God as Embodied: Christology and Participation in and Saint Maximus the Confessor
In St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 67.1–2 (2023): 147–169
Abstract
Does God have a body? The problematic implications of divine embodiment seem obvious: it either makes makes God human (anthropomorphism) or it confuses him with the cosmos (pantheism). This lecture turns to Saint Maximus to argue that Christology requires us to treat creation as divine embodiment. The Incarnation tells us how God typically manifests himself in created form. God's paradigmatic way of acting is visible, therefore, in the Incarnation. The Incarnation—God’s original and full manifestation in the flesh—is figuratively present throughout creation. Creation, therefore, is is a theophany or embodiment of God.
