The Reassessment of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology: A Relational Perspective

The Reassessment of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology:

A Relational Perspective

By

Timothy Ching Lung LAM

A Term Paper Submitted to Ms. Eppie Y.M. WONG of

Alliance Bible Seminary

in Partial Fulfillment of the

Requirements for the Course of

CH512-E: Church History I

Summer 2005

Timothy Ching Lung LAM

Student ID Number: D023111

September 23, 2005

Contents

I. INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................1

II. CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA’S CHRISTOLOGY ......................................................2

A. DEFINITION OF “HYPOSTATIC UNION” ...........................................................................2 B. THE OLD TESTAMENT IMAGES FOR HYPOSTATIC UNION ..............................................3

(1) The Ark of the Covenant............................................................................................4 (2) The Burning Bush......................................................................................................4

III. CRITIQUES AGAINST CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA’S CHRISTOLOGY............5

A. APOLLINARIANISM ........................................................................................................5 B. LOGOS-SARX CHRISTOLOGY .........................................................................................6 C. TERTIUM QUID ...............................................................................................................7 D. DEFICIENCIES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT IMAGES ........................................................8

IV. THE REASSESSMENT OF CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA’S CHRISTOLOGY .....8

A. ADAM-CHRIST TYPOLOGY............................................................................................8 B. TRINITARIAN ADAM-CHRIST TYPOLOGY ...................................................................11

V. CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................14

BIBLIOGRAPHY.................................................................................................................... I

The Reassessment of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology: A Relational Perspective

Church History I Page 1 By Timothy Ching Lung LAM

I. Introduction

According to Gregory of Nazianzus, “the unassumed is the unhealed,” and therefore Jesus

should have assumed our fallen, sinful and alienated humanity in order to be a truly man to heal

us.1 However, it appears to be logically impossible for the unity of the fallen humanity and the

divinity in the one Person of Jesus. Stressing on either sides or synthesizing the two would result

in a formation of heresy as witnessed throughout history such as Docetism, Apollinarianism,

Eutychianism, etc.

Following Gregory’s thinking of Christ’s assumption of our fallen humanity, Cyril of

Alexandria developed his unique Christology, namely, “hypostatic union” in order to demonstrate

the Word united hypostatically with true human nature.2 However, many theologians in history

accused Cyril’s Christology threatened its continuity with the whole human race for “hypostatic

union” suggests a type of humanity different from ours. Accordingly, it appears theoretically

incorrect for Cyril’s “hypostatic union” (though declared orthodoxy by the Council of Ephesus),

which would result in inefficacy of the redemption to the human race leading to the collapse of the

entire Gospel.

Despite the above critiques, Cyril’s Christology still offers a useful way of understanding how

the true humanity is hypostatically united by the Word while maintaining the relatedness of Jesus’

humanity to our humanity if we take a closer look at his Christology using a relational perspective.

In this respect, this paper will reassess Cyril’s classical theological concepts of “hypostatic union”

supplemented with a relational understanding of his “Adam-Christ Typology” as well as his

Trinitarian perspectives mainly based on his letters to Nestorius as well as his exegetical writings

in order to affirm the full humanity of Jesus in relation to our humanity.

1 R.S. Wallace and G. L Green, “Christology,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell

(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House Company, May 1990), 242. 2 G.D.D., “Cyril of Alexandria,” in New Dictionary of Theology, eds. Sinclair B. Ferguson and David F. Wright

(Illinois: Inter-Varsity Press, 1988), 185. Also, see C.A. Blaising, “Hypostatic Union,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 540.



II. Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology

A. Definition of “Hypostatic Union”

For Cyril, the one person (“hypostasis”) of Christ’s incarnate being has two natures

(“physeis”), namely divinity and humanity, united in what he has referred to as a “hypostatic

union.”3 In his first two letters to Nestorius, Cyril clearly stated his definition of this

hypostatic union as follows:

First Letter of Cyril of Alexandria to Nestorius4

Second Letter of Cyril of Alexandria to Nestorius5

Ontological Union

“the Word having Personally (hypostatically) united to Himself...”

“the Word…united to Himself hypostatically..”

