St Maximus the Confessor, Christology and the Salvific Model of Theosis

St Maximus the Confessor

St Maximus the Confessor was born in Constantinople around the year 580.  He was raised in a devout Christian home.  He received an excellent education, then entered into government service and was a counselor to the emperor Heraclius (ruled 611 – 641).  Constantinople and the imperial court were very sympathetic to the Monothelite christological heresy (meaning Christ had only one will — divine will — thus diminishing his human nature among other theological errors).  He left the court and became a monk.  He began to write extensively and persuasively regarding correct christological understanding of Christ’s hypostatic union as defined by the fourth Ecumenical Council (the Council of Chalcedon).  His defense of orthodox Christology, though very influential, brought about his imprisonment and torture (his tongue was cut out and his right hand cut off).  His proper understanding of christology also led him to explain further the salvific model of theosis which will be explored in the text below.

Let’s begin by examining one aspect of the doctrine of orthodox christology.  This is the hypostatic union.  In simple terms it is this:  Christ has two natures:  the divine (being God the Son), and human (being Jesus of Nazareth who took human flesh from the ever-virgin Mary).  Thus, we proclaim that Jesus is fully God and fully man.  These natures are united in the one person of Christ.  The two natures are indivisible, yet never to be confused.  Within this hypostatic union, as St Maximus and others have taught, the divine nature communicates, permiates, and interpenetrates (perikhoresis is a word St Maximus uses) the human nature while the human nature communicates, permeates, and interpenetrates the divine nature of Christ.  There is a mutual interpenetration between the two natures.  Because of this unifying interpenetration, on the Cross God tasted and experienced human death.  This can be said of all of Christ’s incarnate experiences:  God experienced hunger and thirst.  God experienced joy and sorrow.  God experienced a headache.  On the flip side of this, human nature and human will and action were deified as the divine nature was interpenetrated by his human nature.  Added to this, human nature was glorified by Christ’s resurrection from the dead.

This hypostatic union also exists and is expressed in a similar, yet differing manner by the Eucharist.  St John 6: 50 – 51 teaches that by the Eucharist the Incarnation is re-presented to us (see my posting “Brief Commentaries on St John Chapter Six, Part Four:  The Poetic Parallelism of St John 6: 50 – 51).  Hence, there is an expression of the hypostatic union.  We have the material elements of bread and wine.  By the work of the Holy Spirit (as he is invoked by the epiklesis) Christ joins his Body and Blood to the bread and wine.  There is an indivisible union without confusion in this Sacrament.

By sacrament and faith, the Christian is in Christ, and Christ in us.  Our salvation is relational union in Christ!  Therefore, there is a similar interpenetration (perikhoresis) within man.  St Maximus states that “…divine and human energy [are] in cooperation, and not as a mixed form of both.”  The divine interpenetrates our humanity.  Our human nature interpenetrates the divine in our lives.  It is important to clearly state that a creature cannot encounter the essence of God, just as a creature cannot encounter the surface of the sun and survive.  But, creatures experience the rays of the sun which exert their life giving effect to every creature on this planet.  In like manner, the Fathers teach that it is God’s energies that we experience and works their saving effect in us.

This brings us to the concept of theosis  — or “divinization” / “deification”.  “God became man that man can become god,” teaches St Anthanasius.  This divinization occurs only as is proper for our species:  humans do NOT become God!.  Simply put, it is the perfect, whole, complete restoration of the image of God within us.  We become who and what we were intended by our Creator to be.

However, though this process does occur and is a process, it is not “magical” —  we must cooperate with our Lord.  St Paul gives us this:

Have this mindset in you which was also in Christ Jesus, though existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God to be cause for exploitation.  But he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in the likeness of man.  And being found in the likeness of man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death — even the death of the cross (Phil 2: 5 – 8).

As the Son emptied himself to become man, we are to empty ourselves of our passions so that the divine energies — the Light and Life of Christ — can fill us and permeate us.  Speaking to this need for self-emptying was have St John the Baptist’s words:  “He must increase, but I must decrease: (St John 3: 30).  We have Christ’s words from the Beatitudes:  “Blessed are the pure in heart because they shall see God” (St Matthew 5: 8).  We then have this excerpt from the “Prayer of the Hours”: “Sanctify our souls.  Purify our bodies.  Set aright our minds.  Cleanse our thoughts.”

Yet, there is another — and equally mysterious — interpenetration that occurs between Christ our Creator and his creation.  I refer to some verses that St Paul wrote in two of his Prison Epistles.   First, we have these two verses:

Declaring to you the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure, which set forth in him for the purpose of the fulness of time, to gather together in him [Christ] all things, those things in heaven and those things on earth (Ephesians 1: 9 – 10).

Further regarding the union of the entirety of creation in Christ we turn to his letter to the Colossians:

Because by him all things were created, those things in heaven and those on earth, all things seen and unseen, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities:  all things were created through him and for him.  And he is before all things, and in him all things consist in their proper orders (sunestaeken)…because in him all the fulness (pan ta plaeroma) was pleased to dwell (Colossian 1: 16, 17, 19).

Hence, by his Incarnation, an interpenetration also exists between Christ and the entirety of creation because all things also have a relational union in Christ as does humanity.  All things in some way, as is appropriate for their species and their ordering in Christ, experience this interpenetration as is proper for their kind.  And they will, in some wild, unimaginable way will also experience some degree of glorification upon his return at the end of these days.

This is our salvation, and St Maximus has taught the Church this fact clearly.

I need to come back to another fact of St Maximus’ life, and it applies to us in the twenty-first century.  If we live out and clearly teach the Orthodox faith, we can expect troubles and persecution.  Persecution of Christians is now fully operational in this country.  Oppression is being made manifest and is growing at an alarming rate.  Because of his steadfast faith in Christ, and his unwavering commitment to declare the truth of the faith, St Maximus is known as a Confessor.  He was imprisoned.  His tongue cut out and right hand cut off that he could no longer speak or write of the truth of the Orthodox faith.  Yet, he never denied the Lord.  May the same grace of God be with us in our days!

Here is the troparion for St Maximus the Confessor,

O Champion of Orthodoxy, teacher of purity and of true worship, the enlightener of the universe and the adornment of hierarchs; all wise Father Maximus, your teachings have gleamed with light upon all things.  Intercede before Christ God to save our souls!

Here is the link to the corresponding sermon:

In Christ who transforms and strengthens us,

Fr Irenaeus