Concept
Incarnation (Christianity)
Overview
In Christian theology, the incarnation is the belief that the pre-existent divine person of Jesus Christ, God the Son, the second person of the Trinity, who is also the Logos (Koine Greek for 'word'), was "made flesh" by being conceived through the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of a woman, the Virgin Mary, who is also known as the Theotokos (Greek for "God-bearer" or "Mother of God"). The doctrine of the incarnation then entails that Jesus was at the same time both fully God and fully human.
In the incarnation, as traditionally defined by those Churches that adhere to the Council of Chalcedon, the divine nature of the Son was united but not mixed with human nature in one divine person, Jesus, or according to those adhering to the Council of Ephesus, the divine and human natures of Christ are fully united into one composite nature "without mixing, confusion, or separation". This is central to the traditional faith held by most Christians. Alternative views on the subject (see Ebionites and the Gospel of the Hebrews) have been proposed throughout the centuries, but all were rejected by Nicene Christianity.
The incarnation is commemorated and celebrated each year at Christmas, and reference can also be made to the Feast of the Annunciation; "different aspects of the mystery of the incarnation" are celebrated at Christmas and the Annunciation.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Possible passages
Found by search and not yet checked by a person; they may only mention the idea in passing.
In creation the Person of the Father is indicated by God the Creator, the Person of the Son by the beginning, in which He created, and the Person of the Holy Ghost by the Spirit that moved over the waters. But in the formation, the Person of the Father is indicated by God that speaks, and the Person of the Son by the Word in which He speaks, and the Person of the Holy Spirit by the satisfaction with which God saw…
Aquinas Thomas, Summa Theologica, Part I
The author is tied to Incarnation in the knowledge graph.
For after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because…
of Hippo Augustine, The City of God, Volume I
States what Incarnation is; names Incarnation.
Even so, the relation between the soul and the gland was absolutely unintelligible, as Descartes disarmingly confessed. Incarnation was all very well in the old philosophy: those who had allowed the interaction of disparate natures throughout the physical world need find no particular difficulty about the special case of it provided by incarnation. Why should not a form of conscious life so interact with what would…
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Theodicy Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil
Names Incarnation twice.
Philosophers who discussed Incarnation (Christianity)
- Giordano Bruno
- Lev Shestov
- John Hick
- Slavoj Žižek
- Simone Weil
- Thomas Aquinas
- Anselm of Canterbury
- Richard Swinburne
- Alvin Plantinga
- Jens Zimmermann (philosopher)
Related ideas
- Jesus
- God in Christianity
- Gnosticism
- Gospel of John
- Arianism
- John Calvin
- Justin Martyr
- Ancient Greek philosophy
- Infallibility
- Latin
- Catechism of the Catholic Church
- Monotheism
- Heresy
- Philosophy of religion
- Christian prayer
- Pope John Paul II
- Nontrinitarianism
- Richard Swinburne
- Church of the East
- Resurrection of Jesus
- Hypostasis (philosophy and religion)
- Christian theology
- Trinity
- Koine Greek
Place in the tradition
Part of Animism.
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