CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 9
Aesthetics: participation in beauty Irenaeus' demand for truth and reason is joined by his sense of perception. He is visually oriented (homme du 'voir').' From the beginning we have found in Irenaeus the two criteria of truth and fitness, the logical and the aesthetic. Participation in truth, through the rule, ended in consonantia, a harmony at once logical and aesthetic, while the truth of scripture was governed by a rebirth of images. In this chapter we shall review the persistence of the aesthetic criterion, then note how a modern theologian used Irenaeus to support his claim that theology should be aesthetic rather than logical. Early Christian art echoes the imagery of Irenaeus. The manifestation of God enables participation in divine beauty. The vision of divine glory brings participation in life. g-1
PERSISTENCE OF AESTHETICS
A rapid recall of earlier chapters indicates the persistence of perception in the thought of Irenaeus. When he speaks of his youth and Polycarp, he explains how visual and aural memories persist in the mind. He can go back to encounters with Polycarp with a clear recollection of where the master was teaching, how he spoke, and what he said. The freshness of the image underlines his power of perception." On the other hand, Irenaeus' objection to gnosis is linked, from the beginning, to the need for vision and light. Despite
' Tremblay, Manifestation et la vision, 19.
2 Eusebius, H.E. 3.20.4. The same priority of mental images is found in the account of the Gospels given by Erasmus, who claims that so vivid is the picture of Christ in the text that 'you would see him less clearly' if he were present to the eyes: "Denique totum ita praesentem reddunt, ut minus visurus sis si coram oculis conspicias', Erasmus, /Vovwm
Testamentum, Praefatio, Paraclesis, Opera Omnia, V1 (Lugduni Batavorum, 1705).
LOS
Participation the visionary qualities of Valentinus, his followers love the darkness and wish to remain unseen. Irenaeus is concerned to spread light and to uncover what is hidden.
Irenaeus' account of God as cosmic Intellect (nous) stresses the perception of God. God is pure mind and consciousness (sensus, sensuabilitas). He is all eye, all light, all hearing, so that nothing is excluded from his perception. Creation is the work of God the wise architect. Everything has its distinctive place. As from the lyre different notes produce an unbroken melody, so in the variety of creation we listen to the melody, discern differences and admire the one artist who has produced the whole (2.25.2). Those who look down on the creator need to prove their superiority: they have produced nothing which can compare with the heavens, earth, stars, rains, frosts and snows, all in their special place. 'They have not ordered the variety of the innumerable parts of creation or tempered the oppositions of light and darkness, heat and cold, to form rivers, fountains, flowers, trees and the variety of animals "all adorned with beauty' (2.30.3).
The intricacy of saving history reflects the plan of the divine architect to bring man to see his glory. The themes of the economy include the glory of creation and incarnation (4.20.7), the vision and knowledge of God (4.20.6), and the image and likeness which is perfected in man by the spirit. God works continually in time, speaking to his people and enlarging their vision.
Recapitulation unites a vast range of images in its correction and restoration of fallen humanity. The details of the first Adam are fulfilled in the perceived actions of the second Adam. Every event of the life of Jesus points beyond itself to a pattern of opposites and a fresh perception of God. He who hungered and thirsted was son of David and lord of David. He was from Abraham yet before Abraham. He was servant of God and also lord of the universe.
He who was spat upon breathed holy spirit into his disciples. In his sadness he gave joy. Handled and touched, he passed through the midst of enemies and through closed doors. He whom the manger contained now fills all things (Irenaeus, frag. 52).
'The new creation inaugurated by Christ raises his faithful people to heavenly places. While he was born in human fashion so that he might renew all mankind, the glory of the father is in the son and in
Aesthetics
this glory men may participate. The structure of his church spreads through the world as it offers a pure sacrifice with one soul and one heart. 'The final stage of his salvation on earth will be exuberant.
The tradition of truth is not abstract but visible in the church and the succession of the apostles. Secret tradition is suspect because it cannot be observed. The rule of faith guards against the folly of Gnostic myth and all truth is joined in concord (consonantia). The test of coherence is both aesthetic and logical. The bible is a work of typology, allegory and history to be interpreted by what is fitting
(to prepon). The four Gospels, with their different symbols, express visible distinctions.3 g2
A THEOLOGICAL AESTHETIC?
No one has argued more vigorously for aesthetic theology than has von Balthasar; he bases his case on Irenaeus as the first great
Christian theologian' and illuminates the poetic and aesthetic elements in Irenaeus. Gnosticism, says von Balthasar, had presented a challenge through its myth, which later inspired poets like Shelley and Blake. The poetic response of Irenaeus proposed a fresh vision of the divine mystery and salvation history.
Vision grasps divine manifestation. Anyone who wishes can see the truth, for God never refuses his light. The prophets did not see God's face directly, but saw saving decrees and mysteries which were to give man a vision of God (4.20.10). From his own resources man cannot see God, but God chooses to make himself visible at a particular time (4.20). By his insistence on manifestation or display
Irenaeus argued for the clarity of divine activity. Secret tradition must be public and the whole truth must be declared.
The idea of recapitulation is neither a piece of rhetoric nor a pretty picture, but a speculative achievement which is at the same time vibrant and poetic.5 This central mystery both perfects and begins a new exposition where each part of creation is integrated
3 See above, 8.4.
4 H. U. von Balthasar, The glory of the lord: a theological aesthetics (Edinburgh, 1984), 31, ET of Herrlichkeit, vol. 11.
5 [bid., 50. This claim, already established in chapters 5 and 6 above, shows the soundness of von Balthasar's achievement.
Participation and renewed so that man might share the image and likeness of God. Both image and likeness point to an assimilation to God which transforms through divine presence the man who both carries and embraces the son of God (5.16.2).
What is it that God has manifested? First there is his own divine fullness, second is his relation to his creation, and third is the pattern of time and eternity. As rational spirit he is the source of all beauty, joining heaven and humanity. The centre of the universe is a humanity shaped by God and receptive of God's breath or spirit
(5.6.1). The flesh shares in the artistic wisdom and power of the God who produces perfection from the weakness of his creature
(5.3.3). The miracle of the human body enlivened by the soul is the clearest evidence of the hand of God — 'the flesh is devised to be receptive and to be able to contain the power of God, since in the beginning it received the art of God' (5.3.2). The eye gave sight, the ear gave hearing, the hand provided sensation, while arteries and veins produced the circulation of the blood, and nerves held the different limbs together. 'It is certainly impossible to describe the whole masterly structure of elements which constitute man; this did not come into being without greatness and wisdom. But vars shares in the art and wisdom of God also shares in his power.'
(5.3.2). Both body and soul grow in the image and likeness of God.
The noble work of art which is man must be be to follow the gentle persuasion of God (4.37.1—4). The flesh is united with the spirit in the incarnate son of God so that flesh might be saved (5.14.2—4).
The whole of creation is marked with the sign of the cross (dem. 3.4) because the essence of the mystery (3.12.9; dem. 25) is that the light of the father reaches us through the suffering flesh of Christ (4.20.2).
In all these details, von Balthasar discerns the artistic genius of Irenaeus, for whom proportion, order and beauty are to be found throughout the bible. The beauty of the bible and of the cosmos can only be seen through the mystery of recapitulation in Christ.
The demand that the created image should resemble the divine artist is the governing principle that orders the world. God must be allowed 'to draw out of himself the beautiful form of created things and the devising of the beautiful ordering of the world'
(2.7.5). God can raise children of Abraham out of stones and his art
Aesthetics
never slackens.° God creates all things by his artistic logos (dem. 38; dem. 60). All is created in proportion and measure and nothing is without number (4.4.2). The design for creation comes from God's own power and from himself (2.16.1). The world of forms and numbers is not needed to give order to the world: we ourselves declare the harmony of created nature because in their relation to us, things are suitable, because their own rhythm is appropriate to the general rhythm for which they were created (2.15.3).
The Pythagorean heavenly and earthly numbers are unnecessary interpolations (2.14.6) for God has himself numbered the hairs of our head and given everything its own pattern of action, order, number and quantity, showing all the time his skill and intelligence in matching things together (2.26.2,3). God has brought all existing things into harmony. They are well proportioned, fitting and harmonious (4.38.3). The artist is the key to creation, just as the one harmonious melody is more important than the differences between notes (2.25.2). Scripture follows the pattern of the universe for its harmony is evident when we follow the rule of faith. Parables and plain speech fit together and interpret one another to produce from many words one harmonious melody (2.28.3).
The glory of man is to receive God's art and to become his perfect work in patient submission (4.20.2; 4.14.1). God's glory is the man who lives by the vision of God (4.20.7). Participation in God's glory comes through increasing love, devotion and gratitude (3.20.2) in those who stand before the face of the father (4.13.3). The glory which is found in the presence of God is marked by beauty in those who have struggled to attain it (4.37.6,7) and this glory is the proof of God's power in the presence of grateful, abiding and submissive love (3.20.2). Even the world is capable of receiving the glory of the father as it follows the divine decree and fulfils to perfection the work God has given (dem. 10).
