Did Jesus have the ability to say "No" to the Father?

[goout]

Actually it is connected to this thread because IF the evolutionary theory is correct in any form (including divine guidance) then the historical nature of the A&E story has to be questioned, and along with it the doctrines based on the story as being historical. As I said I do not see how evolution could be accurate as it presently stands probably for the same reasons as you. If it did occur it had to be directed by a mega-intelligence, and there actually IS scientific evidence of that.
The “Wow! signal” of the terrestrial genetic code - ScienceDirect

The Icarus article only postulates that the mega-intelligence was another species within the universe and the overlook that the intelligence could be from outside of the universe or divine.

The science point to (does not prove) that the A&E story more likely than not is scientifically incorrect. The deeper meaning of the story which I referred to is enhanced if it is not taken literally.

Likewise if Jesus and the ability to sin, as several Church doctrines do state, even if He would never do so it also bring into question the same doctrines.

As I said to Fr. David it is a can of worms that I really didn’t want to get into on this thread, but the can has been opened. What I would love to see is an unquestionable logical explanation of how these doctrines could preserved as-is while at the same time embracing the modern scientific theories as factual in some way.

The whole issue you are having is a misunderstanding of the relationship between faith and reason, or faith and science.
And with that, a misunderstanding of the Church’s view of Inspiration and the senses of scripture.
A passage isn’t an either/or proposition. Genesis has historical elements, and at the same time, it has deeper spiritual senses. These two things do not contradict one another.
Faith and reason are integrated and inform one another, and scripture expresses this.

So your assumption that the sciences invalidate spiritual truths because the scriptures are lacking modern scientific discovery does not follow.

 

[STT]

So He made a sacrifice.

Although I think that one cannot have both Divine and human will.

 

[Happymom]

Hi @Roseeurekacross,

I understand about the two natures of Jesus, Jesus was the Son of Man and also the Son of God, fully human and fully divine now hear me out. I don’t deny the human nature of Jesus but I also know that Jesus ALWAYS did the will of the Father. I also realize that Jesus was like us in emotions, pain, and could get sick and really the Jesus, the Son of Man, really learned about practically everything including the details on the divine plan He entered into as He grew. He pleaded on His hands and knees for the Father to take this cup away from Him but if it was in the Fathers will it Shall be done. I see that as both an obedient statement and a divine statement. Jesus couldn’t do anything but what He did because He did the will of the Father as a perfect human. Now read the Catechism on what sin is.

CCC1849 Sin is an offense against reason, truth, and right conscience; it is failure in genuine love for God and neighbor caused by a perverse attachment to certain goods. It wounds the nature of man and injures human solidarity. It has been defined as “an utterance, a deed, or a desire contrary to the eternal law.”

Does that sound like something Jesus would be capable of as a perfect ‘human’? That would defy His very nature as a perfect human sent down from heaven to save us from our sins. CCC 480 Jesus Christ is true God and true man, in the unity of his divine person; for this reason he is the one and only mediator between God and men.

Now lets look at the Catechism again especially the parts I’ve bolded.

CCC481 Jesus Christ possesses two natures, one divine and the other human, not confused, but united in the one person of God’s Son.

CCC482 Christ, being true God and true man, has a human intellect and will, perfectly attuned and subject to his divine intellect and divine will, which he has in common with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

CCC483 The Incarnation is therefore the mystery of the wonderful union of the divine and human natures in the one person of the Word.

Now if Jesus human will was perfectly intuned to His divine will He would not have been able to sin though because He is in agony we see Him (the human nature Jesus) ‘asking’ for the Father to remove the cup from Him.
Luke 22:42 “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.”
That is NOT a statement saying Jesus on His own could make such decision. It was a prayer request.

I go back to what I was saying EVERYTHING that Jesus did or said while on earth teaches us something. In this case Jesus teaches us to Ask the Father for help from suffering and death. It’s our job to trust in Jesus in all things. Jesus can’t let us down.
God doesn’t make mistakes and Jesus couldn’t sin. He just wasn’t that way. He was in perfect union with God but that doesn’t mean He wasn’t human with human emotions, needs, etc. So one shouldn’t focus on the specific words Jesus said in relation to this question but who Jesus is.

God bless you all.

