In What Sense is Christ a “Composite Hypostasis”? Jonathan Hill Refuted

By: Jay Dyer

An errant, troublemaking individual has upset some catechumens recently due to his last couple months of confused insisting that the meaning of the fathers referring to Christ as a “composite hypostasis” is not what I say it is and leveling the accusations of “monophysite” at me and many friends.  For him, the idea is confused because he 1) believes this means the Hypostasis itself altered and changed into some new hybrid state where it is now possible to speak of Christ as a human person and 2) because he doesn’t understand what enhypostatized means, as it was introduced to explain this very point – that the eternal Logos is the only Personal Subject in Christ and 3) the individual foolishly fails to see how these matters relate directly to St. Maximos’ Dispute with Pyrrhus and the monothelites, telling me it “has nothing to do with two wills and energies.”  Indeed it does, as St. Maximos and St. John of Damascus both explain the relationship of dyothelitism and dyoenergism to the sole Subject being the Logos (as Bathrellos will elucidate) showing the objector has no knowledge of these subjects, as he pretends. 

What can one expect from an opera singer with no formal training in either theology or philosophy who attempts to strike up disputes endlessly to make a name for himself.  He also believes hypostasis is “what we are” in some strict sense, without understanding the nuance that hypostasis is merely the particular, the individual, and is district from nature.  This distinction means requires the further crucial category of enhypostatized, which is the tropos or mode in which nature exists – always in the mode of Persons, hence enhypostatized.  Hypostasis is not a holistic statement of “what we are,” in some low IQ, reductionist sense. 

Here was his stellar, nonsensical claim that was intended to spark a debate, and would have been correct until he got to the crucial part at the end where he affirmed Christ is a human person and outright made the Nestorian statement I accused him of two months ago, as he upset and confused may catechumens alleging I was secretly teaching people “Monophysitism.”  In reality, as is now known to many, he merely wants to be known as a “somebody” and is claiming to represent Rocor.  Not only does his foolish statement illustrate delusion and prelest, it shows he has no facility with nuance and the important terms and meanings in Christological dogma.  

First, let’s look at one his proof-texts which misunderstands the argumentation of St. John of Damacus.  The opponent cites this from Defense, 4.5:

“The subsistence of the Word before the Incarnation was simple and uncompound, and incorporeal and uncreate: but after it became flesh, it became also the subsistence of the flesh, and became compounded of divinity which it always possessed, and of flesh which it had assumed: and it bears the properties of the two natures, being made known in two natures: so that the one same subsistence is both uncreate in divinity and create in humanity, visible and invisible. For otherwise we are compelled either to divide the one Christ and speak of two subsistences, or to deny the distinction between the natures and thus introduce change and confusion.”

In the errant opponent’s mind this means the Incarnation was like an addition formula – divine nature plus human nature = Incarnate Composite Hypostasis of Christ, as if the single Hypostasis itself can now be called a human person also, as you see from his foolish quote.  That is not the Orthodox doctrine, but in fact the crypto-Nestorian idea that McGuckin rebukes in typical errant western readings of Christology that fail to understand the Neo-Cyrillian interpretation of Chalcedon that later was adopted as our Christology.  Again, McGuckin makes this abundantly clear.  What may be confusing him is the New Advent translation and Latin use of substance here, which is Person.  If we look at the Ex Fontibus translation it becomes clearer as Person is used and makes the meaning clearer where the brackets give my interpretation:

“Before the Incarnation, the Person of God the Word was simple and uncompounded, bodiless and uncreated.  But when it [the Divine Person of the Word] had assumed flesh, It [the Divine Person of the Word] became Person to the flesh, and also became compounded of the divinity, which it [the Divine Person of the Word] always had, and the flesh which it took as an addition.  Being thus found in two natures, it bears the properties of the two, so that the same Person is at once uncreated in His divinity and created in its [the Divine Person of the Word’s] humanity.” (Defense, pg. 339)   

St. John is in fact stating my view, that the Divine Person of the Word became composite by being found in two natures, with no created human hypostasis and in no sense possessing a human hypostasis nor can he be referred to, in any sense, as a human person. 