God's artistry is shown, not in transcendent forms, but in the pattern of time where every point depends on him and looks to his glory. From the beginning, the son with the father made known prophetic visions in logical sequence and harmonious arrangement. Regular succession (consequentia) governs the timely
6 Thid., 71.
Participation dispensations of salvation (4.20.7). The art of God is not in vain because the times and their fulfilment are appointed by his pleasure
(3.23.1). His order and symmetry guide man towards his image and likeness (4.38.3). From the order of God's plan comes the mild peace of his kingdom (4.20.10) in which persuasion, not force, guides the hearts of men. The growth of man towards God is governed by the ideas of childhood, testing and habituation: the infant Adam rises to maturity (dem. 12), engages in a contest which ends in fellowship with God, and is made accustomed to God throughout his long pilgrimage. At the same time God is made accustomed to man and declares his goodness at every stage (3.20.1). God is not reluctant to share his goodness and guides his creature in a way which is everywhere harmonious.
God's artistry is supremely evident in the relation between the old and the new covenants. There 1s nothing out of order as God acts at each appropriate time (3.16.7). The different seasons (Kazroz ) reveal the rich multiplicity of one God who does all things in appropriate form, expression and communication. He is one God but rich in his gifts (3.16.7).
The artistry and harmony of the two covenants spring from the fact that despite their difference (3.1271 2) they come from one
God whose various acts of grace lead mankind to life incorruptible (4.9.3-4.11.1). The trinity was active from the beginning and there is no limit to the work of the divine artist. Before Abraham, God made his covenant with the whole world through Noah, pledging himself to all animals and men (dem. 22). In Abraham, God gave his word so that 'Abraham followed in generous faith, freely and without ties and so became the friend of God' (4.13.4). This natural law of freedom was given to the wandering Abraham through God's mercy (dem. 24).
The perfection of God's work from the beginning provokes the question: what could be new? Christ brought all novelty in himself when he fulfilled what had been foretold. Irenaeus answers this question with the fulfilment of Christ who brought renewal of all things by his own perfection (4.34.1).' God's temporal artistry in the divine economy conveys a mystery because on the one hand
7 omnem novitatem attulit, seipsum afferens qui fuerat annuntiatus.
Aesthetics
it is progress and growth (4.4.13 4.9.3; 5.12.4), while on the other hand it is a return to childhood (dem. 46, 96) because God's word has become a child like us (coinfantiatum) (4.38.2).°
The church is governed by a tradition and order which gives it the same form throughout the world (5.20.1). In its beauty the faith is preserved forever young and fresh (3.24.1). The members of the church gain incorruption from baptism (3.17.2) and are fed in the eucharist with heavenly food (4.17.5). Yet the perfection of the church is eschatological and the pilgrim people finds fulfilment in heaven. Indeed the whole order of salvation on earth copies a heavenly original and the one God brings the image to the likeness of spiritual perfection (4.19.1). Both the tent of the covenant and the visions of the prophets pointed to heavenly things to come
(dem. 26).
9-3
ART AND AESTHETICS IN EARLY CHRISTIANITY
The richness of imagery in Irenaeus invites attention to early Christian art and aesthetics. Early Christian art moves from images which were common to pagan art, such as the good shepherd, the philosopher and the praying figure, to the miracles of Christ as they manifest his glory and to biblical subjects which depict the triumphs of faith in saving history. As these are reflected in liturgy, so the figures appear in Christian art: Enoch, Eljah,
Noah, Abraham, Job, Isaac, Lot, Moses, Daniel, the three Hebrews and Susanna.
This art declares a simple message as the Christian addresses his lord:
You have come to us. You have been wonderfully present in our history.
We wish to represent your presence in this picture. We have received these signs as constituting our history and our destiny. 'They are not a mere spectacle, they are our life and our truth. These things belong to the past, it is true. But you are lord of all time including our time. All that you have done is eternally present. The history of salvation is also a 8 Novalis speaks of the man who has moved from childhood to manhood and back to childhood, the 'true synthetic child', as the ideal, much cleverer and wiser than an adult and at the same time ironic and playful. He links this with the movement of the true
Machen which must be prophetic. The teller of tales is prophet of the future. All of which is reminiscent of parts of Irenaeus; Novalis, Schriften, vol. m, ed. R. Samuel, H. J. Mahl and G. Schulz (Stuttgart, 1983), 281.
Partwipation revelation. By this picture we must present it. Daniel and Jonah are not strangers to us. They are our brothers, our contemporaries in the faith.
They form the cloud of witnesses which surrounds us with your grace.9
The earliest Christian art finds its beauty in such proclamation, not in classical excellence of form. It follows the popular tradition of Roman art which is best seen in the column at Adanklissi, the site of the Dacian campaign, in contrast with the classical beauty of Trajan's column, although both-are concerned with the same subject. The first signs of classical influence on Christian art appear in the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (AD 350), which is clearly more refined than the arch of Constantine (312). The classical beauty of Christian art develops in the latter part of the fourth century. Earlier Christians had found the unembellished events of the bible to be the revelation of divine glory. It was enough to tell the story.
The bible gave a limited account of beauty. The Greek environment joined beauty and goodness, but in the old testament goodness covered a much wider range of meanings to culminate in a conformity with the will of God. In the new testament, moreover, there is reference to beauty which is transcendent and eschatological (Rev.
21:11). This is the transcendence of divine glory and points back to the glory of God in the old testament; mystery surrounds this glory, but the work of God points to its creator. All this is clearly declared in the Greek books of the old testament. Wisdom 13:5 contemplates the creator through the beauty of his creatures.
Sirach 43:9-11 indicates how the beauty of heaven, the stars and the rainbow leads man in wonder to God. There is a note of distrust in Wisdom 13:7 and Wisdom 13:3, for the beauty of the stars can lead to idolatry. This distrust will persist in Jewish and Christian tradition.
In the Synoptic Gospels the glory of God is seen in the transfiguration, the nativity stories, the entry to Jerusalem and the walk to Emmaus. 'The Fourth Gospel elevates divine glory to a central theme and the prayer of chapter 17 displays the ultimate glory in which the believer may participate. Paul has one striking reference in 2 Corinthians 3 where the transfiguration of Moses is
9 P. Prigent, Jmmagini Cristiane, immagini sacre, in arte e teologia (Turin, 1997), 70.
Aesthetics
reflected in the transfiguration of the believers. At all these points there is an attempt to declare, in language, the transcendent beauty of God."° The visions of the apocalypse provide material for a theology of image or picture. They point to a reality which is higher than the earth. The revelation of this transcendent world is indicated by images which can only be approximate. Their meaning finds explanation in the hymns of the Apocalypse. These require that we consider the pictures as revelations which, so far from being remote, enable us to discover where we now are in the sight and according to the will of God. The approximate nature of the visions is evident in a common introduction: 'I saw as', 'which appeared', 'like to'.
No image is able by itself to express its meaning. The Messiah is described as a lamb 'as it had been slain'. This ambiguity means that the visions are meant not to represent but to signify. Their meaning is an object of revelation. They speak through their symbolic force.
All of which means that the most skilful visual representations of the visions of the Apocalypse fall far short of their meaning and power.
The hymns indicate a link between image and cult and point to the presence of a reality. The images of the Apocalypse reveal a glory which is accessible only to the eyes of faith, the glory of a God who rules over the world."
A fuller theology of the image can be gained from Irenaeus who supplements the concept of the word with the concept of vision. The frequency of the words 'see', 'vision', 'visible', 'invisible',
'show', 'manifestation' and 'light' (video, visto, vistbilis, invisibilis, ostendo, ostensio, lumen) is striking. Moreover Irenaeus punctuates his writings with appeals to vision — "You see' (1.9.1); "See! (1.14.3).
The appeal to vision is a principle of method, a way of argument.
In order to refute heresy one must first see it and recognise it; for heresy is like a savage animal hidden in a thicket. Irenaeus brings it into the open so that it may be seen and attacked. Indeed mere ostensio or manifestation is enough to show how irrational Gnostic teaching is. The manifestation is followed by projecting the light of 10 P Prigent, 'Bible et beauté, Esthétique de l'éthique, De la morale comme art d'aimer', in Supplement, Revue d'éthique et de théologie morale 181 (1992), 129-44.
'' P Prigent, 'Pour une théologie de l'image: les visions de l' Apocalypse', RHPAR 59 (1979),
373-8.
Partucipation scripture so that nothing is hidden and the heretic can only persist in his error because he is blind.
Vision governs the theology of redemption because life comes through the sight of God. Salvation consists in seeing God. God's glory is a living man and what makes man alive is the vision of God. Perception of God, however, presents a problem. How does
Irenaeus handle the insistence of the bible on two different things: the pure in heart will see God (Matt. 5:8) and no one can see God and live (Exod. 33:20)? Irenaeus makes a distinction between the greatness of God and his love. Man cannot contemplate the exalted grandeur of God; but God's love makes God known at all times through Jesus Christ (4.20.4 and 4.20.1).
To reach the vision of God, the plan of salvation brings man from anticipation in the old testament to the visible divinity of Christ.
God is seen by the spirit prophetically, by the son through adoption and he will be seen as the father in the kingdom of heaven. Degrees of participation in the divine splendour are degrees of participation in the divine vision and life.
