Athanasius Doctrine - Essay Example

Athanasius doctrine Athanasius was a saint and the 20th bishop of Alexandria and was originally of the Coptic Orthodox denomination. Athanasius spent a significant part of his life specifically seventeen years in forced exile under different serving emperors in Rome. To the Christian faith, Athanasius is a significant theologian because of his strong criticism of Arianism and defended Trinitarianism making him to be a notable Egyptian cleric in the fourth century. In essence, Arius from Egypt developed Arianism, which dealt with the relationship between God and Jesus where he advocated that the latter was a subordinate of the former. On the other hand, Trinitarianism was the theological approach that Athanasius advocated for that defines God as being three divine persons constituting of the Father, Jesus as the Son and the third person as the Holy Spirit. In one of Athanasius’ recognized literature, this theologian sought to explain the principle reasons why God incarnated in the flesh, which was the purpose of the converting the sinful to holiness. With this, this essay will summarize the main points embedded in Athanasius’ theology and also give an insightful analysis of the principal points that Athanasius discussed about incarnation. One of the key concepts that v communicated in his doctrine was the fact that man could never understand the ways of God despite him being created in His divine image. However, man has the opportunity of understanding how his maker functions through His grace and in this knowledge, man is able to live and prosper. Principally, Athanasius intimates that it is God’s desire for man to know Him and for man to revere in His delight in which the creation of the universe was for the sole purpose of self-revelation. In essence, God’s word is an eternal factor in which everything that God created was because of the word in which God allowed the word to be flesh in order for it to accomplish purpose on earth1. Further, God’s undying love for humanity led him to incarnate into the human form as this was a sign that he cared for the souls that were to die in eternal damnation because of the separation that existed between man and God. A known fact is that God is an invisible, but omnipotent because he exists in nature, but man cannot term Him as nature because is His own creation and He cannot be created. According to the theory of creation, everything that God created was a result of a command by word of mouth and it became existent meaning that His word can command things to be existent. Therefore, God used the creation through His word to allow man to try to get an insight about the nature of God meaning that His works speak for Him because of His invisible nature. The hidden meaning of this statement is that an artist’s work tends to stand out even in his absentia in which no man should argue should argue that He is not there because He is invisible. Subsequently, God created nature and all that is in it in order for man to have the knowledge of whom God is and His nature making Himself known to men of all walks. Another significant aspect that Athanasius discussed in his doctrine was the fact that man could understand God’s nature in His invisible state through the order that He used when creating the universe and everything in it. In essence, God did not create the animals on the first day of creation but on the six because He is a God of order hence creating the earth and light on the first day. This means that to God things do not just happen, but they do occur because it is His plan hence allowing man to have the knowledge of how exactly God operates. The obvious doctrine that Athanasius did not stand for was the one in Aranius intimated that Jesus stood in between the deity while Athanasius advocates for the fact that Jesus is the mediator between God and His creation2. Theologists that came after Athanasius argued that Jesus had come to substitute the word, which was not true as Jesus became flesh through the word in order for Him to reconcile man to his maker. As much as God involved Himself with the affairs of the earth, that did not make Him the lesser version of Himself and did not signify that He had abandoned the earth. People shared a different interpretation of the nature of God, but Athanasius also did not acknowledge the Holy Spirit in his initial teachings, but later included this person as the other part of the trinity. Athanasius also asserts that sin was one of the key reasons as to why God’s revelation seized upon man because of the deceit and demonic attributes that had overpowered him. God’s disappointment was because He had created man but instead of him devoting his life to serving Him, he engaged in the reverence of other gods apart from Him. In the beginning, God had warranted man the unlimited knowledge about His nature, but man destroyed this relationship by sinning against God making God to seek other ways of bringing man back to Him. As much as He is God consumed by rage and anger, God is also caring hence influencing him to incarnate through His Son who also happens to be the eternal word, which is God himself. In his doctrine, Athanasius suggests that God did not create man