The Divine Within: Selected Writings on Enlightenment

by Aldous Huxley

In patristic times we find a profound difference between the Greek theologians and the Latin theologians. The Greek theologians were not primarily concerned with the death of Christ; they were concerned with the life. The death was thought to be a mere incident in the life. Their view of the atonement was that it existed, not to save man from guilt, but to save him from the corruption into which he had fallen after the fall of Adam and Eve. And the consequence was that the life was therefore more important than the death. Irenaeus says that Christ came and lived the life of man in order that man might live a life comparable to Christ’s, and that this was the saving quality of the atonement. Among the Latin fathers the stress was entirely different. There the idea was that man was being redeemed, not from corruption primarily, but from guilt. He was redeemed from the punishment which had to be inflicted upon him for the sin of Adam. And whereas the Greek theologians regarded God as, primarily, absolute Reality, absolute Spirit, the Latin theologians regarded God with the mind