True Humanity with Flesh Ensouled

“…flesh ensouled with reasonable soul…” “…flesh enlivened by a rational soul…”

Ineffable Union

“…unspeakably and incomprehensibly…” “…in an unspeakable, inconceivable manner…”

Humanity not by God’s will alone nor by assuming a person alone

“…was made Man and was called son of man not in respect of favour only or good pleasure, nor yet by appendage of person only…”

“…and so became man and was called son of man, not by God’s will alone or good pleasure, nor by the assumption of a person alone.”

One Reality with Two Distinct Natures after the Union

“…and that the natures which are gathered together unto Very Union are diverse, yet One Christ and Son of Both, not as though the diversity of natures were taken away because of the Union, but rather that the Godhead and Manhood make up One Lord and Son through their unspeakable and ineffable coming together into Unity.”

“Rather did two different natures come together to form a unity, and from both arose one Christ, one Son. It was not as though the distinctness of the natures was destroyed by the union, but divinity and humanity together made perfect for us one Lord and one Christ, together marvelously and mysteriously combining to form a unity.”

3 This was famously contended by Cyril of Alexandria and that he had used the term, “physis” almost in the same

manner as “hypostasis” for the one being of Christ. See G.D.D., “Cyril of Alexandria,” in New Dictionary of Theology, 185.

4 Cyril of Alexandria, “First Letter of St. Cyril of Alexandria to Nestorius,” edited and translated by Pusey, P.E.. The St. Pachomius Orthodox Library, http://www.voskrese.info/spl/cyr1.html; accessed 12 July 2005.

5 Cyril of Alexandria, “Second Letter of Cyril to Nestorius,” ed. Norman P. Tanner, http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum03.htm; accessed 12 July 2005.



Based on the above, five aspects of Cyril’s hypostatic union can be summarized as follows:

1. Hypostatic union affirms one hypostasis or person of Jesus Christ, which rules out

Nestorius’ notion of conjunction union between the two natures for it suggested two

persons of Christ.6

2. Hypostatic union is beyond human comprehension (“unspeakable”).

3. Hypostatic union affirms human nature’s dependent personal subsistence in the Word

which guards against all forms of Adoptionism.7

4. Hypostatic union assures all the essentials attributes of humanity that Christ possesses

as a truly and wholly man with “flesh ensouled with a reasonable soul.”

5. Hypostatic union affirms the inseparable distinctness of the two natures united in One

Christ while preserving their own characteristic properties “without confusion, without

change, without division, (and) without separation” as set forth officially by the

Council of Chalcedon.8

In short, Cyril asserted that Christ did have two distinct natures united ontologically to form

one reality without destroying the distinctness of the two natures.9

B. The Old Testament Images for Hypostatic Union

In order to demonstrate the very concept of his hypostatic union, Cyril employed images

6 H. Griffith, “Nestorius, Nestorianism,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand

Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House Company, May 1990), 759. Actually, Cyril condemned Nestorius in his famous “Twelve Anathemas” subjoined to his third letter to Nestorius that “if anyone divides in the one Christ the hypostases after the union, joining them only by a conjunction of dignity or authority or power, and not rather by a coming together in a union by nature, let him be anathema.” See Cyril of Alexandria, “Third Letter of Cyril to Nestorius,” ed. Norman P. Tanner, http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum03.htm; accessed 12 July 2005.

7 Blaising, “Hypostatic Union,”540. 8 Ivor Davidson, “Theologizing the Human Jesus: An Ancient (and Modern) Approach to Christology

Reassessed,” International Journal of Systematic Theology, Vol. 3 No. 2 (July 2001): 135. 9 In fact, Cyril repeatedly affirmed this assertion in his later epistles even after the schism arising from his

conflicts with Nestorius. For example, in his letter to John of Antioch about peace, he said, the Word “is now understood to be one with his own flesh, and he was therefore been designated the man from heaven, being both perfect in godhead and perfect in humanity and thought of as in one person. For there is one lord Jesus Christ, even though we do not ignore the difference of natures, out of which we saw that the ineffable union was effected.” See Cyril of Alexandria, “Letter of Cyril to John of Antioch about Peace.” ed. Norman P. Tanner, http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum03.htm; accessed 12 July 2005. Similar assertion could also be found in “the Formula of Reunion between Cyril and John of Antioch. Cyril said, “He (God the Word) is also called the Man from heaven, being perfect in his Divinity and perfect in his Humanity, and considered as in one Person. For one is the Lord Jesus Christ, although the difference of his natures is not unknown, from which we say the ineffable union was made.” See Cyril of Alexandria, “The ‘Formula of Reunion’ between Cyril and John of Antioch: Epistle 39 of the Cyrilline Corpus,” ed Norman P. Tanner, http://www.monachos.net/patristics/christology/cyril_johnantioch.shtml; accessed 20 July 2005.



