Did God decide to save before he decided to create? Though this question is often considered abstract, its answer informs both the purpose and nature of the incarnation.In The Justification of the Sinless, Brendan Case argues that God the Son would have become incarnate even if humanity had never sinned. The incarnation benefits creation in many ways besides redemption. Indeed, it is the ultimate reason for the creation of the cosmos itself.Case develops his argument primarily by drawing on the work of Robert Grosseteste (ca. 1168-1253). Though neglected today, this brilliant medieval theologian drove the thirteenth-century debates over the incarnation. Building on Grosseteste, Case provides a compelling set of exegetical and theological arguments for the supralapsarian thesis. If the incarnation is logically prior to the fall, then God always planned to endow creation with a glory beyond estimation.
Brendan Case (ThD, Duke Divinity School) is associate director for research of the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He is the author of Doubting Thomas: Early Franciscan Disputes with Aquinas and The Accountable Animal: Justice, Justification, and Judgment.
Introduction: Robert Grosseteste and the Supralapsarian Thesis1. Edenic Justification and the Necessity of the Fitting Means2. "More Splendid Than the Sun": Christ's Flesh Among the Reasons for the Incarnation3. The Devil's Envy: Christ as Angelic Justifier and Demonic Stumbling Block4. "Recapitulating All Things": Grosseteste's Cosmic Christology from Nyssa to Llull5. The Cosmic Scope of the Unity-Argument: Implications for Extraterrestrials and Multiple Incarnations6. The Absolute Predestination of Jesus ChristConclusion: Proclaiming Supralapsarian ChristologyIndexes