To begin, lets look at how St. John of Damascus uses some of these terms for us in his Fount of Knowledge – both hypostasis and enhypostatized:

“The word hypostasis has two meanings. Thus, when used in a strict sense it means substance simply.  However, the hypostasis subsisting in itself means the individual and the distinct person.  Enypostaton, or what has real existence, has two meanings also.  Thus, it may mean being in the strict sense.  In this sense we not only call substance in the strict sense enhypostatic, but the accident also.  And it also means the hypostasis in itself, that is to say the individual.” (Fount 1.29)

Like St. Cyril of Alexandria, enhypostatized is the tropos or mode in which nature exists.  For God and men, nature always exists in some Person or persons.  Next in Chapter 43 St. John expands on in what sense a hypostasis can be “composite:”

“One should know that it is impossible for one compound nature to be made from two substances, that is to say, from two natures, because it is impossible  for logically opposed constituent differences to exist in the same thing.  It is possible, however, for one compound hypostasis to be made from diverse natures, which is how man is made up, body and soul.”  

Here, St. John is using the analogy common in St. Cyril about the fact that human nature only exists in the tropos or mode of individual persons – en-hypostases.  There is no abstract human nature that exists in theory, but always in the mode of some Person. Likewise if you have read St. Cyril or McGuckin you know this analogy is used of Christ, that like the body moves the soul, the Logos moved the flesh (the fully human nature) of Christ (as we will see below).  As we move to section 43-44 it becomes even clearer in what sense St. John wants us to understand Person and enhypostatized, especially in special cases like the Incarnation of Christ. 

Next he explains the differences in 42-46:

“A person is one who by reason of his own operations and properties exhibits to us an appearance which is distinct and set off from those of the same nature as he. When Gabriel, for example, was conversing with the Mother of God,’ while he was one of the angels, he alone was present there and speaking. Thus he was by his presence and conversation in that place made distinct from the angels of the same substance with him. And when Paul spoke to the people from the stairs, while he was one of the number of men, by his properties and operations he was distinct from the rest of men.

One should know that the holy Fathers used the term hypostasis and person and individual for the same thing, namely, that which by its own subsistence subsists of itself from substance and accidents, is numerically different, and signifies a certain one, as, for example, Peter, and Paul, and this horse. Hypostasis has been so called from its hupostasis, or subsisting….

Or it is that which is compound with another thing differing in substance to make up one particular whole and constitute one compound hypostasis. Thus, man is made up of soul and body, while neither the soul alone nor the body alone is called a hypostasis, but both are called enhypostata. That which consists of both is the hypostasis of both, for in the proper sense hypostasis is that which subsists of itself by its own subsistence, and such this is called.

Again, that nature is called enhypostaton which has been assumed by another hypostasis and in this has its existence. Thus, the body of the Lord, since it never subsisted of itself, not even for an instant, is not a hypostasis, but an enhypostaton. And this is because it was assumed by the hypostasis of God the Word and this subsisted, and did and does have this for a hypostasis.” (Fount of Knowledge)

We see here at the close of this section after elucidating the human aspects of nature and enypostatization, St. John clearly wants to show the humanity of Christ possesses no other hypostasis than the divine Person of the Word. This means, following St. Cyril, there is only one personal subject present and in no sense can he be called a human person.  Later, he makes clear that hypostasis is not “what we are” as the opponent thinks, but merely the particular aspect of individuals, not their nature.  Nature is distinct from person, but never divide and never separated.  

“Substance is a most general genus. It is divided into corporeal and incorporeal.

The corporeal is divided into animate and inanimate.

The animate is divided into sentient, or animal, zoophyte, and non-sentient, or plant.

The animal is divided into rational and irrational. The rational is divided into mortal and immortal. The mortal is divided into man, ox, horse, dog,

and the like.

Man is divided into Peter, Paul, and all other

individual men. These are individuals, hypostases, and persons….”

Next St. John of Damascus discusses the hypostatic union and follows St. Cyril closely while explaining in the first paragraph of Chapter 66 in what sense we call Christ a “compound hypostasis:” 

“One should know that the hypostatic union produces one compound hypostasis of the thing united and that this preserves unconfused and unaltered in itself both the uniting natures and their difference as well as their natural properties.”  

