Wherefore this is no consequence: to whomsoever Christ cometh with the Father, according to the form of God, to him he also cometh, and abideth in him in his own substance according to the form of a servant, much less that he is so everywhere. Like as therefore the form of God is one, and the form of a servant another, so the actions and proprieties of the one and of the other be diverse, though many times both the one and the other have one and the same work and operation. Much less then doth the deity of Christ work all things by the flesh which it took.įor doth the deity understand by the human understanding, or doth it will by the human will? Or doth it keep or sustain the human nature in the person of the Word by the very same human nature? Or doth it bear all things by the human flesh or rather by the word of its own virtue? Lastly, if the form of God do nothing but by the form of a servant, how can that saying of Leo be true: “E ach form doth the property of itself with communion of the other“? If God himself, and so the divine nature in Christ raised his body from the dead, not by the same body, but by itself: namely by the divine nature, then it is false, that the divine nature in Christ did all things and doeth not only in and with, but also by the human nature.įor the soul of Christ Jesus doth not work all things by the body, as neither do our minds understand or will things by our bodies: and that for this cause, that as the philosophers also taught, our mind dependeth not on the body. So is this other: Christ Jesus being man is everywhere and simply omnipotent, therefore he is everywhere and omnipotent not according to his humanity, but according to his deity, seeing the divine nature is no less united to the human, than the human is to the divine, in the same person of Christ Jesus. 28:20), therefore not only in his deity, but also in the substance of his humanity, he is really present with us on the earth.īut as this consequence is good: Christ being God, suffered, therefore he suffered not according to his deity, but according to his humanity. So neither is this: “ behold I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” (Mat. If then (since he truly died) neither his soul for that time of his death was in his body, neither (since he was truly buried) his body, while it hung upon the cross, was in the grave, or while it lay in the grave, hung upon the cross neither since God truly raised him from the dead, either his soul recalled his body, or his body recalled himself from death to life: therefore the human nature in Christ was neither omnipotent, nor everywhere present in its own substance.įor as this consequence is not good: Christ Jesus himself was dead and buried, and rose again from the dead, therefore he was dead and buried and rose again according to both his natures. Christ then if he truly rose from the dead, it can by no means be denied, but that he also truly died, his soul being truly separated from his body. But death consisteth in a true separation of the soul from the body, whereby the body which dieth may presently be rightly called a dead carcass. Neither can any be truly said to be raised and to rise from the dead, unless the same be truly said to be dead and to have died. Therefore the same Christ, as he is true God coessential with the Father, so he is true man, coessential with his mother and his brethren. Christ therefore is no less God, than the Father, neither is he God of lesser might.īut one and the same cannot be, truly the raiser and the raised from the dead, unless he consist of diverse natures, of the divine, according to which he doth raise, and the human, according to which, he is raised. Yea but Christ also by his power raised himself from death as he said, “ destroy this temple, and in three days I will build it up: but he spake of the temple of his body:” (John 2:19 & 21) and that, “ I lay down my life that I may take it again” (John 10:17). Therefore only God, by his infinite power, is the efficient cause of the resurrection of Christ and all the dead.
God did effectually show the greatness of his power in Christ by raising him from the dead (Eph. Of the Resurrection of Christ Jesus from the Dead, his ascension into heaven, and sitting at God’s right hand, out of the first of Paul to the Ephesians.