Zanchi on the Resurrection, Ascension, and Session of Jesus Christ
Edited by David Attebury December 2023. This is a compound work: I use a customized ChatGPT 4 to assist in the first translation draft, but check each line to the original and make changes.
6,544 words.
HIERONYMUS ZANCHIUS ON THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD, His Ascension into Heaven, and His Sitting at the Right Hand of the Father:
THESES.
JOHN XVII.
I am no longer in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to You.
NEUSTADT IN THE PALATINATE,
In the workshop of Matthaeus Harnisch.
1581.
ON THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST FROM THE DEAD, His Ascension into Heaven, and His Sitting at the Right Hand of the Father, based on Paul's letter to the Ephesians, Chapter 1:
THESES.
Which, under the presidency of Dr. Hieronymus Zanchius, will be defended, God willing, by Petrus Moraus Neruius, in Neustadt in the Palatinate, in the new auditorium, on April 15, 1581.
PART 1 - On the Resurrection
1.
God effectively exercised the greatness of His power in Christ, by raising Him from the dead: therefore, only God, with His infinite power, is the efficient cause of the resurrection of Christ, and of all the dead. [Ephesians 1:20]
2.
But Christ also raised Himself by His own power from the same [state], according to that [saying]; “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up: But He spoke of the temple of His body”: and that, “I lay down My life, that I may take it again.” Therefore, Christ is no less God than the Father, nor is He a lesser power of God. [John 2:19. John 10:17]
3.
However, the same [being] cannot truly be both the one raising from the dead and the one raised from the dead; unless [He] truly consists of distinct natures, divine, according to which He raises, and human, according to which He is raised. Therefore, the same Christ, as true God, is ὁμούσιος (of the same essence) with the Father, so as true man, He is ὁμούσιος (of the same essence) with His mother and His brethren.
4.
Nor can anyone be said to have truly been raised from the dead and to have resurrected, unless they are also said to have truly died and truly fallen. Death consists in the true separation of the soul from the body, by which the body, soon falling, is rightly called a corpse. Therefore, if Christ truly rose from the dead, it cannot be denied that He also truly died, with the soul truly separated from the body.
5.
But if (because Christ truly died) neither His soul was in the body during that time of death; nor (because He was truly buried) was His body existing on the cross while also in the tomb, or lying in the tomb and still hanging on the cross; nor (because God truly raised Him from the dead) either the soul called the body back, or the body itself from death to life: Therefore, the human nature in Christ was neither omnipotent nor present everywhere with its substance.
6.
Just as this conclusion does not hold, “Christ Himself died and was buried, and rose from the dead; Therefore, according to both natures, He died, was buried, and rose.”: So neither does this, “‘Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age,’ Therefore, not only by His Deity, but also by the substance of His humanity, He is really present with us on earth.” [Matthew 28:20]
7.
But in so far as this conclusion is valid, “Christ as God has suffered,” since He suffered not according to His Deity, but according to His humanity: So this other one [would be valid], “Christ as man, is everywhere, and simply omnipotent,” since not according to His human nature, but according to His divine nature is He everywhere and omnipotent: since the divine nature is no less united to the human nature, than the human nature to the divine nature in the same person of Christ.
8.
If God Himself, and therefore the divine nature in Christ, raised the body from the dead, not through the body itself but by itself, then it is false that the divine nature in Christ has done and does everything not only in, and with, but also through the human [nature].
9.
For the soul of Christ does not work everything through the body, just as neither do our minds understand or will through it, and this is because, as even the philosophers have taught, our mind in no way depends on the body. Much less, then, does the Deity of Christ operate everything through the assumed flesh.
10.
For does the Deity understand through human intellect, or will through human will, or does it, through human nature itself, sustain and preserve the very human nature in the person of του λόγου (the Word)? Or does it carry everything through human flesh, or rather by the word of its power? Finally, if the form of God does nothing except through the form of the servant, how true would be that [saying] of Leo: each form acts in accordance with its own nature in communion with the other:
11.
Just as, therefore, the form of God is one thing, and the form of the servant another, so too are the properties and actions of the former different from those of the latter: although often the work and result of both is one and the same.
12.
