Church fathers conversing together on Eden

     Irenaeus of Lyons was a disciple of Polycarp and Polycarp was a disciple of the apostle John of the New Testament. So Irenaeus is like John the apostle’s grandson and for that reason, along with the fact that he was recognized as a leader of the church, I find it interesting to read his writings. As bishop, Irenaeus’s goal was to expound the faith he received from his teachers. Also, you may notice that John Paul II’s Theology of the Body teaching appears to be based at points on his work. So here is the elaboration of Irenaeus’ views on Eden from Justo Gonzales’ church history textbook The Story of Christianity:

“Like a true shepherd, God placed the first couple in Eden. They were not mature beings, but were rather ‘like children,’ with their own perfection as such. This means that God's purpose was that human beings would grow in communion with the divine, eventually surpassing even the angels….The situation in paradise, as described in Genesis, was not the goal of creation, but its beginning. From this perspective, the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ is not the result of sin. On the contrary, God's initial purpose included being united with humankind. In fact, the future incarnated Word was the model that God followed in making humans after the divine image. Adam and Eve were so created that, after a process of growth and instruction, they could become like the incarnate Word. What has happened because of sin is that the incarnation has taken on the added purpose of offering a remedy for sin, and a means for defeating Satan….In his resurrection, the final resurrection has dawned, and all who are part of his body will partake of it….The focal point of that history is the incarnation, not only because through it God's word has straightened the twisted history of humankind, but also because from the very beginning the union of the human with the divine was the goal of history"  (pages 69-71). 

     There’s so much here to comment on—the true shepherd, children, communion with God, the first creation, incarnation’s purpose, image of incarnated Word, growth, remedy for sin, defeat of Satan, final resurrection dawning, the body of Christ, the history of humankind, the goal of history— but I’ll just leave it for our contemplation. Then I thought it would be interesting to see how the church father Athanasius  in his fourth century work “On the Incarnation of the Word” (or here) may have elaborated on some of the teachings of Irenaeus in his second century instruction for recent converts, “Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching.”

     So here’s Athanasius’s words on Eden:

“He set them in His own paradise, and laid upon them a single prohibition. If they guarded the grace and retained the loveliness of their original innocence, then the life of paradise should be theirs, without sorrow, pain or care, and after it the assurance of immortality in heaven. But if they went astray and became vile, throwing away their birthright of beauty, then they would come under the natural law of death and live no longer in paradise, but, dying outside of it, continue in death and in corruption…. But men, having turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising, had come inevitably under the law of death” (The Incarnation of the Word of God).

More ideas here—original innocence, immortality, natural law of death, life in death and corruption, contemplation of God versus contemplation of evil of their own devising.

     But to these men what was God’s original intent and the meaning of being in God’s image? Irenaeus says that humans were made in the image of Jesus.

For He made man the image of God; and the image of God is the Son, after whose image man was made: and for this cause He appeared in the end of the times that He might show the image (to be) like unto Himself (22).

The Son appeared to show that we are like Him. Athanasius elaborates and says that God the Artificer gave man His own Image, expressing the Mind of God in limited degree, to be able to live incorruptible in true life in paradise. This was “in order that through this gift of Godlikeness in themselves they may be able to perceive the Image Absolute, that is the Word Himself, and through Him to apprehend the Father; which knowledge of their Maker is for men the only really happy and blessed life” (11). Ideas here—gift of Godlikeness to be able to perceive the Word and apprehend the Father, the happy and blessed life.

     So what went wrong? Irenaeus says we have lost our incorruption and need to be restored.

 (God is) calling men anew to fellowship with God, that by fellowship with Him we may partake of incorruption (40).

So then He united man with God, and established a community of union between God and man; since we could not in any other way participate in incorruption (29).

Athanasius agrees and adds that the union with God that allows us to be incorruptible includes of necessity the contemplation of God. He says man “turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising” and subjected themselves permanently to corruption (4).  A person now “bears also the Likeness of Him Who is, and if he preserves that Likeness through constant contemplation, then his nature is deprived of its power and he remains incorrupt”(4). We preserve the likeness of God by constant contemplation--what happens in our thought life is huge (Phil 4:8).

     So what needs fixing?  Irenaeus says that by going beyond God’s limitations, people would be dissolved to earth.

And He set (Adam) certain limitations, so that, if he should keep the commandment of God, he should ever remain such as he was, that is to say, immortal; but, if he should not keep it, he should become mortal and be dissolved to earth from whence his formation had been taken (15).

If Adam kept the limitations of God, immortality, but since he didn’t, mortality would cause him to dissolve back to the dust.

     Athanasius agrees saying, they were “now on the way to returning, through corruption, to non-existence again.” But “being incorrupt, (man) would be henceforth as God, as Holy Scripture says, ‘I have said, Ye are gods and sons of the Highest all of you: but ye die as men and fall as one of the princes.’” So even if people could cease from sinning, death and corruption still had power over them because God would have to be consistent with His word in the Garden (6). Therefore, Athanasius sees that Jesus "assumed humanity that we might become God. He manifested Himself by means of a body in order that we might perceive the Mind of the unseen Father. He endured shame from men that we might inherit immortality” (54).

     I might word this more carefully. Christianity is not God but our response to God. However, we are to become like God through Christ and know the mind of the Father, and as we do, we begin to experience the eternal life today.