Docetism

Docetism (from the Greek dokein, “to appear, seem”) encapsulates a number of Christologies, all of which deny or diminish the full humanity of Jesus Christ. Its adherents claim that Jesus only appeared to have suffered and died, for his divinity must surely have displaced his inferior humanity (the two being inherently incompatible in this system of thought) if he was to be considered fully God. More-extreme forms of Docetism melded with a disdain for the physical/material world, as found within early Gnosticism. Other forms, such as Apollinarianism, allowed that Jesus’ body was real while denying that his mind was genuinely human. The Councils of Nicaea (325) and Chalcedon (451) anathematized any Christology that did not uphold the full humanity and divinity of Jesus Christ—including Docetism, Gnosticism, Apollinarianism, and Arianism.