Christology

In the light of Christian faith, practice, and worship, that branch of theology called Christology reflects systematically on the person, being, and doing of Jesus of Nazareth (c. 5 BC- c. AD 30). In seeking to clarify the essential truths about him, it investigates his person and being (who and what he was/is) and work (what he did/does). Was/is he both human and divine? If so, how is that possible and not a contradiction in terms as being simultaneously finite and infinite seems to be? Should we envisage his revealing and redeeming 'work' as having a impact not only on all men and women of all times and places, but also on the whole created cosmos? In any case, can we describe or even minimally explain that salvific 'work'?

In terms of this study in Christology, is it a fatal admission to grant that our knowledge of Jesus' career does not rise 'above' the level of contingent truths? Strictly speaking, he could have done, said, and suffered different things. Only someone like Lessing who was/is bewitched by the pursuit of necessary, universal truths of reason would deplore this (historical) situation. In the strictest sense of the word, 'necessary truths of reason' are tautologies, mathematical truths, and other a priori deductions that are in principle true always and everywhere without needing the support of any empirical evidence.

For Christology we need both the data and truths of history and the help and truths of philosophical reason. Apropos of our empirical knowledge of the world, Immanuel Kant ( 17241804) observed: 'thoughts without content [= empirical content] are empty, intuitions [= experiences?] without concepts are blind.' This remark might be adapted to read: 'metaphysical thoughts without empirical historical content are empty, historical experiences without philosophical concepts are blind.' Or perhaps it is better not to risk doing violence to the positions of either Lessing or Kant and simply to point out that Christology requires both some historically credible information and some philosophical structure. Right from the second century Christology has rightly drawn on metaphysical reflection, as well as historical experience.

We have just seen how philosophical considerations necessarily turn up when Christology raises questions of hermeneutics (the role of tradition in the work of interpretation) and questions of epistemology (the evidential status of experience and the dependence of Christian faith upon historical knowledge). Yet the contribution of philosophy (as a properly autonomous discipline) to theology in general and to Christology in particular has gone beyond these three tasks.

The primary, biblical language of Christology is analogical and symbolic. The post-biblical language has often been less blatantly symbolic (e.g. one divine person in two natures, the primordial symbol of the Father, the second person of the Trinity, or the Pantocrator), but not always so (e.g. the Sacred Heart).

In Christology, as in other branches of theology, we explore the meaning and test the truth of various religious claims in which history, philosophy, or language may be, respectively, more to the fore. But there is this frequent difference. In the area of religious claims of a historical nature, truth will be often a matter of correspondence to the available data.

Talk about truth should not, however, be allowed to encourage a facile optimism in Christology or in the rest of theology. To what extent can history, philosophy, language, and tradition really show us how things are with Christ, God, and the divine-human relationship? We should never claim to know or say too much. Of course, there is the task of clarifying and making sense of things. But at our peril we forget that in Christology, as in other branches of theology, we are dealing with mystery, the mystery of the ineffable God and, for that matter, the corresponding mystery of the human condition.