Chapter 9

Christ's Human Nature in the Epistles

Paul, Hebrews, and the Apostolic Witness

Introduction

In Chapter 8, we walked through the Gospels and saw that Jesus possessed a rich, deep inner life — a soul that grieved, a spirit He committed to the Father at death, a will that struggled and submitted in Gethsemane. Every Gospel portrait paints the same picture: Jesus was not merely a body going through the motions of human life. He was a complete human being with a genuine interior world. But the Gospels are not the only New Testament witness to Christ's full humanity. The apostolic letters — especially the letter to the Hebrews and the writings of Paul — take the same truth and develop it in powerful new directions.

This chapter turns to the epistles to ask a focused question: What do the apostolic writers tell us about the nature of Christ's humanity, and does their testimony support a physicalist or a dualist understanding of what it means to be human? I believe the answer is clear. The epistles consistently portray Christ as possessing a complete human nature — one that includes not just a physical body but also a genuine human soul, a human will, and a full inner life. This complete humanity is essential for His role as our mediator, our high priest, and our savior. Without it, the entire New Testament vision of salvation falls apart.

The thesis of this chapter is straightforward: the apostolic writings consistently affirm that Christ possesses a complete human nature — one that encompasses the fullness of what it means to be human — and this complete humanity, including a human soul, is essential for His role as mediator, high priest, and savior. A physicalist reading of these texts cannot do justice to their theological depth. Only a dualist anthropology, in which human beings are composed of both body and soul, can make sense of what the epistles actually say about who Jesus is and what He has done for us.

We will begin with Hebrews — the single most important epistolary source for understanding Christ's humanity — and then move to Paul's letters and the Pastoral Epistles. At each step, we will examine the Greek text carefully, draw out the theological implications, and show why physicalism fails to account for what these texts actually teach.

I. Hebrews: The High Priest Who Shares Our Nature "In Every Respect"

The letter to the Hebrews is, in many ways, the New Testament's most sustained theological reflection on the humanity of Christ. While other New Testament books affirm Christ's humanity in passing, Hebrews makes it central to its argument. The reason is Christological and soteriological: Hebrews wants to show that Jesus is the perfect high priest, and a high priest must share fully in the nature of those he represents. If Jesus is not truly and completely human, He cannot serve as our mediator before God.

This makes Hebrews an absolutely critical text for our purposes. If Christ's humanity is merely physical — if "being human" means nothing more than having a functioning biological body — then the writer of Hebrews has set the bar far too low. But as we will see, the writer sets the bar as high as it can possibly go. Christ was made like us "in every respect." And the inner life that Hebrews attributes to Christ — His prayers, His tears, His learning, His will — cannot be reduced to brain states without destroying the entire theological argument.

A. Hebrews 2:14–18 — "Made Like His Brothers in Every Respect"

Let us begin with what I consider the most important passage in the epistles for our argument. Here is the full text:

"Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted." (Hebrews 2:14–18, ESV)

This passage is packed with theological significance. Let us work through it carefully.

First, notice that the children — that is, human beings — "share in flesh and blood" (kekoinōnēken sarkos kai haimatos, κεκοινώνηκεν σαρκὸς καὶ αἵματος). The word koinōneō (κοινωνέω) means "to share in" or "to participate in." Human beings share in a common nature that is described here as "flesh and blood." This is a standard Jewish expression for the whole of human existence, not just the material body. In Jewish usage, "flesh and blood" stands for the entirety of the human condition — mortal, finite, embodied, vulnerable.¹

Second, the Son "likewise partook" (paraplēsiōs meteschen, παραπλησίως μετέσχεν) of the same things. The word metechō (μετέχω) means "to share in" or "to take part in," and the adverb paraplēsiōs (παραπλησίως) means "in like manner" or "similarly." The Son did not take on a different kind of human existence. He entered into the same human condition that we experience. He shared in our nature — fully and genuinely.²

The purpose of this sharing is stated clearly: "that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil" (v. 14). Christ took on full human nature so that He could die a genuine human death and, through that death, defeat death itself. Notice something important here: the death that Christ died was not merely a physical event. It was the death of a complete human being — a person with a body and a soul. As we saw in Chapter 8, Jesus committed His spirit to the Father at the moment of death (Luke 23:46). His body went to the tomb; His soul went to the Father. On physicalism, there is no soul to commit. Death is simply the cessation of biological function. But the writer of Hebrews does not view death this way. Death is the great enemy, the tool of the devil, and Christ entered into it fully — body and soul — in order to conquer it from the inside.

The climactic statement comes in verse 17: "Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect" (hothen ōpheilen kata panta tois adelphois homoiōthēnai, ὅθεν ὤφειλεν κατὰ πάντα τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς ὁμοιωθῆναι). The verb ōpheilō (ὀφείλω) expresses necessity — "he was obligated" or "he had to." This was not optional. If Christ was going to serve as our high priest, He was required to share fully in our nature. The word homoiōthēnai (ὁμοιωθῆναι) means "to be made like" or "to become similar to." And the qualifier is kata panta — "in every respect" or "in all things."³

This is where the argument becomes devastating for physicalism. The phrase kata panta (κατὰ πάντα) is comprehensive. It does not say kata tina (κατά τινα, "in certain things") or kata ta anankaia (κατὰ τὰ ἀναγκαῖα, "in the necessary things"). It says "in all things." If we human beings possess souls — and as I argued in Chapters 3 and 4, both Scripture and philosophy overwhelmingly support the reality of the human soul — then Christ must also possess a human soul. He was made like His brothers in every respect. No exception is carved out for the soul.

