Christology

Orthodox Christology confesses that Jesus Christ is one divine Person (hypostasis) — the eternal Son and Logos of God — who in the Incarnation assumed a complete human nature, so that he exists in two natures (divine and human), without confusion, change, division, or separation. This was defined at the Council of Chalcedon (451) and further clarified by Constantinople II (553), Constantinople III (681), and the patristic synthesis of St. John of Damascus.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox

The Pre-Chalcedonian Christological Controversies

Apollinarianism

Apollinaris of Laodicea (c. 310–390) taught that in the Incarnation, the divine Logos replaced the human rational soul (nous) in Christ. This preserved the unity of Christ’s person but at the cost of the completeness of his human nature. Apollinarianism was condemned at the Council of Constantinople I (381) on the principle (articulated especially by St. Gregory the Theologian) that “what is not assumed is not healed” (to gar aproslepton, atherapeuton) — if Christ did not assume a complete human nature including a rational soul, then the human mind is not saved (Gregory the Theologian, Epistle 101 [To Cledonius], 32).

(Council of Constantinople I, Canon 1 / Definition)

Nestorianism

Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople (428–431), objected to calling the Virgin Mary Theotokos (“God-bearer” or “Mother of God”), proposing instead the title Christotokos (“Christ-bearer”). While Nestorius’s own precise teaching is debated by modern scholars, the position attributed to him and condemned by the Church was that Christ consisted of two persons (or two subjects) — one divine and one human — united only by a moral or external conjunction (sunapheia) rather than a true hypostatic union.

St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376–444) was the principal opponent of Nestorianism. Cyril insisted on the “hypostatic union” (henosis kath’ hypostasin): the one hypostasis of the eternal Logos is the single subject of all of Christ’s experiences, both divine and human. It is the Logos himself who was born of the Virgin, suffered, and died — hence Mary is rightly called Theotokos. Cyril’s formula was: “one incarnate nature of God the Word” (mia physis tou Theou Logou sesarkomene), which he attributed in good faith to Athanasius but which in fact derives from Apollinaris’s Letter to Jovian, a text transmitted under Athanasius’s name in the Alexandrian archives (Cyril of Alexandria, Third Letter to Nestorius; Twelve Anathemas; on the misattribution see McGuckin, St. Cyril of Alexandria and the Christological Controversy, SVS Press, 2004).

The Council of Ephesus (431), the Third Ecumenical Council, condemned Nestorius and affirmed Cyril’s second letter to Nestorius as the standard of orthodoxy, including the title Theotokos.

(Council of Ephesus, Definition / Canons)

Eutychianism / Monophysitism

Eutyches (c. 380–456), an archimandrite in Constantinople, reacted so strongly against Nestorianism that he fell into the opposite error: he taught that after the union, Christ had only one nature (monophysis), the human nature being absorbed into the divine “like a drop of honey in the sea.” This position is called Monophysitism (or, more precisely, Eutychianism; the term “Monophysite” is contested by modern non-Chalcedonian churches, which prefer “Miaphysite” and reject Eutyches).

The “Robber Council” of Ephesus (449), dominated by Dioscorus of Alexandria, vindicated Eutyches, but this council was repudiated by the subsequent Ecumenical Council.

The Council of Chalcedon (451)

The Fourth Ecumenical Council, held at Chalcedon in 451, produced the Chalcedonian Definition (Horos), which remains the foundational Christological statement of Orthodox Christianity. The Definition confesses:

We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a reasonable [rational] soul and body; consubstantial [homoousios] with the Father according to the Godhead, and consubstantial with us according to the manhood; in all things like unto us, without sin; begotten before all ages of the Father according to the Godhead, and in these latter days, for us and for our salvation, born of the Virgin Mary, the Theotokos, according to the manhood; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation [en duo physesin, asynchytos, atreptos, adiairetos, achoristos]; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one Person [prosopon] and one Hypostasis [hypostasis] — not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and Only-begotten, God the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ.

(Council of Chalcedon, Definition)

Analysis of the Four Adverbs

The four negative adverbs are the heart of the Definition, simultaneously rejecting the two opposing heresies:

Without confusion (asynchytos) and without change (atreptos): against Eutychianism/Monophysitism — the two natures are not mixed, blended, or transformed into a third thing.
Without division (adiairetos) and without separation (achoristos): against Nestorianism — the two natures are not split into two persons or two subjects.

As St. John of Damascus summarizes: “We do not say that the natures are united to each other by composition or confusion, nor by admixture… but rather that they are united to each other in the one hypostasis of the Logos without confusion, without change, and without division” (John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, III.3).

The Communicatio Idiomatum

The doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum (antidosis idiomaton in Greek, “exchange of properties”) follows directly from the hypostatic union. Since one and the same hypostasis (the Logos) is the subject of both natures, the properties and actions of either nature may be predicated of the one Person:

It is correct to say: “God was born of the Virgin Mary” (because the Person born is the Logos, who is God).
It is correct to say: “God suffered and died on the Cross” (because the Person who suffered is the Logos — though he suffered in his human nature, not in his divine nature).
It is correct to say: “The Son of Mary created the world” (because the Person of the Logos, who created all things, is the same Person who was born of Mary).

