Jesus's Divine Body

[Jerok]

God has no body. He is incorporeal.
Jesus is God. Jesus has a Body.
Jesus’s Body IS God.

All of these are correct, right? How do Catholics discuss Jesus’s body being God, or ‘part of’ 'God (His Body is fully God right?) when God himself has no body.

Followup question. When did Jesus get his body? Was it eternal, as God is eternal? Or was the body created at the incarnation. If it’s at the incarnation, didn’t God change?

We discussed the Eucharist as RCIA yet these questions popped up in my mind. Sorry for all the questions, hopefully someone can make me understand this mystery more fully. Thanks!

 

[grace_singh]

well, yes and no.

i hope this explaination helps, and is orthodox.

Jesus is God the Son, but He is not God the Father.

God the Father remained in Heaven while Christ walked on earth as a Man, yet the two were always One, in communion, and fully God.

God the Son is One with and yet distinct from God the Father, and it is the second Person of the Trinity who took on flesh in history (as a babe in Bethlehem) and was crucified on the cross.

He reigns now in Heaven and is seated at the Father’s right hand. He is still eternal, holy, God, and Lord, fully God and also fully Man.

 

[mumahc]

Jesus is the invisible God made flesh through his birth, life, death and resurrection. About 2000 years ago he walked the face of this earth. However Jesus had existed even before the begining of time as stipulated in the Bilble…" In the begining was the word…"

By faith He is present in the Holy Eucharist in his body, blood and divinity. At the last super he broke bread and shared wine, referring them to his body and blood. To understand this I believe we need to ask the Holy spirit to help us see the bread and wine beyond the physical eyes and in our spiritual eyes creat a personal relationship with Jesus in his body, blood and divinity because he is very much alive especially in the Eucharist and in all the masses

 

[SunnaB16]

God has no body. He is incorporeal.
Jesus is God. Jesus has a Body.
Jesus’s Body IS God.

All of these are correct, right? How do Catholics discuss Jesus’s body being God, or ‘part of’ 'God (His Body is fully God right?) when God himself has no body.

Followup question. When did Jesus get his body? Was it eternal, as God is eternal? Or was the body created at the incarnation. If it’s at the incarnation, didn’t God change?

D

Jesus has two natures: His divine nature as the Second Person of The Blessed Trinity, and a human nature which He took on when Mary said “Yes.”. This is when His body came into being: The Incarnation.
His human nature means that His body is just as human as ours. There`s a human soul, as well.
Scripture says that He is like us in every way, except sin. No original sin
Although He has two natures, He is only one "Person’: God the Son.

Adam was/is only finite, but his sin offended the infinite God; so it took an infinite act to atone for his sin, and everyone else`s, and to redeem us. Jesus suffered and died in His human nature, but, being God as a person, His sacrifice was, and is, infinite, and perfect. and eternal.

God is Spirit, and doesnt occupy 3-dimensional space, except in the sense of sustaining it with His will (like pervading it). Hes perfect, infinite, eternal.
God the Son is God the Fathers perfect, infinite, eternal Self-knowledge; literally God because the Father knows Himself totally, but not a separate God, because He is generated by the Father (in eternity). ie He cant exist without the Father. And the Father can`t exist without the Son.

When we receive our Lord in Holy Communion, we receive all of Him, as already posted above: His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. His Divinity means that we receive all three Persons of the Blessed Trinity.

We can`t grasp the significance of Eternity and Infinity.

got too longwinded…

 

[Jerok]

A lot of very thoughtful answers. Now my follow up, if this can be answered… did Jesus have a human body before the incarnation, in the billions of years before he came to Earth? I can’t seem to grasp how God could be God immaterial for a few billion years, and then make it God immaterial + God in body form… when He is literally outside of time.

 

[SunnaB16]

A lot of very thoughtful answers. Now my follow up, if this can be answered… did Jesus have a human body before the incarnation, in the billions of years before he came to Earth? I can’t seem to grasp how God could be God immaterial for a few billion years, and then make it God immaterial + God in body form… when He is literally outside of time.

We cant think of God as being in any sort of time. He exists in the eternal NOW. Its something that our human intellects cant grasp. He "ISSES" in one eternal act of "ISSING"!!! He "EVERYTHINGS" in one eternal act of "EVERYTHINGING"!!! Theres no word or set of words which can adequately cover “Eternity”.

From our created, immersed in time point of view, His human body didnt exist before the Incarnation. Same with His human soul. From His Divine, eternal point of view, the Sons human body and soul would have to somehow be in the eternal “Now”, because God is immutable. We just cant grasp it from His perspective. From Gods angle, all of spiritual and material creation must somehow be in eternity, seeing that for Him, there`s no succession of events

A good book to get hold of is “Theology and Sanity” by Frank Sheed, published by Ignatius Press. Frank Sheed devotes more than 30 pages to The Blessed Trinity. He covers what id call the "physics" of The Trinity. Scott Hahn doesnt touch the “physics”, but the “chemistry”; eg the relationship between the inner Life of the Trinity, and marriage and family life. The reason the Church has a male-only priesthood flows from the inner Life of God. Ultimately, all of Creation bears at least His 'Footprint".

All we can do with this sort of thing is meditate on it. Every so often you get little insights which help to make it more understandable. Find somewhere quiet, and just lie there and get your mind to dwell on it. When you do that, the whole thing becomes more and more AWESOME!
As Frank Sheed says: God is the Lover; we are His beloved, and the Lover wants to be known by His beloved.

Sorry! i can`t come out with anything in only a few words. But the inner Life of The Most Holy Trinity is really the Heart of our Catholic Faith. And it is awesome…
Keep hammering away at it.

 

[Mintaka]

did Jesus have a human body before the incarnation, in the billions of years before he came to Earth?

No.

I can’t seem to grasp how God could be God immaterial for a few billion years, and then make it God immaterial + God in body form… when He is literally outside of time.

Well, the Incarnation was a Big Deal. Now you see why it was a big deal. “See, I have done something new, something never before heard of.”

“And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to His temple.”

The whole point of the Incarnation was for the Author, outside time, to take flesh and become a character in the great story He was writing. He took His chances and suffered pain and death right alongside us human characters. By joining His divine life to our human life and death, He made it possible for us to get outside time, and for the story to be totally transformed at the end.

To take it another way, covenants and adoptions and families are made among human people. God wanted to adopt us as His children in a fitting way, and to fully take on Himself the consequences of His own covenants which we had repeatedly broken. Entering within space/time, and taking on flesh, was a good way to do that.

It is absolutely astounding, yes. But God can do anything, and He’s not afraid of innovation. Each of us is also absolutely new and different, in His eyes. Every day comes up new.

 

[SunnaB16]

It is absolutely astounding, yes. But God can do anything, and He’s not afraid of innovation. Each of us is also absolutely new and different, in His eyes. Every day comes up new.

But dont forget that for God, theres no past or future; just the eternal NOW.
So, we cant say that God existed for a "period", and then created. From His point of view, He "CREATES", not "CREATED" or "WILL CREATE". We just cant grasp it.
He encompasses time (and everything else); so He`s omniscient.