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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Among mainline denominations what is the dominant theory of the atonement?
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PaulTH*
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# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Rosina:
Why do you believe our chance to respond is eternal Paul?
OK, I'll qualify that statement! During the 11 years that I've been a member here, I've several times mentioned my love for the medieval, mystical German treatise known as the Theologia Germanica. Luther described it as, next to Scripture and Augustine, the most influential book in his life. It was on Calvin's hate list, so it can't be all bad. From chapter 51:
"In hell everyone wants to have a self-will. Therefore all is misery there, and wretchedness.....Supposing a denizen of hell surrendered his self-will, and were released from his desire to call something his own. he would then come out of hell into the kingdom of heaven."
Many, though not all mystics, when they touch the hem of God's robe, experience such an overwhelming love, that they know that God doesn't, can't and never will condemn anything He made. People put themselves in hell by their selfish attitudes. The only possibility of hell being eternal in this way of thinking, comes from asking what God could do with an eternally recalcitrant creature. Personally I believe that, given the sacrifice of Christ, and the intercessions of the BVM and the saints, even the darkest recesses will come into the light of God's love.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
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Jamat
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# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Kevin Jamat - but do you see my point, that you seem to be saying it's necessary for us to have a right understanding how Jesus saves us in order to receive that salvation? If this, then what other doctrines do we need a correct understanding of in order to be saved?
Not what I said.
I am concerned that someone may believe a lie and consequently wake up on the wrong side of eternity. It is scary. We are guilt ridden creatures and we need to know we are forgiven not just hope we are.
I do not think your doctrine has to be 100% for you to be right with God. You do have to have made the relational connection with him.
The point at issue here is the assertion that PSA is subscriptural and that the early fathers did not believe it. This is not the case despite the fact that Starlight has co authored a book asserting it is. Paul patently obviously believed it for starters. Why else would he assert in Galations that Christ was made a curse?
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Jamat
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# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Gamaliel: but the reality is that it (PSA) wasn't the dominant view until after the Reformation - and even then only among a subset of the reformed churches - notably evangelicalism.
Well it suits the theology of some to assert this. In fact, you can find evidence of a belief in PSA in almost all ancient writers and scholars. For instance in The dialogue with Trypho, Justin Martyr(c100-165) explains that the reason Jesus was crucified is that the curse that rested on us for our sin was transferred to him
"If then, the father of all wished his Christ for the whole human family to to take upon him the curses of all, knowing that, after he had been crucified and was dead, he would raise him up, why do you argue about him who submitted to suffer these things according to the father's will, as if he were accursed and do not rather bewail yourselves?"
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Jamat
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# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Paulth: Personally I believe that, given the sacrifice of Christ, and the intercessions of the BVM and the saints, even the darkest recesses will come into the light of God's love.
The idea that we put ourselves in hells of our own making is both popular and plausible and it allows us to believe in a tolerant God who tut tuts at our folly and is always ready to rescue us from it. It is very appealing but like all partial truths it has to ignore some of the less attractive stuff. Jesus mentioned a literal Hell and threatened the hypocritical pharisees with it for instance. But he also told the great story of the lost son. It seems that God is indeed a rescuer but not as you state, a universalist one.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Gamaliel
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# 812
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Posted
Well, it suits your theology to assert otherwise, Jamat. Two can play at that game.
I'm not suggesting that we can't find a scriptural basis for PSA nor that some of the writings of the Fathers can be interpreted that way ... such as the quotation you've given.
What I AM saying (and what you appear to be ignoring) is that PSA wasn't the dominant motif or model until well after the Reformation - and even then with a subset within Christianity as a whole. I'm not saying that makes the doctrine right or wrong, simply stating an historicial fact.
The reality is that there wasn't a single over-riding atonement model in the first few centuries of Christendom. An Orthodox priest once opined to me that the Church had never come to a definitive conclusion on the atonement because the Great Schism occurred before an Ecumenical Council was able to debate and discuss the issue. The earlier Councils had dealt with issues like Christ's divinity, the Trinity and so on, but hadn't come to any firm conclusions on the atonement because it wasn't the issue at stake.
As for the 'curse' elements in the Patristic quote and in the Pauline corpus, there are alternative ways to understand this other than God punishing Jesus. 'Cursed is everyone who hangs upon a tree ...'
