Discourses, or, Sermons on several Scriptures

First, It was impossible Christ should be held under the Power of Death, because of that great and ineffable Mystery of the Hypostatical Union of the Divine and Humane Nature in the Person of Christ. ¹There are three Unions, the Belief of which are the Foundation of the greatest part of the Christian Religion, which are wholly beyond the reach of Reason: The Mystical Union of a Believer unto Christ: The Union, or rather Unity of the three Glorious Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, in one Nature; and this Hypostatical Union of two Natures in one Person, in the Mediator. It is a Mystery Angels pry into, ⟨p. 100⟩and adore, with Wonder and Astonishment, how the Eternal, only begotten Son of God should assume Flesh to himself, in so close and intimate a Conjunction, that though he be Eternal, yet he should be born; though he be Immortal, yet he should truly die; and though he were truly dead, yet he should raise himself to Life again. These are things that seem very inconsistent one with another, yet they truly come to pass through this miraculous Union, which transcends the Reach of Reason, as far as these things do that of Nature. That the same Person that is Eternal, should be young; yea, be born in the Fullness of Time. That the same Person that hath Immortality and Life dwelling in himself, should also die a shameful and accursed Death. That the same Person that was truly and really dead, yet had ⟨p. 101⟩a power to quicken and recover himself, Joh. 10.18. And this was it which declared him to be the Son of God with Power, as the Apostle speaks, ²even by his Resurrection from the Dead. And indeed, if he had not risen from the Dead, the Deity would have suffered in the Opinion of the World; nor would they have believed him to be the Son of God, who would suffer himself to lie under the Dominion of Death, longer than the End of his Death required it: And this I shall demonstrate to you by two Arguments; only premising this, which is a common and true Maxim among Divines; That when the Natural Union between Christ's Body and Soul was dissolved, yet both Soul and Body did retain the Hypostatical Union to the Divine Nature. The Divine Nature was united to the Body of Christ, when the Soul was separated from it.