from the Old Testament as illustrations for the Logos of God entering a hypostatic union with

humanity as set out below:

(1) The Ark of the Covenant

For Cyril, the Ark of the Covenant served as a good analogy to describe the union of

the two natures without confusion of the two. He noticed that the Ark was “made out of

imperishable wood, and covered with pure gold both inside and out.” 10 Similarly, Jesus

has the “incorruptible body” covered with the “pre-eminence of the divine nature.”11

Although the Ark was composed of the two different natures, the attributes of the two

remained unchanged and that wood and gold were not confused with each other. So did

the two different natures of Jesus Christ, albeit united to form one Christ and one Son, had

preserved their own characteristic properties without confusion.

(2) The Burning Bush

Another Old Testament image utilized by Cyril was the Burning Bush Narrative, which

was used to demonstrate that the hypostatic union was an impossible act of God uniting the

two natures without consuming the human nature by the divine nature.12 The Burning

Bush story was narrated in Exodus 3:2~3 and that God appeared to Moses “in flames of fire

from within a bush” while the bush did not burn up even on fire. For Cyril, the bush was

of wood nature, which should be consumed by the fire easily under the natural order. On

the other hand, the fire itself could not sustain burning without the “fuel” provided by the

bush if the bush was not being consumed. In this regard, the bush and the fire, by their

respective natures, could not be united together without destroying the other’s attributes.

However, the Burning Bush in Exodus narrative proved that God made the impossible

possible. Same as the hypostatic union that the human nature could easily be “consumed”

by the divine nature, but it turned out the two natures remaining “unconsumed” by the act of

God.13

10 Steven A McKinion, “Cyril of Alexandria, The Old Testament, and Images of Christ For The Church,”

Theological Research Exchange Network (TREN): Conference Papers (2000): 11. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid, 11-12. 13 Ibid.



III. Critiques against Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology

Notwithstanding that the hypostatic union affirms the doctrine of the two natures possessed in

the one Person of Jesus, there are indeed some problems with it.

A. Apollinarianism

As Cyril employed ‘mia physis’ (one nature) formula to speak of Christ being “one nature

of God the Word incarnate and one person of God the Word in (from) two natures,”14

Nestorius considered Cyril’s Christology as a sophisticated form of Apollinarianism, which

contended the Logos assuming flesh without human soul.15 For Nestorius, Cyril’s notion of

‘mia physis’ formula would result in the destruction of the human nature and that the

impassible divine nature would actually suffer what the passible human nature suffers. In his

words,

“They confuse his divine and his human (qualities), saying that the union with

flesh resulted in one nature…even as the soul and the body are bound

(together) in one nature in the body, suffering of necessity, whether he will or

not, the sufferings of the nature which he took upon himself, as though he was

not of the nature of the Father impassible and without needs….He hungered

and thirsted and grew weary and feared and fled and died; and in short they

say that he naturally endured whatever appertained to the sensible nature

which he assumed.”16

Accordingly, Cyril’s ‘mia physis’ formula apparently did not rescue himself from being

accused as an Apollinarianist, which jeopardized the true humanity of Jesus Christ in relation

to our humanity.

14 G.D.D., “Cyril of Alexandria,” in New Dictionary of Theology, 185. 15 Roger E. Olson, The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition (Downers Grove, Illinois:

InterVarsity Press, 1999), 214. 16 C.R. Driver and L. Hodgson, eds., The Bazaar of Heracleides (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1925), 8-9 quoted in

Thomas Weinandy and Daniel A. Keating, eds., The Theology of St. Cyril of Alexandria: A Critical Appreciation (London & New York: T. & T. Clark, 2003), 34.



B. Logos-sarx Christology

As an Alexandrian, Cyril’s Christology was often regarded as Logos-sarx Christology,

as Aloys Grillmeier contended, in which Christ possessed a passive human soul.17 For

Grillmeier, Cyril attributed the psychological suffering to the sarx (flesh) of Christ, which is

considered as an unanimated body.

