Jesus: God and Man
Human and divine: an indissoluble union
All Catholics and other Christians
believe today that Jesus is both God
and man. Little do we know that there
was much controversy and strife in this
truth in the early centuries.
Introduction
Today, we Catholics tend to take for granted our
faith that Jesus is both God and man. Little do
we know that in the early Christian centuries,
the Fathers of the Church and other leading
religious leaders of our faith fought very
hard with those persons who wish to teach another
truth about Jesus' person as man alone and not
God, or about Jesus being God in one sense and
Jesus being man in another sense. One serious
heresy was the denial of the Godhead of Jesus
Himself. These and all others were heresies
that challenged the Church at the time.
The schools of theology and the early heresies
One serious heresy at the time was the teaching
of Arius which denied the Godhead of Christ. This
heresy was resolved by the ecumenical council of
Nicaea from May 20 to July 25, 325 which resolved
this issue. After long and heated debates, it
was finally agreed that the orthodox stand should
prevail and the right doctrine was enfleshed in
the Creed of Nicaea: Christ was "the only begotten
Son from the substance of the Father, God from God,
light from light, true God from true God, begotten
not made, of one substance (homousios) with
the Father".
Also existing during these times were two famous
schools of thought: The school of theology at
Alexandria and Antioch versus the schools of
theology at Antioch. The Alexandrians emphasized
more the divine nature of Christ while the Antiochans
emphasized more the human nature of Christ. Because
of these differing schools of thought, Nestorius,
an Antiochan, concluded that Mary could not be
called the "God-bearer" [Theotokos], but
merely "Christ-bearer" [Christotokos],
since she has given birth to only a human being,
Jesus. It was the third ecumenical council of
Ephesus in 431 that resolved this. Again, after
many discussions and debates, the [Theotokos]
designation was accepted.
Jesus as God and man in our Christian life
Although at the time that the controversies were
strong and there was much conflict and strife
being produced by the differing schools of thought,
today, we enjoy the privilege of simply believing,
through the hard work of our Church fathers and
religious leaders at that time, that Jesus is
the God-man who saves us from our sins, from our
sufferings and from death. He is the One who will
bring us eternal life and lead us to the blessings
of salvation.
Jesus as God and man is best represented by the
images that give us a reason to believe in His
saving and merciful love: the Sacred Heart of
Jesus, the Divine Mercy, the Good Shepherd,
Christ the King, Christ crucified, the Risen
Christ, Jesus with the children, Jesus as the
new Moses on the Mount of the Beatitudes,
Jesus as the Truth, the Way and the Life,
Jesus as the Word of God, and many more other
representations and images that we can find
in other Christian traditions like in the
Orthodox traditions and among the Eastern
Catholics. Whatever image we love or are more
familiar with, we know by heart that Jesus is
our Savior; that he is both God and man, whose
conception in the womb of the Blessed Mother,
[now also venerated as "Theotokos" or Mother of
God], was the mystery that made him both divine
and human.