79. Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature.

Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature.

YOUCAT Catechism + Catechism of the Catholic Church Lesson 79

Ave Maria series

79.  Did Jesus have a soul, a mind, and a body just as we do?

Yes.  Jesus “worked with human hands, he thought with a human mind.  He acted with a human will, and with a human heart he loved”  (Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes 22, 2).  [470-476]

St Joseph and Jesus in the carpentry room. …..79

                        

The humanity of Jesus is complete and includes also the fact that Jesus possessed a soul and developed psychologically and spiritually.  In this soul dwelled his human identity and his special self-consciousness.  Jesus knew about his unity with his heavenly Father in the Holy Spirit, by whom he allowed himself to be guided in every situation of his life.

Mystery (Greek mysterion=secret): A mystery is a reality (or one aspect of a reality) that in principle eludes rational knowledge.

And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature.  Luke 2:52

[470-476]

HOW IS THE SON OF GOD MAN?

470 Because "human nature was assumed, not absorbed (Gaudium et spes 22 subs 2)" ⁹⁷, in the mysterious union of the Incarnation, the Church was led over the course of centuries to confess the full reality of Christ's human soul, with its operations of intellect and will, and of his human body. In parallel fashion, she had to recall on each occasion that Christ's human nature belongs, as his own, to the divine person of the Son of God, who assumed it. Everything that Christ is and does in this nature derives from "one of the Trinity". The Son of God therefore communicates to his humanity his own personal mode of existence in the Trinity. In his soul as in his body, Christ thus expresses humanly the divine ways of the Trinity (compare John 14:9-10) "⁹⁸: --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

The Son of God. . . worked with human hands; he thought with a human mind. He acted with a human will, and with a human heart he loved. Born of the Virgin Mary, he has truly been made one of us, like to us in all things except sin (Gaudium et spes 22 subs 2).⁹⁹ --CCC

Christ's soul and his human knowledge

471 Apollinarius of Laodicaea asserted that in Christ the divine Word had replaced the soul or spirit. Against this error the Church confessed that the eternal Son also assumed a rational, human soul (compare Damasus 1: Denzinger-Schönmetzer 149)..¹⁰⁰—CCC

472 This human soul that the Son of God assumed is endowed with a true human knowledge. As such, this knowledge could not in itself be unlimited: it was exercised in the historical conditions of his existence in space and time. This is why the Son of God could, when he became man, "increase in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man (Luke 2:52)",¹⁰¹ and would even have to inquire for himself about what one in the human condition can learn only from experience (compare Mark 6:38; Mk 8:27; John 11:34; etc.).¹⁰² This corresponded to the reality of his voluntary emptying of himself, taking "the form of a slave (Phiippians 2:7)".¹⁰³ –CCC

473 But at the same time, this truly human knowledge of God's Son expressed the divine life of his person (compare St. Gregory the Great, "Sicut aqua" ad Eulogium, Epist. Lib. 10, 39 Patrologia Latina 77, 1097A ff.; Denzinger-Schönmetzer 475).¹⁰⁴  "The human nature of God's Son, not by itself but by its union with the Word, knew and showed forth in itself everything that pertains to God (St. Maximus the Confessor, Qu. et dub. 66: Patrologia Graeca 90, 840A)."¹⁰⁵  Such is first of all the case with the intimate and immediate knowledge that the Son of God made man has of his Father (compare Mark 14:36; Matthew 11:27; John 1:18; Jn 8:55; etc).¹⁰⁶  The Son in his human knowledge also showed the divine penetration he had into the secret thoughts of human hearts (compare Mark 2:8; John 2:25; Jn 6:61; etc).¹⁰⁷ –CCC

474 By its union to the divine wisdom in the person of the Word incarnate, Christ enjoyed in his human knowledge the fullness of understanding of the eternal plans he had come to reveal (compare Mark 2:8; John 2:25; Jn 6:61; etc).¹⁰⁸ What he admitted to not knowing in this area, he elsewhere declared himself not sent to reveal (compare Mark 13:32, Acts of the Apostles 1:7).¹⁰⁹ --CCC

Christ's human will

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 (compare Council of Constantinople III (681): Denzinger-Schönmetzer 556-559).¹¹⁰  Christ's human will "does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will (Council of Constantinople III: Denzinger-Schönmetzer 556)."¹¹¹ --CCC

Christ's true body

476 Since the Word became flesh in assuming a true humanity, Christ's body was finite (compare Council of the Lateran (649): Denzinger-Schönmetzer 504).¹¹²  Therefore the human face of Jesus can be portrayed; at the seventh ecumenical council (Nicaea II in 787) the Church recognized its representation in holy images to be legitimate (Galatians 3:1; compare Council of Nicaea II (787): Denzinger-Schönmetzer 600-603).¹¹³ --CCC