Athanasius begins his work with an immediate reference to the ground laid in a prior work, Contra Gentes ("Against the Heathens"), and how he "briefly indicated that the Word of the Father is Himself divine," continuing to expound on the role of Christ in the creation and sustaining of all that is.
Athanasius (hereafter A-Cakes, A-Man, A-Bro, Contra Mundum, ACM, or other) spends a mere sentence on this. His main goal is to "take a step further in the faith of our holy religion, and consider also the Word's becoming Man and His divine Appearing in our midst." This is, of course, the topic of the work...both the reason for and the nature of this divine Appearance. What is entailed in the Incarnation, and why was it necessary?
And his first thought is the inversion of expectations and nature that the Incarnation entails. As unbelievers scorn Christ, "the more does He make His Godhead evident." He takes the impossible and surpasses it; He makes fit the unfit; He takes that which is human and declares it divine. And the result? "Thus by what seems his utter poverty and weakness on the cross He overturns the pomp and parade of idols, and quietly and hiddenly wins over the mockers and unbelievers to recognise Him as God."
That is the first of ACM's observations on the nature of the Incarnation, but it is far from the last. But before delving more into what the Incarnation is, A-Bro pauses, because before understanding what it is, we must understand WHY it is. "He has been manifested in a human body for this reason only, out of the love and goodness of His Father, for the salvation of us men." And then he explains that we will begin with creation and with the Creator, for before we understand anything else, we must understand one crucial fact: "The renewal of creation has been wrought by the Self-same Word Who made it in the beginning."
This is HUGE for A-Cakes. If I remember rightly, he spends a very large chunk of his work building on this observation, because it's very important to him that "there is thus no inconsistency between creation and salvation." ACM sees a logical and personal continuation through creation and renewal: it is the same Agent who accomplishes both.
Following that, Athanasius proceeds to argue for creation as told in the Bible. Since his audience consisted entirely of theists, not atheists, his arguments are quite different from how we would go about introducing creationism today! But through those arguments, one central point emerges: That God is a creator, not merely a craftsman. He creates out of nothing, rather than shaping pre-existent matter. That creation is accomplished "through His own Word, our Lord Jesus Christ," and one of the focal points of that creation is mankind. And upon mankind, the Creator bestowed "especial mercy"..."namely, the impress of His own Image, a share in the reasonable being of the very Word Himself."
The goal of this special mercy is that mankind might live in paradise forever. However, A-Man states that"the will of man could turn either way," and therefore that God made this grace conditional: "If they went astray and became vile, throwing away their birthright of beauty, they would come under the natural law of death, and live no longer in paradise, but, dying outside of it, continue in death and in corruption."
Two things immediately strike me here. The first is that A-Bro goes out of his way to establish libertarian free will in the Garden: "The will of man could turn either way." This emphasis on free will, and real choices, is extremely common in the Church Fathers, and is a thorn in the side of Calvinists who wonder why their doctrine has no adherents in the early Church. And the second is that God isn't sentencing mankind to death: By sinning, we place ourselves under "the natural law of death." It is no more a "punishment" then being burned when you touch the stove is a punishment.
And with this, ACM brings us back to the main event: "The former subject is relevant to the latter for this reason: It was our sorry case that caused the Word to come down, our transgression that called out His love for us, so that He made haste to help us and to appear among us."
Note the story-telling here. Athanasius is not merely teaching theology...he is reciting a saga, an epic, a fantasy...a fantasy that, joy of joys, is actually true. Christ is not merely "made Incarnate," and the Incarnation is not broken down into sterile forensic terms. The Word comes down, as a result of our sin calling out to Him and causing Him to show forth his love for us. Indeed, He makes haste to come to our aid!
God created us to "remain in incorruption." Honestly, we screwed that up pretty quick. Mankind had come under the law of death...indeed, "they were in the process of becoming corrupted entirely, and death had them entirely under its dominion."
And how was this happening? "The transgression of the commandment was making them turn back again according to their nature; and as they had at the beginning come into being out of non-existence, so were they now on the way to returning, through corruption, to non-existence again. The presence and love of the Word had called them into being; inevitably, therefore when they lost the knowledge of God, they lost existence with it; for it is God alone Who exists, evil is non-being, the negation and antithesis of good."
A-Cakes begins to wrap up this train of thought with a recap. We were created by the Word and given "His own life by the grace of the Word." Since we were created beings, we were naturally subject to death and decay; However, through our "union with the Word," "the presence of the Word with them shielded them even from natural corruption." But when we forsook that union and departed from the word, we became victims of corruption even greater than what was natural, "because it was the penalty of which God had forewarned them for transgressing the commandment." A-Bro ends the chapter by detailing the descent of man, his ever-increasing wickedness, and his thirst for sin.
With the word "penalty," Athanasius brings in the first hint of "punishment". However, again, there is the strong sense of natural consequences. God did not make Adam subject to death: Adam did that. God did not give Adam over to corruption: Adam did that, too. We are sustained by proximity to the Word our creator...to the extent that we depart from the Word, we become more corrupt and less...well, just less. Proximity to God equals existence...distance from God equals non-being and negation.
Anyway, we're just getting started here, folks. Athanasius is just setting the stage here, but in chapter 2 he really begins picking up steam. I'll likely be collecting feedback regarding the format of these posts, so if you have thoughts on how this blog-through could be done better, just let me know in the comments!
See Part 2 here.
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