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The Christian, on the contrary, holds that what is redeemed eo ipso survives. Whatever else is involved in redemption persistence certainly is included. Monophysitism stands for a partial redemption; but to the orthodox who believe that Christ assumed human nature in its entirety, each part and the whole are of infinite value.
The Parsee doctrine of demons, also, was not unknown in Arabia, after the conquest of the Persians in the fifth century. After the third, fourth, and fifth centuries, Christianity also, though in a corrupt form, or, definitely, in the form of Monophysitism and Nestorianism, which had been condemned by the church, became established in Arabia.
The monophysites professed great jealousy for the honour due to the Redeemer. But the ascription of such attributes to Jesus Christ detracts from His honour. If the nature that suffered on the Cross be not distinct from the nature that cannot suffer, then the Crucifixion was a sham. Monophysitism is docetism elaborated. It abandons the Christ of history. It rules out His prokopé.
What makes Christians indifferent to Christ's sufferings is not the lapse of centuries nor weakness of imagination but a subconscious monophysitism. There is to most minds a haze of unreality overhanging the accounts of His life and death. They forget that He shared human experience to the full. They think of Him as doing things rhêidíôs like the Homeric gods.
We may conclude this comparison of monophysitism with Neo-Platonism by pointing out that the two systems had a similar bearing on the conduct of life. Neo-Platonism was a religion. Its speculative aspect was subordinate to its practical. A knowledge of the soul's position in creation and of its destiny laid the philosopher under strict obligation.
Such in outline is Bergson's theory of the interpenetration of psychic states. If this psychology be adopted, the abstract character of the catholic doctrine of Christ's being in large measure disappears. It becomes easy to conceive the interpenetration of two natures in one Christ. Further, the Bergsonian psychology furnishes a standpoint from which criticism of monophysitism is easy.
It represented to them all that was distinctive in the highest region of their Faith. Monophysitism, as we proceed to show, compromised this article of the Faith. Its adherents did not, perhaps, do so intentionally. In fact, the first generation of monophysites maintained that their definition safeguarded the impassibility.
Wherever a denial of these facts is found, there is monophysitism. Wherever they are obscured or neglected, there are monophysite tendencies. Failure to appreciate the real humanity of Christ's life results in comparative indifference to the tragedy of His death. Monophysitism in undermining belief in the reality of Christ's manhood is weakening sympathy with His sufferings.
That is what monophysitism does, and because disguised monophysitism is prevalent in the church to-day, Christianity's grip is weak and the fire of devotion low. We may picture faith as a battlefield. Doubt is the enemy entrenched in depth. Arianism holds the first line of trenches.
This addition to the Trisagion was officially condemned at the close of the 7th century owing to its monophysite associations. "Chronicle of Zachariah of Mitylene," translated by Hamilton and Brooks, ii. 2, p. 21. The question of Justinian's orthodoxy has been debated by Bury and Hutton. See Guardian, March 4th and April 15th, 1896. Monophysitism originated in a monastery.
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