Introduction to the Study of Jesus Christ [Christology]

  1. The Centrality of Christology in Human Knowledge and Life

  (1)             What is Christology?

  (i) Christology as an academic discipline is primarily a study of Jesus Christ, that is, who he is and how he lived and what he achieved.

  (ii) However, as it is a study based on the Christian faith that he is still alive, it also discusses about our relationship with him and his activity with our present world in connection with the Holy Spirit and His own Church consisting of his own people.

  (iii) Christology is the answer to the question asked by Jesus himself: “Who do you say I am?” Many answers, so many Christologies are possible and so exist. But a right understanding of Jesus Christ is possible only when it is “revealed … by my Father[God] in heaven”, neither by human teaching nor by human awareness(v.17). As it is clearly stated in I Cor. 12.3, “no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit”. In the words of Anselm, our belief results in true understanding, that is, credo ut intelligam. Or, in the words of Augustine, we reach to the true knowledge through faith per fidem ad intellectum, therefore without belief there is no understanding, that is, nisi credideritis non intelligetis. As Pascal wrote, “You would not seek me had you not already found me.”

  Matt. 16.13-19

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people  say the Son of Man is?" They replied, "Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets." "But what about you?" he asked. "Who do you say I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven."

 (2)             The Centrality of Christology

  (i) Christology is the central and essential belief of the Christianity, and all the other beliefs originate from or depend on this belief. As Karl Barth clearly stated in Church Dogmatics I/2. 346-7, “The Christian religion is the predicate to the subject of the name of Jesus Christ. Without Him it is not merely something different. It is nothing at all … Eliminate this name and the religion is blunted and weakened. As a ‘Christianity without Christ’ it can only vegetate. It has lost its only raison d’etre.”; “The name of Jesus Christ alone has created the Christian religion. Without Him it would never have been.”

  (ii) The Christian faith is the faith in Jesus Christ, and therefore one’s faith essentially depends on his/her understanding of Christ. Misunderstanding of Jesus results in a grave failure to be a genuine Christian. It is true not only individually but also collectively.

  (iii) As Christ is the Truth and the Word of God, Christology is the foundation and center of all human knowledge. So, in his Christ The Center, Dietrich Bonhoeffer pointed out that “Christology is really Logo-logy, the study of study, the word of the Word of God” and thus “the science par excellence”. Christ is the Authentic Man, New Man and New Humanity without any corruption of sin and therefore the epistemological norm of all sciences.

(3)         The Impact of Christology in Human Knowledge and Life

  (i) The true understanding of Jesus Christ makes a great impact to the whole width and depth of human knowledge and life. The Apostle Paul shows an example in Philippians 3. It happened not only in the knowledge and life of Paul but all the disciples of Jesus, even several billion human beings. Christology has an enlightening effect on the human knowledge and life. It does illuminate, straighten, correct, motivate, elevate, envision, and empower. It changes one’s life and world-view.

Phil. 3.4b-11

… If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel , of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless. But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

  (ii) Knowing Christ results in the whole-ranged reconstruction of personal relationships starting from one with Jesus Christ. Hate-relationship is changed to love-relationship. Loving God and loving men become his/her life of relationship and devotion.

  (iii) Christ is infinitely rich, and knowing Christ needs to grow evermore. And, the Christological growth effects to the greater participatio Christi.

Eph. 3.14-19

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on  earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

  2. Contextual Diversity and Richness of Christology

(1)   The Significance of the Multiple Christological Titles

(i) The names of Jesus and Christ are most central and popular so as to be commonly connected. Jesus Ihsouj is the calling name used generally. It is the Greek transliteration form of the Hebrew [;Wvye which is the new form in the post-exilic historical books as an alternate form of Joshua [;vuAhy. It is derived from the root [v;y' meaning ‘to save’ and the savior is h['Wvye Their Greek equivalents are swzw and swthr. Jesus is the Savior from the punishment of sin. On the other hand, Christ Cristoj means the Anointed, derived from the root criw meaning ‘to anoint’. In the Jewish tradition, the servants of God for His people, like king, priest, or prophet was anointed by the will of God in order to ordain, install, and appoint to such holy and important divine missions. So, Christ is the Anointed of God for the salvation of His people. Its Hebrew equivalent is Messiah x;yvim., Aramaic form of x;yvim' derived from the root xv;m' meaning ‘to anoint’. So, when both are combined, Jesus Christ means literally the God-ordained Savior.

