STUDY ON THE NATURE OF THE CHRIST.

I. Sources of the proofs concerning the nature of the Christ. — II. Do the miracles prove the divinity of the Christ? — III. Do the words of Jesus prove his divinity? — IV. Words of Jesus after his death. — V. Double nature of Jesus. — VI. Opinion of the Apostles. — VII. Prediction of the prophets, with regard to Jesus. — VIII. The Word was made flesh. — IX. The Son of God and the Son of man.

I.

Sources of the proofs concerning the nature of the Christ.

The question of the nature of the Christ has been debated since the first centuries of Christianity, and it may be said that it is still not resolved, since it continues to be the object of discussion. It was the divergence of opinions on this point that gave rise to the majority of the sects that divided the Church eighteen centuries ago, it being worthy of note that all the leaders of those sects were bishops or titled members of the clergy. They were, consequently, enlightened men, many of them writers of talent, distinguished in theological science, who did not find conclusive the reasons invoked in favor of the dogma of the divinity of the Christ. Meanwhile, as today, opinions were established more upon abstractions than upon facts. Above all, what was sought was to know what the dogma contained that was plausible, or irrational, while generally, on one side and the other, the facts capable of casting a decisive light upon the question were left unmarked. But where are these facts to be found, if not in the acts and the words of Jesus?

Having written nothing, his only historians were the apostles, who likewise wrote nothing while the Christ was still living. No profane historian, his contemporary, having spoken concerning him, no document remains, besides the Gospels, concerning his life and his doctrine. It is there alone that the key to the problem is to be sought. All the later writings, without excluding those of Saint Paul, are merely, and cannot fail to be, simple commentaries or appraisals, reflections of personal opinions, often contradictory, which, in no case, could have the authority of the narrative of those who received the instructions directly from the Master. Upon this question, as upon those of all the dogmas in general, the agreement among the Fathers of the Church and other sacred writers would not be invoked as a preponderant argument, nor as irrefutable proof in favor of the opinion of one or the other, since none of them cited a single fact, outside the Gospel, concerning Jesus; since none of them discovered new documents that their predecessors did not know. The sacred authors achieved nothing more than to revolve within the same circle, producing personal appraisals, deducing corollaries in accordance with their points of view, commenting under new forms and with greater or lesser development upon the opinions contrary to their own. Belonging to the same party, they all had to write in the same sense, if not in the same terms, under penalty of being declared heretics, as were Origen and so many others. Naturally, the Church included in the number of its Fathers only the orthodox writers, from its point of view; it exalted, sanctified, and collected only those who took up its defense, while it repudiated the others and destroyed their writings as far as it could. Nothing conclusive, then, is expressed by the agreement of the Fathers of the Church, since they form a unanimity arranged by hand, by means of the elimination of the contrary elements. If a comparison were made of all that was written for and against, it would become difficult to say to which side the balance would incline. This takes nothing away from the personal merit of the upholders of orthodoxy, nor from the worth they demonstrated as writers and conscientious men. Being advocates of one and the same cause, and defending it with incontestable talent, they necessarily had to adopt the same conclusions. Far from intending to fault them in any respect whatsoever, we have only wished to refute the value of the consequences that one seeks to draw from the agreement of their opinions. In the examination we are going to make of the question of the divinity of the Christ, setting aside the subtleties of scholasticism, which served only to confuse everything without clarifying anything, we shall rely exclusively upon the facts that stand out from the text of the Gospel and which, examined coldly, conscientiously, and without party spirit, superabundantly afford all the means of conviction one could desire. Now, among these facts, there are none more preponderant, nor more conclusive, than the very words of the Christ, words that no one could refute without invalidating the veracity of the apostles. A parable, an allegory, may be interpreted in different ways; but precise affirmations, without ambiguities, repeated a hundred times, could not have a double meaning. No one can claim to know better than Jesus what he wished to say, just as no one can claim to be better informed than he concerning his own nature. Since he comments upon his words and explains them in order to avoid all misunderstanding, it is to him that we must turn, unless we deny him the superiority that is attributed to him and set ourselves above his own intelligence. If he was obscure on certain points, by using figurative language, with respect to his person there is no possible misunderstanding. Before examining the words, let us look at the acts. II.

Do the miracles prove the divinity of the Christ?

According to the Church, the divinity of the Christ is established by the miracles, which bear witness to a supernatural power. This consideration may have had a certain weight in an age when the marvelous was accepted without examination; today, however, when Science has carried its investigations even to the laws of Nature, there are more unbelievers than believers in miracles, to whose discredit the abuse of fraudulent imitations and the exploitation that has been made of these imitations have contributed not a little. Faith in miracles was destroyed by the very use that was made of them, from which it resulted that many persons now regard those of the Gospel as purely legendary. The Church itself, moreover, takes away from the miracles all their import as proof of the divinity of the Christ, by declaring that the demon can perform some as prodigious as those others. If the demon has such power, it becomes evident that facts of this kind absolutely lack an exclusively divine character. If he can do astonishing things, capable even of deceiving the elect, how could simple mortals distinguish the good miracles from the bad? Is it not to be feared that, observing similar facts, they might confound God and Satan? To give Jesus such a rival in skill is great clumsiness; but, in matters of contradictions and inconsistency, things were not considered with much attention in an age when, for the faithful, it would have been a matter of conscience to think for themselves and to discuss the least article of belief imposed upon them. No reckoning was then made of progress, and no one imagined that the reign of blind and naive faith might come to an end, a comfortable reign, like that of one's own pleasure. The role so preponderant that the Church persisted in attributing to the demon produced disastrous consequences for faith, as men came to feel themselves capable of seeing with their own eyes. After having been exploited with success for some time, he became the pickaxe set into the old edifice of beliefs and one of the causes of incredulity. It may be said that the Church, by taking him as an indispensable auxiliary, nourished in its bosom the one who would turn against it and undermine its foundations. Another consideration no less grave is that the miraculous facts do not constitute an exclusive privilege of the Christian religion. There is, in fact, no religion, idolatrous or pagan, that does not have its miracles as marvelous and as authentic to its respective adherents as those of Christianity. And the Church has deprived itself of the right to contest them, since it attributed to the infernal powers the power to perform them. In the theological sense, the essential character of the miracle is that of being an exception opened in the laws of Nature, which, consequently, makes it inexplicable by means of those same laws. A fact ceases to be a miracle once it can be explained and is found to be linked to a known cause. It was thus that the discoveries of Science placed within the domain of the natural many effects that were qualified as prodigies, while their causes were unknown. Later, the knowledge of the spiritual principle, of the action of fluids upon the organism in general, of the invisible world within which we live, of the faculties of the soul, of the existence and the properties of the perispirit, afforded the explanation of the phenomena of the psychic order, proving that these phenomena do not constitute, any more than the others, derogations of the laws of Nature, but that, on the contrary, they nearly always proceed from applications of these laws. All the effects of magnetism, of somnambulism, of ecstasy, of second sight, of hypnotism, of catalepsy, of anesthesia, of the transmission of thought, prescience, instantaneous cures, possessions, obsessions, apparitions and transfigurations, etc., which form almost the totality of the miracles of the Gospel, belong to that category of phenomena. It is now known that such effects result from special aptitudes and psychological dispositions; that they have occurred in all times and in the midst of all peoples, and that they were considered supernatural for the same reason as all those whose cause was not perceived. This explains why all religions had their miracles, which are nothing more than natural facts, nearly always, however, amplified to the point of absurdity by credulity and now reduced to their just value by present-day knowledge, which permits one to separate out from them the part owing to legend. The possibility of the majority of the facts that the Gospel cites as performed by Jesus is today completely demonstrated by Magnetism and by Spiritism as natural phenomena. Since they occur before our eyes, whether spontaneously or when provoked, there is nothing abnormal in Jesus having possessed faculties identical to those of our magnetizers, healers, somnambulists, seers, mediums, etc. From the moment that these same faculties are found, in different degrees, in a multitude of individuals who have nothing divine about them, even in heretics and idolaters, they in no way imply the existence of a superhuman nature. If Jesus himself qualifies his acts as miracles, it is because in this, as in many other things, it was incumbent upon him to adapt his language to the knowledge of his contemporaries. How could they grasp the nuances of a word that even today not all understand? For the common people, the extraordinary things that he did and that appeared supernatural, in that time and even long afterward, were miracles. He could not give them another name. A fact worthy of note is that he made use of this denomination to attest the mission he had received from God, according to his own expressions, but he never availed himself of the miracles to present himself as the possessor of divine power. n It is fitting, then, that the miracles be struck from the list of proofs upon which one seeks to found the divinity of the person of the Christ. Let us now see whether we find them in his words.

