I think Garcia raises some good questions about Hays on pp. 223-225. However, he uses this to say that Hays and Wright must deal with pre-modern questions of “substance and nature.”
No. Substance and nature are questions raised about the union between the divine and the human in the man Jesus. They are not the same as questions about how David incorporated Israel or Jesus incorporates the Church.
Garcia also chooses this time to ask if the participation between believers and Christ is imaginary. I have a hard time believing this does justice to Hays, but it is certainly rather blunt and undeserved put down to mention this in relation to Wright. And since Lusk and Garlington have also been included in this mix, it is hard to believe that these are really well thought out questions. Other than raising a bunch of suspicions in the minds of those who don’t read Lusk or giving fodder to those who have already decided he is the Enemy, I don’t see much point in raising the possibility.
On the bottom of page 225 Wright is said to have an “ambiguous relationship” to “orthodox Christology.”
Wright has made claims about Christ’s self-consciousness that invite criticism. But Wright’s Chalcedonian orthodoxy has been seen again and again. Jesus is Yahweh, the God of Israel. He has personal pre-existence before his birth in Bethlehem. He has defended the Ecumenical Creeds as applying the truth revealed in the Bible to the philosophical needs of their day, coming up with true formulas.
The fact that Wright doesn’t believe that the man Jesus knew he was God in the same way that Wright knows he is human does not open up the door for people to make these false accusations in the face of Wright’s clear testimony to the contrary–a testimony and defense he makes in quarters where the Westminster Theological Journal, believe it or not, is not widely read.
The question Wright is addressing is how omniscience relates to the person of Jesus in his earthly ministry. When Jesus said he did not know the day or the hour of Jerusalem’s destruction, are we to assume that he was lying? [Addendum: When Luke claims Jesus grew in knowledge, are we to disbelieve him? Are we to tell people that, when the Gospel writers claim Jesus was sleeping, it wasn’t real sleep because God can never fail to be fully conscious?]
If Jesus can in some sense be ignorant of a future date, then how is a claim that Jesus didn’t know who he was from remembering, say, commanding the angels to guard Elijah, some sort of permission slip to question his Christological orthodoxy? Garcia goes on to say how kind he is being because others have made even balder assertions, but it doesn’t make his claims credible.