Exactly – what is compound is the the uniting of two uniting natures: that’s it.  All it means is that He possesses two natures unconfused and undivided. It doesn’t mean that he takes on a new attribute or quality of human personhood.  Furthermore this section of compound is, like St. Cyril comparing the compound aspects of our enhypostatic state of body, soul, intellect and will (human nature) with the union in Christ, also known as henosis or the henotic union. (See McGuckin, St. Cyril of Alexandria and the Christological Controversy, pages 198-9). 

And here in this section compound hypostasis is referring to humans, where our nature is compounded of two different things, body and soul, utilizing the henotic analogy of St. Cyril and explaining that hypostasis simply means particular persons:

“Those things are specifically the same which belong to the same species and agree in their essence. Peter, for instance, and Paul both belong to the same species, that of man. On the other hand, those things are specifically different which differ in species, that is, in their essence, as, for example, man and horse. The holy Fathers, however, use ‘generically the same’ and ‘specifically the same’ for the same things, namely, for things which are consubstantial, that is to say, are hypostases belonging to the same species. Things are hypostatically the same when two natures are united in one hypostasis and have one compound hypostasis and one person, as in the case of soul and body. Those things are hypostatically and numerically different which, by the combination of their accidents, have set apart as distinct the peculiarity of their own hypostasis, or, in other words, those things which differ from one another in their accidents and have their existence individually. An example would be the individuals Peter and Paul, for the latter is one and the former another.”

St. John continues in 66 still discussing human enhypostatization, and then moving on to Christ:

“These, however, in no wise separate the soul from the body, but they unite and bind them together, at the same time marking off the one hypostasis composed of them from all other hypostases of the same species. Moreover, once the natures become hypostatically united, they remain absolutely indivisible. And this is so because, even though the soul is separated from the body in death, the hypostasis of both remains one and the same. For the constitution in itself of each thing at its beginning of being is a hypostasis. Therefore, the body remains, as does the soul; both always having the one principle of their being and subsistence, even though they are separated.

It is further necessary to know that it is possible for natures to be united to each other hypostatically, as in the case of man, and that it is also possible for the hypostasis to assume an additional nature. Both of these are to be observed in Christ, because in Him the divine and human natures were united, while His animate body subsisted in the pre-existent hypostasis of God the Word and had this for a hypostasis.”

And here we have the crux of the matter from St. John.  Here our opponent is fully defeated by the Neo-Cyrillic interpretation of Chalcedon, which is that the humanity of Christ has for its Hypostasis the Divine Person of the Word alone.  And the nail in the coffin is the explicit condemnation of the opponent’s formulation:

“It is, however, quite impossible for one compound nature to be made from two natures or for one hypostasis to be made from two, because it is impossible for contrary essential differences to exist together in one nature. This is because it is of the very nature of these to distinguish from each other the natures in which they exist. And again, it is impossible for things that have once begun to subsist in themselves to have another principle of subsistence, for the hypostasis is subsistence in self. It must further be known that in the Holy Trinity a hypostasis is the timeless mode of each external existence.”

I will include the rest of this section so that I am not accused of leaving out anything, even though the rest of this section deals with compound created natures and not the Incarnation specifically. 

“One should know, moreover, that whenever a compound nature is produced, the parts must be coincident and a new thing made from other things. This new thing will not preserve the thing of which it has been composed as such, but will change and alter them. Thus, when the body has been made up from the four elements, a new thing has been made out of other things, and this new thing is neither pure fire nor any of the other elements, nor is it so called. It is the same with the mule, which is bred from a horse and an ass, for it is neither a horse nor an ass, nor it is so called. On the contrary, it is a new thing produced from others and which does not preserve unconfused and unchanged either one of those things of which it is composed.”

The part we want to stress again here is the key issue that “in Him the divine and human natures were united, while His animate body subsisted in the pre-existent hypostasis of God the Word and had this for a hypostasis.”

Christ’s humanity has, for its hypostasis, its personal subject and locus of action, the Divine Person of the Word, and Him alone.  There is thus absolutely no sense in which He is a human person at all, whatsoever.  In fact, St. John even uses the Athanasian motif of the flesh being the organon of the Logos, as the animating power behind the deification of His flesh by the uncreated energies and because the only Personal subject present in Him is the eternal Logos: 

“The subsistence of God the Word before the Incarnation was simple and uncompound, and incorporeal and uncreate: but after it became flesh, it became also the subsistence of the flesh, and became compounded of divinity which it always possessed, and of flesh which it had assumed: and it bears the properties of the two natures, being made known in two natures: so that the one same subsistence is both uncreate in divinity and create in humanity, visible and invisible. For otherwise we are compelled either to divide the one Christ and speak of two subsistences, or to deny the distinction between the natures and thus introduce change and confusion.