Yes, Christ did become a 'curse' for us, but that may or may not mean what you take it to mean. It's not a clear-cut issue we can simply proof-text our way around - on either side (or sides) of this particular debate.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
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South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
I do not think your doctrine has to be 100% for you to be right with God.
Then we agree. ![[Smile]](smile.gif) However, I do share Gamaliel's view that the Bible verses you quote as solid evidence for PSA by no means require a PSA viewpoint. Most views of the atonement )I guess the Moral Influence view is an exception) assert that Jesus died in our place, that he was our substitute; what's at issue is how Jesus substituted for us.
You think it was to take the punishment (from God?) that by rights was ours to suffer, while I tend towards the view that Jesus took our place to achieve what was beyond us, namely defeating the curse of sin and releasing us from the devil's clutches.
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My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
The earlier Councils had dealt with issues like Christ's divinity, the Trinity and so on, but hadn't come to any firm conclusions on the atonement because it wasn't the issue at stake.
Perhaps because it was actually beyond dispute.
To me this issue is actually beyond debate. There is no definitive gospel without it. You cannot dismiss its centrality by tolerantly observing there are other ways to look at Christ. The issue of how one is forgiven, the mechanism by which a Holy God accepts our flawedness is answered in no other model. They all devolve into either a universalist concept or a variation of a religion of works. And these are shared by other world religions. I might as well be a buddist without PSA ..but I'm not. It is the only conception of the gospel that gives it teeth. BTW where do you see proof texting? I always try to explain my interpretation of scripture. You might like to look at "Pierced For Our Transgressions" by Jeffrey, Ovey and Sach if you are interested enough.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Jamat
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# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Kevin: the Bible verses you quote as solid evidence for PSA by no means require a PSA viewpoint. Most views of the atonement )I guess the Moral Influence view is an exception) assert that Jesus died in our place, that he was our substitute; what's at issue is how Jesus substituted for us.
So now we hit the post modernist concept of linguistics. There is no objectivity in language because we bring our preconceptions to any text?
That is a double edged sword If one view is as good as another, what price any?
Perhaps the day of judgement will be the only way we get a definitive ruling on that. However, I think 66 books by 40 authors is sufficient to triangulate a pretty good estimation of truth. They would suggest that God is holy, I am not. Christ was sent from God to offer salvation. The situation is pretty clear really. Where PSA works well is that it creates a means where the holy can validly meet the unholy. Think of it this way. Why should a holy God hear my prayers? He cannot be approached unless my unholiness is removed. The gospel is that in Christ this happened. But how could it happen? Christ took my curse, my sin, my unholiness, on himself. How else can you see the substitution working? Its pretty clear what Peter, Paul and John thought.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
Hi Stejjie,
In Augustine's theology, humanity is sufficiently fallen to be unable to do good. God therefore selects people and changes their psychology so that they do good, which Augustine calls "grace". Humans then do good, and God rewards them for it at the judgment.
Augustine is generally regarded as teaching MI, as he takes the view that humans need to do good and pass the judgment of God by doing so, and he also emphasises the teachings and example of Christ as his primary idea of what Christ accomplished.
What differs with Augustine is his stronger than usual view of the fallenness of man in his natural state, and a stronger than usual view of the empowering effect that God's grace has to empower individuals to do good. A famous statement from Augustine is "when God crowns our merits, He crowns nothing else but His own gifts" referring to the fact that though final judgment is according to our human works, it was God working in us that led to those works in the first place, and thus the good works he rewards were nothing but his own gifts in the first place.
Augustine's novel teachings on the fallen state of man, and his new notion of grace that was internally psychologically transformative continued to be greatly influential in Western Christianity right throughout to the end of the medieval period. Augustine's teaching that God's grace was required in order for fallen man to be able to do the works that pleased God is, from your quotes, what McGrath is referring to here.
