I hope to address the argument that a (possible) annihilation of Jesus's human spirit after His crucifixion would constitute of a separation of Christ's humanity from His divinity, thereby contradicting Chalcedon:

1. That Christ's two natures should not be separated was a response to Nestorianism, to which was attributed the heresy that Christ represented a 'moral union of two beings'. This means that the inclusion of 'without separation' in the Creed was to block any proposal that Christ was of two BEINGS, which itself impacted the understanding of salvation i.e. the first being obviously has not 'assumed' the nature of the second being, and thus cannot save it, and so on.

Importantly, this suggests that if there was no danger of Christ being understood this way, then the separation of His two Natures AFTER salvation need not be a problem. Because He has already assumed what needed to be healed and the healing has been performed whilst the two natures were united. There isn't any de facto theological problem with Christ 'letting go' of His humanity post-atonement, especially if it is that part of Him meant to be ultimately judged, to be later replaced by renewed humanity.

This is significant because we often forget WHY a certain clause was included in the first place, resulting in a defense of a clause for the clause's sake to the exclusion of valid attempts at rethinking Christology.

Another example is, of course, Apollinarianism. The issue, strictly speaking, was not about whether or not Christ has a human soul/rational mind - it's about what constitutes those aspects of humanity which need salvation which in turn depends on the assumption that Christ must assume ALL ELEMENTS of humanity in order to save it. Somehow the idea that Christ can save all of humanity just by assuming only one (or some) element of it was never really an option. But what if He can? Why not?

2. Also, consider this. Before the crucifixion, Christ's humanity was Body+Soul; AFTER the crucifixion it was only 'Soul'. In other words, post-crucifixion, only Christ's human soul was 'active' in the union - the corpse could, for all intent and purposes, be burned to dust. Yet, strangely enough, we do not consider this a compromise on the 100% humanity clause? We do not think that Christ has been 'separated' from at least ONE aspect of His humanity? Why not? Is a wandering human spirit 100% human?

Note too that this human spirit (without the body) went on to 'do'/experience certain things NO 'NORMAL' HUMAN SPIRIT would, correct? At this stage, can ANYONE say with ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY what Jesus' human spirit can or cannot experience in order to maintain the (already controversial) '100% humanity' tag? What kind of '100% human' can do what Christ's human spirit did?

Any argument which depends on the post-death humanity of Christ stands on shaky epistemic ground.

3. Many scholars agree that it is highly likely that Nestorius,

"...did NOT hold that the man Jesus and the divine Word were two distinct persons...his fundamental christological concept is the prosopon of unity, in which the two natures, essence, concrete realities of God and Man were joined." (Doctrines & Practices of the Early Church, S.Hall, p.91)

Whilst it would be quite easy to find groups affirming that Christ either wasn't really God nor really Man, I think it's supremely harder to find any explicitly stating that in Christ there resided TWO BEINGS (even though their doctrines may 'sound' that way - this was the main reason why Nestorius was condemned, because he 'sounded' like saying that Christ was two beings).

Therefore, to the extent that it was based on a misunderstanding (not to mention influenced by political motives - Cyril of Alexandria wasn't quite St. Francis of Assisi), it would be possible to argue that the 'without separation' clause need not have been added into the Creed. If Christ's human nature had separated from His divine after the atonement, the object and subject and sufficiency of salvation (which ground the Creed) would yet remain intact.

The above is not an argument to abandon Chalcedon, as it is a plea for more humility and caution in ostracizing thinkers who disagree with us. If we can accept Chalcedon IN SPITE of such great complexity involving the Person of Christ in His divine-human union *through the process of post-crucifixion AND pre-resurrection(!)*, why be so dogmatic regarding one more (possible) complexity (e.g. the annihilation of his soul)?

We can appreciate Chalcedon as a beautiful and formal expression of certain axioms of the faith WITHOUT the need to banish those who interpret these axioms differently, or fail to be convinced by our less-than-solid explanations of their complexity.

Regards, Al.

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