Such designation was apparently misleading and that Lawrence Welch, in his lengthy

paper, defended against Grillmeier that Cyril did not refer the word, “sarx” to an unanimated

corporeality, but rather a completed humanity consisting of body and soul.18 For example,

Welch, based on Cyril’s Thesaurus, proved that Christ, who possessed a true humanity, was

afflicted with the same passion as all humans were afflicted such as fear, sad, and troubled in

order to free humans from “psychic passions in and through his own human soul.”19

Although Welch demonstrated Christ possessing a real human soul in Cyril’s thought,

Wolfhart Pannenberg disagreed and argued that Cyril did not overcome the problem of

Logos-sarx Christology.20 In his words, “human nature, even if a soul now belongs to it, was

for Cyril…only the “garment” of the Logos.”21 His argument was mainly based on Cyril’s

hypostatic union which led to a problem of Christ possessing a human nature without its own

hypostasis (“anhypostatic humanity”).22 As a result, Christ, for Pannenberg, cannot be

conceived as “a real, individual man….” 23 Roger Olsen also shared this view that

anhypostatic humanity suggested “either Christ did not have a human personal center of

consciousness and will or less it was inactive.24

In short, the anhypostatic and passive humanity of Christ, within Cyril’s Christology

framework, is apparently different from ours, and hence hinders its relatedness to the human

race and threatens the efficacy of Christ’s salvation through His incarnation.

17 Lawrence J, Welch, “Logos-Sarx? Sarx and the Soul of Christ In the Early Thought Of Cyril of Alexandria,” St

Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 38 no 3 (1994): 271-272. 18 Ibid, 278, 281. 19 Ibid, 280. 20 Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus-God and Man, translated by Duane A.Priebe and Lewis L.Wilkins (Philadelphia:

The Westminster Press, 1964), 288. 21 Ibid, 289. 22 Ibid. 23 Ibid, 291. 24 Roger E. Olson, The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition, (Downers Grove, Illinois:

InterVarsity Press, 1999), 218-219.



C. Tertium Quid

Besides the above challenges, Cyril’s hypostatic union in terms of ‘mia physis’ formula

has also been criticized for it, as Nestorius believed, would lead to “the danger of destroying

the distinctive character of the natures by absorbing them into one title of Son.”25 As a result,

the two natures united to espouse one nature meant that Jesus was neither human nor divine,

but rather “a tertium quid” (a third nature). 26 As Nestorius accused,

“You [Cyril] do not confess that he is God in ousia in that you have changed

him into the ousia of the flesh, and he is no more a man naturally in that you

have made him the ousia of God; and he is not God truly or God by nature,

nor yet man truly or man by nature.”27

Thomas Weinady disagreed with Nestorius and argued that Cyril’s ‘mia physis’ formula

was used to illustrate the Son of God hypostatically united to the humanity to form “one

reality of Jesus” instead of a quiddity.28 His argument was based on a parallelism used by

Cyril to demonstrate the similarity of hypostatic union to human soul/body union. For Cyril,

humanity and divinity form one ontological reality of Jesus in the same manner as the

ontological reality of human being formed by soul and body.29

Having said that, one reality of Jesus out of two natures did not safeguard the threat of

forming a tertium quid as hypostatic union implied anhypostatic humanity, a type of humanity

different from ours, i.e. “impersonality” as challenged by J.A.T. Robinson and D.

Bonhoeffer.30 Again, Cyril’s hypostatic union appears not only risking the authenticity of

Jesus’ humanity as a person, but it also threatens the continuity of His humanity with the rest

of the human race.

25 Nestorius. “Second Letter of Nestorius to Cyril.” ed. Norman P. Tanner,

http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum03.htm; accessed 12 July 2005. 26 Weinandy and Keating, 32-33. 27 Liber Heraclidis. ET The Bazaar of Heracleides, ed. C.R. Driver and L. Hodgson (Oxford: Clarendon Press,

1925), 16 quoted in ibid, 33. 28 Weinandy and Keating, 33. 29 Ibid. 30 Davidson, 136.



D. Deficiencies of the Old Testament Images

Although the Ark of the Covenant does give us a better understanding on how the two

natures were united without confusion of the two, it could not guard itself from Nestorian

dualism error of the two persons adjoined in one reality. For Cyril, he rejected the

conjunction of the two persons for “we do not worship a human being in conjunction with the

Logos. The one Lord Jesus Christ must not be divided into two Sons.”31 However, this

illustration suggested two realities, namely wood (humanity) and gold (divinity) conjunct in

one reality of the Ark. Furthermore, the imperishable wood covered with pure gold

suggested the divinity being only the ‘garment’ of Jesus which denies a true union of the two.

