Christian theism specifically to which they fail to do justice. One way in which this is the case is (as I have noted before, e.g. But it is not only generic theism to which the critics of classical theism fail to do justice. It istheism specifically to which they fail to do justice. One way in which this is the case is (as I have noted before, e.g. here ) that it is classical theism rather than its contemporary rival “theistic personalism” that best comports with the doctrine of the Trinity. But to reject classical theism also implicitly trivializes the Incarnation, and with it Christ’s Passion and Death.

person and under it the two species embodied persons and disembodied persons. Disembodied persons is, in turn, a genus relative to the species disembodied souls, angelic persons, and divine persons. And it’s in the latter class, it seems, that you’ll find God. Perhaps he is for the theistic personalist a unique instance of this kind, though how this relates to the doctrine of the Trinity is not clear. (Is God, for the Christian theistic personalist, three persons in one person? Presumably not. What, then? Are there actually three instances, though only three, of the species divine persons? No wonder Swinburne’s position on the Trinity seems to amount to Theistic personalists are, as I have said, explicitly or implicitly committed to regarding God as an instance of a kind. Their core thesis, to the effect that God is “a person without a body” (Swinburne) or that “there is such a person as God” (Plantinga), seems to give us something like the following picture: There’s the genusand under it the two speciesandis, in turn, a genus relative to the speciesand. And it’s in the latter class, it seems, that you’ll find God. Perhaps he is for the theistic personalist a unique instance of this kind, though how this relates to the doctrine of the Trinity is not clear. (Is God, for the Christian theistic personalist, three persons in one person? Presumably not. What, then? Are there actuallyinstances, though only three, of the species? No wonder Swinburne’s position on the Trinity seems to amount to a kind of polytheism . Some thoughts on Plantinga and the Trinity from Dale Tuggy here -- be sure to read the comment by Dale in the combox.)

For the theistic personalist, then, the biblical assertion that “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us” seems to amount to something like “a certain instance of a species within the genus disembodied persons acquired a body.” Now, when you think about it, that’s essentially the plot of Ghostbusters II. Not as bad as the critics took it to be, I suppose, but hardly the Greatest Story Ever Told. And it doesn’t get much better if you add that the “person without a body” in this case “exemplifies” “great-making properties” like omnipotence, omniscience, etc. What you’ve got then is at most something like a sequel that ups the ante, the Incarnation as a movie pitch:

Fade in: We meet God, a divine person who’s at the top of the game. Think Olivier in Clash of the Titans, but invisible and with something even cooler than the Kraken: we call it ‘maximal greatness.’ I think we can get Anthony Hopkins, though maybe he’ll worry about typecasting after the Thor movies. Anyway, God’s an Intelligent Designer too, like Downey, Jr. in Iron Man but with angels. We’ll show him making bacterial flagella and stuff -- CGI’s pretty good now, so it’ll look realistic. Now, here’s the twist: He takes on a human body and comes to earth! It’s The Ten Commandments meets Brother from Another Planet. We gotta go for 3D on this…

Well, we’ve seen that movie a hundred times. Horus was incarnate in the Pharaohs, Zeus changed into a swan, the Marvel Comics version of Thor took on the human guise of Donald Blake, and so on. If God were, as theistic personalism claims, “a person” and “a being” alongside all the other persons and beings that populate the world, then he would differ only in degree from these other gods. His Incarnation would be more impressive than theirs only in something like the way having the president of the United States show up at your costume party would be more impressive than having a local city alderman show up.

Now for the classical theist, God is not “a being” -- not because he lacks being but on the contrary because he is Being Itself rather than something which merely “has” or “possesses” being (in “every possible world” or otherwise). Nor is he “a person” -- not because he is impersonal but on the contrary because he is Intellect Itself rather than something which merely “exemplifies” “properties” like intellect and will. (As I have put it before, the problem with the sentence “God is a person” is not the word “person” but the word “a.”) Describing God as “a being” or “a person” trivializes the notion of God, and it thereby trivializes too the notion of God Incarnate.

For the classical theist, what the doctrine of God Incarnate entails is that that which is subsistent being itself, pure actuality, and absolutely simple or non-composite, that in which all things participate but which itself participates in nothing, that which thereby sustains all things in being -- that that “became flesh and dwelt among us.” That is a truly astounding claim, so astounding that its critics often accuse it of incoherence. The accusation is false, but those who make it at least show that they understand just how extremely strange and remarkable the claim is -- and how radically unlike the “incarnations” of the various pagan deities it is. You can plausibly assimilate the incarnation of the “God” of theistic personalism to those of Horus, Zeus, et al. You cannot so assimilate the Incarnation of the God of classical theism. It is sui generis.