From the many stages of the divine economy the climax is reached_in the coming of the son. He is the father in visible form just as the father is the son in invisible form (4.6.5, 6). At present the believer finds in the scripture, which is inspired by the spirit, the possibility of seeing God. Also the eucharist presents the shape of heavenly things (4.19.1). Through these means the Christian is accustomed to see God in a vision which then expands until in the kingdom of heaven he sees God face to face.
In these and other ways the vision of God is integral to human salvation and represents the final goal of Christian revelation. Life eternal comes only through the vision of God.'?
9-4
MANIFESTATION, VISION AND PARTICIPATION
'Two themes dominate the aesthetic of Irenaeus: manifestation and vision (manifestatio/ostensio and visio). 'They contrast with Gnosticism, where all is concealed and secret. This concealment demands disclosure to be followed by exposition. The themes which '* A. Benoit, 'Pour une théologie de image: remarques sur le théme de la vision chez Irénée de Lyon', RHPhR 59 (1979), 379-84.
Aesthetics
Irenaeus follows are both biblical and Greek, both visual and rational. Perception and vision mean everything to him."
As a ruthless empiricist, he constantly appeals to evidence and demands respect for facts.'* His repeated objection to the Gnostics is that they are wilfully blind and turn from the light of the gospel
(2.27.2). He presents visible manifestation as a contrast; all, who have reached the smallest particle of truth can see who Christ is and what has been declared of him (3.19.2). The evidence of facts must be accepted without argument, whether these facts are proclaimed by scripture or observed in the world.'5
In this light there is vision, disclosure, refutation and demonstration. The disclosure denounces both obscurity and error, together with those who deceive through this error. Their error once hidden is destroyed when it is brought to light and shown to be vacuous; their folly produces flagrant contradiction (2.12.3). On the other hand true doctrine is coherent: for example, a true incarnation is declared by eucharistic communion (5.2.2; 4.18.5). To see the truth of Christian proclamation we look at the clear, unambiguous words of scripture (3.11.8; 5.36.3), which offer the unique message of the church as something to be seen (5.20.1). The unity of this message is in contrast with the unending divisions of the heretics.
No one has seen more clearly than Irenaeus a marvellous unity in the divine economy.'° His ideas were taken up again in the nineteenth century when Hegelian influence drew attention to the history of salvation.'" The unity of the history of salvation derives from its one author who is the one God (4.2.1~7), and is expressed through the twofold formula of father/son and word/wordincarnate.'®
What is the manner of the manifestation of God? It declares the invisible God. For the Gnostics the supreme father is both incomprehensible and invisible (1.1.1). Irenaeus does not deny that the father is invisible and that no one can survive the sight of his glory (4.20.5). Yet according to his love, his goodness and almighty
'3 Tremblay, Manifestation et la vision, 19.
4 Thid., 21.
'5 Tbid., 24.
6 ©, Cullmann, Christus und Die Zeit (Zurich, 1946), 48.
"7 See above, 4.1.
'8 Tremblay, Manifestation et la vision, 41-5.
Participation power, God grants to those who love him the privilege to see him.
So those who have pure hearts are blessed (4.20.5). This constant refrain of love's accessibility to God sets the divine vision within the communion of the believer and the father. Because the love is immense, immeasurable, aesthetics must take over from logic, and lead on to prayer.
Where God has been manifest, man has seen his glory, for the sight of God comes to those who.love him. By Christ they are adopted and are able to carry ( portare) and to lay hold of (capere) the son of God whom they embrace (complectz) (3.16.3).
What emerges from Irenaeus' account of adoption is that the vision of God is intimately spiritual, a mystical communion, a participation in the mystery of sonship. The vision of God granted to Simeon, the shepherds and the wise men has this inner perception of the son (3.16.3, 4; 3.20.2).
A whole mass of terminology points to perception. ~ There is no life without participation in God and no participation without a vision of God and the enjoyment of his goodness
(4. 20.5). The patriarchs saw God in the sense that they participated in him and prefigured a future indwelling ; and union. In Christ, this participation becomes a sharing in the divine sonship (4.14.1), and in the eschatological kingdom a still greater vision will come to those who lay hold of God (4.37.7). This final vision shares in the glory of God, as light can only be seen by those who are within light (4.20.5). The spirit, offspring of the father, joins man to God
(4.7.4); for without the spirit no one can see the son of God and without the son no one can approach the father (dem. 7). Already we share joy through the spirit, who brings us to God whom we shall see finally face to face (5.7.2-5.8.1). The spirit is the pledge or earnest of our inheritance (Eph. 1:13~14) living within us and enabling us to address God as father (Rom. 8:15).
To conclude, the vision of God in Irenaeus, for all its unqualified vigour, is integrated with entry into the mystery of God. God is seen directly in his son who is the face of the father. The incarnation is ultimate and concrete. God will be seen by those who are adopted in Christ, whom they seize, carry and embrace. Irenaeus' passion
"9 Thid., 138-9.
Aesthetics
for the vision of God is not, as some have suggested, an alternative to conceptual thought: Irenaeus insists that both the truth and beauty, the logic and aesthetics of the Christian revelation can only be discovered through prolonged awareness of the saving presence of God in Christ.
9.5.1
GLORY "The glory of God is a living man and the life of man is the vision of God' (4.20.7). This much-quoted aphorism can best be understood within the context of wider argument. The argument of Book 4 which precedes chapter 20 includes two points.
(i) The wholeness of creation. Irenaeus begins by a defence of the creator against the blasphemy of the Gnostics. They will not allow the salvation of the flesh, yet this flesh is made by God and sustained by him (4 pref.). In rejecting creation they reject the totality of God's dispensation in Christ, in creation and the economy of salvation (4.1). From creation to redemption there can be no break in the work of God (4.5). So Justin had claimed that if the only
God were denied, he would not believe his source: if the lord himself had spoken of another God beside the creator and sustainer,
Justin would have found his lord incredible. From this one God came the only son of God to sum up in himself his own handiwork (4.6.2). The word could be seen and touched. Announced by law and prophets, he proclaimed himself and the father to all
(4.6.6).
(ii) The wholeness of time. Abraham rejoiced to see the day of Christ, as did his descendant Simeon who saw the salvation which God had prepared before the facé of all people. 'The promised light had given revelation to the Gentiles and glory to the people of Israel
(4.7.1). The vision of God expands, not because he changes, but as we love him more. We know in part but we shall see him face to face, and in that perfection of trust and love we shall not see another
Christ, but only him who was born of Mary and who suffered for us (4.9.2). From one God comes ever greater grace, in many gifts
(4.9.3). The love which fulfils the law and which alone makes man perfect never ends. The more we behold him the more we love him
(4.12.2).
Partwipation In chapter 20 Irenaeus brings together the wholeness of creation and the wholeness of time. All begins from the creation where
God makes man after his image and likeness (4.20.1). The word becomes flesh that all things on earth might behold their king.
From his glorious flesh, we reach immortality and are clothed with the light of the father (4.20.2). God joins those who now know him with their beginning in himself (4.20.4). The glory of God passes to those who from his love behold him and find life through the vision which joins them with the prophets (4.20.5, 6). Within the wholeness of time and the wholeness of creation, God's glory is a living man, and man's life is the vision of God. The life which the word gives is joined with the life which God bestows on all creation
(4.20.7).
The word told Moses to stand on the ridge of the rock and to see his rear part but not his face. When he finally came as man,
Moses was able to see him on the mount.of transfiguration (4.20.9).
In the wholeness of time the prophets and Moses saw the likeness of the glory of the lord in many forms and in many dispensations
(4.20.11).?° Daniel saw him as son of God, a crashing rock, and son of man. The revelation to John was so powerful that he fell to the earth as though dead; for no one looks upon God and lives. But the word renewed him to life and reminded him that he had leant on his bosom at supper. So he was able to endure the visions of the lamb and the white horse, of the king of kings and the lord of lords.
These were forms of the dispensations of the father, given as visions to show what was to come (4.20.11). What was said and done by the prophets is fulfilled in the church. The scarlet sign of Rahab, which pointed to the redemption of the people from captivity, returns in Christ (4.20.12).
After chapter 20, Book 4 continues to speak of the unity of faith in patriarchs and in believers who look towards the inheritance of the kingdom which they now behold through faith. In all his dispensations God does nothing which does not point as a sign to the final reality.
The wholeness of time is ensured by the glory of God, when the word made flesh descends into the lower parts of the earth so that ulpote dives et multus exsistens, non in una figura neque in uno charactere videbatur videntibus eum, sed secundum dispensationum ews causas sive efficaciam (4.20.11).
Aesthetics
he might see the state of those who rested from their work and that they might see him and learn of his salvation (4.22.1). For he did not come simply for those who believed in him during his earthly life, nor did the providence of God cover those only who have lived since that time. For all who from the beginning have feared and loved
God, who have lived in justice and piety with their neighbours, and who have longed to see Christ and to hear his voice, for all of these, at his second coming he shall speak to rouse them from their sleep so that they might take a place in his kingdom (4.22.2). Thus the scripture displays the wonderful dispensations which have preserved our faith in the one God who made us and have ever increased our love for the son of God who fulfilled the different dispensations of divine glory (4.26.5). The prophets remain secure, for they saw his glory at the right hand of the father and saw him coming on the clouds of heaven. They spoke of his pierced side on which men would gaze
(4.33.11), of the fire which would burn up the chaff, of his beauty as he rode forth fairer than the children of men with his sword on his thigh. The splendour of his kingdom ensured that those who hear would desire that kingdom (4.33.11). He is the wonderful counsellor and mighty God foretold by Isaiah, the lord who speaks from Sion and the God who comes from the south, from Mount Pharan covered with leaves. At his coming the lame shall leap, the dumb shall speak, and the eyes of the blind be opened. 'The weak hands and the feeble knees will be strengthened and the dead in the grave will arise in the presence of him who takes our weaknesses and our sorrows upon himself. Throughout the wholeness of creation and the wholeness of time the glory of God brings life and salvation.
