Jesse Sharpe PhD thesis - Research@StAndrews:FullText ...

Introduction 8
And so have we here now in one, both twaine his Natures. God sent his Sonne,
There his Divine: made of a woman, Here his humane Nature, That, from the
bosome of his Father, before all worlds: this, from the wombe of his mother, in the
world. So that, as from eternitie, God his Father might say, that verse of the
Psalme. Filius meus es tu, hodie genui te: Thou art my Sonne, this day have I
begotten thee. So, in the fulnesse of time, might the Virign his mother, no lesse
truely say, Filius meus es tu, hodie peperi te: Thou art my Sonne, this day have I
brought thee into the world. 10
Here Andrewes still emphasises the humanity and divinity of Jesus, but there is less
description of the flesh and bones of Christ and more discussion of humanity’s role in the
making of the Incarnation through the person of his mother, Mary. The phrases ‘made of a
woman’ and ‘from the wombe of his mother’ are the strongest statements about the
physical ‘humane Nature’ of Jesus, and they intriguingly put Mary and women at the
forefront of the issue. This understanding of the Incarnation will be of particular
importance to Aemilia Lanyer, as will be seen in chapter three. In addition to Andrewes,
Richard Hooker, in his Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, ensures that he properly
defines and addresses the importance of this doctrine in book five of his work. He defines
the Incarnation thus:
The Lord our God is but one God. In which indivisible unitie notwithstandinge
wee adore the father as beinge altogether of himself, wee glorifie that
consubstantiall worde which is the Sonne, wee blesse and magnifie that
coessentiall Spirit eternallie proceeding from both which is the holie Ghost.
10 ‘A Sermon Preached on Christmas Day 1609’ in Peter McCullough (ed.), Lancelot Andrewes: Selected
Sermons and Lectures (Oxford, 2005), p. 169.