[I couldn’t leave the mess as it was. The top half of this is a tidied up and slightly expanded string of thoughts that are mostly topically connected. Below the line I drew is the original, multi-edited complete mess.]
The article was interesting, but I wonder what your response is to it. Even the universalists mentioned saw a connection between Incarnation/s and sin. In regard to other-worldly persons, who may not sin, Lewis saw Incarnation/s as unrelated to sin in their case. I don’t remember, though, if there was an explanation of the purpose of Incarnation/s to the sinless. Maybe you saw one?
This does bring me to ask, what you view the purpose of Incarnation/s to be?
And after reading more views on the possibility (or not) of multiple Incarnations, do you feel closer to an explanation that satisfies you? In what way?
Earlier I had brought up Jesus’s resurrected body, and you replied:
Certainly not! No, I see no reason to have a problem with Jesus’s resurrected body and person. Although, I’m pretty sure we mean different things, when we talk about this.
A multiverse cosmology does, certainly, bring your question to the forefront. Whatever is, is. Whether I grasp it or not. However, what/how/who/when/wherever God is is also unified with the reality that exists. Whether I grasp it or not. I don’t intend to be reckless, but what is is.
Further regarding resurrection you said:
Would this non-existence then imply no soul or spirit or anything like that? No permanence of the Self, or any sort of self-awareness?
It does give a different insight into how a purely humans-to-humus model not only provides for but requires “making all things new,” if it is to include resurrection. It would certainly provide for your understanding of reconciliation. Although, really, it would remove any need for reconciliation, wouldn’t it? What would be left to reconcile?
A model of resurrection from obliteration is new to me. If I’ve misunderstood what you mean, please help me with that.
When I asked about Jesus’s (or maybe rather the Son of God’s) resurrected body, I was referring to a challenge that comes up in the article and that I’ve only become aware of as a topic of controversy, when I started reading about Reformed doctrines related to the Lord’s Supper. I learned that there are/have been heated doctrinal debates about the exact location of Jesus’s physical body right now. Baptist lay people don’t worry about this. We’re more concerned that God the Son not actually be at his table with us, because we’re set on a memorial, rather than a supper with the host.
Multiple Incarnations of God the Son would potentially complicate traditional understandings of where Jesus’s currently resurrected human body resides (at the right hand of God the Father) and what he is doing there. If there were more than one, much less infinite, Incarnation/s of God, would there (according to this system of thinking) imply infinite individual Gods-the-Son in heaven at one time? I think you were getting at this at the end of your OP.
Hebblethwaite addressed this in his work, quoted in the article:
"Even he does not take seriously enough the fact that a series of divine incarnations would have to be the same person, human as well as divine. And there lies incoherence – an incoherence brought out only too clearly by the eschatological implications of the simultaneous existence of a number of risen humans each alleged to be the incarnate Son of God.
(p 401-402)
But Lewis and some of the others, got around it by simply saying that while God could incarnate multiple times, He didn’t.
I thought Ward’s and Mascall’s views were probably the most interesting. [Possibly useful to you.]
Ward:
‘God could in theory take many minds and bodies to be finite forms of the divine nature. There is nothing to prevent the infinite God from taking any number of finite forms. But two main factors are necessary if a human person is to be a finite form of God. That person must be wholly obedient to God, and there must be an historical and cultural context which makes the expression of the divine nature in that person intelligible. The number of people who are wholly obedient to God must be very small indeed.’77
and
‘A human life that shows perfect knowledge and love of God, and which is selflessly devoted to the service of God, is so rare that its appearance is almost, if not quite, a miracle. It becomes truly a miracle if that human soul is such that it could not fall away from God, but is indissolubly united to the divine will.’78
Mascall:
To Mascall a second incarnation is irrelevant because Christ had already been taken up in glory, drawing humanity with Him, and the rest of creation. Both Bonting and Mascall note how the orthodox view is that the incarnation is not the conversion of Godhead into human flesh, but rather the taking up of humanity into the Godhead (a point of confluence with Lewis who also asserted the divinization of the human as God descended to reascend), so there is no reason why another finite rational nature, the inhabitants of another planet, could not also be taken up in this way.
But I don’t think that’s a problem in your view, because…
Does this mean, then, that you see the hypostatic union as temporary?
If that’s the case, then one infinite eternal Person of the Godhead could in theory be present in any infinitely present Progenies of God, because there’s no human aspect of resurrected remains to consider.
However, you did mention a resurrected Jesus, which makes me ask about him. Still hypostatically unified? If not, then what was/is he and where? How to understand this Jesus? I don’t expect that you’re going all Dan Brown on us.