Now, I can anticipate the physicalist objection. Someone might respond: "But 'in every respect' only means 'in every relevant respect,' and the soul is not relevant because it does not exist." This objection, however, is circular. It assumes the truth of physicalism in order to interpret a text that, read on its own terms, supports dualism. If the writer of Hebrews believed — as the broader biblical witness affirms — that human beings possess souls, then "in every respect" necessarily includes the soul. The question is not what a twenty-first-century physicalist thinks is relevant. The question is what the first-century author of Hebrews understood human nature to include. And as John Cooper has demonstrated in his comprehensive study of biblical anthropology, the New Testament writers consistently operated within a dualist framework in which human beings are composed of body and soul, with the soul surviving bodily death.⁴

Michael Wilkinson, in his important study of Chalcedonian anthropology, draws out the implications of this passage powerfully. Wilkinson argues that the eternal Son took on "flesh and blood" for the specific purpose of becoming "like his brothers in every respect" — and that this requires a constitutional correspondence between the Son of Man and the mere sons of man. If human beings are constituted by body and soul, then Christ's human nature must likewise include body and soul.⁵ This is not an optional add-on. It is a necessary condition for the Incarnation to accomplish its saving purpose.

There is also a soteriological dimension here that we dare not miss. Verse 17 tells us that the reason Christ had to be made like us in every respect was "so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people." The word propitiation (hilaskesthai, ἱλάσκεσθαι) refers to the act of making atonement — of dealing with sin in a way that satisfies God's justice and reconciles us to Him. If Christ lacked a human soul, His atonement would be incomplete. As Gregory of Nazianzus argued in his famous Epistle 101, "what is not assumed is not healed" (to gar aproslepton, atherapeuton, τὸ γὰρ ἀπρόσληπτον, ἀθεράπευτον).⁶ The full treatment of Gregory's argument will come in Chapter 12, but the principle is essential here: if the human soul is the primary seat of sin, moral failure, and alienation from God, then Christ must have assumed a human soul in order to redeem it. An atonement that addresses only the body while leaving the soul untouched is like treating a patient's broken arm while ignoring the cancer that is killing them.

There is one more dimension of this passage that deserves careful attention. Verse 18 says, "For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted." The word "suffered" (peponthōs, πεπονθώς, from paschō, πάσχω) indicates genuine suffering — not the mere appearance of it. And this suffering is connected to temptation (peirastheis, πειρασθείς). Christ's suffering in the face of temptation was real, interior, and personal. It was the suffering of a soul in moral struggle — the genuine agony of a human will confronting the pull of sin and choosing, at great personal cost, to remain obedient.

The consequence of this suffering is that Christ "is able to help" (dynatai boēthēsai, δύναται βοηθῆσαι) those who are currently being tempted. This ability is grounded in His firsthand experience. He is not helping from a distance, based on theoretical knowledge. He is helping from the inside, based on lived experience. He has been through what we go through. He knows what it is like — not merely at the level of biological function, but at the level of the soul. On physicalism, Christ's "help" would be based on nothing more than having had certain brain states. But Hebrews presents it as something far more personal and relational — the help of one who has shared in our deepest interior struggles.

Joshua Farris, in his treatment of Christological anthropology, notes that the Chalcedonian confession insists on Christ's completeness in both deity and humanity, including "a rational soul and a body." He points out that Apollinarianism — the view that the divine Logos replaced Christ's human rational soul — was rejected precisely because it implied that Christ saves only a part of humanity: the bodily part. If Christ did not assume a rational human soul, then the rational human soul is not redeemed.²⁹ The logic of Hebrews 2:14–18 confirms this: Christ had to be made like us "in every respect" in order to accomplish a complete redemption. A Christ who lacks a human soul cannot save the human soul.

B. Hebrews 4:15 — "Tempted in Every Respect as We Are"

Hebrews returns to the theme of Christ's complete identification with us in chapter 4:

"For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:15, ESV)

The phrase "in every respect" here translates kata panta (κατὰ πάντα) — the same phrase we encountered in 2:17. And the verb "to sympathize" is sympatheō (συμπαθέω), which means "to suffer with" or "to share in the experience of." This is not mere intellectual knowledge of what temptation is like. It is firsthand, experiential sharing in the reality of temptation.

Think carefully about what genuine temptation requires. On the surface, we might think temptation is just about external circumstances — seeing something attractive and being drawn to it. But anyone who has experienced genuine moral temptation knows that it goes far deeper than that. Temptation is an interior experience. It involves the pull of desire against the resolve of the will. It involves the mind weighing alternatives, the emotions stirring in response to what is appealing, and the will choosing — sometimes with great struggle — to resist. Temptation, in other words, is an experience of the soul.⁷

On physicalism, temptation is nothing more than a brain state. It is electrochemical activity in neural pathways. There is no interior agent who is "drawn" or "pulled" — there are only neurons firing in patterns determined by prior physical causes. But Hebrews does not describe Christ's temptation in these terms. The writer says Christ can "sympathize with our weaknesses" precisely because He has been through what we go through. He has experienced the inner struggle. He has felt the pull. He has exercised the will to resist. And He did so "without sin" — not because His brain was wired differently, but because His human soul, empowered by the Holy Spirit, chose obedience in every instance.