III.

Do the words of Jesus prove his divinity?

Addressing some of his disciples who were disputing as to which among them was the greatest, he said to them, calling a child to his side:

“Whosoever shall receive me, receives him who sent me, for he who is the least among you all shall be the greatest of all.” (St.

Luke, 9:48.)

“Whosoever shall receive in my name one little child such as this, receives me;

and he who receives me receives not me, but receives him who sent me.” (Saint Mark, 9:37.)

“Jesus then said to them: If God were your Father, you would love me, because it was from God that I came forth and it was from his part that I came; for I did not come of myself, it was he who sent me.” (St.

John, 8:42.)

“Jesus then said to them: I am still with you for a little time, and then I go to him who sent me.” (St.

John, 7:33.)

“He who hears you hears me; he who despises you despises me;

and he who despises me, despises him who sent me.” (St.

Luke, 10:16.)

The dogma of the divinity of Jesus was based upon the absolute equality between his person and God, since he himself is God. This is an article of faith. Now, these words, which Jesus so many times repeated: He who sent me, not only prove a duality of persons, but also, as we have already said, exclude absolute equality between them, since he who is sent is necessarily subordinate to him who sends. In obeying, the former performs an act of submission. An ambassador, speaking of his sovereign, will say: My lord, he who sends me; but if the one who comes is the sovereign in person, he will speak in his own name and will not say: He who sent me, since he cannot send himself. Jesus said it in categorical terms: I did not come of myself, it was he who sent me. These words: He who despises me, despises him who sent me, do not absolutely imply equality, nor, still less, identity. In all times, an insult to an ambassador has been considered as done to the sovereign himself. The apostles had the word of Jesus, as he had that of God. When he says to them: He who hears you hears me, he certainly did not mean to say that his apostles and he were one and the same person, equal in all things. The duality of the persons, as well as the secondary and subordinate state of Jesus with relation to God, stand out, moreover, without possible misunderstanding, from the following passages:

“It is you who have always remained firm with me in my temptations. — This is why I prepare for you the Kingdom, as my Father prepared it for me, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and that you may be seated upon thrones, to judge the twelve tribes of Israel.” (St.

Luke, 22:28 to 30.)

“Of myself I say what I have seen with my Father; and you, you do what you have heard from your father.” (St.

John, 8:38.)

“At the same time, there appeared a cloud that covered them, and from that cloud came a voice that caused these words to be heard: This is my beloved son; hear him.”

(The Transfiguration:

St. Mark, 9:7.)

“Now, when the son of man shall come in his majesty, accompanied by all the angels, he shall sit upon the throne of his glory; — and, all the nations being gathered together, he shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; — he shall place the sheep at his right hand and the goats at his left.

— Then the King shall say to those who are at his right hand: Come, you who have been blessed by my Father, to possess the kingdom that has been prepared for you since the beginning of the world.” (St.

Matthew, 25:31 to 34.)

“He who shall confess me and acknowledge me before men, I also will acknowledge and confess him before my Father who is in heaven; — he who shall renounce me before men, I also myself will renounce him before my Father who is in heaven.” (St.

Matthew, 10:32 and 33.)

“Now, I declare to you that whoever shall confess me and acknowledge me before men, the son of man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God; — but, if anyone shall disown me before men, I also will disown him before the angels of God.” (St.

Luke, 12:8 and 9.)

“For, if anyone is ashamed of me and of my words, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed when he shall be in his glory and in that of his Father and of the holy angels.” (St.

Luke, 9:26.)

In these last two passages it even seems that Jesus places above himself the holy angels who compose the celestial tribunal, before which he would be the defender of the good and the accuser of the wicked.

“But, with regard to your sitting at my right hand or at my left, it is not for me to grant it to you; that will be for those for whom my Father has prepared it.” (St.

Matthew, 20:23.)

“Now, the Pharisees being gathered together, Jesus put to them this question: What do you think of the Christ? Whose son is he? They answered: Of David. — How is it then, he replied, that David in spirit calls him his lord, in these terms: The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies serve as a footstool for your feet? — Now, if David calls him his lord, how is he his son?” (St. Matthew, 22:41 to 45.)

“But, teaching in the temple, Jesus said to them: How is it that the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David, since David himself says to his Lord:

Sit at my right hand, until I have made your enemies serve as a footstool for your feet? — For, if David himself calls him his Lord, how is he his son?” (Saint Mark, 12:35 to 37; St.

Luke, 20:41 to 44.)

