Who is Jesus Christ? This is a question that the early Church struggled with during the first 400 years of the Church. It was not until the Councils of Nicea A.D. 325 and Chalcedon A.D. 451 that the matter was officially settled in the Church in what is known as The Nicene and Chalcedonian Creeds. In these Creeds, stated simply, Jesus was declared One person with two completely distinct natures: fully God and fully man. what does this mean? We will get to this later. First lets study the historical background of what led up to these Christological formulas which both the Catholic as well as the Protestant Churches have held to ever since.

The Jews believed God to be one person and the Law, Torah of Moses, to be eternal. Jesus also expressed this view point in Matthew 5:17-18 and 24:35:

"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one iota or one point shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished. Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and so teaches others, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

"Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words shall not pass away."

What was the question? If the law of God is absolute and unchangeable, then how can the man Jesus be a further revelation of God? If God is One, how can He have a Son equal to Him of His essence? These were some basic questions that plagued the early Church in their trying to share the Gospel with Jews and men of other religions. There were also heretical offshoots of the early Church which taught things about Jesus that the early Church Fathers knew contradicted what they read in the writings of the Apostles. It was these questions and heresies that motivated the Church to dig into the Scriptures and come up with a unified belief and formula about who Jesus Christ was which culminated in the Nicene and Chalcedonian Creeds. Lets study this background and then we will cover what is in these creeds.

There was a group of believers talked about by Justin Martyr (ca. 100-165) and Eusebius (ca. 260-340), some early Church fathers, which they called Ebionites. The term Ebionite comes from the Hebrew word Ebionism meaning "poor."^71/63 Justin Martyr said they consisted of two different sects: those who viewed obedience to the law necessary for salvation and those who not only believed this but tried to impose this belief on others.

They believed Jesus to be the messiah but only a man not of a virgin.^70/43 Eusebius said about the Ebionites that they insisted on obedience to the Law. The first group taught that Jesus had a natural birth, was an ordinary man with unusual moral character. The second group taught that Jesus had a supernatural birth, but they rejected Jesus’ preexistence as the Son and Logos.^72/3.27

Epiphanius (ca. 315-403) distinguished between two groups he called Nazareans and Ebionaeans. These labels persisted as late as Jerome (ca. 340-420) Epiphanius called them, "Pretend to be Christians." He said that the Nazareans held to an orthodox belief in Christ but insisted on adherence to the law.^73/112.13

A man by the name of Cerinthus (fl. 100) held to what is called Adoptionism. He held to elements of Gnostic thought. He taught that God did not create directly, but through angels, one of these the God of the Jews, who gave the Law. His Christology taught that Jesus was an ordinary human being whom God adopted as His Son.

He taught that because of Jesus’ ethical qualities, God gave him a special gift of spirituality. After testing Him, at His water baptism, God’s Spirit descended upon him revealing the Father to Him and enabling Him to do miracles. He further taught that before Jesus’ death that the Christ spirit withdrew from him. He said that the mission of the Messiah was educational, rather than redemptive, as a prophet. As a mere human His suffering and death had no special value for sin.

Another heretical group called the Clementines, that was Essenes from eastern Palestine, distinguished between Jesus and the Christ. They taught that Christ, the Son of God, had appeared in a series of incarnations in perfect men, Jesus being the last. Jesus’ death and Resurrection, therefore, had no special significance. Jesus’ mission was to educate, not redeem.^24/44-45

This was especially evident under the teachings of Gnostics. Gnosticism taught that the spiritual reality is not connected to the physical reality. They are diabolically opposed. In light of this they taught that the demiurge, an intermidiary between God and man, who created the world and man, did it out of ignorance. As a result, man did not fall from perfection, but was created imperfect. Since creation is regarded as evil, anything that comes into being through the reproductive processes is corrupted because it involves the material aspect of man. The end result of this is a division between that which is spiritual and that which is physical. God is not the creator, but an intermediator, the demiurge, who should not have created it in the first place. This teaching depreciated the human reproductive processes. The logical conclusion of this position was that since the Material world is evil, Jesus could not have come in the flesh, but only appeared to have done so; therefore Jesus was not human.

In light of the teaching of Gnosticism, Docetists taught that though Mary was a virgin, she contributed nothing to Jesus, but was transmitted through or by means of Mary, but was not born from or of her. He derived no part of his being from her, but merely passed through her.^58/1.7 Jesus’ appearance of humanity, then, was only a means of revelation, used briefly for the introduction of the eternal into the world.^70/47

Salvation, according to Docetists is a matter of coming to know the gnosis, the higher truth. The work of Christ was primarily revelatory, appealing to those who are of a high or spiritual orientation, and made clear by the special truth possessed by the enlighted (the Gnostics).^70/44-47

Marcion (A.D. 140), a second-century heretic, while admitting that Jesus had a body capable of suffering in some sense, rejected the idea that it was a material body.^59/1-5 Ignatius (A.D. 50-115), Bishop of Antioch, writing against these heresies, wrote that Jesus "was really born and ate and drank, was really persecuted by Pontius Pilate, was really crucified and died. . . [and] really rose from the dead."^60/9

Two historical movements called Dynamic and Modalistic Monarchianism aimed to preserve the uniqueness and greatness of God the Father. Monarchianism is a form of Adoptionism. According to this teaching God put his Spirit upon Jesus, thus adopting Him as the Son, but this did not make Jesus divine. Modalistic Monarchianism did not deny Jesus’ divinitiy. They denied His separate identity from the Father.

Noetus (fl. 200), one of its leaders, held that there is only one God and that the Father suffered in Christ (Patripassianism).^73/2 Hippolytus Summarized the teaching of Modalism: there is one God to which the terms Father and Son can be applied, no moment manifests Himself as Father, Son or Holy Spirit.

Arius (ca. 250-336) believed God is absolutely transcendent, therefore He could not be involved in His creation to the limitation of a body, thus Jesus could not be fully divine.^74/3.8 He further taught that an earthly father precedes his son, so the Heavenly Father preceded Jesus, thus Jesus had a beginning and is not eternal in existence.^75/1.15 In conclusion: Jesus is not of the same substance as His Father. Because Jesus created all else, He is less than the Father, but greater than all else created.^76/198

Emperor Constantine in A.D. 325, in order to settle these disputes, called for The Council of Nicea, A.D. 325. After much debate, they came up with the Nicean Creed which said the following:

We believe in one God, the FATHER Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible.

"What did he just say?" The Nicene Creed taught the following about Jesus:

The Nicene Creed denied:

The Book of Hebrews teaches about Jesus,

"And He is the reflected-brightness of His glory and the exact-image of His essence, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." (Heb 1:3)