Accommodation (or condescension) is the theological principle that God, while being in His nature unknowable and unreachable, has nevertheless communicated with humanity in a way which humans can understand and respond to. The concept is that scripture has accommodated, or made allowance for, the original audience's language and general level of understanding. Accommodation is not an innovation of the Reformation Period, but "has a long tradition of use within Judaism and subsequently within Christian theology, and can easily be shown to have been influential within the patristic period."