A. The Opinion of Others

37. And if it be said that the adoration is hyperdulia (which is the highest reverence due to a creature), there are many arguments to the contrary:

38. First, that this reverence of hyperdulia is due absolutely to Christ as to the nature whereby, even had he not redeemed us, he was full of grace; so a greater reverence is due to him now when, as Mediator in that nature, he has redeemed us.

39. Again, Christ in that nature is head of the Church, according to Augustine, commentary on John 15.1, ‘I am the vine’ - therefore he has to infuse grace into the whole Church; therefore the whole Church is more especially beholden to him than if he were not head and did not have to infuse grace. But if he had only the amount of personal grace he does have, then, even though he would not be head, he would still be owed supreme hyperdulia; therefore a greater reverence now is due to him.

40. Further, a reason that some posit as to why man could not have been repaired by a pure creature is the following, that then man would not have been perfectly restored to the excellence that he had before, because he would be bound to serve that creature and not God alone as he is now; therefore the repairer had to be God. - This reasoning would not be conclusive if Christ was to be adored only with the adoration of hyperdulia; for man could very well have been restored to his former excellence so as to be held to adore God alone with the adoration of latria and to adore that other mediator with the adoration of hyperdulia; but man would not be held to adore that other mediator with adoration of hyperdulia if Christ now in his human nature is to be adored by reason of no other adoration than hyperdulia; therefore man should not now adore him only in this way.

41. Again Anselm, Why God Man 2.14, proves that the life of the man Christ was better than all the sins were evil, or could be evil, that were not sins against God or the person of God. But Anselm is speaking of the created life that Christ was deprived of by death, because he says that his killing is a graver sin than all other sins that are not committed immediately against God; for it was more detestable, according to Anselm, to deprive the man Christ of life than to commit any other sin; but in the case of any sin the will is turned away from the supreme Good; therefore it was more detestable to take away the life of the man Christ than to turn away, by any other sin, from the supreme Good (unless one turns immediately away from this Good). Therefore too Christ’s life was more to be loved than the supreme created good, and so it was to be adored as an infinite good.

42. Or one can argue from the words of Anselm in this other way, that if Christ’s life was as great a good as the privation of it was an evil, and if the privation of it was a greater evil than all the evils, even infinite evils, that there could be, then that evil was worse than all the other infinite evils; therefore the good opposed to it was the infinite Good; therefore Christ in his human nature is owed the adoration of latria that is owed to the infinite Good.