Christianity wherein the radical uniqueness of the divine
action (salvation, justification, sanctification, etc.) is
necessarily derived out of, and is vital expression of, the
divine Being in Christ. The ontological connection and
association of God and man is restored in Christ.
The explanation of this living presence of God in man
by the risen Lord Jesus was not a simple matter since the
original proclamation was set in the context of Jewish
religion. Epistemological mind-set was rigidly fixed in their
law-based doctrinalism and moralism.
The Greek wisdom of Gnosticism was also a
formidable antagonist to nascent Christian presentation. A
dualism of spirit and matter alongside of a dualism of cause
and effect via spiritual emanations created a pseudo-
balance of epistemological and experiential understanding.
Whereas the first century polarization was primarily a
breaking free from identification with Jewish religion, the
concerns of the Christian thinkers in the second, third and
fourth centuries was primarily in reaction to Greek
Gnosticism. Reactions often produce opposite extremes as
the pendulum swings the other way, and so it was that the
ontic distinctive of Christianity was overshadowed by the
epistemological concerns of doctrine and morality, as
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