Saturday, February 16, 2013

Kenotic Christianity and the problem of Christ's resurrected body

According to kenotic Christianity, when Christ became incarnate, he literally ceased to have divine omni-properties. But at the same time, after his resurrection, he was glorified and presumably has regained them.

But what happened to his humanity after his glorification? Either Christ is still human or he is simply divine. If Christ is still human, then it follows that having the divine omni-properties is logically compatible with being human, which undercuts I assume one of the major motivations for kenotic Christianity. If Christ is no longer human, what happened to his resurrected body? Was it resurrected only to be destroyed shortly thereafter? That seems deeply unfitting.

5 comments:

Dan Lower said...

Did you mean to say that if Christ remains human, this indicates the omnis are compatible with Christ being human?

Alexander R Pruss said...

Yup, fixed, thanks!

Richard A. Christian said...

We could also argue against Kenotic Christianity by means of natural theology.
(1) If Kenotic Christianity is true, then God is not a necessary being.
(2) If the Leibnizian cosmological argument is sound, then God is a necessary being.
(3) The Leibnizian cosmological argument is sound.
(4)therefore, God is a necessary being.
(5) therefore, kenotic Christianity is false.

Someone how holds to Kenotic Christianity should hold to (1) since presumably human beings are essentially contingent and God, in their view, made himself a human being. And If they say 'God was only contingent in his human nature' then they are starting to sound more Chalcedonian. Right?

Alexander R Pruss said...

Well, they could say that God is a necessary being, but that the divine persons are not essentially God. But the natural theology point still adapts. If a divine person is not essentially God, then it calls out for an explanation as to why he is in fact God.

Richard A. Christian said...

"Well, they could say that God is a necessary being, but that the divine persons are not essentially God."

I'm not sure it is possible for God to be a necessary being if the divine persons are not essentially divine. I suppose all three persons could have become contingent beings on their view, and if all three together could become contingent beings ( by becoming human or whatever, I don't see why on Kenotic Christianity this wouldn't be possible), then there wouldn't be a necessary being, but according to the LCA there is such a necessary being. Thoughts?