--- title: "Summa Theologica, Second Half" author: "Thomas Aquinas" translator: "Fathers of the English Dominican Province" languages: [en] shelf: "Medieval" section: 285 of 935 url: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/285/ cite: "Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, Summa Theologica, Second Half, section 285. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/285/" --- # Summa Theologica, Second Half *Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province* Courage and temperance, the states of life, then Christ, the sacraments and the last things. ## 285. III · Q. 16, Art. 11: Whether this is true: 'Christ as Man is God'? Source: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/285/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/285/#p-N [¶0] Whether this is true: "Christ as Man is God"? [¶1] Objection 1: It would seem that Christ, as Man, is God. For Christ is God by the grace of union. But Christ, as Man, has the grace of union. Therefore Christ as Man is God. [¶2] Objection 2: Further, to forgive sins is proper to God, according to Is. 43:25: "I am He that blot out thy iniquities for My own sake." But Christ as Man forgives sin, according to Mat. 9:6: "But that you may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins," etc. Therefore Christ as Man is God. [¶3] Objection 3: Further, Christ is not Man in common, but is this particular Man. Now Christ, as this Man, is God, since by "this Man" we signify the eternal suppositum which is God naturally. Therefore Christ as Man is God. [¶4] On the contrary, Whatever belongs to Christ as Man belongs to every man. Now, if Christ as Man is God, it follows that every man is God---which is clearly false. [¶5] I answer that, This term "man" when placed in the reduplication may be taken in two ways. First as referring to the nature; and in this way it is not true that Christ as Man is God, because the human nature is distinct from the Divine by a difference of nature. Secondly it may be taken as referring to the suppositum; and in this way, since the suppositum of the human nature in Christ is the Person of the Son of God, to Whom it essentially belongs to be God, it is true that Christ, as Man, is God. Nevertheless because the term placed in the reduplication signifies the nature rather than the suppositum, as stated above (A 10), hence this is to be denied rather than granted: "Christ as Man is God." [¶6] Reply to Objection 1: It is not with regard to the same, that a thing moves towards, and that it is, something; for to move belongs to a thing because of its matter or subject---and to be in act belongs to it because of its form. So too it is not with regard to the same, that it belongs to Christ to be ordained to be God by the grace of union, and to be God. For the first belongs to Him in His human nature, and the second, in His Divine Nature. Hence this is true: "Christ as Man has the grace of union"; yet not this: "Christ as Man is God." [¶7] Reply to Objection 2: The Son of Man has on earth the power of forgiving sins, not by virtue of the human nature, but by virtue of the Divine Nature, in which Divine Nature resides the power of forgiving sins authoritatively; whereas in the human nature it resides instrumentally and ministerially. Hence Chrysostom expounding this passage says [*Implicitly. Hom. xxx in Matth; cf. St. Thomas, Catena Aurea on Mk. 2:10]: "He said pointedly 'on earth to forgive sins,' in order to show that by an indivisible union He united human nature to the power of the Godhead, since although He was made Man, yet He remained the Word of God." [¶8] Reply to Objection 3: When we say "this man," the demonstrative pronoun "this" attracts "man" to the suppositum; and hence "Christ as this Man, is God, is a truer proposition than Christ as Man is God." ### III · Q. 16, Art. 12: Whether this is true: 'Christ as Man is a hypostasis or person'? [¶10] Whether this is true: "Christ as Man is a hypostasis or person"? [¶11] Objection 1: It would seem that Christ as Man is a hypostasis or person. For what belongs to every man belongs to Christ as Man, since He is like other men according to Phil. 2:7: "Being made in the likeness of men." But every man is a person. Therefore Christ as Man is a person. [¶12] Objection 2: Further, Christ as Man is a substance of rational nature. But He is not a universal substance: therefore He is an individual substance. Now a person is nothing else than an individual substance of rational nature; as Boethius says (De Duab. Nat.). Therefore Christ as Man is a person. [¶13] Objection 3: Further, Christ as Man is a being of human nature, and a suppositum and a hypostasis of the same nature. But every hypostasis and suppositum and being of human nature is a person. Therefore Christ as Man is a person. [¶14] On the contrary, Christ as Man is not an eternal person. Therefore if Christ as Man is a person it would follow that in Christ there are two persons---one temporal and the other eternal, which is erroneous, as was said above (Q 2, A 6; Q 4, A 2). [¶15] I answer that, As was said (AA 10,11), the term "Man" placed in the reduplication may refer either to the suppositum or to the nature. Hence when it is said: "Christ as Man is a person," if it is taken as referring to the suppositum, it is clear that Christ as Man is a person, since the suppositum of human nature is nothing else than the Person of the Son of God. But if it be taken as referring to the nature, it may be understood in two ways. First, we may so understand it as if it belonged to human nature to be in a person, and in this way it is true, for whatever subsists in human nature is a person. Secondly it may be taken that in Christ a proper personality, caused by the principles of the human nature, is due to the human nature; and in this way Christ as Man is not a person, since the human nature does not exist of itself apart from the Divine Nature, and yet the notion of person requires this. [¶16] Reply to Objection 1: It belongs to every man to be a person, inasmuch as everything subsisting in human nature is a person. Now this is proper to the Man Christ that the Person subsisting in His human nature is not caused by the principles of the human nature, but is eternal. Hence in one way He is a person, as Man; and in another way He is not, as stated above. [¶17] Reply to Objection 2: The "individual substance," which is included in the definition of a person, implies a complete substance subsisting of itself and separate from all else; otherwise, a man's hand might be called a person, since it is an individual substance; nevertheless, because it is an individual substance existing in something else, it cannot be called a person; nor, for the same reason, can the human nature in Christ, although it may be called something individual and singular. [¶18] Reply to Objection 3: As a person signifies something complete and self-subsisting in rational nature, so a hypostasis, suppositum, and being of nature in the genus of substance, signify something that subsists of itself. Hence, as human nature is not of itself a person apart from the Person of the Son of God, so likewise it is not of itself a hypostasis or suppositum or a being of nature. Hence in the sense in which we deny that "Christ as Man is a person" we must deny all the other propositions.