Therefore, it does not at all follow: To whomever Christ comes together with the Father according to the form of God, to the same He also comes, and in the same remains with His substance according to the form of the servant, much less everywhere.
13.
Furthermore, just as it is not another, but the same Christ: so too, not in another, but in the same body, in which He had suffered, died, and been buried, He rose from the dead.
14.
For it is not truly said to be raised from the dead and to resurrect: unless that which had truly fallen dead, that very thing, is brought back to life and rises again.
15.
But the body with which Christ suffered, died, and was buried was a truly human body, visible, tangible, circumscribed. Therefore, after the resurrection, Christ had and retained no body except that which is circumscribed in a certain place, wherever it was or is, and could and can be seen and touched.
16.
[1 Corinthians 15] Furthermore, the Apostle, while diligently discussing the qualities with which bodies raised from the dead will be adorned for eternal life, does not mention invisibility (ἀορασία), unboundedness (ἀπεριγραψία), or intangibility (ἀψηλάφητος); but only incorruptibility (ἀφθαρσία), glory (δόξα), and power (δύναμις), such as agility, and that the resurrected body is spiritual (πνευματικά), not in the sense that the corporeal substance is transformed into an incorporeal one, but that (as we say in one word with the Greeks) it will be immortal (ἀθάνατα) and fully inhabited and operated by the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the Apostle taught that these are the qualities never to be separated from bodies, namely that they are circumscribed, visible, and tangible. Hence, neither did the body of Christ discard these qualities after the resurrection.
17.
[John 20:19] Nor is the objection valid that Christ, after the resurrection, entered where the disciples were with doors being closed. For this did not make Him invisible, unbounded, or intangible: since Christ, having just entered and been seen by the disciples, said, “Handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have”: and therefore no change (as the fathers teach) was made in the body of Christ, just as neither when He or Peter walked on water; but by the omnipotence of the Deity, which has dominion over all things, the doors yielded to the true and solid body of the Son of God. [Luke 24]
18.
Therefore, it is rightly by the Fathers that not only Marcion, Manicheans, and others, who taught that Christ did not assume a true and solid human body, but a phantasmal one, and performed everything according to appearance and fantasy, were condemned: but also Origenists, John of Jerusalem, Eutyches the Bishop of Constantinople, and others, who said that Christ's body after the resurrection became so spiritual that it was subtler than air, and therefore invisible and intangible, were condemned. [Jerome, Volume 1, to Pammachius. Gregory the Great, Moralia in Job, Book 14, Chapter 29]
19.
However, since in the Lord's Supper no other body of Christ is given to us to eat than that which was broken for us, that is, truly suffered and died: it follows that the true body of Christ, which we eat in the Supper, is truly circumscribed, visible, and tangible; And therefore, since in the Supper nothing but bread is seen, touched, and felt: it is by no means the case that it is contained under the appearances of bread and wine, or hidden and concealed in the bread and wine itself, by its substance actually.
20.
We recognize, however, that the Resurrection of Christ is both the cause and the example of our resurrection, both spiritual and corporeal: indeed, the cause of the spiritual, because of the Apostle's word to Romans 4, “He was raised up for our justification”; and the example, because of this, “Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” [Romans 6.]
21.
We do not doubt that Christ's Resurrection is the cause of our corporeal resurrection, because of what the Apostle says, “If Christ is raised from the dead, we too shall rise”; and because of what the same Apostle says, “Christ the firstfruits of those who have risen”; and the example, because of what is written by the same Apostle, “He will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body.” [1 Corinthians 5, Philippians 3:21.]
22.
From this it also follows that either Christ's body is not invisible, intangible, unbounded, or our bodies too will be invisible, intangible, unbounded, and thus not spiritual bodies, but incorporeal spirits.
23.
For when Christ says, “Handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have,” He not only concluded that He is not a spirit, but primarily taught that there are no flesh and no bones that cannot be seen and touched.
PART 2 - On the Ascension
24.
