23. Hebr. iv. 15.
24. St. James i. 14.
25. Comp. Riehm, Lehrbegr. d. Hebr. Br. P. 364. But I cannot agree with the views
which this learned theologian expresses. Indeed, it seems to me that he does not meet the
real difficulties of the question; on the contrary, rather aggravates them. They lie in this:
How could One Who (according to Riehm) stood on the same level with us in regard to
all temptations have been exempt from sin?
To obtain, if we can, a clearer understanding of this subject, two points must be kept in
view. Christ's was real, though unfallen Human Nature; and Christ's Human was in
inseparable union with His Divine Nature. We are not attempting to explain these
mysteries, nor at present to vindicate them; we are only arguing from the standpoint of
the Gospels and of Apostolic teaching, which proceeds on these premisses - and
proceeding on them, we are trying to understand the Temptation of Christ. Now it is
clear, that human nature, that of Adam before his fall, was created both sinless and
peccable. If Christ's Human Nature was not like ours, but, morally, like that of Adam
before his fall, then must it likewise have been both sinless and in itself peccable. We
say, in itself, for there is a great difference between the statement that human nature, as
Adam and Christ had it, was capable of sinning, and this other, that Christ was peccable.
From the latter the Christian mind instinctively recoils, even as it is metaphysically
impossible to imagine the Son of God peccable. Jesus voluntarily took upon Himself
human nature with all its infirmities and weaknesses - but without the moral taint of the
Fall: without sin. I t was human nature, in itself capable of sinning, but not having sinned.
If He was absolutely sinless, He must have been unfallen. The position of the first Adam
was that of being capable of not sinning, not that of being incapable of sinning. The
Second Adam also had a nature capable of not sinning, but not incapable of sinning. This
explains the possibility of 'temptation' or assault upon Him, just as Adam could be
tempted before there was in him any inward consensus to it.26 The first Adam would have
been 'perfected' - or passed from the capability of not sinning to the incapability of
sinning - by obedience. That 'obedience' - or absolute submission to the Will of God -
was the grand outstanding characteristic of Christ's work; but it was so, because He was
not only the Unsinning, Unfallen Man, but also the Son of God. Because God was His
Father, therefore He must be about His Business, which was to do the Will of His Father.
With a peccable Human Nature He was impeccable; not because He obeyed, but being
impeccable He so obeyed, because His Human was inseparably connected with His
Divine Nature. To keep this Union of the two Natures out of view would be
Nestorianism.27 To sum up: The Second Adam, morally unfallen, though voluntarily
subject to all the conditions of our Nature, was, with a peccable Human Nature,
absolutely impeccable as being also the Son of God - a peccable Nature, yet an
impeccable Person: the God-Man, 'tempted in regard to all (things) in like manner (as
we), without (excepting) sin.'
26. The latter was already sin. Yet 'temptation' means more than mere 'assault.' There
may be conditional mental assensus without moral consensus - and so temptation without
sin. See p. 301, note.
27. The heresy which unduly separated the two Natures.