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Subsections
Grace of Union, Assumption, Subsisting & Sustentation
Person & Natures
Communication of Properties
Ubiquity & Multi-Presence
Communion of Natures & Extra Calvinisticum
Christ’s Two Wills
Mediator’s Two Operations to Same Effect
Christ’s Offices
Events in Christ’s Life
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Order of Contents
Articles 10
Book 1
Quotes 3
Incarnation apart from Redemption? 5
Latin 2
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Articles
1500’s
Vermigli, Peter Martyr – 17. ‘Of Christ & his Manifestation in the Flesh, & by what Means He Performed All the Parts of our Salvation’ in The Common Places… (d. 1562; London: Henrie Denham et al., 1583), pt. 2, pp. 599-612
Musculus, Wolfgang – Common Places of the Christian Religion (1560; London, 1563)
‘Incarnation of the Word’ 133.b
Vain & curious matters of the Schoolmen concerning the Incarnation 133.b
Testimonies of Scriptures concerning the Word of God 134.a
Ethnics do declare the Word to be in God 134.a
No man must be too curious to search how the Word is in God 134.a
The Word is the Son of God 134.b
John reports two things of the Word of God, the Godhead & the Incarnation 134.b
He says not, ‘God was made flesh’ 134.b
He says not, ‘Christ was made flesh’ 135.a
He says not, ‘God made the Word’ 135.a
He does not say, ‘The Word is made man’ 135.a
The Word was made flesh 135.a
The Lord took upon Him man’s weakness 135.b
He says not the Word took flesh or joined it unto Him 135.b
Personal unity 135.b
Interchange of properties 135.b
The natures of the Word and of the flesh be contrary 135.b
The Word and the flesh be so united that the Word may be said to be made flesh 135.b
Whether it may be said that the flesh was made the Word 136.a
He says not, ‘The Word was changed into flesh.’ 136.a
The Word receiving flesh left not his nature 136.a
The testimonies of the Godhead and manhood of Christ cannot be vain 136.a
The fathers travailed much to confute them that deny two natures in Christ 136.b
We must wisely put a difference between nature and person 137.a
The beginning of Christ’s flesh 137.b
The true good and right opinion of the sound Church 137.b
Of the way how the Word is incarnated 139.a
It passes the compass of man’s understanding 139.a
Christ took upon Him the soul, spirit and flesh of man 139.b
Cause of this incarnation 139.b
The general cause is to redeem mankind from sin and everlasting death 139.b
To declare the love of God towards mankind 139.b
That He might like his brethren 140.a
That He should be a faithful and merciful bishop 140.a
Viret, Pierre – A Christian Instruction… (London: Veale, 1573), The Summary of the Christian Doctrine, set forth in Form of Dialogue & of Catechism
Of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ & of the Redemption had by Him
Ursinus, Zacharias – Of the Incarnation of the Word, A confession made by the fathers of the Church of Antioch against Paulus Samosatenus in A Collection of Certain Learned Discourses… (d. 1583; Oxford, 1600)
Perkins, William – ‘The Incarnation of Christ’ in An Exposition of the Symbol, or Apostles’ Creed… (Cambridge, 1595), p. 148
Perkins (d. 1602) was an influential, puritan, Anglican clergyman and Cambridge theologian.
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1600’s
Thysius, Anthony – 25. ‘On the Incarnation of the Son of God & the Personal Union of the Two Natures in Christ’ in Synopsis of a Purer Theology: Latin Text & English Translation Buy (1625; Brill, 2016), vol. 2, pp. 66-100
Hacket, John – Fifteen Sermons upon the Incarnation in A Century of Sermons upon Several Remarkable Subjects (1675) Westminster divine
Turretin, Francis – 4. ‘Whether only the second person of the Trinity became incarnate and why.’ in Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1994), vol. 2, 13th Topic, pp. 304-6
van Mastricht, Peter – ch. 10, ‘The Incarnation of the Mediator’ in Theoretical Practical Theology (2nd ed. 1698; RHB), vol. 4, pt. 1, bk. 5, pp. 291-342
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1700’s
à Brakel, Wilhelmus – ch. 18, ‘The Divinity, Incarnation & Union of the Two Natures in the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ’ in The Christian’s Reasonable Service, vols. 1 ed. Joel Beeke, trans. Bartel Elshout Buy (1700; RHB, 1992/1999), pp. 493-517
a Brakel (1635-1711) was a contemporary of Voet and Witsius and a major representative of the Dutch Further Reformation.