By these words, Jesus consecrates the principle of the hierarchical difference that exists between the Father and the Son. He could be the son of David by corporeal filiation, as a descendant of his race, and it was for this reason that he took care to add: How does he in spirit call him his Lord? If there is a hierarchical difference between the father and the son, Jesus, as the son of God, cannot be equal to God. He confirms this interpretation and acknowledges his inferiority with relation to God, in terms that leave no room for doubt.

“You have heard what was said: ‘I am going away and I return to you. If you loved me, you would rejoice, since I go to my Father; because my Father IS GREATER THAN I.’”

(St.

John, 14:28.)

“A young man then approaches and says to him: Good Master, what good must I do to attain eternal life? Jesus answered him: ‘Why do you call me good?

There is none but God alone who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.’” (St.

Matthew, 19:16 and 17; St.

Mark, 10:17 and 18; St.

Luke, 18:18 and 19.)

Not only did Jesus not, in any circumstance, give himself as equal to God, but, in this passage, he positively affirms the contrary: he considers himself inferior to God in goodness. Now, to declare that God is above him, in power and in moral qualities, is to say that he is not God. The passages that follow support those we have cited and are also quite explicit. “I have not spoken of myself; my Father, who sent me, was the one who prescribed to me, by his commandment, what I must say and how I must speak; — and I know that his commandment is eternal life; what, then, I say is according to what my Father commanded me to say.” (St.

John, 12:49 and 50.)

“Jesus answered them: My doctrine is not mine, but his who sent me.

— He who shall wish to do the will of God will know whether my doctrine is from him, or whether I speak of myself. — He who speaks by his own impulse seeks his own glory, but he who seeks the glory of him who sent him is truthful, and there is no injustice in him.” (St.

John, 7:16 to 18.)

“He who does not love me does not keep my word, and the word that you have heard is not mine, but my Father's who sent me.” (St.

John, 14:24.)

“Do you not believe that I am in my Father and that my Father is in me? What I say to you I do not say of myself; my Father who dwells in me, he himself performs the works that I do.” (St.

John, 14:10.)

“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. — With regard to the day and the hour no one knows it, neither the angels who are in heaven, nor even the son, but the Father only.” (St.

Mark, 13:32; St.

Matthew, 24:35 and 36.)

“Jesus then said to them: When you shall have lifted up on high the Son of man, you shall know what I am, for I do nothing of myself; but, I say what my Father has taught me; and he who sent me is with me and has not left me alone, because I always do what is agreeable to him.”

(St.

John, 8:28 and 29.)

“I came down from heaven, not to do my own will, but to do the will of him who sent me.” (St. John, 6:38.)

“I can do nothing of myself. I judge according to what I hear, and my judgment is just, because I do not seek to satisfy my own will, but the will of him who sent me.” (St.

John, 5:30.)

“But, of myself, I have a testimony greater than that of John, for the works that my Father gave me the power to do, the works, I say, that I do bear witness of me, that it was my Father who sent me.” (St. John, 5:36.)

“But, now you seek to put me to death, me who have told you the truth that I learned from God; this is what Abraham did not do.” (St.

John, 8:40.)

Since he says nothing of himself; since the doctrine he preaches is not his own, since it came to him from God, who ordered him to come and make it known; since he does only what God gave him the power to do; since the truth he teaches he learned from God, to whose will he is subject, it is that he is not God, but merely his envoy, his messiah, and his subordinate. It would have been impossible for him to refuse, in a more positive manner, any assimilation of himself to God, nor to determine his principal role in more precise terms. There are not in the passages above thoughts hidden beneath the veil of allegory, which can be discovered only by dint of interpretations. They are thoughts expressed in their proper sense, without ambiguity. If it be objected that God, by not having wished to make himself known in the person of Jesus, provoked an illusion concerning his individuality, one might ask upon what such an opinion is founded, who has the authority to fathom the depth of his thought and to give his words a sense contrary to what they express. For, since, during the life of Jesus, no one considered him as being God; since all, on the contrary, considered him a messiah, if he had not wished them to know him as he was, it would have sufficed him to say nothing. From his spontaneous affirmations, it must be concluded that he was not God, or that, if he was, voluntarily and without utility, he made a false affirmation. It is worthy of note that St. John, the Evangelist upon whose authority the founders of the dogma of the divinity of the Christ most sought to support themselves, is precisely the one who offers the most numerous and most positive arguments to the contrary. Of this anyone may convince himself by reading the following passages, which add nothing, it is true, to the proofs already cited, but corroborate them, because from such passages there stands out evident the duality and the inequality of the two entities: “For this reason, the Jews persecuted Jesus and wished to kill him, that is, because he had done such things on the day of the sabbath. — But, Jesus said to them: ‘My Father works even until the present, and I also work.’” (John, 5:16 and 17.)

“For the Father judges no one; but gave to the Son all power to judge, so that all may honor the Son, as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son, does not honor the Father who sent him.”

“Verily, verily, I say to you that he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has eternal life and does not fall into condemnation; rather, he has already passed from death to life.”

“Verily, verily, I say to you that the hour comes, and it has already come, in which the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear it shall live;

for, just as the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to the Son to have life in himself — and gave him the power to judge, because he is the Son of man.” (John, 5:22 to 27.)

“And the Father who sent me has himself given testimony of me. You have never heard his voice, nor seen his face. — And his word will not remain in you because you do not believe in him whom he sent.” (John, 5:37 and 38.)

“When I should judge, my judgment would be worthy of belief, for I am not alone; my Father who sent me is with me.” (John, 8:16.)

“Jesus having said these things, lifted up his eyes to heaven and said: ‘My Father, the hour is come; glorify your Son, so that your Son may glorify you. — As you gave him power over all men, so that he may give eternal life to all those whom you gave him. — Now eternal life consists in knowing you who are THE ONLY true GOD and Jesus Christ whom you sent. “I have glorified you on earth; I have finished the work with which you charged me. — And you, my Father, glorify me, then, now also in yourself with that glory which I had in you before the world was.

“In a little while I shall no longer be in the world; but, as for them, they are still in the world, and I return to you. Holy Father, I keep in your name those whom you gave me, so that they may be as we are.”

“I gave them your word and the world hated them, because they are not of the world, as I myself am not of the world.”

“Sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth itself. — As you sent me into the world, so also I have sent them into the world — and I sanctify myself for them, so that they also may be sanctified in the truth.”

“I pray not for them only, but also for those who shall believe in me through their word; — so that they may all be united, as you, my Father, are in me and I in you; that they, in the same manner, may be one in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me.” “My Father, I desire that, there where I am, those whom you gave me may also be with me, so that they may contemplate my glory, glory which you gave me, because you loved me before the creation of the world.”