The sinlessness dimension of this passage receives its full treatment in Chapter 27. Here, the important point is that genuine temptation — the kind that allows Christ to sympathize with us — requires more than a physical body responding to stimuli. It requires a genuine human will and a genuine interior life. It requires a soul.

C. Hebrews 5:7–8 — "In the Days of His Flesh"

One of the most theologically rich passages in all of Hebrews is found in chapter 5:

"In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered." (Hebrews 5:7–8, ESV)

This passage opens a window into the inner life of Christ in a way that is both moving and theologically profound. Let us examine each element.

First, notice the phrase "in the days of his flesh" (en tais hēmerais tēs sarkos autou, ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις τῆς σαρκὸς αὐτοῦ). This is a fascinating expression. It refers to the period of Christ's earthly, embodied existence — His life from the Incarnation through His death. But the very phrasing implies that there is more to Christ than His flesh. The expression "in the days of his flesh" would be redundant if flesh were all there was. If the Son is nothing more than a physical body, then every day is a "day of his flesh." The phrase only makes sense if it marks off a specific period — the period of embodied, mortal existence — within a larger reality that extends beyond the flesh. The Son existed before the Incarnation (as the pre-existent divine Son) and continued to exist after the death of His body (His soul surviving death, as we will discuss in Chapter 21). The phrase implicitly distinguishes between the Son in His totality and the fleshly, bodily dimension of His earthly life.⁸

Second, consider the description of Christ's inner life: "prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears." This is not the language of a body performing automatic biological functions. These are the expressions of a soul in anguish — a human person crying out to God from the depths of His being. The word "supplications" (hiketērias, ἱκετηρίας) is a rare term that carries overtones of intense, earnest pleading. Combined with "loud cries" (kraugēs ischyras, κραυγῆς ἰσχυρᾶς) and "tears" (dakryōn, δακρύων), the picture is one of profound spiritual and emotional engagement — the kind that flows from the deepest dimensions of a person's inner life.⁹

As I argued in my companion book, The Heart of God, the emotional life of Christ is not mere physiology. It is the genuine expression of a human soul in relationship with the Father. The prayers and tears of Christ are not neurochemical events that happen to look like spiritual devotion. They are real spiritual acts — the outpouring of a human soul in communion with God.

Andrew Loke's Divine Preconscious Model helps us understand how this is possible without compromising Christ's divinity. On Loke's view, Christ's divine knowledge was present at a preconscious level but was not flooding His human conscious experience. His human soul genuinely learned and grew, just as Hebrews describes. The divine attributes were concealed — present but not constantly accessed in Christ's waking human awareness. This preserves both the genuine humanity portrayed in Hebrews 5:7–8 and the unbroken possession of divine attributes that orthodoxy requires.¹⁰ A full treatment of the kryptic model is given in Chapter 17.

Third, the passage says Christ "was heard because of his reverence" (eisakoustheis apo tēs eulabeias, εἰσακουσθεὶς ἀπὸ τῆς εὐλαβείας). The word eulabeia (εὐλάβεια) can be translated "reverence," "godly fear," or "piety." It describes an inner disposition of the soul — a habitual attitude of awe, submission, and devotion toward God. This is not something that can be meaningfully attributed to a brain. Reverence is a stance of the whole inner person toward God. It flows from the soul's awareness of God's holiness and its own creaturely dependence. On physicalism, Christ's "reverence" is just a pattern of neural activity — but can a pattern of neural activity be heard by God? Can God respond to electrochemical impulses? The language of Hebrews presupposes that Christ's inner life is genuinely relational — that His soul was engaged in real communion with the Father.

D. Hebrews 10:5–10 — "A Body You Have Prepared for Me"

Our final major passage from Hebrews is found in chapter 10:

"Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, 'Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, "Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book."' When he said above, 'You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings' (these are offered according to the law), then he added, 'Behold, I have come to do your will.' He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." (Hebrews 10:5–10, ESV)

This passage is a quotation from Psalm 40:6–8, placed on the lips of Christ at the moment of the Incarnation. It is one of the most important Christological texts in the entire New Testament for our argument.

Notice the language of personhood and intentionality. The Messiah says, "A body you have prepared for me." The word "me" (moi, μοι) is a dative pronoun referring to the person who receives the body. The body is prepared for someone — it is not identical with that someone. The "I" who speaks is not the body itself but the person — the divine Son — who assumes the body. There is a clear distinction here between the person who wills and the body that is assumed. This distinction is precisely what substance dualism affirms: the person is more than the body. The body is something the person has, not something the person simply is.¹¹

Then the Messiah says, "I have come to do your will, O God." The language of will and intentionality is unmistakable. The "I" who has come possesses a will — a capacity to choose, to commit, to act in obedience. This will is exercised by the person, not produced by a body. On physicalism, the "will" is a function of the brain — a physical organ. But Hebrews does not describe Christ's will as a brain function. It describes it as the intentional commitment of a personal agent who has entered the world to accomplish the Father's purpose.

Wilkinson's work on Chalcedonian anthropology is especially relevant here. He points out that God did not set up the system of old covenant sacrifices because He delighted in animal blood. Those sacrifices were provisional, pointing forward to the incarnate Son who would accomplish the Father's will as a man. The Son became a man — assuming a body and a human soul — in order "to do the will of God as a man." The same animal sacrifices offered repeatedly under the old covenant could never take away sins, but the incarnate Son, acting through His complete human nature, "offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins."¹² The completeness of that sacrifice requires the completeness of His human nature — body and soul, not body alone.

