Chapter VIII.
On the passion of Christ with respect to the state of the one suffering.
After the union of natures has been considered regarding the incarnate Word, and the plenitude of charisms has likewise been considered, next must be considered the endurance of sufferings; concerning which must be considered the state of the one suffering, the manner of suffering, and the outcome of the passion.
Concerning the state of the one suffering, these things are to be held, namely that Christ assumed not only human nature, but also defects pertaining to nature. For he assumed bodily penalties, such as hunger, thirst, and weariness; he also assumed spiritual ones, such as sorrow, grief, and fear; yet he did not assume all bodily ones, such as the defects of manifold illnesses, nor all spiritual ones, such as ignorance and the rebellions of the flesh against the spirit; nor in just any manner, because he undertook the necessity of suffering in such a way that he could suffer nothing unwillingly, neither according to the will of the Deity nor according to the will of reason, although the passion was contrary to the will of sensuality and the flesh, as the prayer of the Savior expresses, which says: Not as I will, but as you will.
Now the reason for understanding the aforesaid is this: because, since the restorative principle in reconciling necessarily has the office of mediator, therefore it is necessary that it have conformity with both extremes, not only with respect to nature, but also with respect to those things which pertain to nature. Since therefore God is just and blessed, impassible and immortal, but fallen man is a sinner and wretched, passible and mortal, it was necessary that the mediator of God and men , in order to be able to lead man back to God, share with God in justice and beatitude, but with man in passibility and mortality; so that thus, by having "a passing mortality and a permanent beatitude," he might lead man back from present misery to the blessed life; just as conversely the evil angel, by having immortality with misery and injustice, was a mediator causing the fall into guilt and misery through his suggestion. Since therefore Christ the mediator had to have innocence and the beatitude of fruition together with mortality and passibility, hence it is that he had to be at once a wayfarer and a comprehensor.
For from every state he had something in himself, inasmuch as he is said to have assumed from the state of innocence immunity from sin, from the state of fallen nature mortality, but from the state of glory the beatitude of perfect fruition.
Furthermore, since penalties pertaining to vice, such as those four inflicted on account of original sin, namely ignorance, infirmity, malice, and concupiscence, cannot coexist with the most perfect innocence, hence it is that he neither ought to have assumed these nor did he assume them.
But since the sufferings that are exercitative of perfect virtue and testificative of true, not feigned, humanity are chiefly those that regard nature in common, such as hunger and thirst in the absence of nourishment, sorrow and fear in the presence of harm: hence it is that He ought to have assumed and did assume those.
Finally, because no innocent person ought to sustain any suffering unwillingly, since this would be against the order of divine justice; nor does any mortal wish to die and suffer according to the appetite of nature, which naturally shrinks from death: hence it is that Christ ought to have had sufferings of this kind, yet in such a way that He could suffer nothing unwillingly according to reason, not only on account of the beatitude and the omnipotent Deity united to Him, through which He could repel all things, but also on account of His most perfect innocence, which according to the order of natural justice is permitted to suffer nothing unwillingly: yet He also suffered in such a way that this was against the natural inclination and appetite of nature, which resides in the sensuality and the flesh. - And hence it is that Christ, praying according to reason, expressed the will of the flesh, by which He shrank from the passion, when He said: Let this cup pass from me; yet He conformed the will of reason to the will of the Father and set it before the appetite of the flesh, when He said: Not my will, but yours be done. - And thus one will was not contrary to the other: for "according to the divine will He willed what was just, according to the will of reason He consented to justice, but according to the will of the flesh He refused the suffering, yet did not accuse justice. And thus each will operated what was its own and followed what pertained to it: the divine will, justice; the rational will, obedience; the will of the flesh, nature"; and through this there was in Christ no struggle and conflict, but a peaceful ordering and an ordered tranquility.