Christological Heresies and the Orthodox Response
Docetism – Jesus is wholly divine, his manhood is an illusion. The divine Christ could not take part in evil flesh and only “seemed” (doceo, Gk. “to seem”) to be a man. The “Christ” departed from the man Jesus before the crucifixion.
Modalistic Monarchianism [Sabellianism, Patripassionism] – God is one and at different times has changed his mode of being or roles as Father, Son or Holy Spirit. There is no permanent distinction between Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Apollinarianism – Jesus is fully God but only partially a man. Christ did not have a human mind or will but only a divine nature that controlled his human flesh.
Jesus Christ is Unique Human Being
Ebionitism – God is one. Jesus is a special prophet much like prophets in the Old Testament.
Dynamic Monarchianism [Adoptionism] – At his birth or baptism, God adopted the human Jesus to be his son and gave him special power (Gk. dynamis, “power”).
Arianism – the Word (logos) was created by God before time (“There was a time when he was not.”). The Word was God’s agent in creating the world. Jesus is less than God by more than a man.
Jesus Christ’s Deity and Humanity
Monophysitism [Eutychianism] – Jesus has only one nature. Jesus’manhood absorbed by his divine nature.
Nestorianism – Jesus has two natures and two persons. The divine Christ and the human Jesus lived together in Jesus Christ.
Orthodoxy’s Answer
Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man. Christ has both a divine and human nature in one person “without confusion, without change, without division, without separation.”