9-5-2
CRITICISM AND DIFFICULTIES
The striking formulae of Irenaeus may easily distract attention from the problems which emerge in his account of the glory of God. What are the strengths and weaknesses?
First, we may note the strength of his position.*' Already in Book 2 Irenaeus has set the contrast between the transcendence of God and his providence. God cannot be known because of his
21 F. Lanne, 'La vision de Dieu dans l'oeuvre de Saint Irénée', Jrén 33 (1960), 311-20.
Participation transcendence but he cannot be ignored because of his providence.
No one can escape the awareness of his overruling power (2.6.1—3).
In Book 4 the notion of providence is replaced by that of love.
Meanwhile in Book 3 Irenaeus begins from Christ as the supreme source of knowledge of the father (3.11.5, 6) and goes on to speak of God as the glory of man and man as the receptacle of his wisdom and virtue (3.20.2). The incarnation enables man to see God and to lay hold of him. The word of God has lived in a man to accustom man to receive God and God to dwell in man.
Irenaeus follows on from this thought in his extended account in 4.20. The purpose of the incarnation is that all creation should see its king and that in the splendid flesh of the lord it should find and receive the light of the father and incorrupubility (4.20.2). The incarnation is the mixture and communion of God and man so that man may participate in God by seeing him and enjoying his goodness. 'This participation follows a progressive manifestation of the glories of the father at different times and to different people.
The transfiguration on Mount Tabor is the climax where God is seen by.Moses, Elijah and the disciples. 'The end of time has come through the incarnation and it is now possible for Moses to speak to God face to face.
What are the problems with this theology? First, is there a problem in Irenaeus' use of the negative attributes of God which were common to Valentinians? No: this kind of transcendence was attributed to God by philosophers and others who had little in common with Gnosticism. Secondly, is the primacy of the flesh of Christ consistent with divine transcendence? The light of God which is slowly revealed finds its perfection in the flesh of Christ, yet the glory of God is inaccessible (4.20.5). This difficulty can be resolved by the idea of progress which accustoms man to see God. The prophets have glimpsed his glories at different stages of the divine economy. Between the adoptive vision, which his children now enjoy, and the eternal vision of the kingdom there is a special point in the transfiguration where the king is seen and the promise to Moses is fulfilled. There is an anticipation here of the final vision of divine glory promised to men.
Aesthetics
9-6
THE LIMITS OF BEAUTY
Aesthetics as perception 'pure vision, abstracted from necessity'?? is everywhere in Irenaeus. This second criterion beside that of logic guides his thought. The term 'aesthetics' was coined by Baumgarten,'3 where he argued that the kind of knowledge which came from sense experience and feeling should be distinguished from the abstract knowledge of logic and reason. This difference could be joined to the distinction between aesthetic, logical, moral and religious values which in Irenaeus, as in subsequent Western tradition, are often difficult to separate. When they are confused, the Orthodox speak of the sin of aestheticism and iconoclasts destroy beauty in the name of God.
While aesthetics as perception and what is fitting are important for Irenaeus, the perceived glory of God is not only beautiful; it is also the source of truth, goodness and reality. Above all it is an object of religious faith. The subjection of all these elements to beauty, as found in the Romantic movement, finds no support in Irenaeus. While sharing a room in the Tiibingen Stift, Holderlin,
Hegel and Schelling, a youthful and redoubtable trio, produced the Systemprogramm, which, by merging ethics, physics, religion and politics under aesthetics, could redeem the world. 'Iam now convinced that the supreme act of reason, in which all ideas are embraced, is aesthetic, and that truth and goodness are joined together only in beauty.'?4
Irenaeus finds God through reason and aesthetics just as Plato finds his first principle through the argument of the Republic and the aesthetics of the Symposium. There the similarity ends, for Irenaeus moves in two other directions. First, finality is found not merely in the first principle of truth, beauty, goodness and reality, but in 22 R. Fry, Vision and design (London, 1920), 25.
23 Meditationes philologicae de nonnullis ad poema pertinentibus (Halle, 1735). Taking Descartes' distinction between clear and confused ideas, he found sense data to be both clear and confused, able to be brought into an ordered structure by poetry as 'sensate discourse'.
24 G. W. FE Hegel, FE Hélderlin and F. W. J. Schelling, 'Das alteste Systemprogramm des deutschen Idealismus'. It concludes 'Ein hoherer Geist vom Himmel Gesandt, muss diese neue Religion unter uns stiften, sie wird das letzte, grosste Werk der Menschheit sein';
Sturm und Drang. Klassik. Romantik. Texte und Zeugnissen, ed. H. E. Hass, vol. 1 (Munich,
1966), 1654-6.
Participation a God who is believed. Beauty is part of the glory of God and is subordinate to the object of faith. Second, and more startling, the glory of God is found not in transcendent forms but in the word made flesh. When we come to the end of all our pilgrimage our final vision shall be the face of him who was born of Mary.
For all its exuberance, the aesthetic of Irenaeus is only part of his theology. The glory of God is not merely beautiful, while the wholeness of creation and the wholeness of time point beyond aesthetic judgements. The glory of God is a living man and to that living humanity we now turn.
CHAPTER I0
Human growth from creation to resurrection: participation in life Irenaeus' anthropology, his optimism for man, has long excited enthusiasm. At the Renaissance he inspired Erasmus. In the twentieth century he gave fuel to those who, like Teilhard de Chardin, were driven by science to see man's evolution to Christ as the Omega point. The dogma of original sin was to be discarded and there was hope for all. On examination, however, Irenaeus proved more complex. 'The great theme of man as the image of God seemed to lack cohesion. Sin was still an awesome evil. How could divine spirit be mixed with body and soul? Through it all Irenaeus argued his way to the triumph of resurrection and life eternal. He holds our attention because of his passionate enthusiasm that mortal man should participate in the life of God. Controversy has centred on four problems: image and likeness, sin and fall, breath and spirit of God, flesh and spirit.
10.1.1
IMAGE AND LIKENESS: THE PUZZLE
The terminology of image and likeness was widely present in Greek philosophy from Plato to the Stoics." Here man's rational principle was the image of God, and likeness to God was acquired by perfection of this reason. Early Christian writers changed this and defined perfection by the gift of the divine spirit and salvation (4.20.6).
Recapitulation' restores the divine image and likeness which was lost in Adam.3 Likeness to God is found in the incarnate word of ' See J. Fantino, L'homme, image de Dieu chez S. Irénée de Lyon (Paris, 1986), 5~7.
2 Peter Schwanz, Imago Dei (Gottingen, 1979). The secondary literature on this topic is vast.
3 Paul and John do not connect this concept of divine image with the creation story of Genesis 1:26-7. This connection is first found in Ignatius of Antioch.
2 lak
a2 Participation God (dem. 32; 3.18.1), the image from which the creation of man was taken (dem. 22).
There is confusion among interpreters on the meaning of image and likeness in Irenaeus, because Irenaeus can differentiate between the two. The image plainly is the body, and the likeness comes through the spirit (5.6.1). The image includes the physical and intellectual qualities with which man is born. Image cannot be lost whereas likeness can. This explains the claim (3.18.1) that Adam lost the likeness but regained it in Christ. In general, the image and likeness of God can be distinguished into the image which is natural man (5.10.1, 2) and the likeness which comes from the son and the spirit (5.6.1).
Later fathers have two interpretations. Origen sees man as created in the image of God with the purpose of gaining the likeness of God. The image is the beginning and the likeness is the end.
Other fathers, like Gregory of Nyssa and Augustine, do not distinguish between image and likeness. Irenaeus offers support to both positions, sometimes making the two terms interchangeable,* sometimes making the image visible and the likeness invisible.
~ ~ 10.1.2
IMAGE AND LIKENESS: INSEPARABLE
CONJUNCTION
One careful study of this question> acknowledges that Irenaeus' striking formulae lead to problems. For example, in his account of creation, man is made zm the image and likeness of God, whereas
Christ zs the image and likeness of God. Irenaeus denies the Valentinian interpretation, which separated God from man and higher from lower man through a distinction between image and likeness: some men had the image only, some also had the likeness.
Irenaeus rejects this position and denies any such division.° God had said, 'For I made man in the image of God" (Gen. 9:6) and the image of God is the son according to whose image man was
* P. Beuzart, Essai sur la théologie d'Irénée (Le Puy, 1908), 69-73.
5 Wingren, Man and the Incarnation.
° All accept Loofs' insistence on the future reference of Christ at creation. He is the homo
Juturus. This does not exclude, as Loofs believed, the importance of the pre-existence of Christ. Both are essential to Irenaeus.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
made; and for this reason he appeared in the last days that he might show the image to be lke himself' (dem. 22).