Ender's Shadow
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow
The doctrine of the atonement is concerned with God's forgiveness of sins: that this is offered seems unambiguously clear from 1 John 1:9:
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
In MI God freely forgives sins when a person sincerely repents. God is regarded as interested in whether a person is currently good or bad, and not particularly interested in the history of their prior actions. So yes, if we confess our sins, God will forgive them. (where 'confess' is understood as meaning sincerely repent of them, and not merely listing them in God's direction with the intention of repeating them later)
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South Coast Kevin
Shipmate
# 16130
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Posted
EDIT - in reply to Jamat:
But the ministry of Jesus shows God meeting the unholy and unclean - the woman with menstrual bleeding who was healed after touching Jesus' clothes, the girl he raised from the dead, Zaccheus and Matthew the tax collectors. Jesus transformed the unholy and unclean, rather than being 'contaminated' by them.
I don't think the Biblical witness is as simple as God being unapproachable unless our holiness is removed. The Bible simply isn't as clear as you believe. I also don't know what you meant with your comment about a 'post modernist concept of linguistics'. I think there is truth to be found, just that none of us has all of it. Indeed, and as others have suggested, it may be that the atonement is multi-faceted and there is truth in all these different models we're talking about.
[ 16. April 2012, 22:39: Message edited by: South Coast Kevin ]
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My blog - wondering about Christianity in the 21st century, chess, music, politics and other bits and bobs.
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
I find it interesting that at least a few people here seriously believe that salvation is a kind of legal transaction, and that a literal blood sacrifice is demanded by God as a payment. That's very...um...Bronze Age.
I'd steer you toward the writings of theologian Rene' Girard, whose argument is essentially that Jesus' "sacrificial" death was necessary not because God needs it but because we brutish human beings and our unevolved psyches need it.
Lutheran - wanted to just pick up on this. I'm more or less in the same place as you and am in full agreement with the Girardian take. It is the only one that doesn't paint a picture of God that is either repugnant or incompetent. Did Jesus have to die because God needed it? According to Girard (or at least early Girard) - no.
Yes there are a number of scriptures that you probably have to 'go against' - particularly in Hebrews - but then if that isn't a problem to you, you end up with a much sharper critique of sacrificial logic than any other atonement theory. You end up with a sort of moral influence plus.
[ 16. April 2012, 22:44: Message edited by: Luigi ]
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Augustine is generally regarded as teaching MI, as he takes the view that humans need to do good and pass the judgment of God by doing so, and he also emphasises the teachings and example of Christ as his primary idea of what Christ accomplished.
Not by everyone.
Against Faustus the Manihchean Section 6:
"But as Christ endured death as man, and for man,so also son of God as he was, ever living in his own righteousness, but dying for our offences, he submitted as man and for man, to bear the curse that accompanies death. And as he died in the flesh which he took in bearing our punishment, so also while ever blessed in his own righteousness, he was cursed for our offences, in the death which he suffered in bearing our punishment."
Seems a pretty straightforward assertion of PSA from his own pen.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
EDIT - in reply to Jamat:
But the ministry of Jesus shows God meeting the unholy and unclean - the woman with menstrual bleeding who was healed after touching Jesus' clothes, the girl he raised from the dead, Zaccheus and Matthew the tax collectors. Jesus transformed the unholy and unclean, rather than being 'contaminated' by them.
I don't think the Biblical witness is as simple as God being unapproachable unless our holiness is removed. The Bible simply isn't as clear as you believe. I also don't know what you meant with your comment about a 'post modernist concept of linguistics'. I think there is truth to be found, just that none of us has all of it. Indeed, and as others have suggested, it may be that the atonement is multi-faceted and there is truth in all these different models we're talking about.
The belief that language is not definitive or objective is the reason many say that just saying something textually may not be saying that thing but something else. This is because in post modern terms the text is itself no longer definitive or objective. Any text creates meaning only when read and then depending on the preconceptions of the reader, it may create different meanings. Hence, our argument over whether Paul believed in PSA.
Many here would say I am reading my PSA belief into his writings. My reply as a post modernist can only be that there is more objective evidence for my eisegesis than there is for theirs.
I am not denying the CV or MI elements that others find in scripture either. I just cannot agree that they make any sense without the centrality of PSA. All atonement models are not equal players IMV.
The holiness issue I try to deal with below in something I wrte in the CV thread several years ago.
