st. john of damascus (676-749 - Cristo Raul

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THE "FONS SCIENTLE."
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themselves diversely the same which long after
wards formed the subject of an interesting discussion
between Erasmus and Colet the agony in Gethsemane,
with its prayer "Not my will, but thine, be
done
(c. Ixii.). This leads to a consideration of the
passions, or affections, of our nature, to which, as
being sinless, Christ in His humanity could be sub
ject. Such are the cravings of hunger and thirst,
weariness and sorrow and fear. In like manner are
we to understand the growth, or progress, made by
Christ, when it is written that he "increased in
wisdom and knowledge" (c. Ixvi.). The feeling of
human weakness suggests prayer. Thus it is natural
to turn next to the Lord s Prayer. Christ s divine and
holy mind needed nothing to raise it to communion
with God. He needed not to ask anything of God,
who was Himself God. But having taken upon Him
our nature in its entirety, Jesus would give us this
example of prayer. Such, it is added, was the reason
for His praying given by Christ Himself at the raising
of Lazarus (c. Ixviii.).
The reality of the human
nature taken upon Him by Christ suggests the
question of its "
corruptibility. He saw no corrup
tion in the grave, but yet His body could not be
called incorruptible
till the resurrection ;
other
wise it would not have been truly our nature that He
wore. The third book ends (c. Ixxiii.) with a short
section on the Descent into Hell, and the proclama
tion of a Redeemer there: "that unto Him every
knee should bow, of beings in heaven, and on earth,
and under the earth."
The fourth book (c. Ixxiv.) begins with the resur-