Aner, you have no way out of the maze till the OP is satisfactorily answered. Till then, best luck!
Yes - I have been starting to lean in that direction (that there is no way out) as well. I had hoped that the course you and Linus were recently laying out for me was going to solidify and thought that I was going to crest that hill (“nature” is completely independently functional from incarnate deity and thus, we assume, including the phenomenon of consciousness and functionality of will), however, I was seemingly just waylaid into quicksand by Linus’ last post …
Not to give up hope however -
I had begun to go in that direction (answering the OP) with my introduction of the phenomenon of “consciousness” and function of “will” into the conversation and in particular into “nature” rather than “person”.
BTW - I am still working with your leaning (albeit hedging your bets) that “person” is phenomenal rather than purely ideational. Thus, I assume that when you deny the human person of Christ - you are deleting something from reality more than simply an idea - at least some good clean “person” energy.
Before we go too far into the detailed break-down of the variables that constitute each of what appear to be simply ideational constructs, I would assert that if one is going to introduce a reality as expressed by a word into the conversation then one should damn well know specifically what the nature of the reality is that they are introducing. Otherwise such an introduction is pointless – indeed, even holding such an idea is pointless and essentially amounts to just a word that popped into your head – with no semantic content. Talk about a cloud without any rain… Reasonably, we should establish the beachhead of our fellowship on mutually agreed upon reality. Say, how about the Bible?
The Bible plainly teaches that
5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
We note that Jesus is denoted not only specifically as a man (and is done so as aligned with all other men) but in absolute and fundamental contrast to God Himself (note the singular pronoun…). The real question “What is a man?” is simply answered in this same text. You and I – and as noted in the text, all of mankind - are men (unless you are a lot different than the rest of us - we are not incarnated deity). Without question, we all know exactly what we are and that we and all others like us are and always have been this “maness” – not one variable more or one less. Indeed, then, Jesus MUST have everything that we do in order to be a genuine man - otherwise He is not. Simple math. To strip Him of ANYTHING is make Him less than a genuine man – those to whom He is specifically and fully here and elsewhere (Heb2:11) identified. Such a stripping is, thus, to make Him someone other than the Lord and Master who bought us (egads – I don’t want to even glance in the direction of that fire…). Likewise, to make Jesus less than a man is to violate the clear teaching of scripture (which presumably your own teachers (the vatican) hold as authoritative). Are you willing to assert that Paul’s writing to Timothy here, Peter’s sermon in the book of Acts 2 and 20 other instances including Jesus own words in Jn8:40 are flat out wrong? That Paul, Peter and Jesus Himself are confused and don’t know what they are talking about? Or that every one of the 20 or so texts are simply wrong and your teachers have been in error by their consideration of these texts as holy scripture….
Sincerely,
In the Lord and Master who bought us,
Aner
