Chapter 29 — The error of the Manicheans concerning the Incarnation

There were others who denied the true doctrine of the Incarnation, and invented a fictitious imitation of it. The Manicheans, in fact, said that the Son of God assumed not a real but an imaginary body: so that he could not be a real man, but only seemed to be one. They pretended that whatever he did as man—for instance, that he was born, that he ate, drank, walked, suffered, and was buried—was all unreal, though having some semblance of reality. Consequently, they reduced the whole mystery of the Incarnation to a work of fiction.

Now in the first place, this view entirely negates the authority of Scripture. For, since the likeness of flesh is not flesh, and the likeness of walking is not walking (and so on), the Scripture lies when it says: The Word became flesh, if it were but imaginary flesh. It lies again when it says that Jesus walked, ate, died, and was buried, if these things happened to a mere imaginary apparition. Now, if the authority of Scripture be allowed to suffer in the slightest degree, our faith loses all its stability, for it is based on Sacred Scripture: These are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God (John 20:31).

Someone, however, might say that Sacred Scripture is not lacking in truth, if it records apparitions as though they were real facts. For the likenesses of things are equivocally and metaphorically called by the names of the things themselves. Thus the picture of a man is called a man. And Sacred Scripture is wont to speak in this way: for instance: the Rock was Christ (1 Cor 10:4). Thus in Scripture many corporeal terms are applied to God for no other reason but likeness: for instance, he is called a lamb, a lion, and so forth.

Yet, though it be true that the likenesses of things are sometimes called by the names of the things they represent, it is not becoming for Sacred Scripture to relate an entire incident with such a double meaning, unless one were able to elucidate the truth from other passages of Scripture, because this would lead men not to knowledge, but to deception. Yet the Apostle says that whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction (Rom 15:4), and: All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching (2 Tim 3:16). Moreover, the whole Gospel story would be a poem and a fable if imaginary things were portrayed as being real. But it is said: We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Pet 1:16).

Moreover, whenever Scripture relates apparitions and not realities, this is quite clear from the manner of the narrative. Thus it is said: He lifted up his eyes (that is, Abraham) and looked, and behold, three men appeared in front of him (Gen 18:2); whereby we are given to understand that they were men in appearance only. Hence he adored God among them, and witnessed to his divinity, saying: Behold, I have taken upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes (Gen 18:27); and again: You who judge all the earth will not make this judgment (Gen 18:25). When Isaias, Ezechiel, and other prophets describe their visions, we are not led into error, because such things are set down not as an historical narrative, but as descriptive of the prophecy; moreover, they always use some expression to indicate an apparition. For instance, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne (Isa 6:1); The hand of the Lord was upon him there. As I looked, behold, a stormy wind came out of the north (Ezek 1:3–4); and: He put forth the form of a hand . . . and brought me in visions of God to Jerusalem (Ezek 8:3).

Again, we ought not to be led into error if Scripture uses metaphors in speaking of divine things. In the first place, these metaphors are taken from things of so little account that it is clear that the statements are to be taken metaphorically and not literally. Second, what is hidden inside metaphors in one part of Scripture is stated elsewhere in Scripture in proper terms, which express the truth clearly. Now this does not apply to the case in point, because Scripture nowhere affords authority for denying the reality of what it relates of Christ’s human nature.

Yet it might be said that Scripture does this implicitly when the Apostle says: God . . . sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh (Rom 8:3), or when he says: being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form (Phil 2:7). But such an interpretation is forbidden by the context. For he does not say simply: in the likeness of flesh, but of sinful flesh, because Christ had real flesh—not sinful flesh, since there was no sin in him, but like sinful flesh, since he had passible flesh, and such as man’s flesh had become through sin. In like manner, a fictional interpretation of the words: being born in the likeness of men, is excluded by the addition of the words: taking the form of a servant, because it is clear that form here means ‘nature’ and not ‘semblance.’ For the Apostle had said: He was in the form of God, and it is not suggested that Christ was a semblance of God. The fictional sense is also excluded by the subsequent words: became obedient unto death. Therefore, likeness here does not indicate the likeness of simulation, but true likeness of species, just as all men are said to be like in species.

Still more emphatically does Sacred Scripture exclude any suspicion of a ghostly apparition. For it is related that when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying: ‘It is a ghost!’ And they cried out for fear (Matt 14:26). Our Lord took the way to undeceive them, for the narrative continues thus: Immediately he spoke to them, saying: ‘Take heart, it is I; have no fear’ (Matt 14:27). Yet it hardly seems reasonable to suppose that the disciples would be unaware of it if he had assumed only an imaginary body, seeing that he had chosen them that they might bear witness to the truth from what they saw and heard. And, if they were aware of it, then the thought that it was an apparition should not have made them afraid.

And still more did our Lord, after his Resurrection, remove from the minds of his disciples any doubt of the reality of his body. Thus it is related that the disciples were startled and frightened, and supposed that they saw a spirit, when they saw Jesus. And he said to them: ‘Why are you troubled, and why do questionings rise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have’ (Luke 24:37–39). For it would have been useless to tell them to feel him if he had but an imaginary body.

Again. The apostles show themselves to be suitable witnesses of Christ. Thus Peter says: God raised him (that is, Jesus) on the third day and made him manifest; not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead (Acts 10:40–41); and the apostle John says at the beginning of his epistle: That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life . . . we testify to it (1 John 1:1–2). Now it is impossible for a valid witness of the truth to be afforded by things that happen not in reality, but only in appearance. Consequently, if Christ’s body was only imaginary—if he did not really eat and drink, if he was not really seen and handled, but only in imagination—it follows that the apostles’ witnessing of Christ was unfitting. And then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain, as Paul says (1 Cor 15:14).

Moreover, if Christ did not have a real body, he did not really die. Therefore, he did not really rise again. Consequently, the apostles are false witnesses, since they preached to the world that he had risen again. Therefore, the Apostle says: We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified of God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised (1 Cor 15:15).

Further. Falsehood is not the right way to the truth: From something false what will be true? (Sir 34:4). Now Christ came into the world in order to manifest the truth, for he said: For this I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth (John 18:37). Therefore, there was nothing false in Christ. Yet there would have been if what is related of him were only imaginary; for that is false which is not what it seems to be. Therefore, all the things related about Christ happened in reality.

Again. It is stated that we are now justified by Christ’s blood (Rom 5:9), and it is said: By your blood did you ransom men for God (Rev 5:9). Consequently, if Christ had not real blood, neither did he really shed it for us, and we are neither truly justified nor truly redeemed. Therefore, it is useless for us to be in Christ.

Again. If Christ’s coming into the world was nothing but imaginary, there was nothing new in his coming, since even in the Old Testament, God appeared to Moses and the prophets under many figures, as the New Testament frequently declares. But this would void the entire teaching of the New Testament. Therefore, the Son of God assumed a real, and not an imaginary, body.