“Just Father, the world has not known you; but I have known you; and these have known that you sent me. — I made them know your name, and I shall yet make them know it, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I myself may be in them.” (John, 17:1 to 5, 11 to 14, 17 to 26: Prayer of Jesus.)

“It is for this that my Father loves me, because I lay down my life to take it up again. — No one snatches it from me; it is I who lay it down of myself; I have the power to lay it down and I have the power to take it up again. It is the commandment that I received from my Father.”

(John, 10:17 and 18.)

“They took away the stone and Jesus, raising his eyes to heaven, spoke these words:

My Father, I render you thanks for having exalted me. — I, for myself, knew that you would always exalt me; but, I say this for these people who surround me, so that they may believe that it was you who sent me.” (Death of Lazarus: Saint John, 11:41 and 42.)

“I shall speak to you no more, for the prince of the world is about to come, although there is nothing in me that belongs to him, but so that the world may know that I love my Father and that I do what my Father commands me.” (John, 14:30 and 31.)

“If you keep my commandments, you shall remain in my love, as I, who have kept the commandments of my Father, remain in his love.”

(John, 16:10.)

“Then, uttering a great cry, Jesus said: My Father, into your hands I commit my being. And, having pronounced these words, he expired.” (St.

Luke, 23:46.)

If Jesus, in dying, commits his soul into the hands of God, it is that he had a soul distinct from God, submissive to God. Therefore, he was not God.

The words that follow indicate, on the part of Jesus, a certain human weakness, a certain apprehension with regard to the sufferings and the death that are going to be inflicted upon him, which contrasts with the divine nature attributed to him. They, however, demonstrate, at the same time, a submission of an inferior to a superior. “Then, Jesus came to a place called Gethsemane and said to his disciples:

‘Sit here, while I go yonder to pray.’ — And, having taken with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to grow sorrowful and to be in great affliction. — He then said to them: My soul is in mortal sadness; stay here and watch with me. — And, going a little farther on, he prostrated himself with his face to the ground and prayed saying: My Father, if it be possible, cause this cup to depart from me; nevertheless, let it not be as I will, but as you will. — He then came to his disciples and, finding them asleep, said to Peter:

So you could not watch one hour with me? — Watch and pray; so as not to fall into temptation. The Spirit is ready but the flesh is weak.

— He went away again, to pray a second time, saying: My Father, if this cup cannot pass without my drinking it, let your will be done.”

(Jesus in the Garden of Olives: St.

Matthew, 26:36 to 42.)

“Then, he said to them: My soul is in a sadness of death; stay here and watch.

— And, having withdrawn a little, he prostrated himself on the ground, praying that, if it were possible, that hour might depart from him. — He said: Abba, my Father, all things are possible to you, carry far from me this cup;

but, let your will be done and not mine.” (Saint Mark, 14:34 to 36.)

“On arriving at that place, he said to them: Pray, so as not to succumb to temptation.

— And, having withdrawn from them about a stone's throw, he knelt down, saying: My Father, if you will, take this cup from me; nevertheless, let not my will be done, but yours. — Then, there appeared to him an angel from heaven to strengthen him. — Having entered into agony, he redoubled his prayers. — There came upon him a sweat of drops of blood, which ran even to the ground.” (St.

Luke, 22:40 to 44.)

“At the ninth hour, Jesus uttered a great cry, saying: ‘Eli! Eli! Lamma Sabachtani?

which means: My God! My God! why have you forsaken me?’”

(St.

Matthew, 27:46.)

“And, at the ninth hour, Jesus cast a great cry, saying: My God, My God! why have you forsaken me?” (St.

Mark, 15:34.)

The passages we are going to transcribe could leave some doubt and give occasion to believe in an identification of God with the person of Jesus; but, besides that they could not prevail against the precise terms of those that precede, they bring with them the proper rectification. “They asked him: Who are you then? Jesus answered them: I am the principle of all things, I who speak to you. — I have many things to say to you;

but, he who sent me is true and I say nothing but what I learned from him.” (St.

John, 8:25 and 26.)

“What my Father gave me is greater than all things and no one can snatch it from the hands of my Father. My Father and I are one.” (St.

John, 10:29 and 30.)

This means that his Father and he are one in thought, since he expresses the thought of God, since he has the word of God.

“Then, the Jews took up stones to stone him. — Jesus said to them: Many good works have I done before you, by the power of my Father. For which of them do you wish to stone me? — The Jews answered him: It is not for any good work that we stone you; but, on account of your blasphemy, because, being a man, you make yourself God. — Jesus replied to them: Is it not written in your law: I have said that you are Gods? — Now, if it calls gods those to whom the word of God was addressed and the Scripture being unable to be destroyed, how do you say that I blaspheme, I whom my Father has sanctified and sent into the world, because I said that I am the son of God? — If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you may not wish to believe in me, believe in my works, so that you may know and believe that my Father is in me and I in him.” (St.

John, 10:31 to 38.)

In another chapter, addressing his disciples, he says:

“On that day, you shall know that I am in my Father and you in me and I in you.”

(St.

John, 14:20.)

From these words, it is not to be concluded that God and Jesus are a single entity, for, otherwise, it would also have to be concluded, from the same words, that the apostles and God were one.

IV.

Words of Jesus after his death.

“Jesus answered her: Do not touch me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren and say to them on my part:

I ascend to my Father and your Father, to MY GOD and your God.” (Apparition to Mary Magdalene: Saint John, 20:17.)

“But, approaching, Jesus spoke to them thus: All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth.” (Apparition to the Apostles: St. Matthew, 28:18.)

“Now, you are witnesses of these things. — I am going to send you the gift of my Father, which was promised to you.” (Apparition to the Apostles: St.

Luke, 24:48 and 49.)