(ii) In addition to Jesus (975 times used in the NT) and Christ (569), Lord/Kyrios (667), Son of Man (87), and Son of God (49) are used as his major titles. However, there are numerous minor titles throughout the New Testament, such as the Word, Light, Truth, Way, Life, Suffering Servant, King, or the Holy. Strictrly speaking, God cannot be defined by the human terms. Christ is the plhrwma of divinity: “In Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form.”( Col. 2.9) As Oscar Cullmann pointed out, “No single title is sufficient to comprehend the infinite fullness disclosed in Christ.”

(iii) The usages of the Christological titles in the New Testament show the fact that some title was favored by some Christians. It reflects their own experience of Christ as well as their spiritual needs and historical context.

[JBSmith, Greek-English Concordance To the New Testament: A Tabular and Statistical Greek-English Concordance…]

(2)   Historical Diversity of Understanding Christ

  Since Jesus Christ was believed as the Lord and Savior, Christians have depended on Him as the Center of their life and the Source of their life tasks as well as problems. Therefore, some aspects of Christ have been emphasized according to their historical contexts. Jaroslav Pelikan chronologically listed 18 historical and cultural understanding of Christ in Jesus Through the Centuries: His Place in the History of Culture. Of course, this is a matter of emphasis and context, for “Jesus is the same yesterday and today and forever.”(Heb. 13.8)

1.        The Rabbi

2.        The Turning Point of History

3.        The Light of the Gentiles

4.        The King of Kings

5.        The Cosmic Christ

6.        The Son of Man

7.        The True Image

8.        Christ Crucified

9.        The Monk Who Rules the World

10.    The Bridegroom of the Soul

11.    The Divine and Human Model

12.    The Universal Man

13.    The Mirror of the Eternal

14.    The Prince of Peace

15.    The Teacher of Common Sense

16.    The Poet of the Spirit

17.    The Liberator

18.    The Man Who Belongs to the World

(3)   Cultural and Ethnic Diversity of Understanding Christ

Jesus Christ incarnated as a Jewish man and lived a life as a Jew, but the Son of God transcends nationality. If He came to the other people in the other context, He might act and speak differently, as God and the Holy Spirit do. Though His coming as a Jew was unique and significant for the achievement of redemption, particular people and culture in particular time specially need and appreciate some effects of Christ among His rich benefits. Such accommodation was initiated by Paul, when he declared his cultural principle in the application of the Gospel as follows:

I Cor. 9.19-23

Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ's law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

Also, as the anthropomorphic understanding of God is inevitable to man in general, some indigenization of Christ to their own race and people is inevitable and natural, through Christ was incarnated in a human form and so a certain limitation due to the historical Jesus is fixed. As the paintings of Jesus in different culture show such efforts and understanding, the preaching Jesus in different culture reflects their own emphasis and favor in some aspects of Christ. Volker Küster listed many indigenous Christologies in The Many Faces of Jesus Christ: Intercultural Christology.  

3. History of Understanding Christ

Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, 5 vols., The University of Chicago Press, 1971-89.

Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, 3 vols., Harper & Brothers, 1877.

(1)    Early Christology

  (i) When Jesus came to the world, His people rejected Him, i.e., the right understanding of Christ. Only some accepted Him correctly and became His disciples. The classical understanding of Christ appears in the Peter’s confession in Matt. 16.16: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” The right Christology is simply the belief in the self-revelation of Jesus Himself. However, the full Christology was possible after the resurrection and ascension, followed by the coming of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ as well as the Spirit of God. The New Testament shows the formation process of authentic Christology in opposition to the false Christology.

