Apologetics Courses

But What of the Church Fathers

Did they believe Jesus was divine? Clearly heresy crept into the Church from an early period. There have always been those who have sought to undermine the pure Gospel and have attacked the person of Jesus. They have attacked His birth, His miracles, the efficaciousness of His atoning work, His resurrection etc. The people with these ideas are ever with us even today but through all these attacks there is remarkable consistency between the writings of the Church Fathers.
Ignatius of Antioch, on the Divinity of Christ, calls Jesus God 16 times in 7 letters (ca. 110 AD)
1. “Jesus Christ our God” Eph inscr, Eph 15:3, Eph 18:2, Tral 7, Ro inscr 2x, Ro 3:3, Smyr 10:1.
2. He speaks of Christ’s blood as “God’s blood” Eph 1:1
3. He calls Jesus “God incarnate” Eph 7:2
4. In Jesus “God was revealing himself as a man” Eph 19:3
B. Epistle to Diognetus (ca. 125 AD) speaking of God the Father, he says:
1. Diognetus 7:2 “he sent the Designer and Maker of the universe himself, by whom he created the heavens and confined the sea within its own bounds” (ca. 125 AD)
2. Diognetus 7:4 “He sent him as God; he sent him as man to men.”
C. Melito of Sardis on Christ’s Divinity (d. ca. 190) On the Pasch (Peri Pascha).
1. Translation in Lucien Deiss, ed., Springtime of the Liturgy (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1979), 97-110.
2. Peri Pascha was only discovered in 1940 and published in 1960.
3. he says Christ “rises from the dead as God, being by nature both God and man” (p. 100 in Deiss, physei Theos n kai anthropos).
4. he also has an anti-Gnostic insistence on Christ’s true humanity.
D. Justin Martyr on the Divinity of Christ (c. 155 AD)
1. says that Christians adore and worship the Son as well as the Father. 1st Apology 6.
2. says Christ, the Word incarnate, is divine 1 Apol 10 & 63
E. Irenaeus on Christ’s Divinity (ca. 185) in his work Adversus Haereses (Against Heresies)
1. Of Jesus he says “He is the holy Lord, the Wonderful, the Counselor, the Beautiful in appearance, and the Mighty God, coming on the clouds as the Judge of all men; –all these things did the Scriptures prophesy of Him.” AH III.19.2 (Ante Nicene Fathers 1: 449).
2. “He, therefore who was known, was not a different being from Him who declared, ‘No man knoweth the Father,’ but one and the same, the Father making all things subject to Him; while He received testimony from all that He was very [true] man, and that He was very [true] God, from the Father, from the Spirit, from angels, from the creation itself, from men, from apostate spirits and demons, from the enemy, and last of all, from death itself.” AH, IV, 6,7 (ANF, 469).
Tertullian on the Divinity of Christ (ca. 200)
1. the first use of the Latin word trinitas with reference to God is in Adversus Praxean and De pudicitia. The first to use the term persona in a Trinitarian & christological context asserting in Adv. Praxean 12 that the Logos is distinct from the Father as person and that the HS is the “third person” in the Trinity.”
2. Adv. Praxean 27 states that there are two natures, one human and one divine, which are joined in the one person Jesus Christ.
3. In his Apology 21, speaking of the Word, he says, “we have been taught that he proceeds forth from God, and in that procession He is generated; so that He is the Son of God, and is called God from unity of substance with God. . . . Thus Christ is Spirit of Spirit, and God of God, as light of light is kindled. . . . That which has come forth out of God is at once God and the Son of God, and the two are one. In this way also, as He is Spirit of Spirit and God of God, He is make a second in manner of existence–in position, not in nature. . . .in His birth God and man united.”

There are many more evidences which we could put forward but the point I wish to make, from the information we have gathered here, is that the early Christians believed in the divinity of Christ long before the time of Constantine. True the Nicean creed affirmed the divinity of Christ but this was because it was felt necessary to clarify who Jesus was in the light of the heresies of the day. Whereas we now have the Scriptures to look to for our guide these people lived at a time before we had the final Biblical canon to lead us and guide us. Far from claiming for the first time that Jesus is God the Nicean creed summed up the orthodox teaching of the Church up until that time. Christ was affirmed as God so that there could be no doubt in the mind of the ordinary believer that Jesus really was God and so worthy of praise and worship. It was a defining moment in Church history – what had been taught by both the New Testament writers and the Early Church Fathers was set down as orthodox belief to expose much of the erroneous teaching of that day.