Scripture tells, and the Church confesses, that the Lord Jesus Christ, after He was raised from the dead, demonstrated Himself to be truly resurrected to His disciples with many proofs over forty days, and then, being lifted up from the earth, ascended into heaven while the Apostles watched. Just as it was no other Christ than He who had died that rose again, so neither was it another, nor in another body, that He ascended into heaven, but the Son of God, in a truly human body, visible, tangible, circumscribed, who had truly risen from the dead. [Acts 1:3. Acts 1:9.]
25.
Therefore, just as the interaction of the same Lord Jesus Christ, with which He conversed with the Apostles for forty days after the resurrection, was not phantasmal but real and true, so also the Ascension was not only visible, but also truly (as the Fathers speak) local, when the Apostles saw Him ascending from the earth upwards.
26.
Such ascension and movement is not fitting for the divine nature: therefore, He ascended according to the human [nature].
27.
Nor do we deny that Christ, insofar as He is God, just as He is said to have descended from heaven, insofar as He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant and suffering in it, can also rightly be said to have ascended and been exalted to heaven, insofar as in the same form of the servant now glorified, the very form of God was in some way glorified through and after the ascension, that is, made illustrious to the whole world.
28.
Moreover, it is clear, just as this conclusion is not valid, “Christ Himself, God and man, ascended by local and visible motion into heaven, Therefore, even according to His Deity He ascended in the same way”: so neither is this valid, “Christ, God and man, is with us until the end of the age truly and with His essence present, Therefore, the substance of both body and soul, as well as the essence of the Deity, is present with us on earth.”
Also, if the Apostles saw with their own eyes Christ ascending upwards from the earth with His body through a change of place: therefore, the heaven into which He ascended cannot be ubiquitous, but must be far away from the earth.
29.
Moreover, both nature and all fairness demand that a suitable place be assigned to each thing, as we see done by God in things created by Him. Therefore, since no created thing can be found more excellent than the very body of Christ, both because of its union with the λόγος (Word), and because of the most excellent of all gifts created in it, and also because of the most perfect glory and happiness in which it now lives: it is necessary that that body exists in some certain and most blessed place.
30.
Nor does it arise from anything but true piety and true reverence towards Christ that we believe Christ's body is not under the earth, not on the earth, not in the waters, not in a small piece of bread, not in each leaf of the trees, nor in the air, or in the celestial orbs, but resides in a place that is as most blessed, beautiful, and perfect, as it is also the highest. We do not doubt, with Ambrose, that this place was indicated by the Apostle when he said he was caught up to the third heaven and into paradise. [2 Corinthians 12: 2 & 4.]
31.
Furthermore, the same Scripture tells, and the Catholic faith believes and confesses, that from the same heaven, the same Jesus Christ will return on the clouds to judge the living and the dead: and we, raised from the dead, will be caught up from the earth to meet Him in the clouds, into the air, and thus we will always be with the Lord, in the same heaven. [Philippians 3:20. 1 Thessalonians 4:16. 1 Thessalonians 4:17.]
32.
Moreover, this heaven, which is called the Father's house, the heavenly city, among other names, is placed by Scripture above all these visible and moving heavens: it proclaims Christ to have ascended above all heavens and to be in heaven. [John 14:2, Ephesians 4:10.]
33.
For the heaven in which He Himself is with His body, and in which we too are to be with our souls and bodies, cannot be a void and uncreated space, unknown: partly because nothing is uncreated except God; partly because it is openly declared to the Hebrews to be the workmanship of God. [Hebrews 11:10]
34.
Furthermore, the primary and principal efficient cause of that motion by which the body was carried up into heaven was the divine nature dwelling within it, according to Philip. 2: 'God exalted him': likewise 'He was taken up (by God) into glory.' The secondary [cause], however, was the gift of agility, following the glorious resurrection, bestowed by the Deity into the human nature: by which that flesh was neither carried or sustained by angels or clouds, as once was Elijah by a chariot of fire, but ascended spontaneously, without any trouble or difficulty: and thus that motion was not violent.
35.
Indeed, the very ascension of Christ, our head, was and is the cause and model of our future ascension into heaven. Because the head ascended, it is necessary that the members will eventually ascend too: And as His, so will ours be. For He will transform our lowly bodies to be like his glorious body: and we will be caught up in the clouds to meet Christ in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. [Philippians 3:21, 1 Thessalonians 4:17.]
