ONLINE: Sufferings of Christ by George Griffin. At CCEL, Online at

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/griffin/sufferings

Plot

Read this book here:

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/griffin/sufferings

This book became controversial for its depiction of God’s suffering. In graphic, human terms, Griffin describes the Holy Trinity’s inner and outer pain leading up to Christ’s crucifixion and death. With this literary portrayal of a humanized Christ, Griffin hoped to stand in contrast to his theological contemporaries. Many of them, as he saw it, depicted and wrote and thought about God so abstractly that they lost sight of the stark reality of the Incarnation. Even those who agreed with Griffin on this point, however, balked at the liberty he took in interpreting divine suffering. While many granted that theologians had gone too far in depersonalizing Christ, they brought charges of anthropomorphism down upon his depiction of God the Father’s experience of pain.

Kathleen O’Bannon
CCEL Staff