 

[Roseeurekacross]

@Happymom
The church has defined Jesus as fully human , as we are, in all things except sin. We must ensure everyone understands and acknowledges this.

Jesus felt real human pain and really died. Jesus experienced intense pain, intense sorrow and death.

To think any other way is heresy.

And we should always do the will of the father.

There is debate about what Jesus understood about His mission growing up and how Jesus viewed it, as fully human.
Did Jesus see a His mission in the eyes of the Apocalyptic Jewish way of thinking.

I think of martyrs in intense agony , however doing the will of God, in dying for their faith.

Or someone Ill and suffering .

 

[Happymom]

I don’t disagree Roseeurekacross and I’m not sure why you even wrote what you wrote in your post. I made it clear that I agreed you with you on that. Jesus was fully human and fully divine.

 

[Roseeurekacross]

If your argument is with could Jesus have sinned, take it up with our Priest, who says yes, Jesus could have sinned and chose not to.

One big example is his temptation in the desert.

 

[Happymom]

Okay… please where in the catechism does it say Jesus could sin?

Yes Jesus, the Son of Man was tested but could He actually sin since He was also the Son of God?

 

[Roseeurekacross]

Please refer to the Priest, Father David’s replies. FrDavid is much more qualified then I to answer this

 

[Happymom]

Okay please Father David? It seems like such a simple question and shouldn’t be hard to find. Is it written in the catechism?

 

[Vico]

…

Catechism

Christ’s human will

475 Similarly, at the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other, but cooperate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinely with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation. 110 Christ’s human will “does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will.” 111

110 Cf. Council of Constantinople III (681): DS 556-559.
111 Council of Constantinople III: DS 556.

 

[WileyC1949]

A passage isn’t an either/or proposition. Genesis has historical elements, and at the same time , it has deeper spiritual senses. These two things do not contradict one another.
Faith and reason are integrated and inform one another, and scripture expresses this.

Granted Genesis has historical elements, but it is not a history book. The first five books of the Bible is a blend of four different oral traditions. These were stories which had been told and retold for hundreds and perhaps thousands of years before the were even written. They were formatted in different ways and often told around tribal campfires as songs, poems, stories or even plays often for entertainment but also for keeping their traditions alive. But sometimes when they were written down (most likely during the Babylonian Exile) two different genres from different oral traditions are right next to each other telling the same story in different and sometime contradictory ways.

The contradictions are always in the history, but never in the messages the various stories are meant to covey. The order of created things in Genesis 2 is vastly different than the order in Genesis 1. They are from two different oral traditions. Genesis 1 is from the Priestly source. The Hebrew word used is “Elohim” translated as “God” in English. Genesis 2 is from the Yahwehistic source with the Hebrew word “YHWH” or “Yahweh” being translated into English as “Lord God”. The message of Genesis 1 can be seen as God being the source of all that exists, and modern science does seem to agree with it (once you get away from the word “Yom” only meaning “Day”, recognize the poetic quality, and grant it literary licence). The message of Genesis 2+ can be seen as man’s God-led journey in becoming fully human and his subsequent journey into sin. But here again genre must be recognized. Most likely Genesis 2+ was orally a story told around campfires at night. I am relatively certain that even the first people who heard the story did not actually believe that a serpent spoke to Eve, but as a literary device it works perfectly. The order of creation in it are not the focus and is secondary to the story. It can disagree with Genesis 1 without invalidating the messages of either.

So your assumption that the sciences invalidate spiritual truths because the scriptures are lacking modern scientific discovery does not follow.

You are putting words in my mouth with that one. I never said that science “invalidates” spiritual truths. I said it raises questions which should be answered.

 

[Fauken]

Okay please Father David?

Did Jesus have the ability to say "No" to the Father? Philosophy

No. He had to have a choice. In order to have a choice, one must have options: in this case, the option to sin or not-sin. If He had no choice, then the fact that He did not sin would be meaningless. It’s like me choosing not to sprout wings and fly. I can claim all day long that I “choose” not to do it, but that’s meaningless because I could never do it in the first place. This isn’t a complicated question really. The Temptation in the Desert event proves to us that it was possible for…

 

[WileyC1949]

475 Similarly, at the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other, but cooperate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinely with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation. 110 Christ’s human will “does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will.” 111

110 Cf. Council of Constantinople III (681): DS 556-559.
111 Council of Constantinople III: DS 556.

That is what I said. Jesus always placed His will as secondary to that of the Father. But the fact that He chose to do that does not negate that He had a will of His own. The word “submits” means that it was a free decision on His part whether His personal human will agreed or not.

