LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW - Concordia Lutheran Seminary

40 LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW XII
as being theo- and Christocentric—while still calling for the believer’s full
participation as one whose faith is bound up in every respect with Christ’s. 64
At the same time, however, it must be noted that very few of these
theological implications are developed or expounded in the existing
literature with any thoroughness. Partly this is due to the “occasional” nature
the literature, since a glance at any bibliography reveals that the bulk of the
work on pi,stij Cristou/ consists of short exegetical articles. There is simply
not enough space in the span of 15 or 20 pages to develop an integrated
theology based on “the faith of Christ”—even if that were the goal, which in
the case of most of these exegetically-minded scholars it clearly is not. The
only two longer works on the topic, the volumes by Hays and Wallis, both
suffer (in a sense!) from their authors’ preoccupation with advancing their
arguments textually rather than systematically. The reader is left in both
cases with the uneasy feeling that a great deal more needs to be said about
this topic before it can be properly “settled”. Indeed, the ongoing
acrimonious debate on the question points to the same conclusion: that the
theological implications of reading pi,stij Cristou/ subjectively have not yet
fully been explored.
What are some of those implications?
Christology is perhaps the theological area most directly affected by this
debate. Richard Hays, for example, bluntly charges that “Some opposition to
the subjective genitive interpretation may be rooted in an implicitly docetic
Christology.” 65 Docetic or not, though, one’s Christology cannot help being
affected by the suggestion that Christ’s faith as the Son of God differed in no
significant respect from our own. Granted, Aquinas may have exaggerated
matters in a docetic direction by claiming that “from the moment of
conception Christ had the full vision of the very being of God … . Therefore
he could not have had faith.” 66 And surely Aquinas is not alone in defending
the divine aspect of Christ’s person in such abstract and philosophical
arguments that Jesus’ humanity is eclipsed to the point of practically
disappearing. This pendulum, too, as every pendulum, swings to both sides.
But it helps little—even in the face of borderline docetism—to rush
headlong to the other extreme and insist, as some proponents of the
subjective interpretation are on the verge of saying, that Christ’s faith
exactly equals our own in every respect. Hooker’s suggestion, for example,
that “The term ‘Son of God’ … needs to be interpreted in terms of Christ’s
oneness with the Father and obedience to his will, rather than in terms of
64
See Hooker 321-23 and 341-42; Wallis 67-69; and Hays, “PISTIS” 727-29.
65
Hays, “PISTIS” 728.
66
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 3a.7.3, quoted in Wallis 1.