In this article I have been presenting Byzantine theological ideas about the Incarnation of God in the Person of     Jesus, the Christ. The question whether the Incarnation would have taken place had there not been a fall, never stood at the center of attention in Byzantium: Byzantine theologians envisaged rather the concrete fact of human mortality: a cosmic tragedy in which God Himself, through the Incarnation, undertook to become personally, or more accurately, say hypostatically involved. The major, and apparently, the only, exception to this general view is given by Maximus the Confessor, for whom the Incarnation and recapitulation of all things in Christ is the true goal or aim of creation; the Incarnation, therefore, was foreseen and foreordained quite independently of man’s tragic misuse of his own freedom. This view fits in exactly with Maximus’ idea of created nature as a dynamic process oriented toward an eschatological goal – Christ the incarnate Logos. As creator, the Logos stands as the beginning of creation and as incarnate. He is also its end when all things will exist not only through Him, but in Him. In order to be in Christ, creation had to be assumed by God, made His own; the Incarnation, therefore is a precondition of the final glorification of man independent of man’s sinfulness and corruption.

There is great sense in this Eastern approach. God’s actions have never been dependent upon man’s actions. God, from all eternity, preordained that He would become a part of His creation and provide the opportunity for people to voluntarily embrace the idea of His great love for them, thus bringing all of His creation into the process of truly being filled with His life. Although His life-force fills all things, there is something to be said when the part of His creation that has free will comes voluntarily to this awareness and freely chooses to live in accord with this awareness.

I wonder again whether my readers truly sense the difference between Eastern theology and Western theology. There truly is a great difference!

Given the fallen state of man, the redemptive death of Christ makes this final restoration possible. But the death of Christ is truly redemptive and life-giving precisely because it is the death of the Son of God in the flesh (i.e., in virtue of the hypostatic union). In the East, the cross is envisaged not so much as the punishment of the just one, which satisfies a transcendent Justice requiring a retribution for man’s sins. One author states: The death of the Cross was effective, not as a death of an Innocent One, but as the death of the Incarnate Lord. I believe that this is truly a very important distinction.
Think about it!