in His image in order to abandon him because he had sinned against his maker, but His undying love for man influenced Him to find a way of patching up the relationship they once shared. The sacrifice was quite hefty, but it was worth saving man because the bond that God and man shared was incomprehensible. The incredible aspect that Athanasius sought to communicate was the fact that God has never abandoned man despite Him being invisible and that man is the one that chose to dissociate with Him. Man had seized from being in the image of God that He had created him , but this did not influence God to destroy His most prized possession and the word to become flesh in order for Him to prevent His creation from destruction. In essence, the re-imaging of man could not have been impactful if the word did not become flesh through Jesus, but the re-creation was a way of making man to regain the knowledge and relationship with his maker. Further, Jesus conquered death meaning that he allowed himself to be destroyed through the flesh, but remained victorious because he was part of the trinity. Jesus experienced a renewal through his resurrection affirming that death could not deter God from maintaining His invincible nature. The significance of this is that God took a mortal form that He may experience death in order for death to defeat corruption and death permanently in order for man to be free from bondage. Athanasius also asserts that Jesus was the perfect image of the Father meaning that he was in total unity with God hence making the argument by Aranius that the latter is a subordinate of the former to be baseless3. Therefore, God intended man to understand His nature through the image that He gave to him, which was His Jesus Christ and allowing man to participate in the image of God. According to Athanasius, God had intended man to be in full knowledge of God the Father through which his image was His. However, Jesus who is part of the trinity of God came to restore the broken relationship and the broken image that God had given him at the time of creation. Jesus was the incarnate word in order for him to repair the broken image of God that man had become and allowing man to acquire the divine image of God the Father. According to Athanasius, Jesus as part of the Holy Trinity is illustrative of the everlasting holy image and the reinstated human image that once influenced sour ties between God and man. As God became flesh through his Son, He allowed His secrets to dwell in man hence intimating the level of transparency that God was willing to have His interaction with man to be. Athanasius suggests that Jesus was not an obstacle to the relationship between man and God, but he came to mediate the situation and allow both parties to understand the nature of each other. In essence, Jesus became partly God and partly human hence creating a middle ground for the separated parties to try and reason together. God also transferred His knowledge to man through Jesus hence making a clear indication that God was willing to reconnect with man even after the prior committed sin where man bowed to other forces other than Him. Rather than God allowing man to question His nature, God chose to reveal Himself to man by providing adequate avenues that explained and confirmed His existence. Essentially, Jesus as a part of the Trinity incarnated to the human form to repair the broken connection that man once shared with his maker. The incarnation of Jesus to the human form was the only way that the reconciliation process would have been complete as Athanasius puts it because of the imaging aspect that he brought to the union. Further, Athanasius is an apologist as he intimates that the arguments presented by Araniasm were insignificant because Jesus was not an obstacle to the union, but rather he was the mediator who restored the broken relationship4. In his destruction through death, Jesus displayed that God was willing to come down to man’s level in order for Him to continue revealing Himself and His ways to man. Initially, God had allowed man to have knowledge of His existence through nature despite Him being invisible making man to be a significant part of God’s creation. The incarnation of the word to becoming flesh was integral because it illustrated that God also existed in the word that He spoke meaning that He was God overall creation including word. God also existed in the nature because He of the way that He executed creation in an orderly manner denoting that He did not do it by Himself. In the end, Athanasius’ orthodox doctrine was significant in the Christian religion because it influenced people not to conform to the ideology that Jesus was a distraction in the trinity. Bibliography Anderson, William P. A Journey Through Christian Theology With Texts from the First to the Twenty-First Century. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2010. Purves, Andrew. Reconstructing Pastoral Theology: A Christological Foundation. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004. Slater, Jennifer. A Theological Anthropology of Self-Realization. AuthorHouse, 2012. Weinandy, Thomas Gerard. Athanasius: A Theological Introduction. Aldershot [u.a.]: Ashgate, 2007. 66 Read More