Everything, then, in the words of Jesus, whether those he said in life or those after his death, indicates a duality of perfectly distinct entities, as well as the profound sentiment of his inferiority and of his subordination in the face of the supreme Being. By his insistence in affirming it spontaneously, without being constrained or provoked to it by anyone whomsoever, he seems to have wished to protest in advance against the role that, according to his foresight, would be attributed to him. Had he kept silence concerning his personality, the field would have remained open to all suppositions, as to all systems. The precision, however, of his language removes all uncertainties. What greater authority can one claim than that of his own words? When he says categorically: I am or I am not this or that, who would dare arrogate to himself the right to contradict him, even to place him higher than he places himself? Who can rationally claim to be more enlightened than he concerning his own nature? What interpretations can prevail against affirmations so formal and multiplied as these: “I did not come of myself, but he who sent me is the only true God. — It was from his part that I came. — I say what I have seen with my Father. — It is not for me to grant it to you; that will be for those for whom my Father prepared it. — I go to my Father, because my Father is greater than I. — Why do you call me good? There is none good but God alone. — I have not spoken of myself; my Father, who sent me, was the one who prescribed to me, by his commandment, what I must say. — The doctrine that I preach is not mine, but his — who sent me. — The word that you have heard is not mine, but my Father's who sent me. — I do nothing of myself; I say only what my Father has taught me. — I can do nothing of myself. — I do not aim to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. — I have told you the truth that I learned from God. — My food is to do the will of him who sent me. — You who are the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you sent. — My Father, into your hands I commit my soul. — My Father, if it be possible, cause this cup to depart from me. — I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” When one reads such words, one is left wondering how there could even have come into anyone's mind the idea of attributing to them a sense diametrically opposed to what they so clearly express, of conceiving a complete identification, of nature and of power, between the Lord and him who declares himself his servant. In this great trial, which has lasted for almost fifteen centuries, what are the pieces of evidence? The Gospels — there are no others — which, on the point in dispute, give no occasion to any misunderstanding. To authentic documents, which cannot be contested without charging with falsehood the veracity of the evangelists and of Jesus himself, documents which rest upon eyewitness testimonies, what is opposed? A purely speculative theoretical doctrine, born, three centuries later, of a polemic engaged upon the abstract nature of the Word, a doctrine rigorously combated during many centuries and which prevailed only by the pressure of an absolute civil power. V.

Double nature of Jesus.

It could be objected that, by virtue of the double nature of Jesus, his words expressed his feeling as man and not as God. Without, at this moment, examining by what chain of circumstances they arrived, much later, at the hypothesis of this double nature, let us admit it, for an instant, and let us see whether, instead of elucidating the question, it does not complicate it still more, to the point of rendering it insoluble. What, in Jesus, would have been human was the body, the material part. From this point of view, one understands that he may have been able to suffer and even have suffered as a man. The soul, the Spirit, the mind, in a word, the spiritual part of the Being is what there would have been in him of the divine. If he felt and suffered as a man, it would be as God that he would think and speak. Did he speak as a man or as God? Here is an important question, by the exceptional authority of his teachings. If he spoke as a man, his words are subject to controversy; if he spoke as God, they are indisputable and we must accept them and conform ourselves to them, under penalty of desertion and of heresy. The most orthodox will be the one who comes closest to them. Will it be said that, under his corporeal envelope, Jesus had no consciousness of his divine nature? But, if it were so, he would not even have thought as God, his divine nature would have remained in a latent state; only the human nature would have presided over his mission, over his moral acts, as over his material acts. It is, then, impossible to abstract oneself from his divine nature during his life, without weakening his authority. But, if he spoke as God, why this incessant protest against his divine nature which, in such a case, he could not have been ignorant of? He would then have been mistaken, which would be little divine, or he would have knowingly deceived the world, which would be still less so. It seems to us difficult to escape from this dilemma. If it be admitted that he spoke now as a man, now as God, the question is complicated, by the impossibility of distinguishing what came from the man and what proceeded from God.

Granting that he had motives to dissimulate his true nature during the mission he was carrying out, the simplest means would have been not to speak of it, or to express himself, as he did in other circumstances, in a vague and parabolic manner, upon the points whose knowledge was reserved for the future. Now, this is not here the case, since the words above present no ambiguity. Finally, if, despite all these considerations, one could still suppose that, when living, he was ignorant of his true nature, no longer can it be admitted that this was so after his resurrection, since, when he appears to his disciples, it is no longer the man who speaks, it is the Spirit released from matter, which must already have recovered the plenitude of its spiritual faculties and the consciousness of its normal state, of its identification with the divinity. Meanwhile, it was then that he said: I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God! The subordination of Jesus is still indicated by the very quality of mediator, which implies the existence of a distinct person. It is he who intercedes with his Father; who offers himself in sacrifice for the remission of sinners. Now, if he is God himself, or if he were in all things equal to him, he would not need to intercede, since no one intercedes with oneself. VI.

Opinion of the Apostles.

Until now, we have relied exclusively upon the words of the Christ, as the sole peremptory element of conviction, because, outside of that, there are only personal opinions.

Of all these opinions, those of greatest value are, incontestably, those of the apostles, since these assisted him in his mission and since also, if he had given them secret instructions concerning his nature, some traces of those instructions would be discovered in their writings. Having lived in his intimacy, better than anyone they were to know him. Let us see, then, in what manner they regarded him. “Oh! Israelites, listen to the words that I am going to say to you: You know that Jesus of Nazareth was a man whom God made celebrated among you, by the marvels, prodigies, and miracles that the same God did through him in the midst of you. — Meanwhile, you crucified him and put him to death by the hands of the wicked, he having been delivered up to you by the express order of the will of God and by decree of his prescience. — But, God raised him up, restraining the pains of hell, since it was impossible that he should remain there. — Because David said in his name: I had the Lord present always before me, so that I should not be shaken. — It is for this that my heart rejoiced, that my tongue sang canticles of joy, and that my flesh itself rested in hope; — because you will not leave my soul in hell and you will not permit that your Holy One should experience corruption. — You have made me know the way of life and will fill me with the joy that the sight of your countenance gives.” (Acts of the Apostles, 2:22 to 28. Sermon of St. Peter.)

“After then that he was raised up by the power of God and that he received the fulfillment of the promise that the Father had made to him to send the Holy Spirit, he poured out that Holy Spirit which you now see and hear; — for David did not ascend to heaven. — Now, he himself said: The Lord said to my Lord: sit at my right hand — until I have made your enemies serve you as a footstool. — Let, then, all the House of Israel know, with absolute certainty, that God has made Lord and Christ that Jesus whom you crucified.” (Acts of the Apostles, 2:33 to 36. Sermon of St. Peter.)

“Moses said to our fathers: the Lord your God will raise up for you from among your brethren a prophet like me. Hear him in all that he shall say. — Whoever shall not hear that prophet shall be exterminated from among the people. “It was for you firstly that God raised up his Son and sent him to you to bless you, so that each one might be converted from his evil life.”

(Acts of the Apostles, 3:22, 23, and 26. Sermon of St. Peter.)

“We declare to all of you and to all the people of Israel that it is by the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified and whom God raised up from among the dead; it is by him that this man is now healed, as you see him, before you.” (Acts of the Apostles, 4:10. Sermon of St. Peter.)