“For Christ is one, and one also is His person or subsistence, but yet He has two natures, one belonging to His humanity, and another belonging to His divinity. [This is all ‘compound hypostasis means] And the glory, indeed, which proceeded naturally from His divinity became common to both through the identity in subsistence, and again on account of His flesh that which was lowly became common to both. For He Who is the one or the other, that is God or man, is one and the same, and both what is divine and what is human belong to Himself. For while His divinity performed the miracles, they were not done apart from the flesh, and while His flesh performed its lowly offices, they were not done apart from the divinity. For His divinity was joined to the suffering flesh, yet remaining without passion, and endured the saving passions, and the holy mind was joined to the energising divinity of the Word, perceiving and knowing what was being accomplished.”

Here we see an important point that although Christ can never be divided, and even in death He was not separated from His humanity, the opponent foolishly thinks its “always wrong to make distinctions in Christ after the Incarnation,” not realizing this means the whole Christ would have to suffer and die.  In fact this is laughable nonsense, as it should be an Orthodox basic that the humanity of Christ suffered and died and His deified soul descended into Hades, without ever being divided from or separated from the single Divine Hypostasis to which it was united.  This also is the only proof needed to refute the heretic making these accusations. We will see this here in a moment concerning the Descent into Hades, but concerning the sufferings he writes:

“And thus His divinity communicates its own glories to the body while it remains itself without part in the sufferings of the flesh. For His flesh did not suffer through His divinity in the same way that His divinity energised through the flesh. For the flesh acted as the instrument of His divinity. Although, therefore, from the first conception there was no division at all between the two forms, but the actions of either form through all the time became those of one person, nevertheless we do not in any way confuse those things that took place without separation, but recognise from the quality of its works what sort of form anything has.”

Here he notes the distinctions we make do not divide Christ in reality, but are real distinctions without composition or division.   This is necessary to theology to explain the death and descent without falling into stupid heresies like the Calvinists do. 

“Christ, then, energises according to both His natures and either nature energises in Him in communion with the other, the Word performing through the authority and power of its divinity all the actions proper to the Word, i.e. all acts of supremacy and sovereignty, and the body performing all the actions proper to the body, in obedience to the will of the Word that is united to it, and of whom it has become a distinct part. For He was not moved of Himself to the natural passions , nor again did He in that way recoil from the things of pain, and pray for release from them, or suffer what befell from without, but He was moved in conformity with His nature, the Word willing and allowing Him œconomically to suffer that, and to do the things proper to Him, that the truth might be confirmed by the works of nature.”

Here is another nail in the coffin against the heretic: The actions proper to both His humanity and His divinity have one subject – the Divine Person of the Word.  The Body of the Lord, a fully human nature in other words, is fully obedient to the will of the Word [The only Divine Person Present] who assumed it. The Divine Person of the Word moved the flesh as was appropriate in the Economy.  What we see here is a confirmation of the Neo-Cyrillic interpretation of Chalcedon, which the opponent is unaware of, and hence his misunderstandings.  As John McGuckin notes on page 242 of St. Cyril of Alexandria and the Christologcal Controversy, the Neo-Cyrilic view is what was confirmed at the Second Council of Constantinople, which took St. Cyril’s legacy almost a hundred years to finally come to full fruition, from 438 to 553.  As we will see below, modern Orthodox theologians concur, but for added measure I want to highlight how my case is also proven in the Descent to Hades doctrine:

“Wherefore, although He died as man and His Holy Spirit was severed from His immaculate body, yet His divinity remained inseparable from both, I mean, from His soul and His body, and so even thus His one hypostasis was not divided into two hypostases. For body and soul received simultaneously in the beginning their being in the subsistence of the Word, and although they were severed from one another by death, yet they continued, each of them, having the one subsistence of the Word. So that the one subsistence of the Word is alike the subsistence of the Word, and of soul and body. For at no time had either soul or body a separate subsistence of their own, different from that of the Word, and the subsistence of the Word is for ever one, and at no time two. So that the subsistence of Christ is always one. For, although the soul was separated from the body topically, yet hypostatically they were united through the Word.”