Those who are made after God's image and likeness gain man's original state (5.10.1). Yet only in the new humanity of Christ does man find the image and likeness towards which he was created, for Christ is like God and is the image of God. Also he is like
Adam and possesses the shape or form of Adam. Christ is true God and true man. Other men are not true men because they have not yet reached the likeness of God. The new beginning in Christ is parallel to the creation of Adam, a second fashioning
(secunda plasmatio) (5.23.2).
Image and likeness must be held together. Where Irenaeus distinguishes between the two (5.6.1; cf. 5.16.2), he is taking the Gnostic position in order to destroy it. He is arguing against the possibility that either the image or the likeness might be saved alone. If it were the case that the image could be saved alone, we should be speaking about the body, and if it were the case that the likeness could be saved alone we should be speaking about the spirit. Irenaeus rejects this separation. By sharing in the body of Christ, which is the church, man can grow in the image and likeness of God (3.17.3).
Baptism and eucharist enable this process to take place. As Christ gives and men receive, so they move towards their destiny in Christ.
All is the work of the spirit who transforms man into the likeness of him who became man that men might become divine.
10.1.3
IMAGE AND LIKENESS: DISJUNCTION
Irenaeus argues (against the Gnostics) that all men have a point of contact with God.' He therefore needs to distinguish what has been ruined by the fall and what subsists after the first sim. Where image and likeness are synonymous, as they are in the original biblical text (Gen. 1:26), the image-and-likeness was lost by Adam's fall and regained in Christ (3.18.1). However, elsewhere there is a distinction, as where the likeness is lost and restored by Christ, who in his flesh preserves the man who was made in his image and likeness (3.22.1).
7 This paragraph is indebted to Beuzart, Essai sur la théologie d"Irénée.
Partwcipation Sometimes the difference is clear. The image of God is the body of the incarnate Christ, which is the model of the first creation and the final perfection.® The likeness may be identified as reason and freedom? or as the incorruption which flesh will finally receive."
It may even be identified as something visible which was lost because the word was not yet visible (5.16.2).
The likeness comes as the spirit makes man immortal and incorruptible through the paternal light which shines in the flesh of the glorified Christ (5.6.1; 5.7.2; 5.8.1). Man becomes like the unseen father through the word who has been made visible (5.1 6.2).
In this way, the words 'let us make man in our image and likeness' extend beyond creation to the whole divine economy, which ends when mankind progresses from the kingdom of the son to the transforming vision of the father (5.16.2; 5.36.1—3).
10.1.4
SOLUTIONS TO THE PROBLEM: FANTINO
AND SESBOUE
Similitudo has two meanings in Irenaeus."
It can refer to the similarity (0010TNS) which man bears to God, through the freedom he has always had, and to the intelligence which enables him to follow the purpose of God. Stmilitudo can also mean likeness (OMO0iwa ts), or growing like God through obedience to the holy spirit. The image (€(k@v) describes what is common between the incarnate son and every human being. Through the presence of the spirit, the son is the perfect image of God. Image and likeness bring man into unity with him who is the beloved image of the father (5.6.1; 5.36.3).
In his incarnation he presents the archetypal image, making visible the invisible reality of God (4.6.6; 5.16.2). Here the perfection of God and man are joined.
Quite remarkably, the three concepts of similarity, image and assimilation link man to father, son and spirit respectively. Here we have another evidence of the deeper unity of Irenaeus' thought.
God gives freedom to man, and this point of divine similarity is
4.37.73 5.9.33
5-12.43 dem. 11.
9 dem. 11; haer. 4.4.33 4.37.43 4.38.4.
"© dem. 32; haer. 3.18.1; 4.38.33
5.1.33 5.6.1; 5.8.15 5.10.1; 5.16.1.
'' Fantino, L'homme, unage de Dieu, 68-81.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
inalienable from man. Man's image of God is imperfect and needs to be made like the incarnate son, the archetypal image. It is essential to man and declares the bond between creation and salvation. Man exists in imperfection and needs to be transformed. This transformation is his salvation by assimilation to the son through the spirit. "The likeness with the father is the basis on which the image of the incarnate son is constructed progressively by the action of the holy spirit ..
. the father acts by his son in the holy spirit to bring to being the spiritual, perfect man.''?
In all this Irenaeus stands apart from his contemporaries by joining anthropology and soteriology— Christ mediates both image and resemblance/likeness/assimilation as the true archetype of both.'3
For Irenaeus, image is both form and substance, and likeness is the saving action by which the spirit raises man to God. Irenaeus and the Hermetic writers both see image as joining form and substance, but only Irenaeus allows the divine image a place in the created, lower world. The primacy of the physical also marks Irenaeus off from the Alexandrine fathers for whom image and likeness is an entirely spiritual matter: man's intellect is the image of God, and likeness is spiritual transformation by the holy spirit.
For Irenaeus, man as body and soul is the image of the incarnate son. Indeed 'because by his humanity he is the archetypal image, the incarnate son is the first-principle of creation; because as word of God he communicated the spirit, the incarnate son is likewise the first-principle of salvation'.'+ Because the son incarnate is the archetypal image, every human possesses similar shape and flesh.
Every believer receives assimilation (likeness) from the holy spirit at baptism as a dynamic which-gradually transforms the image until it is perfected by resurrection.
Adam was weak, incomplete, an infant, possessing by the spirit a likeness to God which he lost through disobedience. Yet God led Adam on the way of penitence (3.23.5), of life (3.23.7), of immortality (3.20.2; dem. 15), of communion with God (5.27.2). 'The possibilities, once lost by disobedience, were restored by Christ who offered adoption, perfection, deification, and liberation from 12 Thid.,178.
3 Ibid.,179.
'+ 'Ibid.
Partwipation sin and death. The fullness of Christ now excels what was given during his earthly life and makes men divine.
Irenaeus diverges from Paul and John in avoiding explicit reference to anew creation."
For him the first created humanity receives salvation and the gift of the spirit. The likeness in Adam is extended rather than replaced. Within the divine economy, there is no separation between creation and salvation. Christ comes to restore and to complete that perfection to which creation was called.'®
Fantino's lucid account has been confirmed by Sesboiié's more recent analysis.'? The divine initiative shows that the love of God is the source of creation. God made Adam in order to have a recipient for his benefits (4.14.1). He then chose the patriarchs with a view to their salvation, formed his people to teach them the ways of God and instructed the prophets 'making man accustomed on earth to carry his spirit and to possess communion with God' (4.14.2).
Salvation presupposes creation and ends.m participation.
10.2.1-
SIN AND FALL, ORIGINAL SIN
The second problem in Irenaeus' anthrepology concerns original sin. Irenaeus does not clearly state whether sin is hereditary or individual achievement, or a mixture of both. All views appear in his account. God requires obedience, and the opposite of obedience is sin (4.39.1). Disobedience to God is evil and brings death (dem. 1 6).
Did Irenaeus consider sin as necessary to man's development (4.28.3; 4.29.1, 2; 5.29.2), or was it simply a disaster which God repairs by redemption (3.20.2)?
The conflict between truth and falsehood sets the stage.'® God is true, the devil is a har. In the form of the serpent, the devil lied to Eve and thereby obtained power or dominance over man (5.21.1)'9 — and the sin of Adam brought the death of the human race. Irenaeus identifies the devil with the serpent*® who became God's enemy
'D But note man's secunda plasmatto (5.23.2).
' Fantino, L'homme, image de Dieu, 181.
'7 Sesbouié, Tout récapituler, 85-9.
Which is appropriate to Against heresies.
Per mulverem enim homini dominatus est ab initio.
Following Wisdom 2:24, John 8:44, Revelation 12:9. The cunning of the serpent is derived from 2 Corinthians 11:3.
Human growth from creation to resurrection 257, (4.40.3), through envy of God's creation (5.24.4) and of man's gift of life (5.24.4). The lie which the devil told was similar to the falsehood of all heretics (5.21.2). The disobedience of Adam and Eve (3.22.4) caused them to eat (5.23.1) and to transgress the commandment of God.*' This, for Irenaeus, showed their ingratitude towards God
(4.37-6; 3.20.1; 5.3.1) in the face of God's exuberant goodness (3.20.4):
As a result of the fall, Adam was overcome by fear and tried to hide from the ever-present God, because in his confusion he knew himself to be unworthy of God's presence. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of understanding which leads to penitence, which attracts the kindness and mercy of God.?? Nevertheless, Irenaeus does not see the sin of Adam as the worst sin: the sin of Cain, who killed a man, who acted without reverence or penitence and who persevered in his wickedness, drew the curse of God (3.23.3, 4). In contrast, Adam immediately felt a sense of shame and penitence, so God turned his fault along a way towards better things (4.39.1).
God, as a good father, could not turn away from his creation but mercifully gave salvation (5.21.3). After man had learned his fault and turned gratefully to his lord, God's magnanimity brought man on to resurrection and incorruption. Out of his largeness of heart
God even permitted the fall (3.20.1, 2).*? Adam was expelled from paradise not because God was jealous of his participation in the fruit of the tree, but because a merciful God wished to remove him from perpetual, incurable sin. God put a stop to man's sin by interposing death and the dissolution of the flesh, so that man might in the end cease to live in sin and commence to live for God (3.23.6). Man was not handed over to the devil permanently or entirely (3.23.3).
