Recently, in a formal setting among Pastors someone threw out the question of whether or not Jesus could have sinned. Now, I had always been trained that Jesus could not have sinned though the temptation remained very real. However, the answer that was thrown out and affirmed is that Jesus could have sinned. Inwardly, I groaned at this affirmation and since that meeting I have gone back and double checked my training.
In double checking my training I learned that Charles Hodge (he of Princeton fame) believed that Jesus could have sinned. Hodge reasoned that the temptation to sin assumes the possibility to sin. I don’t agree with Hodge but in reading someone as illustrious as Hodge I realized that the idea that Jesus could have sinned was not as obviously muddleheaded as I had thought. I mean … if Hodge can make this kind of mistake then it is understandable that lesser mortals could make it as well.
The refutation of Hodge is really quite simple though the refutation probably opens up more questions. The refutation to Hodge is that since Jesus didn’t sin, Jesus couldn’t have sinned since the not sinning of Jesus demonstrates that Jesus was predestined not to sin. In retrospect no action of any being could have been other than what that action was after the fact for the action, after the fact, belongs to God’s decretal ordering.
I suppose, at this point it is possible for someone to now ask, “Could God have decreed Jesus to sin, thus resulting in Jesus sinning (?) Even here though we run into the reality that as God is both a eternal and necessary being, therefore all of God’s actions, including His decrees, are likewise eternal and necessary. In short, since God is eternal and there never was a time when He wasn’t it is also true that God’s decrees are likewise eternal having the same quality of eternality of God. This explains why we refer to the decrees as “The eternal decrees of God.”
There is a problem though in the presupposition of an affirmative answer to the question,could Jesus have sinned, and that problem is that such an affirmation seems to presuppose the non-Reformed premise that choices that were made, were not made by necessity. This introduces the non-Reformed notion of absolute contingency which suggest that decisions made or actions taken could have been other than they were.
However, the question can also be addressed from another angle. When we talk about the person of Jesus Christ we must take into consideration the question of the properties of His person-hood. Any hypothetical actions of Jesus Christ that we consider, can not be such that those actions violated the properties of his person-hood.
If we were to talk about hypothetical things that I might or might not do we could come up with any number of examples of things I might have done that I didn’t do. However, all of these examples of things I might have done that I didn’t do must remain consistent with the properties of my human person-hood. I might have decided to become a body-builder but I could not have decided to become a insect. (Insert favorite insult here.)
When we consider the person of Jesus Christ and the issue of sin, we have to say again, contrary to Hodge, that Jesus could not have chosen to sin for the same reason I could not choose to be an insect. Both Jesus Christ and I could not make those decision because to make those decisions would be a violation of the property of our person-hood. For myself, humans do not have the ability to become insects and for Jesus Christ — a person with a divine nature — God-Men do not have the ability to sin. Jesus Christ, being very God of very God, had a impeccable and immutable divine nature as a property of His person and as such He could not act in any way that would be contrary to that property.
The implications of this are clear. Jesus could choose to do all things that humans do save those things that humans choose to do that are inconsistent with divinity. Humans who do not have a divine nature choose to sin but a Human who has a divine nature cannot choose to sin.
Now the question that begs being asked is, If Jesus couldn’t sin, then was His temptation really temptation(?) The answer to that question is, “yes.” If our success, as redeemed fallen humans, to occasionally resist temptation, does not negate the reality of the temptation that we occasionally resist then why would Jesus’ always resisting temptation all the time negate the reality of the temptation with which He was presented? Success in resisting temptation does not negate the reality of temptation.
Also, we have to keep in mind at this point, and on this issue, that not only was Jesus divine but also touching His humanity, having no sin nature, He had no inclination to sin.
Hat Tip — Ron DiGiacomo
http://reformedapologist.blogspot.com/2006/09/could-jesus-have-sinned.html