This is not a mere figure of speech but reflects the ontological reality of the union. As St. John of Damascus explains: “We do not attribute the properties of the humanity to the Godhead, nor the properties of the Godhead to the humanity… But we attribute both to the one Christ, for he is both God and man” (John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, III.4).

The communicatio idiomatum is the dogmatic basis for the title Theotokos: Mary gave birth not to a human person but to the divine Person of the Logos, who had assumed human nature.

Constantinople II (553) and the Theopaschite Formula

The Fifth Ecumenical Council, held at Constantinople in 553, was convened by Emperor Justinian to clarify certain remaining Christological ambiguities and to condemn the “Three Chapters” (writings by Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyrus, and Ibas of Edessa that were seen as Nestorian-leaning).

Key Christological contributions of Constantinople II:

Affirmed the theopaschite formula: “One of the Trinity suffered in the flesh.” This formula, championed by the Scythian monks and endorsed by Justinian, makes explicit that the subject of Christ’s suffering is a divine hypostasis — the second Person of the Trinity — though the suffering itself pertains to the human nature (Council of Constantinople II, Anathema 10).
Interpreted Chalcedon in a firmly Cyrillian direction, insisting that “one hypostasis” means specifically the pre-existing hypostasis of the Logos (enhypostasia), not a newly constituted hypostasis.
Condemned Origenism in fifteen associated anathemas. [Disputed: these anathemas are absent from the official acts of the council; Richard Price argues they were adopted at a session held before the formal opening, while others tie the condemnation to Justinian’s edict of 543 and its home synod (Price, The Acts of the Council of Constantinople of 553, Liverpool University Press, 2009).]

(Council of Constantinople II, Canons / Anathemas)

Maximus the Confessor and Dyothelitism (Constantinople III, 681)

The Monothelite Controversy

In the seventh century, a new Christological controversy arose: Monothelitism, the teaching that Christ had only one will (thelema) — a divine-human composite will. This was promoted as a compromise to reconcile Chalcedonians and non-Chalcedonians, and was supported by Emperor Heraclius, Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople, and Pope Honorius I. [Disputed: Honorius’s letters to Sergius (634) confess “one will” of Christ, and Constantinople III anathematized him by name; Richard Price reads the letters as genuinely monothelite, while the Catholic apologetic tradition, following Pope John IV, holds that Honorius meant only that Christ’s human will knew no opposition of the flesh (Price, The Acts of the Lateran Synod of 649, Liverpool University Press, 2014; Catholic Encyclopedia, “Pope Honorius I”).]

St. Maximus the Confessor (c. 580–662)

St. Maximus the Confessor is the greatest Christological thinker of the Orthodox Church after Chalcedon. He insisted that will (thelema) and operation/activity (energeia) pertain to nature, not to hypostasis. Therefore, since Christ has two complete natures, he must have two natural wills (dyothelitism) and two natural operations (dyoenergism):

A divine will, identical with the will of the Father and Spirit (since will belongs to the common divine nature).
A human will, a complete and genuine faculty of the human nature assumed by the Logos.

Maximus insisted that the two wills are not in conflict because the human will in Christ is perfectly attuned to the divine will — not by compulsion or by the destruction of the human will, but by the free and loving submission (tropos) of the human will to the divine. Christ’s human will operates according to its nature (kata physin) but in a mode (tropos) of perfect harmony with the divine will:

Maximus’s fullest treatment of Christ’s human willing is his analysis of the agony in Gethsemane: the prayer “let this cup pass from me” displays a genuinely human natural will, and “yet not what I will, but what thou wilt” displays that will’s free and unforced concurrence with the divine will — neither absorbed nor opposed (Maximus the Confessor, Opusculum 6; trans. Blowers–Wilken, On the Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ, PPS 25; cf. Opusculum 7). The Sixth Ecumenical Council canonized this teaching in its definition that Christ’s human will “follows, and that not as resisting or reluctant, but rather as subject to, his divine and omnipotent will” (Constantinople III, Definition; trans. NPNF II/14).

Maximus also developed the crucial distinction between natural will (thelema physikon) and gnomic will (thelema gnomikon). The gnomic will involves deliberation, uncertainty, and the possibility of choosing wrongly; it pertains to fallen created persons who do not have perfect knowledge. Christ, because his human nature is enhypostasized in the divine Logos, does not have a gnomic will — he does not deliberate or waver. His human will acts with perfect rectitude by nature (Maximus the Confessor, Disputation with Pyrrhus).

This has immense implications for soteriology: Christ saves the human will precisely by living out a perfect human willing, reorienting human nature toward God from within.

