."

Is this an Orthodox council?

If so, what gives?

Yes, it is a true Orthodox council. Where has this contradicted it? It affirms one person, who is both fully God and fully man. This person is one of the Trinity, suffered, and died. Nowhere have I or Orthodoxy challenged that theology.

EDIT:

On the nature of Christ, all the following are or have been affirmed by me:

Christ is one person.
He has two natures united in His person, divine and human, that cooperate fully.
The divinity is the source of all existance, including the human body.
Said divinity is of the same nature with the Father. He is the Logos that begotten by the Father but not created.
This divinity is thus a member of the Trinity.
He suffered and He died as one man, fully God fully man.
I'll throw in that Christ had two wills, one for both His natures.
He was literally flesh, and thus a living icon.

In the preceding I have confessed all seven councils, and I have done so in conformity with everything else I have said.

[Scott1]

I get ya No*s..... but your affirmation still does not clearly show why Mary must have been born with sin for your theology to work....

[No*s]

Originally Posted by SOGFPP

I get ya No*s..... but your affirmation still does not clearly show why Mary must have been born with sin for your theology to work....

Well that part had already been specified . Jesus took our flesh to cleanse it. If He took flesh that had no corruption in it, He wouldn't be cleansing it. As such, he needs to assume humanity just as the human race had in order to cleanse it. This creates an inherent need for Mary to have had the same corruption in her as all the rest of us.