36.
If, therefore, our ascension will be true, and we will truly be lifted from the earth to heaven: then the body of Christ also truly ascended from the earth to heaven, not κατά δοκησίν (in appearance) and presumptively.
37.
Most useful and full of consolation, indeed, is this teaching about the true ascension of Christ into that highest heaven, and His perpetual abode there.
38.
First, it serves to confirm the faith regarding a certain place: where the body of Christ is to be contemplated, touched, and apprehended by the eyes and hands of faith. Then, to establish hope: namely, that even before the resurrection of the bodies, our souls separated from the bodies will not descend below the earth, nor wander in the waters or in the air, nor rotate with the celestial orbs, but will be carried above all these heavens, into that most blessed heavenly house of the Father, into which Christ also entered with His body, so that they may always be with Christ. Lastly, it also serves to kindle in our hearts a love and desire for heavenly life and conduct: according to the Apostle's word, “If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.” [Colossians 3:1-2.]
PART 3 - On the Seating of Christ at the Right Hand of the Father
39.
Concerning the seating of Christ at the right hand of the Father, the Apostle speaks thus: “And He made (Christ, already raised from the dead, and carried up into heaven) to sit in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: And has put all things under His feet, etc.” And with these, whatever else is read about this seating in the Holy Scriptures, or is confessed by the Church in creeds, are consistent. [Ephesians 1:20-22.]
40.
Nowhere, however, do we read that because of the seating at the right hand of God, Christ assumed any other body, whatever name it may be called by, or that in His natural body there was made any change of substance, or of those natural qualities and essential properties, which He retained after the resurrection. It is thus clear that Christ, in the body in which He rose and by which He ascended into heaven, namely visible, tangible, and circumscribed: in that very same [body] also sits at the right hand of the Father in the highest: and wherever He is or wishes to be, He always retains such a body.
41.
The Apostle also testifies, and the Church confesses in the creeds, that Christ died, was buried, was raised from the dead, and was taken up into heaven—before He sat at the right hand of the Father. Therefore, it is either false that the human nature of Christ first received the ability that the substance of His body could be really present everywhere: or if this is true, then it did not receive this from the hypostatic union, which was made in the incarnation itself.
42.
Nor is the objection valid that from the hypostatic union, this was given to Him in the “first act,” or, as if He wished, He could be present everywhere. But from the seating at the right hand it was granted in the “second act,” that is, that He would actually be present everywhere.
43.
For besides the fact that the very names of this distinction are names, not drawn from the fountains of Israel but from the swamps of sophists, Christ Himself refutes this exception: speaking not of the first act but of the second, that is, of actual presence, when before His death He said, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them;” and after the resurrection, before the ascension, He said, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” [Matthew 18:20, Matthew 28:20.]
44.
From these sayings, it also clearly appears that Christ either did not speak of the real presence of the body, but only of the presence of the Deity and the efficacy of His Spirit; nor that He is present with us in the same way as He was then with the Apostles, namely visibly, since He did not say, “I will be,” but “I am”; nor is there any necessity for varying the sense of the words.
45.
Moreover, if He spoke of the same real presence of the body, and this promise pertained not only to the Apostles but also to all other believers who were then in the world, Christ would not have spoken the truth. For neither before His death nor after the resurrection was He with all the believers, who were then in the world and gathered in His name, in a visible presence.
46.
Therefore, the doctrine of the real and substantial, but invisible presence of the body of Christ on earth and everywhere, does not seem to be consistent with the Holy Scriptures, but rather appears to approach the fantasy of the Manichaeans, who (as Augustine reports against Faustus) said that the body of Christ hung invisibly from each tree. [Contra Faustum, book 20, chapter 11].
47.
If even before the resurrection and ascension into heaven, Christ did not sit at the right hand with His body, as the whole Church confesses: then the teaching of those who say that Christ, according to the flesh assumed from the womb of the mother, sat at the right hand of the power of God is impious and heretical.
48.