Like the Ark of the Covenant, the analogy of the Burning Bush narrative also has its

deficiency. In fact, the latter is better than the former as it appears to avoid the conjunction

of the fire and the bush for the fire has no subsistence in and of itself as it subsists only in the

consumption of the bush. Therefore, the Burning Bush Narrative apparently affirms the

hypostatic union of the two natures while maintaining the distinctiveness of the two without

confusion. Nonetheless, the ‘fire’ denoting the divinity should not be anhypostatic;

otherwise, it suggests the divinity hypostatized in the humanity.

Accordingly, what the notion of these two analogies is intended to illustrate is not so

much as what it fails to say.

IV. The Reassessment of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology

A. Adam-Christ Typology

Recapitulating the above challenges, the major deficiency of Cyrillian hypostatic union is

the relatedness of Christ’s anhypostatic humanity to all mankind. To respond to this problem,

Cyril’s Adam-Christ Typology provides us an insight to reassess His hypostatic union from a

relational perspective. Robert Wilken noted from Cyril’s exegetic writings that Cyril used his

“Adam-Christ Typology” to affirm the relatedness of Jesus’ true humanity to us and that God

sent Christ the second Adam standing in a similar position in relation to the whole human race

31 Stefanos Alexopoulos, “An Example of Ecclesial Reconciliation in the Early Church: Three Homilies by Paul

of Emesa and Cyril of Alexandria.” St Vladimir's Theological Quarterly 45 No 4 (2001): 343-344.



as did the first Adam.32 For Cyril, this typology expressed his soteriological concern and that

all mankind died in the first Adam, but were transformed into life in Christ. As he said,

“Since our forefather Adam, who was turned aside by deceit to disobedience

and sin did not preserve the grace of the Spirit, and thus in him the whole

nature eventually lost the good given it by God, it was necessary that God

the Word, who does not change, become man, in order that by receiving as

man he might preserve the good permanently to our nature.”33

But how are we linked up to Christ the second Adam? Here, Cyril’s notion of

hypostatic union helps explain this relatedness as he said,

“For in him the community of human nature rises up to his person; for this

reason he was named the last Adam giving richly to the common nature of all

things that belong to joy, and glory, even as the first Adam (gave) what

belongs to corruption and dejection.”34

With the concept of hypostatic union in mind, Christ, as the second Adam, linked up our

humanity to His fate, and we could say that, for Cyril, Christ’s humanity, albeit anhypostatic,

was hypostatized (personalized) by the Word (or what Leontius of Byzantium referred to as

“enhypostasis”), 35 and thus, we, as human being, were linked to his fate and also

hypostatized (personalized) in Him .

32 Robert L. Wilken, “Exegesis and the History of Theology: Reflections on the Adam-Christ Typology in Cyril

of Alexandria,” Church History 35 (Je 1966): 145. 33 In Joannem ii.1 (John 1: 32, 33), Pusey I, 179 (20-23) quoted in Ibid, 150 34 In Joannem 1.9, Pusey, I, 141 quoted in Ibid, 144. 35 F. LeRon Shults, “A Dubious Christological Formula: From Leontius of Byzantium to Karl Barth,”

Theological Studies, Vol. 57, Issue 3 (Sep. 96): 431.



Although Cyril’s employment of the Old Testament images failed to explain his profound

concept of hypostatic union, the following diagram may help understand it: -

Assuming that the divine nature of Jesus is represented by a rectangle (without color)

while the human nature is represented by a color of purple without any shape, the two together

are united in a purple rectangle. What this diagram is driving at is that the color, purple, has

no independent form or shape in and of itself apart from the “unifying” purple rectangle,

which denotes the human nature that has no independent subsistence apart from the event of

incarnation. In the purple rectangle, the two natures, purple and rectangle, are united without

suffering any loss or change of their respective attributes through relation to the other. In

other words, the one purple rectangle (i.e. the one Person of Jesus) possesses both the two

natures of purple and rectangle (i.e. humanity and divinity) without confusion, without change,

without division, and without separation.

Although one may challenge that the rectangle has been altered from the state of

transparency to purple, it should be noted that the nature of a rectangle is merely a figure itself

without mentioning of any color at all; otherwise, it would then possess two natures, i.e. figure

and color. With the aid of this diagram, not only is Cyril’s hypostatic union affirmed, but

also is the relatedness of our human nature to Christ’s humanity.