Verse 10 drives the point home: "by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." The word "will" (thelēmati, θελήματι) refers to the will of God accomplished through Christ's obedient act. But Christ's obedience was an act of His human will — a faculty of His human soul — choosing to do the Father's will. On the dualist understanding, the Son's human soul chose to offer His body as a sacrifice. On physicalism, there is no human soul to choose — there is only a body that dies. The profound theological vision of Hebrews 10 — a person who wills, who commits, who offers Himself — is reduced to a biological event.

II. Paul: The Son Sent in Human Likeness

Having examined the major passages from Hebrews, we now turn to Paul. While Paul does not provide the sustained theological reflection on Christ's humanity that we find in Hebrews, his letters contain several critically important texts that bear directly on our argument.

A. Romans 8:3 — "In the Likeness of Sinful Flesh"

"For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh." (Romans 8:3, ESV)

This dense verse repays careful attention. Paul says that God sent "his own Son" (ton heautou huion, τὸν ἑαυτοῦ υἱόν) — language that emphasizes the unique relationship between the Father and the Son. This is not a created being sent on a mission. This is the Father's own Son — the eternal, divine Son — who is sent into the world.

The Son was sent "in the likeness of sinful flesh" (en homoiōmati sarkos hamartias, ἐν ὁμοιώματι σαρκὸς ἁμαρτίας). The word homoiōma (ὁμοίωμα) is theologically significant. It means "likeness" or "form" — and Paul uses it with great precision. Christ's flesh is genuine — He truly has a human body. But it is "in the likeness of sinful flesh," not "sinful flesh" itself. There is both identity and distinction here. Christ shares fully in our bodily, fleshly existence — He is truly human. But His flesh is not sinful in the way that ours is, because the person who bears that flesh is the divine Son, and His human soul was created sinless and sustained in holiness by the Holy Spirit.¹³

Andrew Loke has noted, in his treatment of the Philippians 2 passage, that Paul's use of homoiōma in connection with Christ's humanity should be understood as a reference to genuine human existence, not merely an outward appearance. The parallel use in Romans 8:3 confirms this. Christ did not merely look human. He truly took on human nature — flesh and blood, body and soul.¹⁴

Notice also the theological logic: "he condemned sin in the flesh." Sin was defeated not from the outside but from the inside — within the very arena of human flesh where sin has its power. But where does sin actually reside? On physicalism, sin is a malfunction of the brain — a pattern of physical activity that produces antisocial behavior. But Paul does not locate sin in the brain. He locates it "in the flesh" — which, in Paul's theology, refers to the whole fallen human condition, including the disordered desires and intentions that arise in the human heart. Condemning sin "in the flesh" means defeating the power of sin within the fullness of the human condition — including the inner life of the soul, where temptation, desire, and moral choice are experienced.

On dualism, this makes perfect sense. Christ took on a complete human nature — body and soul — and within that nature, He lived a sinless life, demonstrating that sin does not have the final word over human existence. His human soul, empowered by the Spirit, consistently chose obedience over disobedience. On physicalism, sin is merely a physical malfunction, and Christ's "victory" over it is simply a matter of having the right brain chemistry. This trivializes both sin and redemption.

B. Galatians 4:4 — "Born of Woman, Born Under the Law"

"But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons." (Galatians 4:4–5, ESV)

This text is deceptively simple, but it carries enormous theological weight. Two phrases demand our attention.

First, the Son was "born of woman" (genomenon ek gynaikos, γενόμενον ἐκ γυναικός). This is the language of genuine human birth. The Son did not descend from heaven as a fully formed adult. He entered the human race through the normal process of conception and birth — growing in a mother's womb, being born as a helpless infant, developing through childhood into adulthood. The phrase "born of woman" is a standard Jewish idiom for a genuine human being (cf. Job 14:1; Matthew 11:11). It affirms Christ's full participation in the human condition from the very beginning of His earthly life.¹⁵

Second, the Son was "born under the law" (genomenon hypo nomon, γενόμενον ὑπὸ νόμον). This means that Christ entered into the full moral and covenantal framework of human existence. He was not merely a biological organism occupying space in first-century Palestine. He was a person living under moral obligations — subject to the commands of God, accountable for His actions, called to obedience. Being "under the law" is not a condition of the body. It is a condition of the whole person — the moral and spiritual dimensions of human existence that involve the soul's relationship to God.

Wilkinson observes that Christ's covenantal position as one "born under the law" reflects His full identification with the human condition in its moral and spiritual dimensions. As man, He was born of woman to fulfill God's promise of an offspring of Eve who would reverse the curse. He was "born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law," which required genuine participation in the moral structure of human life — not merely a physical presence, but an interior life of will, choice, and obedience.¹⁶

The purpose clause is critical: "to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons." Redemption and adoption are deeply personal, relational realities. They are not transactions between physical objects. They involve the restoration of a broken relationship between persons — between human souls and their Creator. Christ entered the human condition — fully, body and soul — in order to restore that relationship from within.