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Book
1000’s
Anselm – Cur Deo Homo [Why the God-Man?] (Griffith Farran, 189?) 133 pp. ToC
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Quotes
John ‘Rabbi’ Duncan
“We make far too little of the incarnation; the Fathers knew much more of the incarnate God. Some of them were oftener at Bethlehem than at Calvary… We are not too often at the cross, but we are too seldom at the cradle.”
“Jesus Christ… is the perfection of humanity, its ideal made real.”
“On earth He came, He that is from above, to meet with her that is from beneath, to purchase and to betroth her.”
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Whether Christ would have been Incarnated Apart from Sin & Redemption?
See also, ‘Is Vindicatory Justice Essential to God?’ & ‘On the Necessity of the Atonement’.
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No
Articles
1200’s
Aquinas, Thomas – Summa, pt. 3, question 1, ‘Of the Fitness of the Incarnation’
3. ‘Whether, if man had not sinned, God would have become incarnate? [No]’
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1600’s
Heppe, Heinrich – ch. 17, ‘The Mediator of the Covenant of Grace or the Person of Christ’, section 2 in Reformed Dogmatics ed. Ernst Bizer (1950; Wipf & Stock, 2007), p. 410
Heppe quotes Sohn and references Riissen.
Owen, John – Exercitation 26, sections 9-22 in An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews new ed. 4 vols (London: Tegg, 1840), vol. 1, pp. 418-31
Turretin, Francis – 3. ‘Was it necessary for the Son of God to become incarnate? We affirm.’ in Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1994), vol. 2, 13th Topic, pp. 299-304
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Quote
Leonard Riissen
A Complete Summary of Elenctic Theology & of as Much Didactic Theology as is Necessary trans. J. Wesley White MTh thesis (Bern, 1676; GPTS, 2009), ch. 11, ‘Christ’, pp. 112-3
“Controversy 3 – Would Jesus Christ have been made man and come into the world if men had not sinned? We deny against the Socinians and Scholastics.
Arguments:
1. He was only promised after the fall (Gen. 3:15), and He could not have been born of a virgin except in virtue of the promise.
2. Those who are well have no need of a physician (Mt. 9:13). He only came to save sinners (2 Tim. 1:15).
3. He has been sent on the basis of the love of God toward fallen man (Jn. 3:16), which could not exist in that case. [That is, He would not have had compassion on fallen man, if man had not fallen. This compassion and love for fallen man is given as the reason for the Father sending the Son.]
4. It would not have been necessary for God to be man; therefore, He would have come in vain.
5. Nor would humanity have had any obligation (obligatio) to Him as incarnate.
Objections:
1. Christ is the firstborn of all creatures (Col. 1:15). Reply. ‘Firstborn’ means generated from eternity before all creatures.
2. In all things, He is preeminent (primus) (v. 19). Reply. In dignity and position.
3. All things have been created in Him (meaning “on account of Him”). Reply. All things have been created on account of Him as God not as man.
4. Then we have not been made on account of Christ, but He was made on account of us. Reply. Yes, as man. Objection. Then we should be given thanks since it is on account of us. Reply. That’s ridiculous.”
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Yes
Medieval
Scotus, John Duns –
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1500’s
Musculus, Wolfgang – 6. ‘In Whom We be Elect’ in ‘Election’ in Common Places (London, 1563), folios 210.a-211.a irregular numbering: folio 210 reads ‘290’
“The purpose of God’s election relates, for Musculus, to our creation ad imaginem ac similitudinem Dei [in the image and likeness of God] for in the very creation of man, the creature was destined for the blessedness accomplished in the elect through Christ [Musculus derives this from Eph. 1:3-4]. Here, as with Calvin, we may see a remnant of the [Duns] Scotist sense of the priority of incarnation over sin; we also see both here and in the view of the elect as nondum existentes [not yet existing], a supralapsarian tendency linked to christological and soteriological concepts.” – Muller, Christ & the Decree, p. 55
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1600’s
Goodwin, Thomas –
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Historical Theology
In the Post-Reformation
Beeke, Joel & Mark Jones – ch. 9, ‘Thomas Goodwin’s Christological Supralapsarianism’ in A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life (RHB, 2012), pp. 149-61
“And He was first ordained for these higher ends than our salvation is.” – Goodwin
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Latin Articles
1600’s
Voet, Gisbert – Of the Incarnation in Syllabus of Theological Problems (Utrecht, 1643), pt. 1, section 2, tract 2 Abbr.
Wettstein, Gernler & Buxtorf – 10. Person of Christ & the Incarnation in A Syllabus of Controversies in Religion which come between the Orthodox Churches & whatever other Adversaries, for material for the regular disputations… customarily held in the theological school of the academy at Basil (Basil, 1662), pp. 32-35
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