“The kings of the earth rose up and the princes united against the Lord and against his Christ. — Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel truly conspired against your holy Son Jesus, whom you consecrated by your anointing, to do all that your power and your counsel had ordained should be done.” (Acts of the Apostles, 4:26 to 28. Prayer of the Apostles.)

“Peter and the other apostles answered: One ought to obey God rather than men. — The God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom you put to death by hanging him on the tree. — It was he whom God raised up by his right hand, as being the prince and the savior, to give to Israel the grace of penitence and the remission of sins.” (Acts of the Apostles, 5:29 to 31. Reply of the Apostles to the high priest.)

“It was that Moses who said to the children of Israel: God will raise up for you from among your brethren a prophet like me, hear him.

“But, the Most High does not dwell in temples made by the hands of men, according to this word of the prophet: — Heaven is my throne and the earth my footstool.

What house will you build me, says the Lord? and what could be the place of my repose?” (Acts of the Apostles, 7:37, 48, and 49. Discourse of Stephen.)

“But, Stephen being full of the Holy Spirit and raising his eyes to heaven, saw the glory of God and Jesus who was standing at the right hand of God, and said: I see the heavens opened and the Son of man who is standing at the right hand of God. “Then, casting great cries and stopping their ears, they all together rushed upon him; and, having dragged him outside the walls of the city, they stoned him;

and the witnesses, taking his garments, laid them at the feet of a young man called Saul (later Paul). — While they stoned him, Stephen invoked Jesus, saying: Lord Jesus, receive my Spirit.” (Acts of the Apostles, 7:55 to 58. Martyrdom of Stephen.)

These citations clearly prove the character that the apostles attributed to Jesus. The exclusive idea that stands out from these texts is that of his subordination to God, of the constant supremacy of God, without anything there revealing a thought of any assimilation whatsoever, of nature and of power. For them, Jesus was a man, a prophet, chosen and blessed by God. It was not, then, among the apostles that the belief in the divinity of Jesus originated. St. Paul, who did not know Jesus, but who, from an ardent persecutor, became the most zealous and the most eloquent disciple of the new faith and whose writings prepared the first formularies of the Christian religion, is no less explicit on the subject. There is in him the same sentiment of two distinct beings and of the supremacy of the Father over the Son. “Paul, servant of Jesus Christ, apostle of the divine vocation, chosen and destined to announce the gospel of God — which he had before promised through his prophets in the holy scriptures — concerning his son, who was born to him, according to the flesh, of the blood and the race of David; — who was predestined to be the son of God, in a sovereign power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from among the dead; concerning, I say, Jesus Christ, our Lord; — by whom we received the grace of the apostolate, to cause all the nations to obey the faith by the virtue of his name; — among the number of whom you also are, as having been called by Jesus Christ;

— to you who are in Rome, who are beloved of God and called to be saints; may God, our Father, and Jesus Christ, our Lord, give you grace and peace.” (To the Romans, 1:1 to 7.)

“Being thus justified by faith, let us have peace with God through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

“Because, when we were still in the langors of sin, Jesus Christ died for the impious such as us, in the time destined by God.

“Jesus Christ did not fail to die for us in the time destined by God. Thus, being now justified by his blood, we shall, with much stronger reason, be exempted by him from the wrath of God.

“And not only were we reconciled, but we even glorify ourselves in God through Jesus Christ, our Lord, through whom we obtained that reconciliation.

“If many died through the sin of one alone, the mercy and the gift of God poured out, with much stronger reason, more abundantly upon many by the grace of one alone man, who is Jesus Christ.” (To the Romans, 5:1, 6, 9, 11, 15, 17.)

“If we are sons, we are also heirs, HEIRS of God and CO-HEIRS of Jesus Christ, provided, however, that we suffer with him.” (To the Romans, 8:17.)

“If you confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is the Lord and if you believe in your heart that God raised him from among the dead, you shall be saved.” (To the Romans, 10:9.)

“Then shall come the consummation of all things, when he shall have delivered up his kingdom to God and the Father and shall have destroyed every empire, every domination, every power — for Jesus Christ must reign, until his Father shall have put under his feet all his enemies. — Now, death shall be the last enemy to be destroyed, for the Scripture says that God put all things under his feet and subjected all things to him, it being indubitable that from this must be excepted he who subjected all things. — When, then, all things shall be subjected to the Son, then the Son shall, himself, be subjected to him who shall have subjected to him all things, so that God may be all in all.” (I to the Corinthians, 15:24 to 28.)

“But, we see that Jesus, who had been made, for a little time, inferior to the angels, was crowned with glory and with honors, owing to the death that he suffered; God in his goodness, having willed that he should die for all — because he was well worthy of God, for whom and by whom are all things, willed that, by wishing to lead many sons to glory, he should consummate and perfect through suffering him who was to be the chief and the author of their salvation. “Thus, he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all come from one same principle; this is why he is not vexed to call them brethren — saying: I will announce your name to my brethren; I will sing your praises in the midst of the assembly of your people. — And, elsewhere: I will put my confidence in him. And, in another place: here am I with the children that God gave me. “This is why it became necessary that he should be in all things like his brethren, in order to be, before God, a compassionate and faithful pontiff in his ministry, so as to expiate the sins of the people. — For, it is from the pains and the very sufferings, by which he was tempted and tried, that he draws the virtue and the strength to succor those who are also tempted.”

(To the Hebrews, 2:9 to 13, 17, 18.)

“Therefore, my holy brethren, you who have part in the celestial vocation, consider Jesus, who is the apostle and the pontiff of the religion that we profess;

— who is faithful to him who established him in that charge, as Moses was faithful to him in all his house; — for he was judged worthy of a glory so much greater than that of Moses, as he who built the house is more estimable than the house itself; since there is no house that has not been constructed by someone. Now, he who is the architect and the creator of all things is God.” (To the Hebrews, 3:1 to 4.)

VII.

Prediction of the prophets, with regard to Jesus.

Besides the affirmations of Jesus and the opinion of the apostles, there is a testimony whose value the most orthodox believers could not contest, since they constantly point to it as an article of faith: it is that of God himself, that is, that of the prophets speaking by inspiration and announcing the coming of the Messiah. Now, here are the passages of the Bible considered as prediction of that great event. “I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not from near; a star came forth from Jacob and a scepter rose up from Israel and shall pierce through the chiefs of Moab and shall destroy all the children of Seth.” (Numbers, 24:17.)

“I will raise up for them a prophet, like you, from among their brethren and I will put in his mouth my words and he shall say what I shall have ordered him.

And it shall come to pass that he who shall not hear the words that he shall have said in my name, of him I shall require an account.” (Deuteronomy, 18:18 and 19.)