It would seem to me that far from influencing what the Church should believe Constantine sought to help the Church to set down orthodox belief. (I do not wish here to comment on Constantine and his contribution to Church history. There are many questions which could be asked about both his conversion and why he was not baptized as a believer until late in life. In addition although persecution stopped in the Roman Empire after his conversion he did introduce many doubtful practices such as vestments and the interference of the state into the life of the Church). Dan Brown is clearly wrong here and is guilty of false research. Only a brief look at the evidence I have quoted is sufficient for any observer to see the folly of his statement.

The place of Constantine in history: Constantine has always been something of an enigma. Certainly things changed in the Roman Empire after his supposed conversion. Whereas before there had been persecution of Christians this stopped by order of the Emperor. Money from the public purse was made available to the Christians for the rebuilding of the churches destroyed in times of persecution. The emperor called the Council of Nicea and chaired the meetings when the person of Jesus was discussed. On the other hand the Emperor was responsible for bringing vestments into the Church giving a worldly flavour to the worship.

Although persecution stopped the church did lose its` cutting edge as a result of the changes Constantine brought about. His own conversion is somewhat dubious since he was not baptized until very late on in his supposed Christian life.

Shaye ID Cohen Professor of Religious Studies at Brown University has this to say “One of the most surprising Christian heroes in the entire tradition, I think, is Constantine. He is, first of all, a successful general. He is also the son of a successful general and at the head of the army at the West. And he’s fighting another successful general, struggling for who is going to be at the top of the heap of the very higher echelons of Roman government. What happens is that Constantine has a vision.

Luckily for the Church, there’s a bishop nearby to interpret what the vision means. Constantine ends not converting, technically, to Christianity, but becoming a patron of one particular branch of the church. It happens to be the branch of the church that has the Old Testament as well as the New Testament as part of its canon. Which means that since this branch of Christianity includes the story about historical Israel as part of its own redemptive history, it has an entire language for articulating the relationship of government and piety. It has the model of King David. It has the model of the kings of Israel. And it’s with this governmental model that the bishop explains the vision to Constantine.

In a sense Constantine becomes the embodiment of the righteous king. And once he consolidates his power by conquering, eventually, not only the West, but also the Greek East where there are many more Christians [who are] concentrated in the cities, which are the social power packets of this culture, [he] is in this amazing position of having a theology of government that he can use to consolidate his own secular power. And it works both ways. The bishops now have basically federal funding to have sponsored committee meetings so they can try to iron out creeds and get everybody to sign up.” Although we cannot agree with this statement in its` entirety it does show a perspective on what happened in the Roman empire following Constantine`s vision of the cross and the words “in this sign conquer”. The crucial question to ask here, however, is did Constantine up grade the status of Jesus for political purposes? Here we need to observe the following:-

The early Christians both saw Jesus as God and worshipped Him as such. The problem was that there were many heretical views of the person of Jesus which needed addressing and this was one of the main reasons for the council of Nicea. It is important to be reminded of Colossians 1 v 16
For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. and John 1 v 3
Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made..
In addition we need to consider Psalm 102 vv 25 – 27
In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. Like clothing you will change them and they will be discarded.
But you remain the same, and your years will never end. and the fulfilment in Hebrews 1 vv 10 – 12
He also says, “In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end.”

So we see that the New Testament writers and the early church fathers fully accepted the deity of Christ.

a. The early church leaders saw Jesus as divine as we have sought to show above.

b. Constantine called the conference of Nicea not to bring about his own teaching but to bring about an acceptance in the Church of the orthodox teaching about Jesus. The Council met in 325AD to settle the disputes in the Church regarding the nature of Christ especially to face the heretical teaching of the Arians who argued that the Son was created from the non existent and was of a different substance than the Father. Arius was a persuasive person and many were confused by his teachings so that disharmony and division resulted. It was to deal with this that Constantine called the council not to “up grade Jesus”. In orthodox teaching Jesus was already set at the highest point of all but Arianism had begun to think of him differently. When the Council decided on the creed of Nicea it was to uphold the view, put forward by Athanasius, that the Son was the same substance of the Father and so fully divine. The Bishops voted on the issue with the votes cast being 300 to 2. It was not that Constantine decided anything, nor did he influence the voting to “up grade” Jesus.

Early Christian belief regarding Jesus and original sin: If all people have original sin and Jesus was a human being, then didn’t Jesus need to have had a sin nature?

Before we can answer this question, we need to know what the term “original sin” means. This is a term used to describe the effect of Adam’s sin on his descendants. In Romans 5 vv 12 ff we read

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come. But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous. The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning, so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?