Paul's use of the verb ginomai (γίνομαι, "to become" or "to come into being") in both phrases — genomenon ek gynaikos, genomenon hypo nomon — is also theologically significant. The word describes a genuine transition. The eternal Son, who existed before the creation of the world, became something He had not been before: a human being born of a woman, living under the requirements of God's law. This "becoming" is the Incarnation itself. It is not a pretense or an appearance. The Son genuinely entered into the full range of human experience — physical, moral, spiritual, emotional, and relational. He grew in a womb. He was born as an infant. He was circumcised on the eighth day. He grew up in a Jewish home. He learned the Torah. He obeyed its commands. He experienced hunger, fatigue, joy, sorrow, friendship, and betrayal. All of this presupposes a complete human nature — not merely a biological organism, but a person with a body and a soul who participates in the full depth of human life.

We should also notice the purpose clause that follows: "to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons" (Galatians 4:5). The word "redeem" (exagorazō, ἐξαγοράζω) means "to buy out of" or "to liberate by payment of a price." Redemption is a deeply personal act. It is not something that happens to a body; it happens to a person. And "adoption" (huiothesia, υἱοθεσία) is an intensely relational concept — it involves being brought into the family of God as sons and daughters. These are not physical transactions. They are spiritual realities that involve the transformation of persons — body and soul — into children of God. A purely physical Christ, one who lacks a human soul, cannot accomplish a redemption that is fundamentally spiritual and relational in nature.

Richard Swinburne has argued that the Incarnation requires the Son to take on a complete human nature — including a human mind or soul — in order for Christ to serve as a genuine representative of humanity. A divine person united only to a physical body would be, in effect, an Apollinarian Christ — one who appears human but lacks the essential interior dimension that makes us human.³⁰ Paul's description of Christ as "born of woman, born under the law" presupposes exactly the kind of complete humanity that Swinburne describes — a person who lives in the full moral, spiritual, and relational dimensions of human life, not merely a body that occupies space in the physical world.

C. Romans 5:12–21 — The Second Adam

Though a full treatment of Paul's Adam-Christ typology belongs to the broader discussion of theological anthropology, we should note its relevance here. In Romans 5, Paul draws an elaborate parallel between Adam and Christ. Adam's sin brought death and condemnation to all humanity. Christ's obedience brings life and justification.

"For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous." (Romans 5:19, ESV)

For this parallel to work, Christ must be a genuine human being — a real "man" (anthrōpos, ἄνθρωπος) in the fullest sense. If Adam was a body-soul composite, then Christ — the second Adam — must also be a body-soul composite. If Adam's sin was an act of his soul (his rational will choosing disobedience), then Christ's obedience must also be an act of His soul (His rational will choosing obedience). Paul's Adam-Christ typology presupposes a shared anthropology between the first man and the last man — and that anthropology, as argued in Chapter 3, is dualist.¹⁷

It is worth pausing to notice how deeply Paul's argument depends on the completeness of Christ's humanity. The parallel between Adam and Christ is not merely a literary device. It is a theological argument with ontological weight. Paul is saying that the same kind of thing that went wrong in Adam is the same kind of thing that Christ came to set right. Adam's disobedience was an act of the whole person — body and soul acting in concert against God's command. Christ's obedience was likewise an act of the whole person — body and soul acting in harmony with the Father's will. If Christ lacks a soul, then His obedience is categorically different from Adam's disobedience. Adam sinned with his soul; Christ obeyed only with His body. The parallel breaks down, and the entire argument of Romans 5 is undermined.

Moreover, the effects of Adam's sin and Christ's obedience extend to the whole person. Through Adam, sin and death entered the human race — affecting body and soul alike. Through Christ, righteousness and life come to those who believe — restoring body and soul alike. Paul's vision of salvation is comprehensive. It addresses the whole human being, not just the body. A purely physical Christ cannot accomplish a salvation that restores the whole person, because on physicalism there is no soul to restore.

Oliver Crisp, in his discussion of the human nature of Christ, has argued that the concrete nature view — in which Christ's human nature is a concrete particular, a body-soul composite — provides the most natural reading of the New Testament's portrait of Christ. On the concrete nature view, the Son assumed a specific, concrete human nature at the Incarnation: this body united to this soul. The abstract nature view — in which Christ's human nature is merely a set of properties — has difficulty accounting for the rich, personal inner life that the New Testament attributes to Christ.³¹ The concrete nature view, by contrast, gives full weight to the epistles' descriptions of Christ as a person who prays, weeps, learns, chooses, and suffers — because on this view, Christ is a concrete human being with a real body and a real soul, not merely an instantiation of abstract human properties.

III. The Pastoral Epistles: Christ the Mediator, Manifested in the Flesh

A. 1 Timothy 2:5 — "The Man Christ Jesus"

"For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." (1 Timothy 2:5, ESV)

This is one of the most important Christological statements in the entire New Testament, and its implications for our argument are significant. Let us note several things.

First, the verse affirms that Christ is the "one mediator between God and men" (heis mesitēs theou kai anthrōpōn, εἷς μεσίτης θεοῦ καὶ ἀνθρώπων). A mediator is someone who stands between two parties and brings them together. For Christ to mediate between God and humanity, He must share in both natures — He must be truly God and truly man. If He is not truly God, He cannot represent God to us. If He is not truly man, He cannot represent us to God.

Second, notice the present tense: Christ is (not "was") the man Christ Jesus. This is not past tense — it does not say "the one who was once a man." Christ is, right now, the man Christ Jesus. The Incarnation is permanent. The Son did not shed His human nature at the ascension. He remains God and man forever. A full discussion of the permanent Incarnation is provided in Chapter 26. Here, the point is that Christ's ongoing humanity — His continued existence as the man Christ Jesus — requires that He continue to possess a complete human nature, including a human soul.