Maximus suffered imprisonment, the cutting off of his tongue and right hand, and exile for his refusal to accept Monothelitism. He died in 662; his teaching was vindicated posthumously.

The Sixth Ecumenical Council: Constantinople III (681)

The Sixth Ecumenical Council (Constantinople III, 680–681) defined:

“We proclaim equally two natural wills and two natural operations, in no way divided, not converted, not separated, not confused, according to the teaching of the holy Fathers… His human will follows and does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and omnipotent will.”

(Council of Constantinople III, Definition)

The Council condemned Monothelitism and those who promoted it, including Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople and Pope Honorius I (the latter’s condemnation being a significant datum in the Orthodox critique of papal infallibility).

The Synthesis of St. John of Damascus

St. John of Damascus (c. 675–749) composed An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith (the third part of his encyclopaedic Fount of Knowledge), which became the standard compendium of Orthodox dogmatics and profoundly influenced both Eastern and Western theology.

His Christological synthesis (Book III of the Exact Exposition) gathers and systematises the teaching of all previous councils and Fathers. Key points:

Enhypostasia: Christ’s human nature does not have its own independent hypostasis; it subsists in the hypostasis of the Logos. It is “enhypostasized” (enhypostatos), not “anhypostatic” (without hypostasis) in the sense of being unreal, but rather receiving its concrete personal existence in and through the Logos (John of Damascus, Exact Exposition, III.9).
Two wills, two operations: following Maximus, Damascus affirms that will and operation belong to nature, and so Christ wills and acts in two ways (John of Damascus, Exact Exposition, III.14–15).
The Theotokos: Mary is truly and properly Theotokos because “she gave birth not to a mere man, but to true God — not God bare, but God incarnate” (John of Damascus, Exact Exposition, III.12).
Circumscription and the icon: Because the Logos truly assumed a visible, material, circumscribable human nature, Christ can be depicted in icons. This Christological argument becomes central to the iconoclastic controversy (John of Damascus, Three Treatises on the Divine Images; cf. Council of Nicaea II, 787).
The deification of Christ’s humanity: Christ’s human nature is “deified” by its union with the Logos — not by conversion into divinity but by being permeated with divine energy and glory. This is the paradigm for all human theosis (John of Damascus, Exact Exposition, III.17).

Christology in Russian Orthodox Tradition

Russian theological tradition has generally upheld the Chalcedonian synthesis faithfully, with certain distinctive emphases:

Kenotic Christology: Some Russian theologians (e.g., Metropolitan Antonii Khrapovitsky, 1863–1936, and to a degree Sergius Bulgakov) developed kenotic themes, emphasizing Christ’s self-emptying (Philippians 2:7). Bulgakov’s kenoticism was controversial, linking Christ’s kenosis to his sophiological system (Bulgakov, The Lamb of God).
Pastoral and devotional emphasis: Russian Orthodox piety centres on the suffering Christ, reflected in the veneration of the Nerukotvorny Obraz (Image Not Made by Hands), the Passion narratives in Holy Week services, and the tradition of Plashchanitsa (the burial shroud icon carried in procession on Great Friday).
Pomazansky’s summary: the standard Russian seminary dogmatics simply expounds the Creed’s own confession — the Son of God “came down from the heavens… and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man… was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried; and rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures” (Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, articles 3–5; expounded in Pomazansky, Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, Part II, “The Incarnation of the Son of God” and “The Dogma of Redemption”).

References

Council of Ephesus (431). Definition and Canons.
Council of Chalcedon (451). Definition (Horos).
Council of Constantinople II (553). Anathemas.
Council of Constantinople III (680–681). Definition.
Cyril of Alexandria. Third Letter to Nestorius; Twelve Anathemas.
Gregory the Theologian (of Nazianzus). Epistle 101 (To Cledonius).
John of Damascus. An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith (Ekdosis akribes tes orthodoxou pisteos). c. 743.
John of Damascus. Three Treatises on the Divine Images.
Maximus the Confessor. Disputation with Pyrrhus. 645.
Maximus the Confessor. Opuscula Theologica et Polemica. Opusculum 6 translated by Paul Blowers and Robert Wilken in On the Cosmic Mystery of Jesus Christ. Popular Patristics Series 25. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2003.
Lossky, Vladimir. The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. Cambridge: James Clarke, 1957.
McGuckin, John A. St. Cyril of Alexandria and the Christological Controversy. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2004.
Meyendorff, John. Christ in Eastern Christian Thought. Washington: Corpus Books, 1969.
Price, Richard. The Acts of the Council of Constantinople of 553. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2009.
Price, Richard, with Phil Booth and Catherine Cubitt. The Acts of the Lateran Synod of 649. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2014.
Pomazansky, Michael. Orthodox Dogmatic Theology. Translated by Seraphim Rose. Platina, CA: St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, 1984.
Bulgakov, Sergius. The Lamb of God (Agnets Bozhiy). Paris: YMCA Press, 1933.