He could take again his path of holiness through repentance, and with the help of God he could recover from the bite of the serpent
(4.2.7). Otherwise Satan would appear to be the final victor.
Adam is the first man and the source of unity to the human race who are all his sons. We are guilty because we stem from Adam,
21 Man's primal sin was disobedience as Paul (Rom. 5:19) had said.
22 So when Adam took the fig leaves, he chose a utente) form of clothing which was exceptionally uncomfortable (3.23.5).
23 Trenaeus' subtlety and clarity on this point show that the contrast between rise and fall theodicies is not appropriate to his account.
Partwipation and inherit all from him. We are begotten in the same captivity which Adam endured and remain in servitude, as slaves to the devil, because we are Adam's sons (3.23.2). From the disobedience of one man, many became sinners and forfeited life (3.18.7). Similarly the disobedient Eve brought death on the human race (3.22.4). In the beginning we were led captive in Adam (5.21.1) and we committed the sin in the garden against Christ himself (5.17.1). Therefore
Irenaeus understands original sin at least in the limited sense of inherited guilt.2* A mass of imagery pours in. Because we have sinned in Adam and are descended from him physically, we are born as slaves, for all children who are born in slavery are legally slaves, however sad this sounds (3.23.2). Christ comes to save all from sin's captivity and to restore all to communion with God, whether they be infants, little children, children or men young or old (3.18.7). At the tree of paradise we incurred a debt to God which is remitted at the tree of the cross (5.17.3). We are alksick, suffering from the bite of the serpent with a disorder between our soul and our body; to heal this sickness God endured all things on our behalf (4.37.7).
Slavery, birth, debt, two trees, sickness and healing — all the images tumble out.
~ One scholar' points also to inherited mortality (5.1.3), to natural origin as a generatio mortis (4.33.4) and to the captivity of the children of Adam (3.23.1), who need baptism for regeneration (3.17.1).
However, sin is nowhere reduced to a consequence of Adam's sin.?° Adam is the emblem of the human race; rejection of God is always possible because man may choose either good or evil. God himself is never responsible for, but magnanimously allows the apostasy of man, and this very apostasy, as the prophet said, will lead to healing under the grace of God (4.37.7).?7 Evil is something which is overcome within God's total scheme. Irenaeus wrote to Florinus
© While Trenaeus is the first to make Romans 5:12 central to his anthropology, he does not develop it metaphysically, but points to the incarnation and the purity of the Christ who was born from a pure mother to regenerate mankind (4.33.11). The purity of Christ and his mother is seen as the great exception within a fallen race.
Duncker, Des heiligen Irendius Christologie, 142. See also Duncker's inaugural dissertation, iS) 3) Flistoriae doctrinae de ratione quae inter peccatum originale et actuale intercedit pars continens Irenaei,
Tertuliam, August sententias (Gottingen, 1836).
Ziegler, Irendus, 220.
27 Thid., 223.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
concerning the monarchy of God with the subtitle 'that God is not the cause of evils' (H.E. 5.20).
10.2.2
PERFECTION OF ADAM
The primitive condition of man was one of innocence and childhood (3.23.5), where Eve was wife to Adam but still a virgin (3.22.4).
Their intellectual powers were undeveloped, for these are not necessary to please God (2.26.1). Adam was not perfect in himself, for only the unbegotten God is perfect (4.38.3). Adam's perfection consisted in his proximity to the perfect God (4.38.3), in the sense that God's spirit is in him. Through use of created things he must grow in maturity and find immortality (4.5.1) to end in eternal subjection to God (4.28.3). Man is forever marked by growth, as the child grows in the womb and the wheat grows on the stalk
(2.28.1). Perfection for Irenaeus lies at the end, not at the beginning, of man's education by God, a process which takes account of the fall from the beginning.*? Because the redeemer already existed, man was created to be redeemed, lest the redeemer become superfluous. Man possessed body and soul, reason and free will, unimpaired but imperfect and undeveloped. "The fall and its consequence, death, did not disturb God's plan for the world and its salvation but contributed to its realisation, continuing the education of mankind which the plan already envisaged.'%° The fall was a happy fault ( felex culpa).
10.3.1
UNITY OF MAN AS BODY, SOUL AND SPIRIT
The third problem concerns man's grasp of breath and spirit. For the Gnostics, man is created by different powers at different times, and he begins as the work of an inept maker which is then passed over to a maker more skilled and more powerful. Not only does man have more than one maker, but he has more than one part; his parts are of unequal value and do not form a real unity. Against this account, Jrenaeus insists on the unity both of the creator and of the creation.?"
28 Koch, 'Zur Lehre vom Urstand', 193-214.
29 Tbid., 210, 'er rechnet schon den Siindenfall mit ein'.
3° Tbid., 212.
3! Beuzart, Essai sur la théologe d'Irénée, 54-84.
Participation One God made man and made him in his entirety. The property of God is to make and the property of man is to be made (4.39.2;
4.11.2). Yet there is no gap between them which can be filled by intermediaries. The hands of God, his word and his spirit, are in direct contact with man.
Valentinians divided men into three categories, spiritual, earthy and psychic.3? Irenaeus rejected this division of mankind into three classes and man into three parts. The human race is one and the individual is one. Neither body nor soul nor spirit is man but their union forms a complete human person (5.6.1). The natural man is composed of two parts, body and soul, equal in their dignity because they are both created by God. The soul is the faculty of sense, mind, thought or meditation: sensus, mens, cogitatio, intentio mentis (2.29.3). To body and soul must be added the spirit which is man's participation in the spirit of God so that man consists of flesh, soul and spirit (5.9.1).
At one place, Irenaeus distinguishes peereal the breath of life (afflatus) and the spirit. The first gift of life was bestowed by the divine breath. The complete gift of life is bestowed by the spirit of God. The breath is a temporal thing, the spirit is eternal (5.12.2).
Body and soul and spirit, while inseparable, have a hierarchy. The soul is superior and the body is like an instrument in the hand ofa tradesman (2.33.4).
The soul comes from the breath of God and is his creature (5.12.2). The soul is stronger than the body because it gives breath and life and increase to the body (2.33.4). Indeed the soul teaches the body which it possesses and governs (2.33.3, 4). Body and soul explain the activity of man. 'Two parts, not three, are important.
The incorporeal soul possesses the shape of the body. Just as water, when it is placed in a vessel, takes the shape of that vessel, so the soul takes the shape of the body (2.19.6). The story of the rich man and Lazarus shows how souls continue; they do not move from body to body but possess without change the character of the body (2.34.1).
Irenaeus sees death as a terrible thing, when the body loses the soul (5.7.2), for the departure of the soul is the loss of that which 3° In this they simply carried over the Platonic division of spirit, soul and body into the species of man as a whole.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
gave a beginning to man's substance (5.7.1). What God has once made, and which has been decomposed back into the earth, he will again restore (5.3.2). Each man has his own body and his own soul through the wealth and power of God (2.33.5). There can be no basis for a belief in transmigration of souls, for body and soul are joined together.
The activity of the spirit is the clue to man's unity. God's spirit gives to man the breath of life and the gift of rationality (5.1.3). The spirit gives existence and life to man as an animate and rational being (5.3.2). But this does not happen through the rejection of the flesh, but by the communion of the spirit and flesh (5.8.1). Our substance, which is made of soul and flesh, receives the spirit of God to become spiritual man (5.8.2). God grants communion to those who need him (4.14.2). It is not possible to live without life and life only comes by participation in God, through seeing God and enjoying his goodness (4.20.5). The spirit opens to man the way of becoming like God.
10.3.2)
BREATH OF EEE
Irenaeus distinguishes the breath of life which made man an animated being from the life-giving spirit which made him spiritual
(5.12.2). He quotes Isaiah, who speaks of the breath given to the people and the spirit to those who walk on earth, indicating that breath is common to everyone on earth but that the spirit belongs only to those who tread down, that is walk on, their earthly desires.
Again, Isaiah distinguishes spirit from breath when he speaks about the spirit which will go forth from God and the breath which God has made (Isa. 57:1 6 and 42:5). Breath is something temporal while spirit is eternal. Breath increases for a short period and continues for a limited time; then it departs and its former habitation is without breath. In contrast, the spirit pervades man from within and from without, remaining there and not leaving him. 'The substance of the flesh dies when it loses the breath of life, but the spirit which the lord brings is of a different order.
