Chapter 4 (10): 1. For What Reason Christ'S Flesh Is Said In Scripture Not To Have
12 | THE SENTENCES, BOOK 3
cause because, just as Abraham is shown by that tithing to be less than Melchisedech, to whom he personally pays tithe, so too was the Levitical order, which was in Abraham according to seminal reason and descended from him through the concupiscence of the flesh. But Christ was not tithed because, although he was there [in the loins of Abraham] according to the flesh, yet he did not descend from there according to the common law, namely through the lust of the flesh; just as also in Adam all sinned,° but not Christ
AUGUSTINE: LEVI WAS THERE IN SOME MANNER BY WHICH
CHRIST WAS NOT. Hence Augustine, in On Genesis: "Just as those who were in his loins sinned when Adam sinned, so also those who were in his loins were tithed when Abraham paid tithes. But this does not follow in the case of Christ, even though he was in the loins of Adam and Abraham, because he did not descend from them by the concupiscence of the flesh."* "And so, although Levi and Christ were in Abraham's loins according to the flesh when he was tithed, they were not equally tithed on that account, because Christ was there in some manner by which Levi was not." "Indeed, Levi was there according to that seminal reason by which he would come into his mother through sexual intercourse; Christ's flesh was not there according to this reason, even though Mary's flesh was there according to it."° "Levi was tithed in Abraham who was in Abraham's loins as Abraham had been in his own father's, that is, who was born from his father Abraham as Abraham had been born of his own father, namely through the law of the flesh and invisible concupiscence."'
Chapter 4 (10)
1. FOR WHAT REASON CHRIST'S FLESH IS SAID IN SCRIPTURE NOT TO HAVE
BEEN SINFUL, BUT LIKE SINFUL FLESH: WHERE IT IS REVEALED WHY THE
FLESH WAS NOT IN BONDAGE TO SIN IN THE CASE OF CHRIST. And so Christ is rightly said to have taken on 'the first-fruits of our mass,'' because he did not take the flesh of sin, but the likeness of sinful flesh. For as the Apostle says, God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh For the Word took flesh like that of a sinner as to punishment, but not as to fault, and so it was not sinful—AUGUSTINE, ON THE WORDS OF THE APOSTLE:
"But all other flesh of men is sinful: only his is not sinful flesh because his Mother conceived him through grace, and not through concupiscence. And yet it has the likeness of sinful flesh through its ability to *Cf. Rom. 5, 12.
"Ordinary gloss, on Heb. 7, 10.
Cf. Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram, bk 10 c19 n34.
*Tbid., c20 n35.
Ibid., c20 n36.
'John of Damascus, De fide orthodoxa, bk 3 c2.
"Rom. 8, 3.
Distinction III | 13 suffer and die, because it suffered hunger, thirst, and suchlike."? "And So, although his flesh is the same as ours, yet it was not made in the womb in the same way as ours. For it was sanctified in the womb and was born without sin, and also he did not ever sin in it. And so it is similar to our flesh as to punishment, but not as to the quality of sin,"* because (ORIGEN:) "it did not at all have the same pollution as flesh which is conceived from the movement of concupiscence,"" "nor was it born from carnal pleasure."°—HE SETS OUT THREE CAUSES. And so he came to a spotless body,' which had been conceived apart from the concupiscence of lust; nor did he have in himself that vice which is the cause of sin in others; nor did he sin in it. And so it is truly said that the flesh of the Word was not in bondage to sin in the case of Christ.
2. SOMETHING APPEARS TO BE IN CONTRADICTION WITH THAT SENTENCE
IN WHICH IT WAS SAID THAT THE FLESH OF CHRIST WAS NOT CONCEIVED
BEFORE IT WAS TAKEN. But what Augustine says, in On John, appears to go against that sentence in which we said above* that the flesh of the Word was not conceived before it was taken. We there read: Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up again. Then the Jews said: This temple was built in forty-six years, and you will raise it up again in three days?' Augustine says: "This number is suitable for the perfecting of the Lord's body because, as the natural philosophers say, the form of the human body is completed in as many days."''°
3. By reason of these words, some have presumed to say that the form of the Lord's body, like other bodies, was completed and differentiated according to the shapes of the different parts in that many days, and the Word of God immediately united to himself flesh and soul. And it is in this way, they say, that that number is suitable for the perfecting of the Lord's body.
4. But there is another reason for that statement, from which a sound understanding of it flows. For Augustine did not say it because, as soon as that flesh was sanctified by the work of the Holy Spirit and separated from the rest, it was united to the Word of God with the soul, so that he was perfect and true God and perfect and true man; but because the differentiation of the parts of the Lord's body, at the very moment of conception and union of God and man, was so delicate and small that it could
*Augustine, Sermo 152, n8.
'Ambrosiaster, /n Epistolas s. Pauli, Rom. 8, 3.
Origen, In Epistolam ad Romanos 8, 3.
°Augustine, De diversis quaestionibus 83, q66 n6.
7Origen, In Epistolam ad Romanos 8, 3; cf. Wis. 8, 20.
"ist, 2c) hl, °Jn. 2, 19-20.
'°Cf. Augustine, De Trinitate, bk 4 c5 n9.