We come now to the third element in the human spirit. It is only in modern psychology that feeling has secured recognition as a distinct constituent of man's nature; so it is not surprising that the question as to its position in the incarnate Christ was not raised in former days. Now, however, the psychology of feeling has come into its own, and it has become important to consider whether in this particular, too, Christ shared our human experience. Here, again, the argument for maintaining the duality of Christ's emotional experience is twofold. It follows, on the one hand, from the duality of the other parts of His nature; and, on the other hand, it is proved by the facts of His life as recorded in the gospels.
Human nature involves feeling, and two natures involve two universes of feeling. Divine personality cannot be conceived as devoid of feeling. With men feeling lies in the depths of being; it is the dynamic of life. Feeling is the inner reflex of acts of thought and will. It invariably accompanies cognition and volition. If thought and will be attributed to the supreme being, the attribute of feeling cannot be left out. When the God in Christ acted, divine feeling accompanied the act.
This surmise is proved correct on reference to the records of His life. We find there two distinct emotional zones. Christ has all the blameless feelings natural to man. There are in Him the feelings accompanying sensation; physical pleasure and pain, hunger, thirst, weariness, and, in addition, the higher grades of feeling, aesthetic, sympathetic, and ethical. He experienced wonder, surprise, righteous anger, the sublime, joy and love. A life rich in emotion was the life of the Man Christ Jesus. When, however, we look more closely into His experience, we catch glimpses of feeling such as no man could know. We see there transcendent passion, great sorrow, great joy, so great that they would break a human heart. We may instance the deep emotion accompanying His resolve to go to meet His fate at Jerusalem, the rejoicing in spirit at the success of the apostles' mission, His Agony and His universal love.
The monophysites could not recognise this duality in Christ's emotional nature. Hunger and thirst, and even the higher human feelings they considered derogatory to the Son of God. Even when they admitted that He suffered, they threw a veil of mystery over His sufferings. They idealised the Passion. They made it seem as if His flesh was privileged, as if His omnipotence excused Him from the emotional experiences of humanity.
SUMMARY OF THE CHAPTER
We have examined the doctrine of one nature, and exposed its chief consequences. We have considered its effects in respect of the deity of Christ and in respect of His manhood. We have applied the doctrine to the human nature as a whole, and to the several parts that compose it. The result of the examination may be summarised in brief. Monophysitism destroys what is divine in the deity and what is human in the humanity. It offers to Christians a Christ who is not sufficiently above man to be able to help them by His power, nor sufficiently man to be able to help them by His sympathy. The monophysite Christ is neither very God nor very man, but a composition in which all traces of the original entities are lost to view.