CHRIST IS GOD BECAUSE “SON OF GOD”
Justin’s application of “Θεος” to Christ shows plainly that
he bases Christ’s Deity essentially upon His Divine Sonship. But the hypothesis
of a God “in the second rank” or place is not in harmony with Old Testament
teaching, however, much support the Apologist may find for it by means of
allegory; indeed, it creates serious difficulties for Monotheism. For between
the Ingenerate God and His Logos, “in the second place” and derived from Him
(both considered as Persons), there must necessarily exist the difference
between absolute and relative, infinite and finite, which is immeasurable.
Monotheism cannot tolerate two Gods both equally Divine in all senses; and if,
on the one hand, the Second God be less Divine than the First, He is not
equally God in the full sense. These difficulties, admittedly, are immense.
Unable to overcome them actually, the Apologist attempts to circumvent them.
Making good use of his allegorical interpretations of Scripture and his
philosophical knowledge, he endeavours to render conceivable the actual
Divinity of the Logos or Secondary God, (a) by suggesting a moral
harmony between Father and Son amounting even to identity of will; and (b)
by reasoning from the fact that a “Son,” qua Son, has the same nature as his
Father, but is personally subordinate to Him as to seniority; or,
alternatively, arguing upon scientific lines that Rational Speech or Logos is
identical in essence with the reasoning Mind, but, being its Offspring, is
consequently subject thereof. Therefore, Christ the Son and Logos has the same
nature or essence as the Father, yet notwithstanding, is also subordinate “ministering
to the will of the Maker of all things,” being subject to Him on account of generation.
(V. A. Spence Little, The Christology of the Apologists [London:
Duckworth, 1934], 163-64)