In Christ, we all live a spiritual life given by God (5.12.3). Both breath and spirit are given to the same substance; the first does not last while the second endures for ever. In Adam we all die but in
Pyke) Participation Christ we live through the gift of the spirit (5.12.3). The breath of life belongs to the created nature of man whereas the spirit grants participation in God.3
The breath of life presents a puzzle which, like that of image and likeness, can only be solved by the concept of different levels of participation.3+ The breath of life is breathed into the face of man to produce a living soul. It cannot be called mortal because it is the breath of life (5.7.1). The soul is life to the body and also the source of reason (5.1.3); but it is not immortal because it depends on God for the breath of life. 'Life does not come from us, nor from our own nature, but it is bestowed according to the grace of God. Therefore he who shall have preserved the gift of life and given thanks to him who bestowed that gift will also receive length of days for ever and ever' (2.34.3). Participation governs body as well as soul. The body participates in the soul as God pleases and the soul participates in the life which God gives. This means that souls which once did not exist can continue by the will of God which brought them into being (2.34.4).39
Has the soul a natural immortality? Puzzle and controversy surround the question. An affirmative answer begins from 2.34.3. It is claimed that Irenaeus here uses the concept of life in connection with salvation and the life of the spirit.3° It is this life which is lost and regained. 'The soul may continue to exist without participating in the life-creating spirit. For Irenaeus distinguishes between animation and vivification, but not between life lived in the flesh and other forms of life. 'The relationship between the present life and eternal life is a relation between different levels of participation.37
The flesh can partake of life now in its animated condition and therefore may partake of life in its vivified condition (5.3.3). There is a direct continuity between present life and eternal life. The temporal is weaker and the eternal is stronger. "There is no suggestion
33 H-J. Jaschke, Der heilige Geist im Bekenninis der Kirche (Minster, 1976), 253.
34 See section 10.5.
35 Contrary to the axiom that what comes into being must pass away.
3° a vie supérieure qu'instaure en nous lEsprit Saint par sa présence sanctificatrice et divinisante', A. Rousseau, 'L'éternité des peines d'enfer et 'immortalité naturelle de lame selon saint Irénée', NRTh 99 (1977), 854.
37 Behr speaks of the difference between the living soul (Gen. 2:7) and the life-giving spirit
(1 Cor. 15:45—6) as two modes from one source. J. Behr, Asceticism and anthropology in Trenaeus and Clement of Alexandria (Oxford, 2000), 109.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
that they are two different types of life: physical/biological and spiritual/the presence of the Spirit. That the flesh has become accustomed in this present temporal life, to bear life, demonstrates that it is capable of being vivified by eternal life.'3°
Those who rise to life eternal have their own body, their own soul and their own spirit. The others have their own souls and their own bodies but have stood apart from the goodness of God (2.33.5):
Here we see the same dynamics as are operative in Irenaeus' discussion of life in AH 2.34 and AH 5.3.3: those who have been thankful for the gift of life in this temporal life, and are thus pleasing to God, will be raised and maintained in eternal life. But now this thought is expressed in terms of the Spirit, which is given to each in a manner that makes the Spirit
'their Spirit'. Thus those who have pleased God in their body, soul, and Spirit will be raised in their body, soul, and Spirit. The parallel dynamics of these texts, and the fact that it is zm their body, soul, and Spirit that they have pleased God, demand that it is also in their body, soul, and Spirit that the others have shown themselves worthy of punishment, and so are raised in their body and soul for the punishment of an existence without the Spirit, without participation in life.39
Indeed the whole creation subsists by the power, skill and wisdom of God (5.18.1), For the Father simultaneously bears the creation and his own Word, and the Word borne by the Father bestows the Spirit on all as the Father wills, to some, who are in a created state, which is made, He gives the Spirit pertaining to creation, to others who are according to adoption, an engendering, he gives the Spirit of the Father. (5.18.2, Behr's translation)
Rousseau translates differently: and the Word borne by the father gives the Spirit (spirit) to all in the manner which the father wills for us. To some according to their creation, he gives the spirit which belongs to creation, the spirit which is something made; to others according to their adoption he gives the Spirit which proceeds from the father, the Spirit which is his progeny.
Here the claim is that Irenaeus means two different things by the word spiritus: a created spirit which is the breath of life, and the holy spirit.
38 Thid., 97.
39 Tbid., ror. Rousseau restricts possession of the "Spirit? to those who have been justified;
SC 293, 339-40.
Participation Can we clarify the relation of the spirit to the breath of life?
Irenaeus works back from 1 Corinthians 15:45. From Isaiah 57:16 he points out that the breath of life is something made, which will leave the body. 'But when the Spirit pervades man inside and out, it is permanent and remains with the man."#° Irenaeus then uses 1 Corinthians 15:46 to distinguish what is animated from what is spiritual and claims 'it was first necessary for man to be fashioned, and having been fashioned to receive the soul and then to receive communion with the spirit'. He concludes with the claim,
'therefore, just as the one who became a living soul, by turning to evil lost life, so again the same one by turning to what is better and receiving the life giving spirit finds life' (5.12.2). The breath of life produces animation while the holy spirit produces vivification.
In 4.20.5 the role of participation is made explicit: one cannot live without life and life comes from participation in God, which is to see God and to enjoy his goodness.*' The one source of life is received in two ways — creation and vivification. All created things draw their life from God. Some receive a pledge of the spirit in anticipation of eschatological vivification. God and man are becoming accustomed to one another in the interim period.
The process of growth — through creation, increase, adulthood, multiplication, strengthening, glory and vision of the lord — brings incorruptibility (4.38.3). Here is the economy of man, the anthropology of Irenaeus expressed in one sentence.** Each stage is a different level of participation. 'The anthropology of Irenaeus, like all his theology, requires the four concepts of intellect, economy, recapitulation and participation.*8 Irenaeus (5.6.1) oscillates between the two meanings of spirit, which are two levels of participation. When man loses the spirit
4° Behr, Asceticism, 106.
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43. Since participation is a mixture of affirmation and denial, there will always be ambiguities.
A lucid note on the present discussion shows the persisting ambiguity and the triumphant certainty — man is not God, only man with God is man; Sesboiié, Tout récapituler, go-9.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
of God, he is still a man shaped by the hand of God in God's image, but the likeness is no longer there.44 The paradox of God the spirit in whom man's spirit participates - where man's spirit does not belong to the initial definition of man as body and soul, but belongs to the definition of perfect man — corresponds with the difference between image (body and soul) and likeness (body, soul and spirit).
If the language fumbles, the intuition is profound and clear. The link of man to God is so intimate that it belongs to the being of man considered as a creature and considered as vocation. Man is not God; God is radically transcendent to man. Yet, nevertheless, one cannot speak of man completely without bringing in the connection to God which is part of him.*9 One cannot divide the divine spirit which shapes and saves man from the spirit which is a constituent of man. The spirit of man participates in the spirit of God and thereby brings life to body and soul.
10.4.1
SPIRIT TRANSFORMS FLESH INTO INCORRUPTION
The fourth problem in Irenaeus' anthropology concerns the relation between flesh and spirit. In Book 5, where he argues for the resurrection of the body or the resurrection of the flesh, his argument is governed by two principles, one logical and the other theological. Logically, he is concerned to expose the inaccurate argument which has been levelled against the resurrection of the body. He compares his opponents to those who are not expert at wrestling and who gain a hold on their opponent which 1s not to their advantage, but which in their ignorance they will not abandon. In the end they tumble and become objects of ridicule. 'Their failure in argument is due to their refusal to analyse the meaning of the words they use (5.13.2).
The theological principle which lies behind Irenaeus' argument comes from Paul. For Paul, the one question to ask about a man is: what or whom does he serve? Anthropology is a question of 44 Thid., 95.
45 Tbid., 97.
4° Kasemann, Perspectives on Paul, 26-31; Paulinische Perspektiven, 53-60.
Participation power. Those who serve flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom of God. Those who are ruled by the spirit are transformed by divine grace into incorruptibility.
The argument begins with the theorem of participation: the lord brought immortality firmly and truly by bringing us into communion with God. This he achieved by the great exchange, giving his own soul for our souls, his flesh for our flesh, and pouring out the spirit of the father for the communion of God and man. The three elements of soul, flesh and spirit take their place in this constant theme of Irenaeus. Christ has attached man to God by his own incarnation (zmponente) and he has imparted God to men (deponente) by means of the spirit (5.1.1). The whole economy of salvation points to the transformation of flesh into incorruption. Unless this regeneration be possible, then God has neither restored the work of his hands nor taken possession of that which is his own (5.2.1, 2).
Objections against resurrection and incorruptible flesh will not bear examination, says Irenaeus, for God_created human bodies from what did not exist and all he has to do at resurrection is to put together the parts which he has previously formed. While the complexity of the human body is great, it is a simple matter for God to reassemble existing parts (5.3.2).
Nor can it be argued that these disparaté members are not capable of receiving life, for they have already received temporal life as creatures upon earth. The eternal life of God is much more powerful than any temporal life and it can readily vivify the members which it brings together (5.3.3). Since the lord has shown himself able to bring life into what he has made, and since the flesh is clearly able to receive the gift of life, there is no barrier to the flesh receiving incorruption and eternal life (5.3.3).
'The power of God to preserve bodies is clearly indicated in scripture, where some are shown to have lived seven, eight or nine hundred years. From the beginning God has been able to rule, order, sustain and move all that he made. The hands of God have ever been efficacious (5.5.1). There is no limit on what God can do with his creation. The unbelief of those who are sceptical does not affect the faithfulness of God (5.5.2).
The resurrection of Christ concerns the substance of his flesh.
Our resurrection, like his, must be a resurrection of the flesh, for
Human growth from creation to resurrection S27 he will raise us by the same power which he used in his own resurrection. The reality of his flesh was proved when he showed the marks of the nails and the wound in his side. Our mortal bodies will be raised as he was raised.
This is the work of the spirit, whose power we already know in his pledge which prepares us for future incorruption. Those who possess this pledge of the spirit are subject to the spirit and serve the spirit rather than the flesh. The service of the spirit is the only alternative to the service of the flesh, to a slavery which reduces men to pigs and dogs (5.8.1, 2).