If it is also true what the Apostle teaches, and the whole Scripture confirms, and the Catholic Church confesses, that Christ sat at the right hand of the Father not only when He ascended into heaven, but also that He is so placed in heaven at the right hand of God that He is never read of sitting at such a right hand anywhere but in heaven: Therefore, not only can it not be said according to the Scriptures that Christ sits anywhere but in heaven at the right hand of God: but it is also false that He thus sits on earth as well: so that He is no less really present with the substance of His body in the bread of the Lord's Supper, and everywhere in places, than in heaven.
49.
For elsewhere also the Apostle contradicts [this idea], especially in Hebrews, where from the fact that Christ, sitting at the right hand of the throne of Majesty in heaven, performs His priesthood, he denies that He is on the earth, namely in a corporeal presence. [Hebrews 8:4.]
50.
Furthermore, we judge it beyond controversy that Christ sitting at the right hand of God the Father is a figurative expression: since God, properly speaking, has neither a right nor a left; nor is it permissible to think of anything carnal about seats or thrones in which one sits in that heavenly kingdom; and often in the Holy Scriptures, the word 'Sitting,' besides other meanings, is used for dwelling, reigning, exercising judgment, and resting.
51.
That by this phrase the Apostle did not want to signify that Christ with His body is truly and substantially present everywhere: apart from what has been said, is clearly apparent from what he adds for the purpose of explanation.
52.
For to this sitting of Christ at the right hand of God the Father, the Apostle attaches three things for the purpose of explanation: first, that Christ was so placed at the right hand of God, that He was above all principality, that is, that He had no creature above or equal to Himself, not even in heaven, but was made higher than the heavens and all celestial things: Then he adds, that all things were subjected to Him, that is, beneath Him He has nothing which does not have His right and dominion: Thirdly, that He was given as head to the Church.
53.
Just as we said that what he previously mentioned about the resurrection from the dead, and thus about the ascension, should be understood of Christ according to His human nature: so we also believe with the orthodox Fathers that these things, especially, are to be understood according to the same human nature.
54.
The human nature in Christ can be understood to have been exalted above all things in two ways: either as to local position, as in “He ascended above all heavens,” meaning that the human nature was locally placed above all created things: or as to the eminence of dignity and rule, meaning that Christ, even as to His human nature, was appointed over all created things, and given dominion and power over all. For in these two ways, something of the same kind is said to be above another, either by location or by dignity. [Ephesians 4:10.]
55.
Therefore, if this is understood in the latter sense, ubiquity cannot be concluded; because Christ with His human nature can exercise this dominion over all things, even if the substance of His body is not everywhere. If it is understood in the former way; then He is not everywhere: because what is everywhere is as much below, with, and within, as it is above all creatures.
56.
Paul clearly teaches that Christ (as to His human nature) so rose from the dead that He was no longer among the dead, and so ascended into heaven that He was no longer on earth, and so sits exalted above all creatures at the right hand of the Father, that He is neither below nor within created things; since all things are subjected to His feet.
57.
Nor can the head be said to be with its substance where the feet are, although it may be there in its power and efficacy; and also both the head itself is connected to the feet and the feet to the head with their substance, through nerves and soul.
58.
But the Apostle says that Christ has been given to the Church as the head, also according to His humanity: and the head stands out above the entire body.
59.
Therefore, the Apostle intended nothing less with his words about sitting at the right hand of God than to conclude that the body of Christ exists everywhere with its substance. Thus, those who try to conclude this from their sophistries do an injustice to the Apostle.
60.
But neither can such ubiquity be necessarily deduced from that article of faith.
61.
For even if it were conceded (which cannot be conceded) that from sitting at the right hand of God, the human nature had become truly omnipotent in itself: unless it is also proven that it became omnipotent in such a way that it also became infinite and immense, it cannot at all be concluded that the body of Christ is present everywhere with its substance.
62.
For this alone is the reason why even God is truly everywhere with His essence, so that if you take away immensity from Him, He can hardly be said to be everywhere with His essence.
63.
And even if you imagine an infinite body, and thereby that it is everywhere, you will never eternally prove that it is entirely present in each place at the same time, unless you demonstrate that it also has the most simple essence: because even God is entirely everywhere, not according to parts, but because His essence is most simple.
64.