“It shall come to pass, then, when the days come for you to go to your fathers, that I will cause your posterity to rise up after you, one of your sons, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build me a house and I will make firm his throne for ever. I will be a father to him and he shall be a son to me and from him I will not withdraw my mercy, as I withdrew it from him who was before you, and I will establish him in my house and in my kingdom for ever and his throne shall be made firm for ever.” (Paralipomenon, 17:11 to 14.)

“This is why the Lord himself will give you a sign: a virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son and he shall be called Emmanuel.” (Isaiah, 7:14.)

“For the child was born to us, the Son was given to us and the empire was placed upon his shoulders and his name shall be called, the Admirable, the Counselor, the mighty God, the Powerful, the Father of Eternity, the Prince of peace.” (Isaiah, 9:5.)

“Here is my servant, I will sustain him; he is my elect, my soul has set upon him its affection; in him I have put my Spirit; he shall exercise justice among the nations.

“He shall absolutely not withdraw, nor cast himself down, until I have established justice on the earth and the beings shall submit to his law.” (Isaiah, 42:1 to 4.)

“He shall enjoy the labor of his soul and shall be satisfied with it; and my just servant shall justify many, by the knowledge they shall have of him and he himself shall snatch away their iniquities from them.” (Isaiah, 53:11.)

“Rejoice exceedingly, daughter of Zion; cast cries of joy, daughter of Jerusalem!

Behold your king shall come to you, just and a humble savior and mounted upon an ass, upon the colt of a she-ass. And I will make disappear the chariots of war of Ephraim and the horses of Jerusalem and the bow of combat also shall disappear and the king shall speak of peace to the nations. And his domination shall extend from one sea to another sea and from the river to the extremities of the earth.” (Zechariah, 9:9 and 10.)

“And he (the Christ) shall maintain himself and shall govern by the strength of the Eternal and with the magnificence of the name of the Eternal his God. And they shall return and now he shall be glorified even to the extremities of the earth and it shall be he who shall make peace.”

(Micah, 5:4.)

The distinction between God and his future envoy is found there characterized in the most formal manner. God designates him as his servant, consequently as his Subordinate. There is nothing, in his words, that implies the idea of equality of power, nor of consubstantiality between the two beings. Would God have been mistaken and would the men who came three centuries after Jesus Christ have seen with more exactitude than he? Such seems to be their pretension. VIII.

The Word was made flesh.

“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. — He was in the beginning with God. — All things were made by him and nothing of what was made was made without him. — In him was life and the life was the light of men. — And the light shone in the darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it. “There was a man sent from God, who was called John. — He came to serve as a witness, to give testimony of the light, so that all might believe through him. — He was not the light, but came to give testimony of him who was the light. “He was the true light that enlightens every man that comes into this world, and the world was made by him, and the world did not know him. — He came to his house and his own did not receive him. — But, he gave to all who received him the power to become sons of God, those who believe in his name, who were not born of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God himself. “And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we saw his glory, such as the only Son was to receive from the Father; and he, I say, dwelt among us, full of grace and of truth.” (John 1:1 to 14.)

This passage of the Gospels is the only one that, at first sight, seems to enclose implicitly an idea of identification between God and the person of Jesus; it is also the one that served as a basis, later, for the controversy in this regard. The question of the divinity of Jesus arose gradually; it was born of the discussions raised on account of the interpretations that some gave to the words Word and Son. Only in the fourth century did a part of the Church adopt it, in principle. Such a dogma resulted, then, from a decision of men and not from a divine revelation. It is to be noted, before all, that the words cited above are John's and not Jesus's, and that, even when one admits that they have not been altered, they express, in reality, no more than a personal opinion, an induction, in which one meets with the habitual mysticism of his language; they could not, then, prevail against the reiterated affirmations of Jesus himself. Even, however, accepting them such as they are, they in no way resolve the question in the sense of divinity, for they would apply equally to Jesus, a creature of God.

In fact, the Word is God, because it is the word of God. Having received directly from God the word with the mission to reveal it to men, he assimilated it. The divine word, with which he had penetrated himself, was incarnated in him; he brought it with him on being born and thus it is that John can with reason say: The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus could, then, have been charged with transmitting the word of God, without being God himself, as an ambassador transmits the words of his sovereign, without being the sovereign. According to the dogma of divinity, it is God who speaks; in the other hypothesis, he speaks through the mouth of his envoy, which takes nothing away from the authority of his words. But, who authorizes this supposition, in preference to the other? The only authority competent to decide the question is that of the very words of Jesus, when he says: “I have not spoken of myself; he who sent me was the one who prescribed to me, by his commandment, what I have to say. — The doctrine that I preach is not mine, but his who sent me; the word that you have heard is not my word, but my Father's who sent me.” It would have been possible for no one to express himself with more clarity and precision. The quality of Messiah or envoy, which is attributed to him throughout the whole course of the Gospels, implies a subordinate position with relation to him who orders; he who obeys cannot be equal to him who commands. John characterizes this secondary position and, consequently, establishes the duality of entities, when he says: And we saw his glory, such as the only Son was to receive it from the Father, since he who receives cannot be he who gives and he who gives the glory cannot be the equal of him who receives it. If Jesus is God, he possesses glory by himself and does not await it from anyone; if God and Jesus are a single being under two different names, between them there could exist neither supremacy nor subordination. Now, there being no absolute parity of positions, it follows that they are two distinct beings. The qualification of divine Messiah does not express that there is more equality between the mandatary and the mandator than that of royal envoy between a king and his representative.

Jesus was a divine messiah for the double reason that it was from God that he had his mission and that his perfections placed him in direct relation with God.

IX.

The Son of God and the Son of man.

The title of Son of God, far from implying equality, is, very much on the contrary, an indication of a submission. Now, no one is submitted to oneself, but to someone.