Here Paul refers to the sinful nature we receive from Adam in order to then give teaching about our new nature in Christ.The sinful nature originated with Adam and is passed down from parent to child. We are by nature children of wrath as Paul teaches in Ephesians 3 v 2. But if we inherit our sinful nature from our parents. Did Jesus, who had Mary as a parent, have a sin nature? This does not follow logically from the above. In Biblical teaching the sin nature is passed down through the father. Support for this position is found in the fact that sin entered the world through Adam, not Eve. Eve was the one who sinned first. However, sin did not enter the world through her.

It entered through Adam. Romans 5 v 12 says, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.” The concept behind this is called Federal Headship. This means that a person (a father) represents his descendants. We see this concept taught in Hebrews 7 vv 9, 10, “And, so to speak, through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes, 10for he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.” We see in Hebrews that Levi, a distant descendant of Abraham, is said to have paid tithes to Melchizedek when Abraham was the one offering the tithes, not Levi. What this means is that there is biblical support for the idea that the sin nature was passed down through the father.

Since Jesus had not literal, biological father, the sin nature was not passed down to Him. However, since He had a human mother, he was fully human but without original sin. Jesus has two natures: God and man. Colossians 2 v 9 says, “For in Him dwells all the fullness of deity in bodily form.” Jesus received His human nature from Mary, but He received His divine nature through God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, Jesus is both God and man. He was sinless, had no original sin, and was both fully God and fully man.
So belief in the virgin birth is crucial for Christian thinking about Jesus. It was a miracle. It was God`s action upon the body of Mary and meant that Jesus was born with Mary as His mother and the Holy Spirit as His “biological” father. This is very difficult for us to grasp with our finite minds but it is God`s truth and necessary for us to gain a true understanding of the person of Jesus. We shall see that this is an important issue in our consideration of the next point.

Did Jesus have sexual relations with Mary leading to a great cover up? The issue here is important in the light of the statements Brown made about Jesus and Mary. Following are some of the quotes from the book:-
“The marriage of Jesus to Mary is part of the historical record”, “The Last supper practically shouts at the viewer that Jesus and Mary were a pair”, then using the Gospel of Philip as his source Brown asserts that “the companion of the Saviour is Mary Magdalene. Christ loved her more than all the disciples and used to kiss her often on the mouth. The rest of the disciples were offended by it and expressed disapproval….”

When we look carefully at the evidence here we have to say that there is no mention of Jesus being married prior to his 3 year ministry nor yet during his three year ministry. At the crucifixion no “wife” is in evidence but to the contrary the mother of Jesus is placed into the hands of John the Apostle to look after her (Probably because Joseph had died earlier and Jesus was Mary`s eldest son). So there is a strong argument from silence here.

There is also evidence which we can deduce from theological arguments. In 1 Corinthians 9 v 5 Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas? Paul argues that he has the right to be married if he so chose. If Jesus had been married then surely Paul would have used Him as a precedent for marriage himself. After all he does mention the other Apostles here. The indication would seem to be that Jesus was not married.

The third issue that deserves our consideration is the precedent that Jewish men were expected to get married. This may be so but we need to remember both that Jesus was a special case – Had he have married then there would probably be people around today who could trace their ancestry back to the sinless Son of God. Also a number of the prophets were unmarried such as Jeremiah and John the Baptist. The Essene community at Qumran were an unmarried community. Also the Jewish leaders granted exceptions to the general rule of marriage. Finally we need to note that when Jesus spoke of marriage He spoke of it in the future – when He will return for His bride the Church.

Although this is strong evidence it is not conclusive. Brown quotes the Gnostic Gospel of Philip as evidence and this deserves consideration. First the Gospel does not state that Jesus was married. Second the document dates at about 275 AD years after the time of writing of the Synoptic Gospels and John. For this reason we cannot accept it as a reliable first evidence for the life of Jesus. Thirdly Brown puts this as having been written in Aramaic but in fact it was written in Greek. Fourthly the manuscript is not complete. It is true that the document states that Jesus kissed her often on the …. But here there is a break and people have assumed that the missing word was mouth. There is, however, nothing to suggest that the missing word should be mouth. Fifthly there is reference to the disciples criticising Jesus for attention to Mary. Surely if Jesus had been married to her these criticisms would have been out of order.

One final issue needs to be considered. The novel speaks of the painting by Leonardo Da Vinci of the Last Supper in which we have Mary on the right hand of Jesus not John. It is true that the figure does look effeminate but this is in keeping with other paintings of the artist. He does depict John the Baptist in a similar way in another painting. What is interesting however is that in neither painting are the bodies of these people shown – that would have given proof positive one way or the other. In view of the sexual orientation of the painter I would seem to me that we are stretching the point too far to say that the painter had put Mary in the position which should have been taken by John.

