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The Nature of the Early Debate about Christ's Human Soul

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

Maurice F. Wiles
Affiliation:
Dean of Clare College and University Lecturer in Divinity, University of Cambridge

Extract

The New Testament writers, we are constantly being reminded, were not in the stricter sense of the word theologians. We all know what that reminder means and it is one of no small value. It would be disastrous, however, were we to allow it to suggest to us that the Christian writers of the ensuing centuries were men of an entirely different species, whose natural habitat was the study and whose primary characteristic was disinterested reflexion on theological topics. Their teaching, too, can only be rightly understood in the light of the particular concerns and pressures of the moment, which impinged upon them. The importance of this approach to the study of the Fathers is particularly well exemplified by the early history of the question whether or not Christ possessed a human soul.

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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1965

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