This paragraph fully and utterly refutes the opponent in his claims and contradictions and misreading of these fathers and saints.  If the Incarnation produced a human-divine composite Hypostasis in the sense he means, that the hypostasis itself now includes a human subject and person, then Christ death in his flesh is rendered impossible and the Divine-human Hypostasis died.  Look at the foolishness and stupidity this basic mistake is reduced to, yet many heresies begin in a mistake about words and senses, and clearly our opera singer has no philosophical grounding in these terms and their meanings. It was the deified human soul of the Word that descended into Hades at His death and this is what destroyed the power of the Devil. If Christ’s hypostasis itself were altered to now become composite and possess a hybrid subject then this hybrid subject descended into Hades and suffered and died, and not just his flesh.  The irony of this heretic is that his error should logically lead him to Apollinarianism:

“Chapter 29. Concerning the Descent to Hades.

The soul when it was deified descended into Hades, in order that, just as the Sun of Righteousness Malachi 4:2 rose for those upon the earth, so likewise He might bring light to those who sit under the earth in darkness and shadow of death Isaiah 9:2: in order that just as He brought the message of peace to those upon the earth, and of release to the prisoners, and of sight to the blind , and became to those who believed the Author of everlasting salvation and to those who did not believe a reproach of their unbelief 1 Peter 3:19, so He might become the same to those in Hades : That every knee should bow to Him, of things in heaven, and things in earth and things under the earth. Philippians 2:10 And thus after He had freed those who had been bound for ages, straightway He rose again from the dead, showing us the way of resurrection.”

For further confirmation we should point out that St. Justinian affirms all the same ideas in his definitions of faith as shown in On the Person of Christ: The Christology of Emperor Justinian, especially pages 163-198).

Next, we want to look at the magisterial work of Demetrios Bathrellos in his magisterial work The Byzantine Christ: Person, Nature, and Will in the Christology of St. Maximos the Confessor.  In a section that perfectly details the confusion and explanation of the correct view of the Neo-Cyrillic reading, Bathrellos writes:

“Let us briefly consider some other suggestions. Bausenhart has drawn attention to the organon motif of St. Athanasius and Cyril, according to which the Logos moves His flesh as an instrument, and its mediation through neo-Chalcedonians such as Leontius of Jerusalem, down to the seventh-century monothelites.  However, the view that the human is moved by the divine is not a distinct characteristic of Athanasius, Cyril or Leontius of Jerusalem.  In fact, it was commonplace in ancient Christology, including Nestorian Christology, which presents Christ as acted upon (energetai) by the Son.  Leontius of Jerusalem, for instance, agreed with his Nestorian interlocutor that the Logos is the moving principle in Christology.  Their difference had to do with whether what was acted upon was a human person or a human nature.  Leontius argued in favor of the latter, which is preferable because it excludes a human person from Christology. But neither Leontius nor his Nestorian interlocutor were monothelites, as has already been argued.” ( pg. 93). 

Leontius, of course, is the source of the usage of “composite hypostasis,” which as we see means the joining of two natures, not that the Divine Hypostasis itself undergoes a composition or change into some new, divino-human hybrid hypostasis.  This is precisely where the errant individual has made his mistake and it stems from not understanding what enhypostatized means.  Note: “Compound hypostasis, an expression used by Leontius and meaning that the whole Christ is made up as it were of two parts or natures, is used in opposition to Monophysites of one compound nature.” (Defense, pg. 282 footnote 1) What is joined is the natures and both natures share one singular Divine Hypostasis as their sole personal Subject.  St. John of Damascus concurs, elucidating what we mean by enhypostatization: 

“For although there is no nature without subsistence, nor essence apart from person (since in truth it is in persons and subsistences that essence and nature are to be contemplated), yet it does not necessarily follow that the natures that are united to one another in subsistence should have each its own proper subsistence. For after they have come together into one subsistence, it is possible that neither should they be without subsistence, nor should each have its own peculiar subsistence, but that both should have one and the same subsistence. 