For this reason it is superficial in the extreme to think that the story of Christ’s Passion, Death, and Resurrection bears any interesting relationship to the various dying-and-rising deities of pagan mythology. The story of Christ is as different from theirs as classical theism is from belief in one of the various pagan pantheons. Hence, to think that calling attention to these myths is an embarrassment to Christianity is as frivolous and point-missing as the “one god further” objection to theism in general is.

And yet he became one of us anyway. It is because of this -- because Christ is so radically unlike us in his divine nature, so “Wholly Other” -- that his having become so much like us in his human nature is so incomparably profound and moving. We will not understand the Incarnation, and we will not understand the divine love for human beings that it evinces, if we conceive of that divine nature in anthropomorphic terms. Is God’s love for us like the self-sacrificing love of a father for his children or the love between brethren or friends? Indeed it is -- except insofar as it is incomparably greater, incomparably more self-sacrificial, than those merely human sorts of love. Thus do we see yet again how crucial classical theism is to a sound Christian apologetics. But its significance is no less crucial for Christian spirituality. The “God” of theistic personalism was already “one of us” -- an instance of our genus if not of our species -- before he took on flesh. The God of classical theism most definitely was not. Indeed, unlike the “God” of theistic personalism, the God of classical theism, the only God worthy of the name, is immeasurably different from any creature -- “Wholly Other,” in the apt phrase popularized by Rudolf Otto . It is because of this -- because Christ is sous in hisnature, so “Wholly Other” -- that his having become so muchus in hisnature is so incomparably profound and moving. We will not understand the Incarnation, and we will not understand the divinefor human beings that it evinces, if we conceive of that divine nature in anthropomorphic terms. Is God’s love for us like the self-sacrificing love of a father for his children or the love between brethren or friends? Indeed it is -- except insofar as it is incomparably, incomparablyself-sacrificial, than those merely human sorts of love.

Nor does even the thought of God’s having become man -- mind-boggling enough as that thought is when properly understood -- entirely capture the depths of that love. For the second Person of the Trinity did not take on the body of an Adonis, or of an emperor. He was a carpenter in a backwater province of the empire, having “no form nor comeliness… no beauty that we should desire him,” who suffered and died as other human beings suffer and die. He not only lived as a man, but lived as most men have to live, with all their weaknesses and defects, albeit without sin. As Aquinas writes, he did so in part precisely to make it evident that he really was God become man:

It was fitting for the body assumed by the Son of God to be subject to human infirmities and defects… in order to cause belief in Incarnation. For since human nature is known to men only as it is subject to these defects, if the Son of God had assumed human nature without these defects, He would not have seemed to be true man, nor to have true, but imaginary, flesh, as the Manicheans held. And so, as is said, Philippians 2:7: "He… emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man." Hence, Thomas, by the sight of His wounds, was recalled to the faith… Summa theologiae III.14.1)

Our Idea of God, Thomas Morris notes how, according to some philosophical theists, God is too grand even to know about the humbler parts of reality: In his book, Thomas Morris notes how, according to some philosophical theists, God is too grand even toabout the humbler parts of reality:

There is one ancient view according to which it would seem beneath the dignity of a perfect being to even bother to attend to certain details in the world. On this conception, it would be inappropriate for a being of God’s exalted status to acquaint himself intimately with dirt, hair, mud and filth, to cite only a few standard examples… [T]he fastidious deity of Plato’s Timaeus… must have lesser gods interposed between himself and the squalor of this world as buffers to guard his eminence from any taint of cognitive pollution. (pp. 85-86)

Now classical theism, when worked out consistently, in fact should lead us to reject such a view. For classical theism entails that nothing -- most certainly including dirt, hair, mud and filth -- could continue in being even for an instant if God were not sustaining it. He can hardly be said not to know about these things, then. But the doctrine of the Incarnation goes far beyond that. It asserts that God not only knows about “dirt, hair, mud and filth,” but out of love for us took on human flesh -- with its hair, and with its susceptibility to getting dirty, muddy, filthy.

Nor does even that entirely capture the depths of his love. For Christ did not take on human flesh only to get rid of it as soon as he could; nor did he even restore that flesh to perfect integrity as soon as he could. He retains the flesh with its wounds perpetually. As Aquinas writes (quoting Bede), among the reasons for this are:

"that He may convince those redeemed in His blood, how mercifully they have been helped, as He exposes before them the traces of the same death" (Bede, on Luke 24:40). Summa theologiae III.54.4)

He who is Being Itself, pure actuality, and divine simplicity -- has, now as on the Cross, holes in his hands, holes in his feet, a gash in his side. With these wounds, Christ says to us: I am one of you, now and always. They are a valentine to the human race, given to us on Good Friday, on Easter, and forever.