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BOOK REVIEWS 507 Alexander spoke of a human hypostasis in Christ he understood an entity of the logical order. Moreover, when he used the term hypostasis composita, he meant to state that after the union the hypostasis of the Word is said to be composed because it possesses two natures without any change in the Person. Another significant development in the theology of Alexander is seen in the clear distinction he made between the grace of union and sanctifying grace. He eliminated the idea that the grace of union is the grace of adoption and also the notion that the grace of union is an entity standing between the human nature and the Divine Person. Within this theology, too, the teaching of Alexander on the " communication of properties " contributed a great deal to the doctrine of the " communication of idioms." His use, however, limits the attribution of human predicates to the Son of God. In his conclusion the author pays tribute to the originality, the theological method, and the profundity of Alexander's doctrine of the Hypostatic Union. As we look back on the history of theology it is difficult for us to weigh the precise value of the contribution made by individual theologians to the development of doctrine. The author makes clear that Alexander came at a critical point in the history of theology when new ideas and new methods were being introduced. His use of these ideas contributed to the work of his more illustrious successors. We are grateful to the author for his own considerable contribution made in this important study. No theologian who hopes to understand what happened in the early years of the thirteenth century, an extremely important period in the history of the growth of Christian ideas, can afford to neglect this work. Holy Name College Washington, D. C. ALBAN A. MAGUIRE, 0. F. M. Standing and Understanding: A Re-appraisal of the Christian Faith. By STANLEY BRICE FROST. Montreal: McGill University Press, 1969. Pp. 187. $4.50. This volume offers us the contents of a lecture which the trustees of the Arthur S. Peake Memorial Trust invited the author to give in 1968. In it he attempts to harmonize his Christian faith and the modern human situation. The work falls into three parts: 1) his place of standing; 2) his place of understanding; 3) the practice of religion. I shall take up each part in turn. 508 BOOK REVIEWS The Christian presents to his contemporaries a definite attitude, a specific stance toward the developments which have taken place in the physical, the social, and the historical sciences. They can discover it in his speech, detect it in his manner, and observe it in his religious practices. This is not surprising; it would be puzzling were it not so. All this is not less true of the hebrew, the islamic, the buddhist or the pagan man. Each possesses a weltanschauung, each reaches out to an interpretation of life which guides his actions and governs his relations. It indicates his place of standing. A brief description of the Christian's place of standing might be this. God has revealed himself to men in the person of Jesus of Nazareth who as a man lived in the condition of other men on this shrinking planet, earth. This Jesus being truly man is also truly God. Being truly man means that he " can have full sympathy with our moral and mental struggles, full understanding of what it means to be human, because he literally became one of us." (p. 115) Being truly God indicates that he is something new in human history, that he is God breaking into human existence. Since he is God, the Christian accepts " the new understanding of God and the new knowledge of his intentions with respect to the human race " as fully authoritative revelation. Christ's stance in the world becomes the Christian 's stance. But is this Christian stance intelligible to the modern world? Does the Christian tradition inherited by so many provide a coherent, a consistent, a rational way of living in this age of technological progress and rapid change? The author undertakes to reply by a description of man...

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