Trinity

TRINITY & OTHER DOCTRINES OF GOD:
PROF. M. M. NINAN
B: NESTORIUS
Nestorius’s Views
The big theological problem was how exactly Divinity (the eternal Word) could coexist
with the human nature of Jesus. The most common theological explanation assimilated
the God-Man relationship in Christ with the soul-flesh relationship in any human being.
However, the difference between those substances is huge: an incomplete substance
(the soul) versus a complete one (Deity).
The answer Nestorius gave to this unsatisfactory definition was to defend Christ’s
integral humanity and Divinity by supporting two different and complete natures in
conjunction (synapheia) with one another, within the same person (prosōpon, O’Collins,
2009, p. 190).
Although Nestorius did not go any further with this separation, his opponents accused
him of trying to suggest a mere assumption of the human Jesus by God, with just a
moral unity among them.
The practical consequences for the Church were significant. The events occurring to the
human Jesus could not be also attributed to the Logos. The best examples here are the
birth (the Theotokos – “Mother of God” title given to Mary, mentioned by Luke, 1:43:
“And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?”; NRSV
Bible) and the sacrifice on the cross.
The problem got worse as Nestorius and his followers gradually shifted towards the
belief in two prosōpa, (persons), or even “two Sons” (O’Collins, 2009, p. 195). This
prompted a reaction from the rest of the Church.
Nestorianism is basically the doctrine that Jesus existed as two persons, the man
Jesus and the divine Son of God, rather than as a unified person. This doctrine is
identified with Nestorius (c.386-451), Patriarch of Constantinople, although he himself
denied holding this belief. This view of Christ was condemned at the Council of Ephesus
in 431, and the conflict over this view led to the Nestorian schism, separating the
Assyrian Church of the East from the Byzantine Church.
Jesus, Fully Man and Fully God
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