And going back to the beginning (of the hypostatic union) from the (potential) end, Who is Jesus’ father/Father? Sorry. You’ve probably covered that elsewhere, and I forgot. (There’s a lot to put together here. A Choose-Your-Own-Theology-Adventure novel with no page number references.)
Regarding resurrection: you mentioned it is delayed. Delayed until? In an eternal and infinitely infinite multiverse, such a delay could be a problem, if resurrection is ever going to occur at all, couldn’t it? When could it possibly fit?
Sorry to nail you with so many more questions. They multiply infinitely as I think this through. Thanks for taking the time to read all this and for any thoughtful response.
N.B.:
Most useful to me in this article was the background on Lewis’s “doctrine” of Christological prefigurements and views on myth and legend. This explained what I found particularly off-putting in the Space Trilogy. I was baffled by his inclusion of characters like Merlin. This article provided the missing piece I needed to make more sense of that. So, thanks! 30 years was a wait, but now that’s done.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The article was interesting, but I wonder what your response is to it. Even the universalists mentioned saw a connection between Incarnation/s and sin. In regard to other-worldly persons, who may not sin, Lewis saw Incarnation/s as unrelated to sin in their case. I don’t remember, though, if there was an explanation of the purpose of Incarnation/s to the sinless. Maybe you saw one?
This does bring me to ask, what you view the purpose of Incarnation/s to be?
And after reading more views on the possibility (or not) of multiple Incarnations, do you feel closer to an explanation that satisfies you? In what way?
Earlier I had brought up Jesus’s resurrected body, and you replied:
Certainly not! Assuming resurrection at some point for all, what a great way to find out the definitive answers to all these questions. Just ask him. Spend the Resurrection with the person all this frustrating yearning is about. No, I see no reason to have a problem with Jesus’s resurrected body and person.
[Edited 2022.11.19, 05:33]
No, wait! Those questions wouldn’t be possible or practical, because:
This non-existence would also imply no soul or spirit or anything like that, wouldn’t it? No permanence of the Self, or any sort of self-awareness.
It does give a different insight into how a purely humans-to-humus model not only provides for but requires “making all things new.” It would certainly provide for your understanding of reconcilliation.
A model of resurrrection from obliteration is new to me.[/edit]
When I asked about this [edit 2022.11.19–Looking back and forth to your OP I see that you did address this and I misunderstood that you were addressing it. Sorry. Sometimes there’s a lot to take in and assemble. The structure is not always clear until I hash it over.], I was referring to a challenge that comes up in the article and that I’ve only become aware of as a topic of controversy, when I started reading about reformed doctrines related to the Lord’s Supper. I learned that there are/have been heated doctrinal debates about the exact location of Jesus’s physical body right now. Baptist lay people don’t worry about this. We’re more concerned that God the Son not actually be at his table with us, because we’re set on a memorial, rather than a supper with the host.
Multiple Incarnations of God the Son would potentially complicate traditional understandings of where Jesus’s currently resurrected human body resides (in heaven) and what he is doing there. If there were more than one, much less infinite, Incarnation/s of God, would there (according to this system of thinking) imply infinite individual Gods-the-Son in heaven at one time? I think you were getting at this at the end of your OP.
Hebblethwaite addressed this in his work, quoted in the article:
"Even he does not take seriously enough the fact that a series of divine incarnations would have to be the same person, human as well as divine. And there lies incoherence – an incoherence brought out only too clearly by the eschatological implications of the simultaneous existence of a number of risen humans each alleged to be the incarnate Son of God.
(p 401-402)
But Lewis and some of the others, got around it by simply saying that while God could incarnate multiple times, He didn’t.
I thought Ward’s and Mascall’s views were probably the most interesting. [Possibly useful to you.]
But I don’t think that’s a problem in your view, because…
[yet another edit on 2022.11.19]This would mean, then, that you see the hypostatic union as temporary then, wouldn’t it?
If that’s the case, then one infinite eternal Person of the Godhead could in theory be present in any infinitely present Progenies of God.
[/edit]
[Another edit 2022.11.19, 06:07]
Regarding resurrection: you mentioned it is delayed. Delayed until? In an eternal and infinitely infinite multiverse, such a delay could be a problem, if resurrection is ever going to occur at all, couldn’t it? When could it possibly fit?
[/edit]
Most useful to me in this article was the background on Lewis’s “doctrine” of Christological prefigurements and views on myth and legend. This explained what I found particularly off-putting in the Space Trilogy. I was baffled by his inclusion of characters like Merlin. This article provided the missing piece I needed to make more sense of that. So, thanks! 30 years was a wait, but now that’s done.
[Ok. I must stop editing and let this rest. It becomes more disorganized by the minute. Sorry. You can hash it over (or not) as you see fit.]