Third, the word anthrōpos (ἄνθρωπος) is the standard Greek term for a human being — a person, not merely a body. In New Testament usage, anthrōpos refers to the whole person — body, soul, mind, will. When Paul calls Christ "the man Christ Jesus," he is affirming Christ's full, complete humanity. He is not saying "the body Christ Jesus." He is saying "the person Christ Jesus" — a complete human being in the fullest sense.¹⁸

B. 1 Timothy 3:16 — "Manifested in the Flesh"

"Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory." (1 Timothy 3:16, ESV)

This is widely recognized as an early Christian hymn or creedal fragment. It summarizes the Christ event in six powerful lines. For our purposes, the first line is the most significant: "He was manifested in the flesh" (ephanerōthē en sarki, ἐφανερώθη ἐν σαρκί).

The verb phaneroō (φανερόω) means "to make visible," "to reveal," or "to make manifest." It implies that the one who was manifested existed before the manifestation. He was not created at the moment of manifestation — He was revealed. The pre-existent Son, who had been invisible and spiritual, was now manifested in a visible, tangible, fleshly form. "In the flesh" (en sarki, ἐν σαρκί) indicates the mode of His manifestation — He appeared in human nature, in a real human body.¹⁹

But notice something subtle and important. The text says He was manifested in the flesh — not as the flesh. The preposition en (ἐν) with the dative can indicate the sphere or mode in which something occurs. The Son was manifested in the sphere of flesh — that is, in embodied human existence. But the person who was manifested is more than the flesh in which He appeared. There is a distinction between the person and the flesh — the same distinction we saw in Hebrews 10:5. The flesh is the mode of the Son's appearance in the world, not the totality of what He is.

The final line — "taken up in glory" — refers to the ascension. The same one who was manifested in the flesh was taken up in glory. He remains a person — the man Christ Jesus — even after being taken up. The Incarnation continues. The Son who appeared in the flesh continues to exist as a complete human being, body and soul, in glory.

C. Philippians 2:5–8 — A Brief Note on the Kenosis Hymn

Although the full exegesis of Philippians 2:5–11 belongs to Chapter 15, where the kenotic model is examined and critiqued in detail, a brief word is warranted here because this passage is one of Paul's most important statements about the Incarnation and Christ's humanity.

"Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (Philippians 2:5–8, ESV)

What matters for our present discussion is the language Paul uses to describe Christ's entry into human existence. He says the Son was "born in the likeness of men" (en homoiōmati anthrōpōn genomenos, ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος). As Loke has noted, the parallel between this use of homoiōma and its use in Romans 8:3 ("in the likeness of sinful flesh") confirms that Paul is referring to genuine humanity, not mere appearance. The Son truly became human — fully and completely — while remaining fully divine.³²

Notice also the language of interiority and agency in this passage. The Son "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped" — this is a decision, an act of will. He "emptied himself" — this is a voluntary, intentional act of self-giving. He "humbled himself" — again, an act of the will, an interior disposition of submission. He "became obedient" — obedience is a moral posture of the soul, not a physical reflex of the body. Every verb in this hymn points to an active, choosing, willing agent — a person with an interior life, not merely a body undergoing physical processes.

The fact that Paul attributes all of these interior acts to the pre-incarnate and incarnate Son reinforces the point we have been making throughout this chapter. Christ's humanity is not exhausted by His physical body. His humanity includes an interior life — a mind, a will, a capacity for self-giving love and obedient submission — that presupposes a genuine human soul. The full implications of this passage for the kenosis-krypsis debate are developed in Chapters 15 and 17.

D. Colossians 2:9 and the "Fullness of Deity"

One further Pauline text deserves brief mention, though its primary exegesis belongs to Chapter 6 (on Christ's deity). In Colossians 2:9, Paul writes: "For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily" (sōmatikōs, σωματικῶς). This remarkable verse affirms that the full divine nature resides in the incarnate Christ — "bodily," that is, in an embodied form. The adverb sōmatikōs points to the physical reality of the Incarnation: the Son took on a real body. But the verse also implies something more. If the "whole fullness of deity" dwells in Christ, then the person of Christ is more than a body. A body is a finite, physical entity. The "whole fullness of deity" — the infinite, omnipotent, omniscient divine nature — cannot be contained in or reduced to a physical body. The body is the locus of the divine presence, but the person in whom that presence dwells transcends the body. On the dualist understanding, the person of Christ includes a divine nature, a human soul, and a human body. The divine fullness dwells in this person — in and through His complete human nature, body and soul. On physicalism, the "fullness of deity" dwells in a physical organism with no interior dimension beyond brain activity. This is a thin and impoverished reading of what Paul clearly intends as a statement of staggering theological depth.

IV. Synthesis: Do the Epistles Support Physicalism or Dualism?

Having examined the major epistolary texts, we are now in a position to draw our threads together and ask the central question: Do the apostolic writings support a physicalist or a dualist reading of Christ's human nature?

I believe the evidence points overwhelmingly in one direction. The epistles presuppose a body-soul anthropology and apply it to Christ specifically. Consider what we have found:

The language of "every respect" (Hebrews 2:17) demands that Christ share in the full constitution of human nature. If human beings have souls — as argued in Chapters 3 and 4, and as the broader biblical witness affirms — then Christ must have a soul. The phrase kata panta is comprehensive and unqualified. It does not allow for exceptions beyond the one the author explicitly names: sin.

