Monarchianism and Unitarianism -difference?

[andrewlya]

Hi, can someone explain to me what the difference between Monarchianism and Unitarianism is?
Thank you,

God bless

 

[Albion]

That's a good question. It may be simply that one is a historic term and the other is of modern origin and the use of it refers to a particular movement of the 18th and 19th century. But it may be said that Monarchianism tried to finesse the triune nature of God and the divine and human natures of the Son by compromising the divinity of Jesus, while modern Unitarianism is more straightforward in holding that the being we call the Father is the only god while Jesus, the so-called Son, is an enlightened human, period.

 

[andrewlya]

The terms are very similar and may seem to be able to be used interchangeably..

 

[Albion]

I don't see them as 100% interchangeable, but they're close to it. The main thing, simple as it is, would be that the one refers to a movement from far back in history that only Church history devotees talk about much these days, while the other refers to a POV--and denomination--that started much more recently and still is with us.

 

[hedrick]

It's always a bit questionable to use Wikipedia as a source on theology, but they define Unitarianism as including only people who reject the divinity of Christ. Monarchians accepted it. They typically were either adoptionists or modalist, both of which accept the Divinity of Christ, though in different ways.

After a bit of further checking, I think this is correct about the modalists. It's less clear that all the adoptionists actually did teach what I'd call a true divinity of Christ. A brief reference in Chadwick, and an article in Britannica online, both suggest that they did not. Thus it sounds to me like many of the adoptionists might have held views similar to recent unitarians. Though there were a number of variations. One person, for example, seems to have taught that Christ's humanity wasn't God but his divinity was. This sounds like Nestorianism, but given the early time period that's probably not the term one would use.

To my knowledge, modern unitarians typically deny the full deity of Christ, so as far as I know Wikipedia is right about that part.

 

[hedrick]

[sorry, posted in the wrong thread]

 

[andrewlya]

Thank you for the answer,Hedrick

 

[hedrick]

A warning about answers to questions like this:

There are serious questions about what major historical characters actually believed. E.g there's serious question whether Nestorius -- one of the arch-heretics in the area of the Incarnation -- actually held heretical opinions.

With your original question, the period during which the Monarchians functioned is not all that well documented. We often know only snippets from what they wrote, and many early writers are known only from quotations by people who were hostile to them. That makes it hard to compare theology from that time with modern theology. For that reason, and because two fairly different theologies are both characterized as monarchian, I'd be reluctant to use that term for modern writers.

To give you a sense, here's a quotation from the early 20th Cent Catholic Encyclopedia:

"The sect probably died out about the middle of the third century, and can never have been numerous. All our knowledge of it goes back to Hippolytus. His "Syntagma" (c. 205) is epitomized in Pseudo-Tertullian (Praescript., lii) and Philastrius, and is developed by Epiphanius (Haer., liv. lv); his "Little Labyrinth" (written 139-5, cited by Eusebius, V, 28) and his "Philosophumena" are still extant. See also his "Contra Noetum" 3, and a fragment "On the Melchisedechians and Theodotians and Athingani", published by Caspari (Tidskr. für der Evangel. Luth. Kirke, Ny Raekke, VIII, 3, p. 307). But the Athingani are a later sect, for which see MEDCHISEDECHIANS. The Monarchianism of Photinus seems to have been akin to that of the Theodotians. All speculations as to the origin of the theories of Theodotus are fanciful. At any rate he is not connected with the Ebionites. The Alogi have sometimes been classed with the Monarchians. Lipsius in his "Quelenkritik des Epiphanius" supposed them to be even Philanthropists, on account of their denial of the Logos, and Epiphanius in fact calls Theodotus an apopasma of the Alogi; but this is only a guess, and is not derived by him from Hippolytus. As a fact, Epiphanius assures us (Haer. 51) that the Alogi (that is, Gaius and his party) were orthodox in their Christology (see MONTANISTS)."

Note that everything that was known (at least at that time -- there might have been documents discovered in the last century) came from one orthodox writer, who would have opposed them.

 

[hedrick]

And even if we know what they say, classifying theology can be tricky. Let me give you an example. Most “modern” theology teaches both the Trinity and the Incarnation. However if you look carefully at what they say about the Incarnation, typically they don’t talk about Christ having two natures and one person. Typically they say that Christ is a man who is God’s presence with us. When you see him, you see God. He acts as God. He has God’s authority. This is often referred to as “functional” unity between the human and Logos, contrasted to traditional theology, which uses “ontological” terms such as “person,” “nature,” and “essence.”

It’s hard for an outsider to see modern theology, because most of it isn’t available on the net. I think this is largely for copyright reasons. Luther and Calvin are all easily available. So is a whole range of non-professional conservative writers. But modern books and journal articles, not so much. However N T Wright has a good deal of material available on the web. He’s a NT scholar, who is considered conservative in the UK. American evangelicals have mixed assessments of him. But he’s not generally considered a unitarian. Here’s a very nice paper on his view of the Incarnation: http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_JIG.htm.

I think some position like this would be commonly held by NT scholars (though possibly not conservative Protestant NT scholars). But is it orthodox? I would say yes. It says that Jesus functioned as God, which is a functional version of the Incarnation. But if you’re really dedicated to traditional theology you could well say that it doesn’t actually say that Jesus is God (because it’s using functional rather than ontological terms), so actually it’s adoptionist, and thus Wright is at least heretical (maybe Nestorian), if not actually unitarian.

Similar situations occurred in the ancient world. E.g. Theodore of Mopsuestia was rejected by the 5th Ecumenical Council as heretical. Many modern scholars believe

• That his position was misunderstood, because he used technical vocabulary from a different theological tradition, although what he was trying to say was essentially orthodox.
• That there was reasons rooted in Church politics that drove his rejection.

However even today scholars are divided on this issue, in part because of divisions on how we should express the Incarnation today.