The second century was a religious and cultural crucible for early Christian Christology. Was Christ a man, temporarily inhabited by the divine? Was he a spirit, only apparently cloaked in flesh? Or was he the Logos, truly incarnate? Between varieties of adoptionism on the one hand and brands of Gnosticism on the other, the church's understanding took shape.In this clear and concise introduction, James Papandrea sets out five of the principal images of Christ that dominated belief and debate in the postapostolic age. While beliefs on the ground were likely more tangled and less defined than we can know, Papandrea helps us see how Logos Christology was forged as the beginning of the church's orthodox confession.This informative and clarifying study of early Christology provides a solid ground for students to begin to explore the early church and its Christologies.
Table of Content
Acknowledgments
1. Five Images of Christ in the Postapostolic Age
2. Christ as Angel: Angel Adoptionism
3. Christ as Prophet: Spirit Adoptionism
4. Christ as Phantom: Docetism and Docetic Gnosticism
5. Christ as Cosmic Mind: Hybrid Gnosticism
6. Christ as Word: Logos Christology
7. What, Then, Is Orthodoxy?
Chart: Christology Continuum
Subject Index
Scripture Index
About the author
James L. Papandrea (Ph D, Northwestern University) is professor of church history and historical theology at Garrett-Evangelical Seminary at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He is the author of The Earliest Christologies, The Trinitarian Theology of Novatian of Rome, and Reading the Early Church Fathers. He studied Roman history at the American Academy in Rome, Italy.
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