Post Edited (Tom) : 12/6/2009 7:06:27 AM (GMT-6)

Post Edited (PotOnWheel) : 12/6/2009 9:36:23 PM (GMT-6)

Post Edited (Tom) : 12/7/2009 6:18:19 AM (GMT-6)

I can sleep well tonight. Tollefsen, p. 120, on Maximus:

The potentiality to move by rational will into an actualized condition includes, as just mentioned, a possibility of choosing between different options. The will, identified as self-determination, is clearly understood as free. Now, is this power of self-determination similar to the autonomy of the will in the Kantian sense? The answer is undoubtedly negative. The ‘self’ for Maximus is a genuine self by the fact of its being constituted by the divine logos that sets the norm of its behavior in accordance with the divine will. The self is an authentic self, therefore, only to the degree that it lets itself be moved in accordance with the divine intention. Genuine autonomy, consequently is—if the term is allowed—strictly speaking ‘theonomy’.

Now, D, don’ t shout too loudly just yet. This only looks like divine determination of all ‘particular’ creaturely movement. Then there’s this, which D will be happy about:

From the idea of self-determination Maximus concludes that if man is rational by nature, and what is rational is self-determinative as well, then man has by nature a will. Consequently, an ability to decide how to move (i.e., to act) is an essential property of man, that is his natural will, which culminates in an activity or an actualized condition. For these reasons Maximus urges, apropos of the montheletistic controversy, that the human nature which Christ assumed has a rational soul and a natural will, for ‘everything that is rational by nature, certainly also is volitional by nature’.

But then there’s something to make ME happy. Tollefsen finishes up his summary of Maximus:

Because of this essential capacity for willing, it is natural for man to will in accordance with nature of the natural logos. The range of possibilities within which the essential movement takes place [determined by one’s logos,mind ya] is a range of good possibilities, with a view to which the creature is not determined in advance. This is the structure of natural freedom, which is not only a freedom from sin, but also a freedom to choose between diverse goods without a struggle of choice.

FINALLY! FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY. Exactly what I’ve been arguing for 2 years. And this is the heart of Greg’s dissertation too. The divinely offered “subjective aim for creaturely becoming” (in Maximian terms, one’s logos) does not (as it is with Neville) have the creature’s specific choice as its terminus, but rather the logos determines only that range of creative self-expression offer to the creature. The creature determines itself within that range.

Frickin' Aye!

Hahahahahaha!  

T

D, you HAVE to read p. 136. Well, from 130 on. Regarding the hypostatic union (around pp. 130 onward, Tollefsen is on fire!).

But then he’s pure napalm on p. 136.  

A last point should be considered in this context. Does the concrete humanity of Christ have a logos of its own particular manhood? If the logos of the particular essence is the logos of the essence of a definite hypostasis, then the answer is negative. There is no logos of a human hypostasis of Jesus. On the other hand, the humanity of Jesus has a principle of its own. Maximus says that the Logos in his Incarnation does not change anything that is human, but he constitutes it. As far as I can understand, this means that while human hypostases have their principles in the logoi, the humanity of Christ has its principle in the Logos himself: the Logos acts as logos of Jesus’ concrete humanity.

I friggin rest my case. I was RIGHT! Take that, and that, and that...SUCKAAAAAAA!  

This is exactly what I said 2 years ago. Ya’ll beat me down for saying it too.  

Payback’s a bitch ain't it?   

Tom

Where is what?

T

2) Remember these? There were YOUR ideas about things from two years ago...

"one person" <=> "one spirit"

"The Logos takes the place of the human spirit in Jesus"

"I don't know if Jesus has a human spirit."

(Do I have to say anymore, bro? Again, I can actually pull quotes if you want.  There's a distinction between saying that the Logos forms Jesus' particularized humanity hypostatically...and saying that the Logos REPLACES the human spirit inside Jesus, which you DID say.)


So, sorry for "beating you down" over it before.  You WERE half right...and you WERE Appolinarian. I don't think you are anymore. 

Post Edited (One Love) : 12/7/2009 8:06:12 AM (GMT-6)

Post Edited (One Love) : 12/7/2009 8:05:00 AM (GMT-6)