For since one and the same subsistence of the Word has become the subsistence of the natures, neither of them is permitted to be without subsistence, nor are they allowed to have subsistences that differ from each other, or to have sometimes the subsistence of this nature and sometimes of that, but always without division or separation they both have the same subsistence — a subsistence which is not broken up into parts or divided, so that one part should belong to this, and one to that, but which belongs wholly to this and wholly to that in its absolute entirety. For the flesh of God the Word did not subsist as an independent subsistence, nor did there arise another subsistence besides that of God the Word, but as it existed in that it became rather a subsistence which subsisted in another, than one which was an independent subsistence. Wherefore, neither does it lack subsistence altogether, nor yet is there thus introduced into the Trinity another subsistence.” (Defense, 3.9)

Note there arose no new hybrid status to the Divine Hypostasis itself, but rather the only Person present is the Second Person of the Godhead.  This is in order to remove any notion of a human, half-human/half-divine or new third thing divino-human hybrid Hypostasis. The hypostasis is composite in the sense of the joining of two natures, not in the sense that any new personal subject or secondary hypostasis or human person comes to be or resides alongside the eternal Person of the Word.  The Word alone is the only Person present for all His actions and there is no sense at all, whatsoever that Christ is a human person.  So in the sense of a joining of two natures with a singular Divine Hypostasis as their sole Personal Subject, yes, His Hypostasis is composite.  In the sense of the Hypostasis itself altering and taking on another or any new personal subject that’s human or divine, or a mixture, His Hypostasis is absolutely not composite.  He “remained what He was,” as St. Maximos says, and the only “He” present in Christ is the Divine He, the Second Person of the Godhead.  

In fact, anyone who has read John McGuckin on St. Cyril (as the erring opponent thinks would know this, as it’s the central theme of that book, but to add comedy to the mix the opponent actually says he’s  read it “more than once. He hasn’t even read it once.) What is joined is the two natures which have as their sole subject the Divine Person of the Word, thus excluding any sense in which Christ is a human person.  It is a true union without division or confusion because the Logos is enhypostatized and the human nature has for its Personal Subject the Divine Person of the Word alone. This is what Jean-Claude Larchet explains of St. Maximos’ theology as follows: 

“3) The union of the natures in Christ is thus accomplished not according to a composite nature but according to a composite hypostasis (ὑπόστασις σύνθετος), which is not a new hypostasis that would result from the union, but rather the divine hypostasis of the Son of God.

4) This means that the human nature does not have a proper hypostasis outside of the hypostasis of the Logos and that it has never had one, i.e., that it has not preexisted the Incarnation, and that it is from the hypostasis of the Logos that the human nature of Christ has its existence and subsistence. In other words, the human nature of Christ is enhypostatized.

It is in assuming the human nature, which is enhypostatized, that the hypostasis of the Logos beforehand simple becomes a composite hypostasis, being composed of the human nature and the divine nature, as a whole from its parts.”

(French translation from a friend from Maxime le Confesseur, médiateur entre l’Orient et l’Occident, 160).

This quote alone from Larchet refutes the basic mistake of our errant individual: as I said above: What is joined is the natures and both natures share one singular Divine Hypostasis as their sole personal Subject: composed of the human nature and the divine nature, as a whole from its parts.”

Bathrellos continues: 

“Furthermore it is not necessarily problematic to say the Logos moves His humanity, in so far as the reality and authenticity of the will and energy of this humanity are not undermined.  Bausenhart fails to distinguish between a legitimate and illegitimate use of the organon concept in Christology.  Maxmus, for instance, also stated that the Logos moved His humanity, although he was the most important expositor of dyothelitism.  Uthemann has argued that neo-Chalcedonianism paved the way for monothelitism by putting forward the unity fo the “actiones communes,” which with the assistance of the doctrine of ‘enhypostasia’ were finally attribute to the Logos. It should be noted that what some gpost-chalcedonians denoted of the unity of Christ’s energies in acting, and nothing more.  In addition, the fundamental point of the ‘doctrine of the ‘enhypostasia’” – namely that the Logos is the unique hypostasis in Christology, in which his divine and human natures subsist- in and of itself does not cause any problems in so far as the integrity of the humanity of Christ is not undermined, and it is important to remember here the insistence of the Post-Chalcedonians (against the anti-Chalcedonians) that the humanity of Christ is a full and complete nature. Furthermore, the view that the Logos is the unique Hypostasis in Christology is characteristic not only of monothelite Christologies, such as Apollinarius or those seventh century monothelites, but of their opponents too, such as the two Gregories and Maximos.  Finally, to argue on the basis of ‘the doctrine of “enhypostasia”  that the Logos is the unique subject of willing and action is not objectionable, in so far as the Logos is considered to the the subject not only of the divine but also of human willing and acting in virtue of His having two wills and energies.” (Bathrellos, 94). 

