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Did Mary Reveal Jesus' Divine Identity to Him at a Young AGe?

3/22/2016

 
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One of the (many) things that I love doing as a pastor is fielding some of the various theological questions I get.  As someone who cares a lot about helping build and reinforce foundations of the Christian faith, and helping form people theologically, these sorts of interactions provide a fun - and important - opportunity.  

Last week, a question about one part of the recent Young Messiah movie came through my inbox.  I've not seen the movie myself and so I don't first-hand experience with the scene that was described (there's my disclaimer!).  Nevertheless, let me paraphrase/summarize the question that came my way, and then include the way I responded.

Here's the question I got: I understand that the Young Messiah is fictional, and that there's no scriptural support for much of Jesus' life before His public ministry.  Nevertheless, I have a question about one of the scenes.  The movie portrays Jesus as unaware (or at least unsure) of his divinity when he's young - about age 7.  In fact, the climactic moment of the movie portrays Mary telling Jesus the story of his conception and birth after having  withheld the information for his own protection up to that point.  A few questions came to mind after watching that scene.  How could Jesus have ever been unaware of his deity if he was "wholly God?"  On the other hand, how could he have possessed such sophisticated self-awareness from birth if he was "wholly human?"  One movie is not a big deal but I am curious as to whether there is a reliable answer to this question?

Here's my response (in a very-slightly-edited form):
Good question!  You're right - the New Testament is fairly silent on Jesus' growing-up years.  There's some stuff we just won't (and can't) know, because God has chosen not to reveal it in Scripture. 

However, a few lines of reasoning cause me to (seriously) doubt a scenario where Jesus is portrayed as being unaware/unsure of his divinity until Mary reveals it to him.  I'll mention two of these lines of reasoning here:

First, and most significantly to me, we read something about Jesus' boyhood in Luke 2:41-52.  This clear biblical evidence should always be the place we start.

Here's a summary of the story we read about in Luke 2:41-52.  (Though I encourage you to pause before moving on and read the story here - it's not long.)  Jesus' family is in Jerusalem, and when Jesus' family returns home Jesus stays back in the temple interacting  with some of the teachers there.  Mary and Joseph finally realize He's missing and go back and find Him.  When they find Him, Mary seems to gently scold him (v. 48), to which Jesus responds: "Why were you searching for me?  Didn't you know I had to be in my Father's house?" (v. 49).  And then - very significantly - v. 50 says "But they [presumably including both Joseph and Mary, along with whoever else] did not understand what he was saying to them." 

Admittedly, this story happens when Jesus is 12 (v. 42) - after the supposed "revealing" at age 7, suggested in the Young Messiah movie.  Nevertheless, if Mary was so aware of Jesus' divinity, why was she confused at Jesus' statement that he had to be in his Father's [i.e., his Heavenly Father's] home?  The picture we get here is that Mary is confused about Jesus' identity and He's aware of it.  (At a couple other places in the gospels, we see a similar confusion in Mary on exactly what Jesus' divinity [and His mission] all entails - cf, for e.g., Mark 3:31-35; John 2:1-4.)  I have a tough time seeing how this would be the case if - earlier in Jesus' life - Mary had been the one to disclose Jesus' divine identity to Him.

Second, I'm not sure if the Young Messiah scene depicts the mystery of "two natures in one person" accurately.  This is one of those places we can rely on careful thinking in the early church to help us.

In the 5th century at the Council of Chalcedon, the church formalized an orthodox understanding of how Jesus could be 100% human and 100% God - both at the same time in one person.  The language the Chalcedonian Definition uses is this (this is an excerpt from a larger statement): ​
 The person of Christ is to "be be acknowledged in two natures, inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one Person and one Subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and only begotten, God, the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ.. (bold emphasis added).
This won't answer every question about how Jesus is fully man and fully God, both at the same time.  The thing to draw out of this statement, however, is that an orthodox understanding of Christ's person maintains the "property of each nature (divine and human) is preserved" and that these natures come together in the person of Christ "inconfusedly" and "unchangeably."  How this translates into what boy Jesus knew I don't fully know - I'm content to cordon some of that to the area of mystery - but I think we have to admit that somehow, even as Jesus "grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man" (Luke 2:52) He somehow maintained His full identity as deity - even if aspects of this deity could have been consciously restrained by Jesus.  In other words, I don't think an understanding of Jesus' deity as "dormant" (or understanding that suggests He was unaware of His deity) jives with how the Chalcedonian Definition reads.
Bruce
3/23/2016 11:18:58 am

But then you have to wonder how historical that piece in Luke is. If Mary and his family knew how special he was you wouldn't have the incident in Mark 3:20 : When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

Tim Wiebe
3/23/2016 11:42:35 am

Bruce,

Thanks as always for participating! I affirm the historicity of the account in Luke 2. I think that if we start to doubt the historicity of the events recorded, then it's difficult to ascertain what really happened and what didn't. And I think seeing the account in Luke 2 as historical affirms the investigative care Luke seems to have taken in researching this Gospel (Luke 1:1-4).

As far as how to read Mark 3:20 in light of Luke 2: I'd say this just shows how hard of a time others had in fully comprehending Jesus' identity and His mission. In other words, the scene in Mark doesn't mean Luke 2 couldn't have happened - it just shows that Jesus' messianic mission and identity were "outside of the box" for how people were thinking.

Just wanted to chime in and offer these thoughts!

Bruce
3/23/2016 01:37:48 pm

Well I'm not sure that that form of reasoning would hold up with historical biblical scholarship and it seems a little circular to me. And I'm by no means an historical scholar. But what other ancient writings do we have that we just affirm their historicity because otherwise we wouldn't know what’s historical or not? And I'm not saying that Jesus wasn't teaching in the temple. He could have been or maybe he didn't. I think Luke is the only gospel that has this story in it so we just don't know. I believe Luke when he says that he is trying to put together an accurate account of what happened. But what sources was he using and were those accounts accurate? Luke wasn't an eye witness and was writing much later toward the end of the first century. There is a large consensus that one of his sources was Mark (half of Mark is in Luke) and he felt free to correct and make changes to what Mark had in his account.

Bruce
3/23/2016 02:02:50 pm

And I also want to say I'm really not trying to be argumentative. It's just that comparing scripture with scripture it seems a little odd that Jesus would have this extraordinary coming into the world and Mary and Joseph know this but yet in Mark his family is there trying to bring him home because they think he's lost his mind. Mark seems to see be ok with these kinds of circumstances with Jesus but Luke and Matthew either changes it or doesn't include them. Mark elaborates more on Jesus's human traits. Anyway please keep up the good work on the blog.

Tim Wiebe
3/24/2016 08:59:27 am

Thanks for chiming back in, Bruce. I'm grateful for this sort of exchange, and appreciate your tone of not being argumentative. Thanks for that. (Sincerely!)

Comparing Scripture with Scripture can take a lot of work, sometimes introduces additional questions, and isn't always easy. Nevertheless, I applaud this task and think it's REALLY important. As I compare Scripture to Scripture and work to harmonize what can/should be harmonized, I try to factor in a responsible historical method (acknowledging the historicity of events AND God's intervention/workings in history), and a high view of Scripture that allows for revelation, inspiration, and Scripture's authority.

For others who may be reading through these comments, I just wanted to make my own position on Scripture (at a very high level) clear.

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    Tim Wiebe

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