The inner life of prayer, tears, and learning (Hebrews 5:7–8) reveals a person with a genuine human soul — not merely a body producing biological responses to stimuli. Christ's prayers were the expressions of a human soul in communion with the Father. His tears were the overflow of genuine spiritual anguish. His learning was the growth of a rational soul through experience. None of this can be adequately explained on physicalist terms.

The will that chooses obedience (Hebrews 10:7–9) presupposes a personal agent who decides, commits, and acts. The "I" who says "I have come to do your will" is not a body — it is a person with a soul that wills. The body is prepared for the person; it is not identical with the person.

The mediatorial role that requires permanent incarnation (1 Timothy 2:5) demands that Christ continue to be a complete human being — body and soul — forever. A mediator without a soul cannot bridge the spiritual and moral gap between God and humanity.

The manifestation of a pre-existent person in the flesh (1 Timothy 3:16) distinguishes between the person who is manifested and the flesh in which He appears. The person is more than the flesh.

And Paul's teaching that Christ was sent "in the likeness of sinful flesh" (Romans 8:3) and was "born of woman, born under the law" (Galatians 4:4) affirms Christ's genuine entry into the full human condition — a condition that includes moral obligation, spiritual relationship with God, and the inner life of will and conscience that physicalism cannot account for.

V. The Physicalist Reduction and Why It Fails

At this point, we should address the physicalist position directly. What happens to these epistolary texts if we adopt a physicalist reading?

On physicalism, every reference to Christ's inner life — His prayers, His tears, His learning, His will, His obedience, His reverence — must be reduced to physical brain activity. Christ's "learning obedience" in Hebrews 5:8 becomes nothing more than the formation of new synaptic connections in a first-century Palestinian brain. His "loud cries and tears" in Hebrews 5:7 become involuntary biological responses — the firing of neurons in the amygdala and the activation of lacrimal glands. His "reverence" (eulabeia) becomes a pattern of neural activity that has no genuine relational content — it is not a soul's posture toward God but a brain state that happens to correlate with religious behavior.

Is this really what the writer of Hebrews intended to convey? I do not think so. The entire theological argument of Hebrews depends on Christ's genuine, personal, interior engagement with God and with the human condition. If that engagement is nothing more than electrochemical activity in a brain, then the argument loses its force. A brain cannot serve as a high priest. A neural pattern cannot make propitiation for sins. A synaptic connection cannot sympathize with human weakness. The language of Hebrews demands a person — a human being with a body and a soul — who enters into our condition, suffers with us, and offers Himself on our behalf.

The same is true of Paul's texts. If Christ's obedience in Romans 5:19 is merely a matter of brain chemistry, then the Adam-Christ parallel collapses. Adam's sin was not a brain malfunction — it was an act of the will, a choice of the soul. If Christ's obedience is equally a genuine act of the will, then both Adam and Christ must possess souls. If Christ's obedience is merely a physical event, then it is categorically different from Adam's sin, and the parallel no longer holds.

Joel Green, one of the leading proponents of biblical physicalism, has argued that the New Testament does not require a dualist anthropology. Green contends that the biblical writers can be read as describing human beings in holistic, unified terms without positing an immaterial soul.²⁰ While Green is right that the biblical writers affirm the deep integration of body and soul (what Cooper calls "holistic dualism"), he is wrong to conclude that this holism excludes ontological duality.²¹ The epistles' descriptions of Christ's inner life — His prayers, His will, His learning, His emotional and spiritual experience — consistently point beyond the body to an interior reality that is more than physical. The integration of body and soul does not mean the elimination of the soul.

Nancey Murphy has similarly argued that modern neuroscience has made the soul unnecessary — that everything traditionally attributed to the soul can be explained by brain function.²² But even if this were true for ordinary human experience (and I have argued in Chapters 4 and 5 that it is not), it creates a devastating problem for Christology. If Christ has no soul, then the councils were wrong to insist on it. The Chalcedonian Definition states that Christ is "truly man, consisting of a rational soul and body" — and if physicalism is right, this definition is false. Chalcedon does not merely say "truly man, consisting of a body." It explicitly includes the rational soul as an essential component of Christ's human nature.²³

VI. Wilkinson's Chalcedonian Anthropology and the Epistles

Before we conclude, I want to draw attention to a powerful argument that connects the epistolary evidence to the broader project of this book. Michael Wilkinson, in his groundbreaking study Crowned with Glory and Honor, argues that Christ's human nature should serve as the norm for understanding human nature — not the other way around. This is what he calls "Chalcedonian anthropology."²⁴

The typical approach to theological anthropology works from the bottom up: we develop a philosophical or scientific understanding of what human nature is, and then we apply that understanding to Christ. This is the approach that physicalism takes. First, we decide (on the basis of philosophy or neuroscience) that human beings are purely physical organisms. Then, we apply that conclusion to Christ: He must also be a purely physical organism.

