2nd century

Docetism, the Gnostic Christ and the response of Ignatius

The assertion that God suffered provoked, according to Pelikan, the first controversies: Celsus, the Marcionites and the Gnostics would not allow that the body of a god could be born and nourished. Many Gnostics distinguished the created Jesus from the heavenly Christ, who united with him at baptism and left him at Golgotha; in Marcion, Christ is not born of a woman, has a body like that of the angels, and suffers only in appearance. Ignatius of Antioch, in his seven letters, opposed those who denied the physical life of Jesus: Christ was truly born, ate and drank, was crucified and rose – and he is "our God". Polycarp, in his letter to the Philippians, followed Ignatius, placing the reality of Christ's humanity at the center of the doctrine of salvation.