Therefore, whatever the Ubiquitarians may babble, whether arguing from the hypostatic union, or from the right hand of God, or from the words of the Lord's Supper, or from various modes of being, or from the word, “All power is given unto me,” [Matthew 28:18.] and similar sayings: they always admit a fallacy in this dispute (as we presently pass over others, which is called the fallacy of non causa pro causa*), unless they prove by those arguments that the substance of Christ's body has become immense and infinite, and also simultaneously most simple, like the essence of God.
*Not the cause for the cause; aka, false cause. (e.g., every astronaut ate chicken; therefore, chicken makes you go to the moon).
65.
Nevertheless, we do not deny that the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, although it remains in heaven, is truly present with us, not only in its efficacy but also in its substance.
66.
But in what way, or with what kind of presence? Certainly, it is a true presence; but one that is really in us through His Spirit in us and through our faith: and, if it is permissible to use similar examples, in the way that the head is truly and really present to each member, even to the feet.
67.
But how are these [the head and the feet] present to each other? Not by proximity of location (otherwise, the head of a Pygmy would be more present to its feet than the head of a Giant), but by the power of a single soul, and the connection of nerves and ligaments.
68.
Therefore, since according to the Scriptures, we and our bodies, and the body of Christ, are truly connected by the same Spirit, so that we are one and the same body under one and the same head, which God has given to the Church, namely Christ: no one can deny this true presence without the utmost blasphemy.
69.
Furthermore, regarding the Sitting at the right hand, we believe that the Apostle intended by this expression to signify that Christ, according to His humanity, after enduring many grave labors on earth for the cause of our redemption and suffering the pains of death, now rests gloriously in heaven; and that He lives in the highest happiness, dearly loved by the Father; appears in the presence of God the Father for us, and His intercession and ἱλασμός (propitiation) is most pleasing to the Father; also that He reigns with the Father, and has been appointed by Him as the judge who will eventually come to judge the living and the dead, and is placed on the heavenly throne.
70.
For to sit is of one who is at rest, as Tertullian taught: and of one dwelling and reigning, and acting as a judge, as Augustine says. And those who sit at the right hand are said to be the most beloved and closest friends.
71.
Augustine certainly interpreted this passage in this way: 'On the Creed to Catechumens' [Book 1, Chapter 4].
“He ascended into heaven, believe it: He sits at the right hand of God, believe it: To sit, understand it as to dwell: just as we say of any man, He stayed in that country for three years. Also: Therefore, believe that Christ dwells at the right hand of God the Father, He is there. Let not your heart say to you, What does He do? Do not seek what you are not permitted to find: He is there, it is enough for you: He is blessed, and from the blessedness, which is called the right hand of the Father, is itself the name of blessedness, the right hand of the Father. For if we take it carnally, because He sits at the right hand of the Father, then He [the Father] is at the left: is it proper to arrange them in such a way, the Son at the right, the Father at the left? There all is right hand, because there is no misery.”
Also: “Beloved, do not understand this sitting as being in human limbs, as though the Father sits on the left, so that the Son may sit on the right, but understand the right hand as the power which that man, taken up by God, received, to come as judge who had earlier come to be judged.” [Book 2, Chapter 7.]
Also: “Who is it that sits at the right hand of the Father? The man Christ. For insofar as He is God, He is always with the Father and from the Father: and when He came to us, He did not depart from the Father. For this is to be God, to be entirely everywhere. Thus, the entire Son is with the Father, the entire Son in heaven, the entire Son on earth, the entire Son in the womb of the Virgin, the entire Son on the cross, the entire Son in hell, the entire Son in paradise, into which He brought the thief. We do not say that He is entirely everywhere at different times or places, so that now He is entirely there and at another time entirely elsewhere, but that He is always entirely everywhere.” [Book 3, Chapter 7.]
Also: “But the fact that the Son is said to sit at the right hand of the Father demonstrates that the man whom Christ took up has received the power of judging.” [Ibid.]
Also: “The man now taken up by Christ reigns, sitting at the right hand of the Father.” [Book 4, Chapter 7.]
Also: “However, that which He is as God, and equal to the Father, always judges, is always present: but the redeemer will come in that form in which He was taken up.” [Ibid.]
72.