Wilkinson reverses the direction. Instead of moving from anthropology to Christology, we should move from Christology to anthropology. Christ is the paradigm human being — the "second Adam," the "firstborn among many brothers" (Romans 8:29), the one "crowned with glory and honor" (Hebrews 2:9, quoting Psalm 8). His human nature is defined by the ecumenical councils as consisting of a "rational soul and body." Therefore, human nature includes a rational soul and body. Any anthropology that denies the human soul is not just philosophically problematic — it is Christologically inadequate.²⁵

As Wilkinson puts it, the man Jesus Christ, as the man par excellence, must govern how we define the creation of man par ordinaire. If Christ's human nature includes body and soul, then human nature includes body and soul — because Christ is the definitive revelation of what it means to be human.²⁶

Farris makes a related point in his introduction to theological anthropology. He argues that Christological anthropology shows that "no anthropology should contradict claims germane to Christ's human nature." Christ is the link between God and humanity in the most robust sense. He metaphysically unites humans to the divine without merging the natures. What we learn about humanity from Christ — including the reality of the human soul — must govern our broader understanding of human nature.²⁷

This has profound implications for the physicalism debate. If we begin with Christ — as the epistles and the councils define Him — then physicalism is ruled out from the start. Christ has a rational soul and a body. If Christ's human nature is the norm for human nature, then human nature includes a rational soul and a body. Physicalism, which denies the soul, is incompatible with the Christological norm.

VII. The Epistles and the Kryptic Model

One more connection deserves mention before we close. The epistolary evidence we have examined fits naturally within the kryptic model of the Incarnation that I adopt in this book (developed fully in Chapter 17). On Andrew Loke's Divine Preconscious Model, the Son retained all His divine attributes during the Incarnation but experienced a genuinely human conscious life. His divine knowledge was present at a preconscious level, available when the Father willed its use, but not constantly flooding His human awareness.²⁸

This model accounts beautifully for what Hebrews describes. Christ's "learning obedience through what he suffered" (5:8) is genuine learning — His human soul growing in experiential knowledge. His "prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears" (5:7) are genuine expressions of a human soul in communion with the Father — not the play-acting of an omniscient divine being. His temptation "in every respect" (4:15) is genuine temptation — His human will confronting real moral choices and choosing obedience. The kryptic model preserves the integrity of Christ's human experience while maintaining His unbroken possession of divine attributes.

On physicalism, the kryptic model does not work — because there is no human soul in which to locate the "human conscious experience." If Christ has no soul, then His conscious life is entirely a product of His brain. But then the "preconscious" divine attributes have nowhere to reside except in the divine nature itself, and the mechanism by which they are concealed from the human experience becomes unintelligible. The kryptic model requires a human soul as the seat of Christ's genuinely human conscious experience. Without it, the model collapses — and with it, any coherent account of how Christ can be both truly divine and truly human.

Conclusion

We have surveyed the major epistolary texts that bear on Christ's human nature, and the result is clear. The apostolic writers — the author of Hebrews, Paul, and the Pastoral Epistles — consistently affirm that Christ possesses a complete human nature. This nature includes not only a physical body but also a genuine human soul with its own inner life of prayer, emotion, will, learning, and obedience.

Hebrews 2:14–18 tells us that Christ was made like His brothers "in every respect" — a comprehensive phrase that, if humans have souls, necessarily includes the soul. Hebrews 4:15 describes genuine temptation that requires a genuine human will. Hebrews 5:7–8 reveals the inner life of Christ's human soul — prayers, tears, learning, reverence — that cannot be reduced to brain activity. Hebrews 10:5–10 distinguishes between the body that is prepared and the person for whom it is prepared, and describes a will that chooses obedience. Romans 8:3 places Christ "in the likeness of sinful flesh," sharing in our condition while remaining sinless through the holiness of His human soul. Galatians 4:4 affirms His full entry into the human condition — "born of woman, born under the law" — with all the moral and spiritual dimensions that implies. First Timothy 2:5 presents Him as the permanent mediator — "the man Christ Jesus" — a complete human being bridging the gap between God and humanity. And 1 Timothy 3:16 describes the pre-existent Son manifested "in the flesh" — a person who is more than the flesh in which He appears.

Physicalism cannot account for any of this. It reduces Christ's prayers to brain events, His temptation to neural impulses, His learning to synaptic formation, and His will to physical determinism. It strips the epistolary portrait of Christ of its theological depth and leaves us with a biological organism rather than a complete human being.

The apostolic witness demands more. It demands a Christ who is truly like us — body and soul — and who, through the offering of His complete human nature, has accomplished a complete salvation. As we will see in the chapters that follow, the church fathers and the ecumenical councils understood this clearly. They insisted that Christ has a complete human nature with a rational soul — and they condemned any view that denied it. The epistles give us the biblical foundation for that insistence. The Son of God became everything we are — body and soul — so that everything we are might be redeemed.

As we move forward in this book, the significance of what we have established in this chapter will become increasingly clear. In Chapter 10, we will examine how the Old Testament messianic prophecies anticipate a coming figure with a rich inner life — a Messiah whose nephesh (soul) is offered in sacrifice and whose nephesh is preserved in the intermediate state. In Chapters 11 through 14, we will trace how the early church formulated the doctrine of Christ's complete humanity in response to heresies that threatened it. And in Chapters 20 through 29, we will demonstrate that physicalism creates a series of devastating problems for the Incarnation — problems that can only be resolved by affirming what the epistles, the fathers, and the councils all affirm: that Christ possesses a genuine, immaterial human soul.

The epistolary foundation is secure. Paul, the writer of Hebrews, and the Pastoral Epistles all testify with one voice: Christ is a complete human being. He shares in our nature "in every respect." He prays, weeps, learns, wills, obeys, suffers, and mediates — not as a body performing biological functions, but as a person whose human soul is engaged in the deepest dimensions of the human condition. This is the Christ of the apostolic witness. And this Christ — body and soul — is the only Christ who can save us.