(ii) During the first three centuries of Christianity under persecution, there arose diverse understandings of Christ. Two tendencies are prominent. One is Jewish tendency to emphasize the humanness of Jesus in the forms of Adoptionism and Ebionism. The other is Greek tendency to emphasize the divineness of Christ in the forms of Docetism and Sabellianism. Whether He is God or man was questioned, and it centered around the differences about the relationship of God and Jesus. Since the unity of Christianity was necessary as the religion of the Roman Empire , Constantinus requested to call for the first ecumenical council and make the unified Christology. The Nicene Council declared the full divinity and full humanity of Jesus Christ in 325.

(iii) Now, the new question was about the relationship of divinity and humanity of Christ and how two natures are related. Several mismatched formulas like Apollinarianism, Nestorianism, Eutychianism appeared and confused the churches. So, another ecumenical council was called for to make unity in this Christological question. The Chalcedon Council declared two natures united in one person “unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, and inseparably” in 451.

(2)  Medieval Christology

  If early Christology concentrated on the question “Who is Christ?”, now medieval Christology concerned more on the question “How did Christ live?” or “What did he achieve for us?” Anselm presented the classical doctrine of atonement in his Cur Deus homo? On the other hand, Thomas a Kempis raised a new spirituality movement to imitate the life style of Christ, i.e., imitatio Christi.

(3)   Reformation Christology

  Against the Roman corruption or reduction of Christology by the introduction of natural theology, the Reformers advocated to return to the classical Christology: the Nicene and Chalcedon Christology, for it is decisive for the right understanding of salvation. However, the difference in the understanding of Eucharist, especially the presence of Christ there, divided the Protestant Church , and the question behind this was Christological, i.e., communicatio idiomatum vs. extra Calvinisticum.

 (4)       Modern Christology

  The humanistic and rationalistic trend of the Renaissance and Enlightenment continuously questioned about the divinity of Christ, while emphasizing the humanness of Jesus with his failures. His divinity was understood as immanent in the world or simply denied. The quest of the historical Jesus has continued in several forms. Karl Barth attempted to reverse its trend by emphasizing his transcendent divinity, while Rudolf Bultmann existentially advocated demythologization of Christ, which influenced some British theologians to raise the Myth of God Incarnate movement.

  4. Contemporary Trends and Relevance of Christological Study

(1)       Christology for the Unjust Capitalistic Society

  The Industrial Revolution initiated a materialistic society and the last century had been the times of economic and political war between capitalism and communism that ended with the victory of capitalism. But ever-expanding difference between the poor and the rich individually as well as collectively became a fundamental problem and structural sin. Can Christ save us from this problem? Jürgen Moltmann presented the political Christology and Liberation Theology/Minjung Theology emphasized Christ as the Liberator from this economic and political injustice.

(2)      Christology for the Religiously Pluralistic Society

  The rise of contemporary pluralism and post-modernism with the collapse of western colonialism demanded the peace and co-existence among the religions without exclusivistic spirit of sole dominance. Religious pluralism responded to this Zeitgeist and attempted to modify Christology to be inclusive. Process theology advocate a transition from the Christo-centric to theo-centric Christianity. Christ becomes depersonalized and anonymous to be relativized and harmonized with other religions. In the search of the historical Jesus, the third wave arose since the 1980s after the Old Quest and the New Quest with post-modern pluralistic and secular approach.

(3)       Christology for the Spiritually Hungry Society

  Our world is materially affluent but spiritually hungry. So, spiritualistic movements like Pentecostalism inside and New Age outside receive an increasing acceptance. The Holy Spirit rather than Jesus Christ is felt closer and more helpful. Following this trend, the Spirit Christology is developed, or the binitarian identification of Christ and Spirit.