FUNCTIONAL CHRISTOLOGY

2012-02-05T15:06:00.000-08:00

INTRODUCTION

Christology is the study of the personality and the works of Christ. Functional Christology defines Jesus in terms of function rather than ontology. It seeks to understand the person of Christ in terms of what He did, not in terms of what He is. “To know Christ means to know His benefits, and not to reflect upon His natures and the modes of His incarnation.”[1] This is a functional view of Jesus, but Melancthon meant it in a different way. In order to benefit from the atonement, we don’t need to parse out the philosophical and theological details of Christology. But that is not to say that it’s not important to reflect on those issues.

FOUR CLAIMS OF FUNCTIONAL CHRISTOLOGY

Functional Christology has four claims they are as follows;

1. The Bible reveals the work of Christ and not His nature.

2. The Hebrew worldview of the biblical writers was relational, not metaphysical. The Hebrews didn’t think in metaphysical terms; they had no worked out philosophy.

3. Ontological Christology is a product of importing Greek philosophical categories in the post-biblical period.

4. A Christology that is relevant today must be functional, not ontological.

THE BIBLICAL WORLDVIEW

When we take a biblical worldview of functional Christology, one can see that Within the Tanakh, there are Messianic texts such as Isaiah 52:13-53; 61:1-3, that focus upon the Messiah’s "works" rather than his essence or being. Perhaps this is a good indication that one of the starting points in Jewish-Christian dialogue is to understand the issue of Jesus' identity is not only about who He is, but also what He does.

Jewish messiahship doesn’t yield a Christology of status in metaphysical terms of “human” or “divine” origin at all. The Old Testament gives us a human picture of the Messiah. Messianic terms were applied to some prophets, so to be called Messiah doesn’t entail divinity. The term “Messiah,” meaning “anointed one,” is taken from the Hebrew word “masiah.” In the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the term Messiah is translated as "Christos” which was the official title for Jesus within the New Testament. The term "Messiah" is used of those who were of Davidic kings.

More also, It is apparent that form/redaction criticism when applied to the New Testament help us extricate the creedal assertions about Jesus, which are philosophical of a developed Christian community of the second century, from the historical Jesus. This approach reinforces the idea that the world view didn’t include philosophical speculations. For instance, John was incapable of thinking in platonic rapports when describing the “logos.” In his classic book, The Christology of the New Testament, the late Oscar Cullman suggested that while the Greeks were more interested in nature or an ontological Christology, the Jewish people were more interested in a functional Christology. Functional Christology places a greater emphasis on the "deeds" or "actions" of the Messiah. Some of the visible actions of Jesus included the healing of the sick (Mark 1: 32-34; Acts 3:6; 10:38), teaching authoritatively (Mark 1:21-22; 13:31), forgiving sins (Mark 2:1-12; Luke 24:47; Acts 5:31; Col. 3:13), imparting eternal life (Acts 4:12; Rom. 10:12-14), raising the dead (Luke 7:11-17; John 5:21; 6:40), and showing the ability to exercise judgment (Matt. 25:31-46; John 5:19-29; Acts 10:42; 1 Cor. 4:4-5). These "deeds" or "actions" demonstrate that Jesus is able to perform the same functions as the God of Israel.

This view also places the synoptics over John because of their temporal priority.

Jesus made no clear claim to be divine. The “I Am” are Johannine, not synoptic. In the synoptics, Jesus used the title “Son of Man” as a reference to His humanity, not a Messianic claim.

RESPONSE

Below are responses to the claims of functional Christology.

Function, not nature

Titles: “Son of Man,” “Son of God,” “Lord,” “Savior,” and “God” are all titles that have ontological implications. “New Testament Christology was primarily functional, indicating what role Jesus played in effecting God’s salvation of human being, but in so doing, it reflects much about what Jesus was in Himself.”[2] Though the focus is on function, it doesn’t rule out ontology.

Hebrew thought

There are no implications from the Hebrew world view that would exclude ontology. This says nothing about whether there was speculative thought. We cannot read metaphysics off the lexical stock of any language, and it’s dangerous to do so. The reductionist fallacy is that the emphasis becomes exclusive. Vocabulary doesn’t limit what the culture or individuals might know or use in other contexts. The fact that they didn’t do it doesn’t mean they weren’t capable of it. This approach is seriously flawed.

Post-biblical developments

It is assumed that by historical accident Christianity developed in the cradle of Greek philosophy. But if we believe in God’s providence, it wasn’t an accident. why then can’t philosophical categories be borrowed and developed? The claim is that Hebrew “mythology” was replaced by Greek “ontology” because it was found to be inaccurate. We need to do the same thing because we’ve moved beyond Greek thought. The functional point of view was replaced by static (ontic) point of view and ontological definitions (e.g., ousia, prosopon, hypostasis).

Jesus made no clear claim to be divine.

Ontological notions are present in the Old Testament and New Testament. You really cannot separate the “what” from the “who.” Jesus’ saving work depends upon His divine and human natures. Given Jesus’ job description, what must be true about His natures? Post-biblical development is necessary for the articulation and defense of the Gospel. To articulate what was meant by simple statements in the Bible, and to defend against the developing heresies, philosophical development was necessary.

In order to be relevant we need a new Christology that abandons ontological categories and is defined in functional terms.

We now have a richer understanding of natural causation and a better understanding of cosmology. Things don’t have essences and natures. But it is not clear how scientific understanding has to change our metaphysics. The empirical scientific point of view is dynamic, pragmatic, and relational, not static, speculative, ontological. This isn’t an argument, but an assertion. Unless you assume this claim, it doesn’t rule out the traditional view. Contemporary preaching cannot be “logocentric.” If we preach the story of what Christ did, that entails who He was and claimed to be. We don’t preach a philosophical Christology, we preach the Gospel.

CONCLUSION

Jesus couldn’t have accomplished a function of a certain sort if He weren’t a being of a certain sort. Therefore functional Christology cannot rule out the divinity of Jesus. One will not be wrong to go in for orthodox assertion of Christology.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Groningen, G.V (1997). Vol 1 of Messianic Revelation In The Old Testament. Eugene OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers.
Witherington III, Ben (1998). The Many Faces of the Christ: The Christologies of the New Testament and Beyond. New York. Crossraod Publishing Company.

Folarin, George O., (2003). Functional Christology in the Fourth Gospel: Implications for African Christianity.

DeWeese, Garry (2001). Philosophical Theology: Christology. Talbot School of Theology

[1] (Philip Melancthon, Loci communes theologici)

[2] (Raymond Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament)

MY THEOLOGY CLASS

FUNCTIONAL CHRISTOLOGY

INTRODUCTION

FOUR CLAIMS OF FUNCTIONAL CHRISTOLOGY

THE BIBLICAL WORLDVIEW

This view also places the synoptics over John because of their temporal priority.

RESPONSE

Below are responses to the claims of functional Christology.

Function, not nature

Hebrew thought

Post-biblical developments

Jesus made no clear claim to be divine.

In order to be relevant we need a new Christology that abandons ontological categories and is defined in functional terms.

CONCLUSION

Jesus couldn’t have accomplished a function of a certain sort if He weren’t a being of a certain sort. Therefore functional Christology cannot rule out the divinity of Jesus. One will not be wrong to go in for orthodox assertion of Christology.