Nevertheless, one may argue how Christ, as the second Adam, did not fall subject to sin if

He assumed the fallen humanity liked ours. As such, Jesus cannot be conceived as “a real,

individual man, but from the very beginning a superman, the God-man,” as argued by

hypostatized

Human Nature

= Anhypostasis

Divine Nature

The Incarnate Son of God as

the Second Adam

The Hypostatic Union of the Two

Natures

Figure 1



Pannenberg.36 To tackle this, Cyril’s Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology offers a useful way

of understanding how Christ possessed a true humanity in relation to our humanity, which will

be discussed in the next session.

B. Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology

In his third letter to Nestorius, Cyril demonstrated a matter of relationality in Trinitarian

language, i.e. how our humanity is restored through His self-sacrificial dedication to the Father

through His own Spirit. Cyril contended that the one Lord Jesus Christ who “works through

His own Spirit…became the high priest and apostle of our confession…,” offered Himself for

“an odor of sweetness to the God and Father” and that “the confession of faith we make to

Him and through Him to the God and Father and also to the Holy Spirit.”37

For Cyril, the Son of God “became the mediator between God and humanity,”38 and that,

the only begotten Son became the “partaker of flesh and blood” so as to restore the humanity

by rendering it through Himself “a partaker of God the Father” and consequently, human race

could be reckoned as sons.39 In order to explain this very concept of reciprocal partaking,

Cyril said that Christ, precisely in His earthly life, became our perfect representative who

assumed our fallen place, and in return, give us His Sonship with God the Father by offering

His perfect sacrificial dedication to God as a real man who “experienced every characteristic

except sin alone.”40 As a result, our sonship in God the Father is constituted through the

mediation of the Son of God.

But how could Christ live His earthly life without committed a sin? The answer for

Cyril would be the Holy Spirit. Daniel Keating noticed from Cyril’s exposition in the event

of Jesus’ Baptism that “the Spirit did not merely descend upon Him, but importantly has

remained (a perfect tenses) upon Him.”41 Accordingly, Jesus lived out His entire earthly life

with true human responses empowered by His own Spirit. It should be noted that this Spirit

36 Pannenberg, 291. 37 Cyril of Alexandria, “Third Letter of Cyril to Nestorius,” ed. Norman P. Tanner,

http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum03.htm; accessed 12 July 2005. 38 Ibid. 39 Weinandy and Keating, 24-25. 40 Ibid, 27. 41 Ibid, 153.



was not alienated to Christ “for the Spirit is proper to the Son, not something given from

outside…”42

However, the question is how Christ received the Spirit for us? In his Commentary on

John, Cyril contended:

“For all of humanity was in Christ, in that he was human. So, too, his own

Spirit is said to be given again to the Son who possess him, so that we, in him,

might received the Spirit for ourselves.”

In this respect, the soteriological concern of anhypostatic union of Christ came into view

and that the aim of the hypostatic union of the two natures in one reality of Christ was to make

possible the preservation of the Spirit in humanity. So when Christ received the Spirit, it was

not for Himself, but for us:

“in order to preserve for human nature the grace which was lost (in the first

Adam), by receiving this grace as a man, and in order to make it take root in us

again…so that the Spirit might grow accustomed to dwell in us, without having

the occasion to withdraw.”43

Although the first Adam lost the gift of the Spirit breathed from God as described in

Genesis 2:7, the second Adam gave back to the human race His Spirit so as to sanctify our

whole nature as stated in John 20:2. 44 In light of this, the presence of the Spirit in the

incarnate Word helped refine Cyril’s Adam-Christ Typology which constituted the condition

for the possibility of human access to God. As a result, our humanity is restored through the

reciprocal relationship between the Son and the Spirit for the Son is both the giver and

recipient of the Spirit. Marie-Odile Boulnois concluded it well that the Spirit “is the one who

makes possible this union of mankind with mankind and of mankind with God, as well as

being the one who perfects the Trinity.”45 Most profoundly she stated was the divine plan,

which was aimed to bring back the whole human race into participation in the very life of the

42 In Jo. 7:39 (Pusey Vol. I, 692-3), quoted in ibid, 137. 43 Ibid, 106. 44 Wilken, 151. 45 Ibid, 110.



Trinity through the gift of the Spirit.46 In this regard, Cyrillian hypostatic union and

Adam-Christ Typology should not be viewed as Christological matter only, but should also be

extended to the doctrine of Trinity in relation to human reality as in the context of soteriology.

