Friday, April 29, 2022

More Mental Gymnastics from Trinitarians to Answer Mark 13:32 (cf. Matthew 24:36)

The following comes from:

 

Christiaan Kappes, "Jesus and His Allegedly Failed End Times Prophecy: The Straightforward Solution to the Supposedly Insoluble Problem of Jesus’s Parousia (Mark 13:1-37)

 

Excursus on Christology for lay readers: Here “Son of Man” (per the Hebrew) can also be translated “Son of Adam” (cf. Luke 3:8: “Son of Adam, Son of God”). To be “Son of Man” is not to be “Son of God.” Rather, Son of Man is from Adam’s seed, but Son of God is somehow directly from God in heaven. This distinction is a quick point of departure for noting (in Chalcedonian terms) that the human-seed of Adam does not know the day nor hour, but the Word of God or Son who is one with the Father does. In Chalcedonian (AD 451) terms, this is just helping our everyday reader see that it is ok to admit (as did for example St. Ephrem and St. Athanasius) that the human nature is per se limited in knowledge and even brain storage capacity. Whatever Jesus (the combo of Son of God + Son of Man into one whole item, not two separate persons) in his human brain may have metaphorically downloaded from the divine icloud connection with the Son (pre-existent Word of John 1:2-3), he was limited in his download capacity. He was infused in his human brain at certain times with what was needed for his mission. It can be interpreted in an orthodox Christology, that the human brain of Jesus need not have stored all facts about the universe (since the brain is per se limited), but that a selection of knowledge is stored in the human organ according to the Son’s purposes. For the part of the Son (Word), the divine mind in Christ always possesses all knowledge. So, Jesus as one whole possesses all knowledge but in virtue of his divine mind not in virtue of his human brain. This distinction was deemed helpful by many readers who will be familiar with Arius’s objection that Christ’s ignorance means he isn’t allegedly God. Instead, it merely means that his brain isn’t made out of infinite being, but material being that is limited like you and me and that it stores whatever makes Jesus’s human nature, albeit as perfect as possible for his divine mission and sinlessness even in his pre-resurrectional earthly existence (pp. 6-7)

 

On Mark 13:26-27 [B1] and 13:32-37 [B2]

 

B1-B2: Returning to the Bible text, note that B1 might resolve the all-knowing Jesus (the personality of the Word) with his ignorant humanity (the human nature) tension in the way that a Chalcedonian (AD 451) Christian would also do: When Jesus comes riding the clouds (like the Father himself in the Old Testament) it is clear that he knows like his Father, even in his humanity, the day and the hour. As we can suspect, after his death and resurrection, the humanity of Jesus received infused (viz., downloaded) knowledge of the second coming in all its detail. Since Mark 13 is before the resurrection, the humanity of Jesus (and therefore his human speeches and teachings) has nothing to contribute to the discussion, except to say that it is wise to watch as if it can come randomly lest the disciples become complacent. (p. 7)