In order for Jesus to be, absolutely, equal to God it would be necessary that he should exist, like God, from all eternity, that is, that he should be uncreated. Now, the dogma says that God begot him from all eternity; but he who says begot says created. Whether or not it was from all eternity, he does not for that cease to be a creature and to be, as such, subordinate to his Creator. It is the idea that is implicitly contained in the term Son. Was Jesus born in time? Or, in other words: was there a time, in the past eternity, in which he did not exist? or is he co-eternal with the Father? Such are the subtleties over which they disputed for centuries. Upon what authority is the doctrine of co-eternity, which passed into the state of dogma, based? Upon the opinion of the men who engendered it. But, those men, upon what authority did they found such an opinion? It was not upon that of Jesus, since he declares himself subordinate; it was not upon that of the prophets who announce him as the envoy and the servant of God. In what unknown documents, more authentic than the Gospels, did they find such a doctrine? It seems that it was only in the consciousness and the superiority of their own lights. Let us leave, then, these vain discussions, which lead to nothing and whose very solution, were this possible, would not make men better. Let us say that Jesus is a Son of God, like all creatures, that he calls God Father, as we learned to address him as our Father. He is the well-beloved Son of God, because, having attained the perfection that brings the creature near to God, he possesses all the confidence and all the affection of God. He says he is the only Son, not because he is the only being who has reached perfection, but because he was the only one predestined to carry out that mission on Earth. If it may seem that the qualification of Son of God supports the doctrine of divinity, the same no longer holds for that of Son of man, which Jesus also gave to himself, in his mission, and which constituted the object of many commentaries. In order to understand its true sense, we must go back to the Bible, where we find it given by God himself to the prophet Ezekiel.

“Such was the image of the Lord, which was presented to me. On seeing those things, I fell on my face to the ground and heard a voice that spoke to me thus: Son of man, stand on your feet and I will speak with you. — And, having spoken to me in that manner, the Spirit entered into me and set me firm on my feet and I heard that it spoke to me, saying:

Son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to an apostate people, who have withdrawn from me. They have violated until this day, they and their fathers, the covenant that I had made with them.” (Ezekiel, 2:1, 2, 3.)

“Son of man, behold they have prepared for you fetters; they shall chain you and from there you shall not go out.” (Idem, 3:25.)

“The Lord then addressed his word to me, saying: — And you, Son of man, hear what the Lord God says to the land of Israel: the end comes; that end comes in the four corners of the earth.” (Idem, 7:1 and 2.)

“On the tenth day of the tenth month of the ninth year, the Lord addressed his word to me, saying:

— Son of man, mark well this day on which the king of Babylon gathered his troops before Jerusalem.” (Idem, 24:1 and 2.)

“The Lord said to me yet these words: — Son of man, I am going to strike you with a wound and take from you what is most agreeable to your eyes; but, you shall not make for me funeral lamentations; you shall not weep and tears shall not run down your cheeks. — You shall groan in secret and shall not put on mourning, as is done for the dead; your crown shall remain fixed upon your head and you shall have on your feet your sandals; you shall not cover your face and you shall not eat the viands that are given to those who are in mourning. — I spoke then in the morning to the people and in the evening my wife died. On the next day, I did what God had commanded me.” (Idem, 24:15 to 18.)

“The Lord spoke to me yet and said: — Son of man, prophesy with reference to the shepherds of Israel; prophesy and say to the shepherds: Behold what the Lord God says: Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves;

do not the shepherds feed their flocks?” (Idem, 34:1 and 2.)

“Then, I heard him who spoke to me, within the house; and the man who was near me said: — Son of man, here is the place of my throne, the place where I will put my feet and where I will remain for ever in the midst of the children of Israel and the house of Israel shall no more profane my holy name in the future, neither they, nor their kings, with their idolatries, with the sepulchres of their kings, nor with the noble lineages.” (Idem, 43:6 and 7.)

“Because, God does not threaten as man does and does not enter into fury as the Son of man.” (Judith, 8:15.)

It is evident that the qualification of Son of man here means: born of man, in opposition to that which is outside Humanity. The last citation, taken from the book of Judith, leaves no doubt as to the meaning of the expression, used in a very literal sense. God designates Ezekiel thus only, certainly to remind him that, despite the gift of prophecy that had been granted to him, he did not cease to belong to Humanity and so that he should not consider himself of an exceptional nature. Jesus gives himself this qualification with notable persistence, for only in very rare circumstances does he say he is the Son of God. In his mouth, it can have no other signification than to recall that he too belongs to Humanity, identifying himself in this way with the prophets who preceded him and to whom he compared himself, alluding to his death, when he said: Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets! The insistence with which he designates himself as the son of man seems an anticipated protest against the quality that, as he foresaw, would be given to him later, so that it should be well determined that this quality did not come from his lips. It is to be noted that, during that interminable polemic which impassioned men for a long series of centuries and which still continues, which kindled stakes and made rivers of blood flow, what was being discussed was an abstraction, the nature of Jesus, of which the cornerstone of the edifice had been made, although they did not speak of this and have forgotten one thing, which the Christ said to be the whole law and the prophets: the love of God and of neighbor and charity, which he established as the express condition of salvation. They clung to the question of the affinity of Jesus with God and fell silent with regard to the virtues that he recommended and exemplified. God himself remained effaced, before the exaltation of the personality of the Christ. In the symbol of Nicaea, it is said only: We believe in one only God, etc. But, what is that God like? There is no mention there of his essential attributes: sovereign goodness and sovereign justice. It is that these words would have been the condemnation of the dogmas that consecrate his partiality toward certain creatures, his inexorability, his jealousy, his wrath, his Spirit of vindictiveness, and with which they justified the cruelties committed in his name. If the symbol of Nicaea, which became the foundation of the Catholic faith, was in conformity with the spirit of the Christ, why the anathema with which it ends? Is there not there a proof that it is the work of the passion of men? To what, moreover, is its adoption owed? To the pressure of the emperor Constantine, who made of it more a political question than a religious one. Without his order, the council of Nicaea would not have taken place; without the intimidation that he exercised, it is more than probable that Arianism would have gotten the better. Everything, then, depended on the sovereign authority of a man, who does not belong to the Church, who recognized, later, the political error he had committed and who vainly sought to turn back, conciliating the parties. Solely upon that authority depended there not being Arians instead of Catholics and Arianism not being today the orthodoxy and Catholicism the heresy. After eighteen centuries of struggles and vain disputes, in the course of which the most essential part of the teaching of the Christ was set entirely aside, the only part that could guarantee peace for Humanity, everyone finds themselves weary of these sterile discussions, which led only to disturbances, engendering incredulity, and whose object no longer satisfies reason. General opinion manifests today a marked tendency to return to the fundamental ideas of the primitive Church and to the moral part of the teachings of the Christ, because it is the only one that can make men better. This one is clear, positive, and cannot give occasion to any controversy. If, from the beginning, the Church had taken this path, it would now be omnipotent instead of being in decline. It would have congregated the immense majority of men, instead of having been shattered by factions. When they march under that banner, men will join hands fraternally, instead of anathematizing and cursing one another, over questions that they almost never understand.

That tendency of opinion is a sign that the moment has come for the question to be carried to its true ground.

[1] For complete development of the question of miracles, see Genesis according to Spiritism, chapters XIII and following, where all the miracles of the Gospel are explained, by means of the natural laws.