Christ needed to die because the nature of God demanded an expiation of sin. In The OT, animal sacrifice temporarily plugged a gap here but now a perfect sacrifice has been found. The Passover lamb needed to be perfect and Christ filled the gap being The incarnation of the nature of God, the everlasting word,living a perfect life, sinless, and dying in the midst of the Passover feast. God in his holiness could not accept sin in his presence. We are sinners. Christ's 'God' nature was clothed in humanity yet he maintained his integrity of holiness by not sinning when in the likeness of a man.
In his incarnation, he could dwell with sinners because his true nature was concealed, being seen momentarily at the transfiguration. Yet he maintained holiness and his association with sinners was enabled possibly because the cross event was imminent and had a retrospective effect.
The death of Christ saves by the inclusion of us into the cross event. When Christ was judged so was our sin. God can now see us as righteous, Christ having been judged in our place and we having been seen by God as having been simultaneously judged with him on the cross. Romans 6 explains the process. The actualisation of such salvation demands that God reveals this opportunity for grace to us and that we decide to accept it. Such is my understanding of the conversion process.
The problem since the fall has always been that God's holiness separated him from his fallen creation. Holiness and sin are mutually exclusive. But God in his love bridged the gap in Christ and the means was to judge Christ who was sinless by placing our sin upon him. God was never angry in a human sense just separated from us and incompatible with us hence the complexity of Mosaic law which Christ brought to an end and which, consequently, we no longer have to keep thank God.
This is evangelical faith 101 isn't it?
Justice is a moral law that demands redress of wrong; deny it at your peril. The argument on this thread is whether it has to be retributive or can be dealt with by a 'forgiveness'model.
My view as often stated is that retribution is a penalty exacted for redressing a wrong what ever the form it may take. To me retributive may also be restorative but not necessarily. I contend God needed to satisfy justice before forgiveness can be offered. The logic is that:
He judged Christ for my sin.
I am in Christ so I can be forgiven.
I must extend forgiveness to others now since this is Christ's obligation on me.
Whatever the form it takes, satisfaction is demanded by the definition of justice. An eternal law demands that our sin be judged, the problem for God is how to judge our sin yet save us intact.
And it is actually Paul who said that when Christ was judged so was our sin. Ro 6:6,7,8 "Our old self was crucified with him....Now if we have died with Christ, we believe we shall also live with him."
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
Originally posted by Starlight:
Likewise the teaching of Moral Influence was universal for centuries following the NT. It easily dominated the first two hundred years of post-biblical Christianity, and from about 350AD onward it continued to be taught strongly but now in conjunction with other views such as Ransom from Satan and Recapitulation. It wasn't until the 11th century that MI was challenged, by Anselm and his advocates, though many at that time rose to defend it.
Tertullian argues that baptism washes off all sins. Origen was discussing the issue of ransom being paid to the devil, and this is a continuing discussion throughout the centuries. Anselm is reacting to the ransom theory, which he regards as unsatisfactory, with his Satisfaction theory; it's his contemporary Abelard who is usually credited with the teaching of the cross being exemplary, though he also supports ransom to some extent.
Yup, what you say is also true.
In the early Church, baptism was strongly associated with repentance, as a person who repented would get baptised and speak their repentance as part of the baptism ritual. Usually baptism was not permitted until evidence of true repentance had been observed in their lives, and one source from the 3rd century says there was a three year period of observation prior to baptism being permitted to ensure the convert had repented fully. Various passages in the Bible link both repentance and baptism with forgiveness. This lead to Christians wondering: When sins are forgiven at baptism, are they forgiven solely due to the repentance which the baptism signifies, or is the power of God at work during baptism in some additional way to bring forgiveness? Writings in the second and third centuries reflect a variety of viewpoints on this topic. By the fourth century, the primary view was that Baptism confers a special once-off forgiveness for all pre-baptismal sins, and that any sins post-baptism must be arduously atoned for through lengthy sincere repentance and good works. This lead to many putting off baptism until they were on their deathbed (most famously the Emperor Constantine) in order to maximize its effects.