We must now look at the final question – Did Jesus have a sexual relationship with Mary?

There is no trustworthy evidence in any of the ancient documents that tells us Jesus had sex. He had a bit to say about sex, and we have that written in the Gospels (the part of the Bible which records Jesus’ life and teachings). Here are a few examples of his teachings:

Jesus: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery’. But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (from Matthew 5:27).
Jesus: “What God has joined together, let not man separate”. (Matthew 19:6)

You can see from these quotes that Jesus took sex seriously – it wasn’t ‘cheap and easy’ as it sometimes is for people today. As a Jew, Jesus followed the teachings of the Old Testament, which taught him that men and women are made for each other, and sex belongs in marriage. There is no reason to think that he wouldn’t have taken this ancient instruction in God’s ways seriously.

Would it matter if Jesus had sex? It’s a hypothetical question, so we can’t pretend we know the answer to it. Nevertheless, we can say that Jesus would have seen nothing wrong with sex between a man and woman in marriage. God created life that way. In the first book of the Bible, Genesis, we are told that “a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24).

Christianity and some other faiths do teach that Jesus was fully human. He was just like us, with flesh and blood and all the desires that come along with it. But Christians believe that Jesus behaved in a way that pleased God. He could hold his head high when it came to sex. There aren’t any skeletons in his closet.

Which brings us to the claims of the Da Vinci Code. Robert Langdon claims that “Historically, intercourse was the act through which male and female experienced God. By communing with woman, man could achieve a climactic instant when his mind went totally blank and he could see God.”

This might possibly be true where God is a kind of ‘nothingness’. But there aren’t many religions that think so. Most religions teach that God is a being or spirit who can be encountered, who speaks, who does things and interacts with the world. To say that we find God in the ‘emptiness’ of orgasm (at least, male orgasm) is pretty unconvincing. Furthermore, Dan Brown’s novel claims that Jesus had sex with Mary Magdalene, and they produced a child called Sarah. It is important to remember that the book is just a novel. The idea that Jesus and Mary had a family together makes for a great story. That’s reason enough to suggest it.

Another intention of the novel seems to be to rescue Mary Magdalene from the claim that she was a prostitute. Some Christian traditions in the Middle Ages did teach that she was a “scarlet woman”, probably the unnamed woman referred to in Luke 7:36-50. but this is not accepted by all scholars today and even if it was we have to ask why the author wanted to champion her cause?

Dan Brown’s main goal seems to be to emphasise the humanity of Jesus, and to make women more important to Christian spirituality. The Da Vinci Code isn’t going to achieve it by playing loosely with history so that people can’t really find out who the real Jesus and the real Mary Magdalene are.

The most reliable information on both of them is still the pages of the New Testament. It is clear that there is little contrary evidence outside the New Testament for the ideas put forward by Dan Brown. The sad thing is that he has written a book that has caused many to think again about the Christian faith – in one way this is a good thing but in another he is using history too lightly and persuading people that it is possible to believe the lies he is putting forward about both Jesus and Mary.

CONCLUSION:

It has been my intention to show that there is no historical, theological or moral grounds for believing the claims of the Da Vinci Code. The important task for the Christian is to present the truth as I have tried to portray it here. Once a book like this has been published, a film made about it and the book publishers have done their work it is hard to counteract the claims of the book.

In the end, however, we believe that truth is stronger than fiction. That as we present the contrary evidence for the real Jesus people will begin to see that Jesus is who He says He is and that the claims He makes for Himself and for the message He came to proclaim are worth considering. A sinless, perfect Jesus was the only one who could offer a perfect sacrifice to God for the sins of man. Faith in this spotless son of God is the way we can receive eternal salvation. He is worthy of our worship. He is worthy of our trust and confidence in Him for salvation. He is the Lord of the Church who will come again to the earth for His bride the Church, to take believers into the very presence of a holy and all powerful God.

The Jesus of the Bible attested to by the faith of the early church fathers and millions of faithful believers down through the centuries is the one in whom we can trust, the one whom we can depend upon. He is not a liar, He is not a deceiver. He is the One who gave Himself in love for us and taught a morality which is far superior to any found elsewhere. The novel was a good read, it was a page turner but it is fiction through and through. There are no true claims in the book. Rather we conclude with the words of Christians in the early Church which still ring out through the church of the twenty first century – Jesus is Lord. Maranatha come Lord Jesus.