 

[Roseeurekacross]

Where are you copying and pasting that from

 

[Happymom]

So if we believe that Jesus human will is always secondary to that of His divine will how could Jesus say no?

Heres what I believe. Because Jesus suffered and we see Him in His weakest hour doesn’t mean He didn’t make a sacrifice. Jesus sacrifice began long before when He became man and suffered and died for our sins and is continuing His sacrifice forevermore. His sacrifice continued in every agonizing step He took to the cross. To say He was just robotic is not acknowledging what He did. Became man, suffered, died, was buried, and on the third day rose again. That was Gods free will choice. And since God is the source of all that is good it was not possible for Him to say no before His sacrificial death.

 

[Happymom]

The choice was made long before that point. God the Father chose to redeem us from our sins by sending His Only Begotten Son to die for us.

 

[WileyC1949]

That was from Vico. He referenced the Catechism. I would be interested myself. My on-line Catechism doesn’t all copy and paste.

 

[Happymom]

I just copied this from the regular Vatican Catechism site.

Christ’s human will

[475](javascriptpenWindow(‘cr/475.htm’) Similarly, at the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other, but cooperate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinely with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation.110 Christ’s human will "does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will."111

I dont’ know where that javascript came from…or the smiley
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p122a3p1.htm

 

[Roseeurekacross]

Granted Genesis has historical elements, but it is not a history book. The first five books of the Bible is a blend of four different oral traditions. These were stories which had been told and retold for hundreds and perhaps thousands of years before the were even written. They were formatted in different ways and often told around tribal campfires as songs, poems, stories or even plays often for entertainment but also for keeping their traditions alive. But sometimes when they were written down (most likely during the Babylonian Exile) two different genres from different oral traditions are right next to each other telling the same story in different and sometime contradictory ways.

The contradictions are always in the history, but never in the messages the various stories are meant to covey. The order of created things in Genesis 2 is vastly different than the order in Genesis 1. They are from two different oral traditions. Genesis 1 is from the Priestly source. The Hebrew word used is “Elohim” translated as “God” in English. Genesis 2 is from the Yahwehistic source with the Hebrew word “YHWH” or “Yahweh” being translated into English as “Lord God”. The message of Genesis 1 can be seen as God being the source of all that exists, and modern science does seem to agree with it (once you get away from the word “Yom” only meaning “Day”, recognize the poetic quality, and grant it literary licence). The message of Genesis 2+ can be seen as man’s God-led journey in becoming fully human and his subsequent journey into sin. But here again genre must be recognized. Most likely Genesis 2+ was orally a story told around campfires at night. I am relatively certain that even the first people who heard the story did not actually believe that a serpent spoke to Eve, but as a literary device it works perfectly. The order of creation in it are not the focus and is secondary to the story. It can disagree with Genesis 1 without invalidating the messages of either.

I am referring to this one, this quote.

 

[WileyC1949]

So if we believe that Jesus human will is always secondary to that of His divine will how could Jesus say no?

Because it was His choice to always do the Divine Will. Again could and would… He could have said no but He would always say yes. It was always His free choice.

Heres what I believe. Because Jesus suffered and we see Him in His weakest hour doesn’t mean He didn’t make a sacrifice. Jesus sacrifice began long before when He became man and suffered and died for our sins and is continuing His sacrifice forevermore. His sacrifice continued in every agonizing step He took to the cross. To say He was just robotic is not acknowledging what He did. Became man, suffered, died, was buried, and on the third day rose again. That was Gods free will choice. And since God is the source of all that is good it was not possible for Him to say no before His sacrificial death.

I hope you are not thinking that I said He did not make a sacrifice… He most certainly did. What I said was that if He did not have a choice then there would be no sacrifice. Every action we do has to be deliberately chosen for it to be either good or sinful, a sacrifice or not. Something in which we did not have a personal choice to do or not to do is of no credit to us. This is why Jesus HAD TO HAVE the ability to say no even though He never would have.