Thus, saying He is Theanthropos, God-man, does not in any sense make him a “human person” or introduce any human personal subject whatsoever.   Indeed, the only Personal Subject present for all the incarnate actions of Christ is the Divine Person of the Word.

Finally when we come to the final “proof text” the opponent has brought in from St. Maximos, we see that “compound hypostasis” does not mean what he thinks it means, but means what we have explained from the above.  St. Maximos writes:

“He whom you now treat with contempt,” he says, “was once transcendent even over you,” by which he means that, in Himself, the Word of God is beyond all time and every nature, even if now, for your sake, He has willingly become subject to both. “He who is now human was incomposite” and simple both in His nature and hypostasis, for He was “solely God, naked of the body and all that belongs to the body.” Now, however, through His assumption of human flesh possessing intellectual soul, He became the very thing “that He was not,” that is, composite in His hypostasis, “remaining” exactly “what He was,” that is, simple in nature, in order to save mankind. For this was the sole reason for His birth in the flesh: the salvation of human nature, and having become subject to the passibility of that nature, as if it were a kind of thick mass, He “consorted with the flesh through the medium of the intellect, and God on earth became man.” “For the sake of all He became all that we are, except for sin: body, soul, intellect—all that death pervades—and so He became what is the common lot from all these, a human being, indeed God visible in the flesh, to those capable of seeing beyond the flesh.”

This master philosopher left out the next section which proves our point, as St. Maximos continues to explain how and it what sense his Hypostasis became composite, even though the above text doesn’t prove what the heretic thinks it does, as it explains clearly the sense in which He became composite – by assuming a human nature, and not by becoming a human-divine third type of blended hypostasis (as this would be necessary for him to maintain his view that the hypostasis itself now includes a human personal subject, since we all know He didn’t assume a human hypostasis). The simple solution is what has been stated many times above – the humanity of Christ has, for its Hypostasis, the Divine Person of God the Word and that alone. St. Maximos continues in Ambuguua 3:

“It was, then. the Word Himself [the only Hypostasis Present] who strictly without change emptied Himself to the limit of our passible nature.  By taking on flesh He subjected Himself truly to being perceived by the senses and so was called the “visible God” and “God on earth.”  Through the flesh, which by nature is passible, He manifested His immensely measurable power, for “it” – obviously the flesh – was “blended with God and He became one, the stronger side predominating,” precisely because it was assumed by God the Word, who deified it [the human nature} by identifying it with His own Hypostasis.” 

St. Maximos is explaining the comments of St. Gregory Nazianzus’ First Oration on the Son and letting us know in what sense the humanity was “blended with God” to avoid any monophysite or monothelite errors.  In this explanation he clarifies what the sense of compound is by reaffirming the doctrine of St. Cyril that the Word made use of the flesh as an organon, just like Bathrellos explained above.  This removes, as he said, any notion of a human hypostasis in Christ whatsoever.  Like we also saw in St. John of Damascus, the Divine Person of the Word is the only Hypostasis the humanity possesses and since Christ is a Divine Person, this is the only coherent way to understand and read “composite Hypostasis.”  As often happens, mistakes are based on basic misunderstandings and we have all made them in our theological journeys. However, when someone goes public with accusations and upsets catechumens and seeks to subvert for his own ends, it must be called out and I obtained hierarchical permission to respond in this essay. 

In fact, had this clown read on in the Ambiguum to 5, he would have seen his very mistake dealt with as he explains how the humanity in Christ is not self moved and has no hypostasis other than the Word.  It only receives its being and movement from the Person of the Word who assumed it.  I will simply post the actual pages themselves so as to be clear since the book is pricey:

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