10.4.2
STRENGTH MADE PERFECT IN WEAKNESS
The flesh which cannot inherit the kingdom of God is the flesh which is not joined to soul and spirit. By itself, flesh could never reach incorruption, but flesh is joined to soul and spirit within the perfect man, and the weakness of the flesh is taken up by the strength of the spirit. Consequently the flesh is able to do things which, without the spirit, it could never achieve (5.9.2). By this spirit we now live in obedience to God (5.9.3). To speak exactly, the flesh is not able to inherit the kingdom of God; but the spirit of God takes the flesh as an inheritance into the kingdom of God. The various parts of man which rot in the earth are inherited by the spirit and translated into the kingdom of heaven. Flesh and blood cannot inherit, but the word dwells within and the spirit comes upon the flesh and the blood to give it life (5.9.4).
Irenaeus corrects Paul on the olive tree. 'The wild olive stands for flesh and blood, the good olive stands for the spirit. The branch of the good olive is grafted into the wild olive and the first nature of _ man is restored as he becémes the image and likeness of God. No longer is man mere flesh and blood, but a spiritual man, although he still possesses flesh (5.10.2).
Paul sets out the difference between flesh and spirit. 'The works of the flesh (fornication, uncleanness... orgies (Gal. 5:19)) contrast with the fruits of the spirit (love, joy, peace... self-control
(Gal. 5:22)). The flesh will die unless it produces the works of the spirit and moves from corruption to incorruption when the spirit of God grants the gift of life. This spirit is God's eternal
Participation spirit which pervades the whole being of man and never leaves him i122) : -etannee power of the word of God is seen in the healing by which he restored all kinds of illnesses and disabilities. When he raised Lazarus and others, his life-giving power was proved and he prophesied that the hour would come in which the dead in the tombs would hear the voice of the son of man and come forth
(Jn 5:28). Paul gives no ground for objections against the body (5.13.2); he speaks of the body of Christ's glory and how the believer's body will be transformed into glory. When the mortal is swallowed up in life and the flesh is no longer dead but incorruptible, it will sing the praises of God; as Paul said to the Corinthians,
'glorify God in your body' (5.13.3).
There would have been no point in the incarnation if the flesh were not to be saved. For the flesh of the lord established his human nature and confirmed the salvation of our flesh. Unless he had himself been flesh and blood, as man was originally made, he could not have saved what had perished i in Adam (5.14.1). By recapitulation his righteous flesh brought the flesh from slavery to sin into friendship with God (5.14.2).
From Irenaeus a whole theology of physical redemption arises.
His insistence that human flesh is transformed by participation in the incorruption of divine life has lasting relevance.*/ Futility and pessimism belong to those who deny the salvation of the flesh
(5.2.2).
There are five main proofs for the salvation of the flesh.4° The first proof comes from the almighty power of God (5.3.2). If God cannot raise the dead, then he is not the almighty creator who calls things out of nothing. The second proof is the power of the flesh to participate in life. If flesh can share in weak and mortal human life, it can share in the stronger eternal life which God gives (5.3.3).
47 The relevance of this theme was evident in Eastern Europe when materialism reigned but the individual was virtually destroyed. Joppich presents a pertinent account of this element of Christian theology and links it with the understanding of man as the image and above all the likeness of God. For the likeness of God is the gift of incorruption, whereby the flesh which is the image of God is transformed. Irenaeus opposes the Gnostic hostility to the body and the Gnostic denial of salvation for the flesh. G. Joppich, Salus carnis. Eine
Untersuchung in der Theologie des hl. Irendus von Lyon (Miinsterschwarzach, 1965).
48 Tbid., 68-9.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
Thirdly, the goodness of God proves the divine gift of life; for if God did not give life to the body then he would be either neglectful or hostile (5.4.1, 2). The fourth proof comes from the old testament, where the long lives of the patriarchs show that God is able to extend the life of those who are joined to him by love (5.5.1, 2). The fifth and final proof comes from the eucharist; for if flesh cannot be saved then our Lord did not redeem us by his blood and we cannot share in his flesh and blood through the eucharist. We stand in need of communion with him (5.2.1), and that communion is possible because Christ was true man who possessed flesh and blood.
10.4.3
FLESH AND GLORY
God's glory is seen in the flesh of the incarnate word.49 The narratives of the incarnation speak constantly of glory. Mary glorifies the lord at the annunciation (3.10.2) and the song of the angels gives glory to God as do the shepherds when they hear the message of the angels (3.10.4). Both Simeon and Anna glorified God when they saw Jesus the infant in the temple (3.10.5). The miracles which the incarnate Christ worked gave glory to God (5.17.1, 2). Indeed the light of the father shone in the real flesh of the son (4.20.2). The transfigured Christ fulfilled the promise to Moses that he would see God face to face on the rock (4.20.9). The reality of the flesh of Christ is tied to the communication of his grace and to the truth to which he bore witness (3.18.7). Had he not been real flesh then he could not have been truth.
In his account of final glory, Irenaeus unites 1 Corinthians 15 and John 17.5° The glory of God is shown within the nature of the creation and the triumph of God is brought about by the union of the spirit of God with the substance of the flesh. Here, for Irenaeus, the glory is to be found, neither in exaltation above creation nor in any form of separation, but in the intimate joining of God with his creature to produce immortality (4.38.3).
The glory of God is revealed in the flesh (5.3.2, 3). The flesh which was produced by the skill of God at the beginning will once again receive the power of God to be transformed. The spirit
49 Scherrer, La gloire de Dieu, 135. Also see above, 9.5.
5° Scherrer, La gloire de Dieu, 249.
Participation surrounds man within and without (spiritus circumdans intus et foris hominem) and remains always with man, never abandoning him
(5.12.2). This is the action of the same creator God, the imprint of whose fingers is upon us. 'His hand created your substance. 'That hand will reclothe you with pure gold and silver, both within and without, and will adorn you so beautifully that the king will be moved by your beauty' (Ps. 44:12) (4.39.2).
Salvation, we have seen, is a thing of beauty.°' The prophets have spoken of the glory which is to come for those who are fairer than the children of men, anointed with the oil of gladness above others, and who with beauty ride forth to rule in truth and meekness and justice. These things and other things 'of a like nature are spoken concerning him to indicate the beauty and splendour which exist in his kingdom, together with the transcendent and preeminent exaltation given to all who are under his sway' (4.33.11).
The transformation of the flesh is the work of the spirit who makes the flesh his temple (5.9.4). The spirit is given as the seed of life which comes from Christ upon the costes him who slept on the cross, the spirit is mediated to the flesh so that the work which he had shaped is joined and mixed to produce living sons for the living God (4.31.2).
~ 10.5
GROWTH THROUGH PARTICIPATION
Irenaeus' four untidy problems (image and likeness, sin and fall, breath and spirit, flesh and spirit) show that human life depends on participation in God. We become immortal by our vision of God and participation in him (4.20.6). Life springs neither from us, nor from our nature, but is given by the grace of God (2.34.3).
Participation defines Irenaeus' account of the life which will grow to all eternity.
It is the characteristic of humanity to become. Man's growth to maturity is gradual through the benefits of God's love until he finally sees and lays hold of God (4.37.7). He begins as a child
(4.38.1, 2) and is fed on infant food. In his weakness he falls prey to the tempter. He moves beyond immaturity because he has the 5" For the aesthetic dimension of Irenaeus' thought, see especially the previous chapter.
Human growth from creation to resurrection
gift of freedom to choose the way of assimilation to God. His own freedom is matched by the sovereign freedom and liberality of God's grace.>" This means that he may begin as man and end as God. Divine providence leads him towards the goal of incorruption.
His increase is entirely the work of the spirit, who is the bread of immortality and gives nourishment for growth (4.38.1, 2). Only from him who is before all things do men, the recent creatures of his grace, receive increase towards perfection (5.1.1).
Dostoevsky claimed that truth was never found at either extreme but only in the middle; hence come the difficulty and debate in Irenaeus' anthropology. Man is not God but he can grow in the likeness of God. Man is, by his own choice, a sinner; but God takes him and draws him upwards to perfection in Christ. Man is mere body and soul, incomplete until he shares in the divine spirit. Immortality is never a property of man in his own right.
He must constantly receive this gift by participation in the God who grants him life through a continuing act of creation (5.3). The body is included in this reception of life. He who raised up Jesus from the dead now gives life to our mortal bodies through his spirit dwelling in us (Rom. 8:11). It is the triumph of God's goodness, not our survival, which we celebrate in the resurrection of the body
(3.20.1).
Within all the complexity of Irenaeus' anthropology, God's goodness shines. While some have doubted whether Irenaeus coordinated (and not merely juxtaposed) his ideas, theocentric optimism pervades all. It matters to man to know that he is a copy of the incarnate Christ, that God's first loving concern after the fall was to put Adam into more comfortable clothes, that life is a sign of God's gift and that the weakness of flesh is the correlate of God's strengthening grace and goodness. To that goodness and man's share in it we now turn.
5? See the rich development of this theme in R. Berthouzoz, Liberté et grace suwant la théologie d'Trénée de Lyon (Fribourg, 1 980).