Origen indeed discussed several times the notion of a Ransom being paid to the devil. He speculates on a number of different mechanisms for how the Ransom worked and how the devil was defeated. By and large these speculations were not followed up on until the fourth century, when Origen's writings became extremely popular, and a lot of fourth century theologians explored a huge variety of ways of thinking about Christ's defeat of the devil. Origen loved to speculate about things like this, but don't confuse his speculations with his primary teachings. He makes perfectly clear over and over again that the primary purpose of Christ was as a teacher and example whose purpose was the moral betterment of humanity. In Origen's thinking, the moral betterment of humanity (and the demons) is the entire purpose of everything.
Anselm aimed his critique primarily at the Ransom theory of the atonement, yes, particularly the forms of it that appear in the writings of Augustine and Gregory the Great. However one of Anselm's arguments is that humanity is incapable of meeting God's standards. Thus, any Moral Influence teaching is also implicitly ruled out, even though this was not Anselm's primary goal in his work. Peter Abelard then critiqued Anselm's ideas and reaffirmed Augustine's teachings on Moral Influence. Subsequently Abelard was himself critiqued by Bernard of Clairvaux and others, who were variously keen to either support Anselm's view or to reaffirm a Ransom from Satan view.
quote:
Can you provide some similar authorities on whom you depend?
I wrote a book on this subject myself, which you might have noticed in my sig. My book cites a few dozen works in the sections dealing with Church history if you want further references. IMO the best work on historical church doctrine is Arthur C. McGiffert, A History of Christian Thought: Volume 1, Early and Eastern. Pretty spot on concerning the atonement is Hastings Rashdall's The Idea of Atonement in Christian Theology. Both are out of date in their treatment of Paul, as Pauline scholarship has advanced substantially in the last 30 years, but in terms of Church history and changes in doctrinal teachings both are excellent.
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
Starlight - so how much have you looked at Girard's writings on sacrifice and (by implication) the atonement?
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Jamat, I have some sympathy with what you're saying, but still think you're being anachronistic to a certain extent. What you appear to be suggesting is that the whole of the early Church was orientated towards PSA initially but this fell from prominence at some point as the first-among-equals atonement theory or, to put it another way, the 'Pope' or pinnacle of all atonement theories.
At what point did this happen then?
Can you put a date on it?
Why, for instance, don't the Orthodox have PSA as their dominant model if it was such a big deal with the Fathers and those who agreed the great Creeds in the fourth and fifth centuries?
At what point did the Orthodox 'lose' PSA?
I'm not for a moment suggesting that there isn't anything in PSA and that it doesn't 'work' as a model - I agree that it does tackle some of the issues that the other atonement models don't. But only if you're coming at it from a Western stand-point and with a Western view of Original Sin.
There's a logic to PSA, certainly, and it has a neat dynamic all of its own. But if it WAS the main model available to the Early Church, at which point did it cease to hold that position?
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
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Hairy Biker
Shipmate
# 12086
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Perhaps the day of judgement will be the only way we get a definitive ruling on that. However, I think 66 books by 40 authors is sufficient to triangulate a pretty good estimation of truth. They would suggest that God is holy, I am not. Christ was sent from God to offer salvation. The situation is pretty clear really. Where PSA works well is that it creates a means where the holy can validly meet the unholy. Think of it this way. Why should a holy God hear my prayers? He cannot be approached unless my unholiness is removed. The gospel is that in Christ this happened. But how could it happen? Christ took my curse, my sin, my unholiness, on himself. How else can you see the substitution working? Its pretty clear what Peter, Paul and John thought.
Hang on a minute. You just said you're not holy. Then you say you are because of the crucifixion. Well, which is it? It can't be both!
As for 66 book by 40 authors? Have you ever visited a library? I think you need a few more than that to get a clear majority.
PSA is as full of holes as any other human attempt to understand God and His purposes. Like you said, we're going to have to wait until judgement day to be proved wrong, so why do you make so much effort to prove yourself wrong in the meantime?
Sorry if it sounds arrogant and judgmental - but I'm just as wrong as you when we disagree.
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there [are] four important things in life: religion, love, art and science. At their best, they’re all just tools to help you find a path through the darkness. None of them really work that well, but they help.