So far from the Apostle having meant by sitting at the right hand of God that Christ is with the substance of His body on earth and everywhere, he seems rather to have taught the contrary: since perfect human blessedness consists only in heaven, not on these earths; and it is said that God dwells in heaven, not on earth, and reigns rather in heaven than on earth: and Christ is believed and proclaimed to come not from the earth but from heaven to judge the living and the dead.
73.
Furthermore, just as the feet of God are said through anthropopathism to not be in heaven but on earth, according to the phrase, “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool,” so also it can rightly be said by us that His right hand has its place more in heaven than on earth. [Acts 7:49.]
74.
We therefore conclude, just as from the Apostolic teaching on the resurrection from the dead and the ascension into heaven, the ubiquity of the body of Christ cannot be demonstrated but rather is refuted: so neither can it necessarily be inferred from that which concerns the Sitting at the right hand of God.
75.
Indeed, if such ubiquity is admitted, we say that all these articles of faith, namely, 1) the Incarnation made only in the womb of the Virgin; 2) the true death, that is, the true separation of soul from body; 3) the true resurrection of the flesh; 4) the true and visible ascension from earth to heaven; 5) the true sitting at the right hand of the Father in the highest heavenly places; and finally, 6) the visible return from the same places to judge the living and the dead, are not just shaken but utterly overturned.
76.
For a body that is everywhere cannot be moved from place to place entirely in itself, as true philosophy demonstrates and Christian Theology confirms; which teaches that God is not moved from place to place because, being immense, He fills all things.
77.
Nor can a body that is everywhere be rightly said to sit either at the right or at the left of another; but you must confuse the substance of the one sitting with the substance of the right hand, to which [it sits], and with the substance of the one to whom the right hand belongs: since the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, filling heaven and earth and being everywhere, and each one, because all are one and the same essence.
78.
Finally, we feel that this doctrine of the invisible and intangible presence of the flesh of Christ everywhere is neither true nor salutary.
79.
Indeed, not true, because we have not yet been able to see it demonstrated with clear testimonies from the Holy Scriptures, or with necessary conclusions deduced from them.
80.
In fact, upon carefully examining it with the Holy Scriptures and with the Catholic consensus of the old Church as comprehended in the rule of faith, the Apostles' Creed, we observe that it conflicts.
81.
And we have observed such a conflict that both what the Creed conveys and what the authors of the Ubiquitarian doctrine write cannot be admitted together without involving a manifest contradiction.
82.
Nor is it salutary, because to present, believe, or maintain something as consistent and necessary for salvation that is not in agreement with the Word of God, is a sin: as the Lord says, “Do not add or subtract,” and the Apostle: “Whatever is not of faith is sin,” and “the wages of sin is death.” [Deuteronomy 12:32, Romans 14:23, Romans 6:23.]
83.
Finally, because if it is believed to be true, it is an impediment to grasping and consuming the true flesh of Christ existing in heaven with a mind uplifted through Christ, to which both the Apostle and the Church call us, saying, “Lift up your hearts,” and also, “Seek those things which are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God.” [Colossians 3:1.]
84.
Therefore, those who do not contemplate the flesh of Christ in heaven, where it truly is, but imagine it to be really present everywhere with its substance, are far from consuming the flesh of Christ. Like the dog in Aesop's fable, foolishly chasing after the vain shadow of meat, leaving the real meat, because the shadow appeared to be a larger piece.
Question from 1 John 4:3:
Describing the Antichrist, St. John says: “Every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh (truly human), is not of God: And this is the spirit of the Antichrist.”
However, since Christ, once having assumed flesh, never laid it aside but took it with Him into heaven, and in it, visible to all people, He will return to judge the living and the dead in the clouds: It is asked, what spirit do those belong to, and by what name should they be called, who ascribe to our Lord Jesus Christ, I know not what kind of invisible, unbounded, intangible flesh, present everywhere, in the heavens and stars, in the air, on earth, under the earth, in hell, and in every part of the world, and in the smallest particles of these parts, existing wholly and in its entirety (if it pleases God) in substance, really, contrary to Scripture, and against the Orthodox consensus of the Catholic Church, daring to imagine it with the ancient heretics.