# Christ's Two Wills



## Scott (May 4, 2006)

Does Christ have two wills, one divine and one human, as Catholic theology states? I owuld expect reformed theology to be consistent with Catholic theology in regards to Christology and the Trinity, as I don't recall seeing criticisms in those areas in the usual inventory of criticisms (Tradition papacy, prayer to saints, etc.). From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:



> 475 Similarly, at the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other, but cooperate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinely with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation.110 Christ's human will "does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will."111
> . . .
> 482 Christ, being true God and true man, has a human intellect and will, perfectly attuned and subject to his divine intellect and divine will, which he has in common with the Father and the Holy Spirit.


Is this correct?


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## DTK (May 4, 2006)

> Does Christ have two wills, one divine and one human, as Catholic theology states? I owuld expect reformed theology to be consistent with Catholic theology in regards to Christology and the Trinity, as I don't recall seeing criticisms in those areas in the usual inventory of criticisms (Tradition papacy, prayer to saints, etc.). From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:



Well, it is an area that was very much explored and addressed in the early Church in regard to the Christological controversies. The heresy that the CCC has in mind here, though not mentioned, is that of Monothelitism, (from mo,noj, "œone, only" plus qelh,matoj, "œwill"). This was one of the heresies repudiated at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD. If you do a Google search on "œMonothelitism," you´ll probably get a number of hits.

DTK


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## Scott (May 4, 2006)

Thanks. It is a correct description, then?


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## Preach (May 4, 2006)

"Not My will, but Thine be done"


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## DTK (May 4, 2006)

> _Originally posted by Scott_
> Thanks. It is a correct description, then?


Yes, I think so.

DTK


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## larryjf (May 5, 2006)

Does that mean that the will is connected to nature as opposed to personhood?


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## DTK (May 5, 2006)

> _Originally posted by larryjf_
> Does that mean that the will is connected to nature as opposed to personhood?


Yes, that is how Muller states it as the Protestant scholastic understanding. In Christ, the will belongs to His two natures rather than His person. See Richard A. Muller, _Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology_ (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1985), p. 227.

DTK


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## Jon (May 11, 2006)

> _Originally posted by Preach_
> "Not My will, but Thine be done"


This verse says it all, but even more, we can infer it from the proposition that Christ is truly human. Humans have wills. God also has a will. Christ, being God and man, must then have two wills: an human one, and a divine one.

_Soli Deo Gloria_

Jon


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