To integrate the above concepts, a schematic presentation in respect of a relational model

of Cyrillian hypostatic union and the Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology could be illustrated as

follows:-

In this diagram, the three Persons of the Trinity are represented by three adjoined

“seven”-shaped figures distinguished by their respective colors and that the blue one depicts

for the Person of the Father, the purple for the Son, and the green for the Spirit.47 In regard to

Figure 1, the same principle can be applied to this purple “seven”-shaped figure illustrating

that the color of purple has no hypostasis in and of itself (anhypostasis) apart from the purple

figure (enhypostasis).

With the assistance of the Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology, the schematic model should

illustrate the following:-

1. The three distinctive “sevens” are inseparably united in one entity of triangle, which

depicts a dynamic interrelationship between the three Persons of the Trinity.

2. The purple “seven” (the incarnate Son) in its color connects to the blue “seven” (the

46 Ibid. 47 The number “seven” is used here because it apparently means perfection and completeness in the Bible which

Son

Figure 2

Humanity

1st Adam (Fall)

2nd Adam (Restoration)

Father

Empowerment/Sanctification

Spirit

Spirit Breathing



Father) inasmuch as the incarnate Son in His human sacrificial dedication to the Father.

3. The blue “seven” (the Father), in return, connects to the purple “seven” (the Son)

denoting His constitution of the Sonship.

4. The green “seven” (the Spirit), also in its connection to the purple “seven”, denotes the

empowerment and sanctification of the Spirit in the incarnate Son’s earthly life.

5. The parabolic arrow denotes the movement of the saving activity of the Trinity in

relation to the humanity.

6. The green “seven”, also connects to the blue “seven” represents God the Father

breathing the Spirit to the first Adam and the gap between the parabolic arrow and the

triangle demonstrates the separation of the humanity to the Trinity due to the fall of the

first Adam.

7. In the purple “seven” (as the second Adam), the color of purple becomes actualized

fully and completely in relation to the interconnection of the three figures, which

denotes the fullness and completeness of our human response personalized in the Son

relating to the communion of the three Persons of the Trinity (i.e. the concept of

Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology).

8. Although it appears that the three “sevens” have their distinctive characters, they are

inseparably united together in one triangle and that the color of purple is also

actualized in the one unifying triangle (i.e. our humanity fully and completely

personalized in the second Adam who brings us into participation in the life of the

Trinity).

V. Conclusion

The above discussion demonstrates that Cyrillian hypostatic union of the two natures in the

one reality of Jesus is not merely a matter of Christology, but rather an important doctrine at the

heart of the Gospel. Despite its deficiencies, Cyrillian hypostatic union is still useful upon

thorough reassessment and reconstruction of his Trinitarian Adam-Christ Typology. As such, an

integration of a relational model of the two very concepts has been established here to affirm that

Jesus has assumed our fallen humanity and lived out His earthly life in perfect obedience to the

Father in the Spirit while we, in the Spirit, are united to Jesus sharing His humanity and through

Him, we are united to the Father. Here the notion of the relational concept of person (i.e. God as

might well-describe the perfect nature of each Person of the Trinity.



‘personalizing Person,’ and human as ‘personalized persons’) has been adopted to unite all these

profound concepts as follows:-

Firstly, we, in light of Cyril’s hypostatic union, find the personalization of God’s

relationship with humanity in Jesus Christ.

Secondly, in Christ’s anhypostatic humanity, we find our humanity personalized in

relation to God in view of Cyril’s Adam-Christ Typology.

Thirdly, we find the entire personalizing process of our humanity occurs not merely in

Jesus’ saving activities, but also in the Trinity’s coactivity that the three Persons are

present and active in the realization of Jesus’ humanity (i.e. the Father’s constitution of

sonship and the Spirit’s empowerment and sanctification) without undermining our real

and truly human response so as to restore our human nature and bring us back into

communion with the whole undivided Trinity.

By integrating all these insightful relational concepts, Cyril’s Christology is refined and that

the full humanity of Jesus in relation to our humanity is undoubtedly affirmed.

i

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The Reassessment of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology: A Relational Perspective

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