Damien Hirst
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Whatever the form it takes, satisfaction is demanded by the definition of justice. An eternal law demands that our sin be judged, the problem for God is how to judge our sin yet save us intact
I've never been able to see this! If we are born under original sin, with a tendecy to concupisence, it isn't our fault. God put us here in this environment, with a flwed nature. In other words, he set us up to fail. And then punishes when we do? I want no part of such a god. It get worse. He created a perfect universe, allowed it to go wrong, condemns all creatures to destruction, and then intervenes with a cosmic sticking plaster to sort out his own mess. We can be saved from god's incompetance, as long as we believe the story, as the Bible tells it. This isn't worthy of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent Creator. it belongs with the brothers Grimm.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Against Faustus the Manihchean Section 6:
"But as Christ endured death as man, and for man, so also son of God as he was, ever living in his own righteousness, but dying for our offences, he submitted as man and for man, to bear the curse that accompanies death. And as he died in the flesh which he took in bearing our punishment, so also while ever blessed in his own righteousness, he was cursed for our offences, in the death which he suffered in bearing our punishment."
Seems a pretty straightforward assertion of PSA from his own pen.
Hi Jamat,
This is not PSA, at all. If you have a read of the sections immediately before your quote, it adds quite important context, and you'll see you're reading Augustine wrong here. Particularly Sections 3 and 4 (of book XIV of Against Faustus which you are citing). Augustine is saying that due to being fully human Jesus died like a human, even though he was himself sinless. That's not PSA: PSA claims Jesus suffered the punishment of God instead of us, as a substitute, so that we wouldn't have to. Augustine is saying Jesus suffered exactly the same punishment we do: ie death. He's saying Jesus shared in our punishment.
Augustine clarifies in the sections I referenced that his argument is this:
(1) Humanity sinned, and as a result humans die, as death is the curse and punishment for sin.
(2) Christ became a human.
(3) Christ never sinned personally, but is liable to die only because he is human.
(4) Christ died, and in doing so suffered from the punishment and curse of death, just like we do.
(5) Therefore when Christ died, it wasn't because he was a sinner, it was a result of him being human and suffering the normal punishment and curse of death just like other humans.
If you read back to section 1 of that book, Augustine is trying to explain how it is that Moses could say "cursed is anyone who hangs on a tree" given that there had been many innocent people crucified over the years (including Jesus). Faustus had pointed out it was pretty mean and nasty of Moses to pronounce a curse on all those innocent people. Augustine's explanation is that the 'curse' refers merely to death, which in Genesis 3 is God's punishment/curse for sin. Thus Augustine wants to read Moses' curse as meaning nothing but "anyone who is hung on a tree dies [and thus suffers from the curse of death placed on all humanity in Genesis 3]". IMO Augustine's rereading of Moses' curse is not highly convincing. I note that it is quite a different reading of the Moses curse than how modern PSA advocates like to read that curse.
But anyway, my point is that Augustine's not advocating PSA in this passage - he's not even advocating anything close to it in the passage you cite. This is why you need to not quote the early church fathers without understanding their views and reading the context, because they can say things that look PSA, but which aren't PSA at all when you read the context.
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Starlight - so how much have you looked at Girard's writings on sacrifice and (by implication) the atonement?
Girard's ideas do not strike me as plausible and so I have never been inspired to get round to doing much study of his works. I have naturally run across his theories from time to time in my readings, but I've not read his books.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
Words words words
So..
Christ has no sin deserving of death but for our sakes he bore sin in the sense of death as brought on himan nature by sin.
If death is a punishment for sin and it is..and Jesus embraced it and he did..and we benefit from it and we do..then God has punished Jesus in our place.
This seems to be a case of 'if it quacks like a duck.."
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Hairy Biker: You just said you're not holy. Then you say you are because of the crucifixion. Well, which is it? It can't be both!
The reformers use the word 'imputed righteousness' to depict this concept. It is the paradoxical idea that God sees me as holy through my faith in Christ. When I pray, he can hear because in a sense, Christ is praying as his righteousness has 'clothed' me.
They also realise that this could just be a big excuse for me to sin with impunity so they have a parallel concept called 'outworked righteousness'. This depicts my state when by God's grace and through the power of the HS I have lived up to the label God has put on me as being 'in Christ'.
They are careful to acknowledge that human righteousness is unacceptable to God. As Paul says: "In me, that is, in my flesh dwells no good thing."
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Rosina
Shipmate
# 15589
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Posted
Death is the result of sin - not punishment - I don't believe God punishes at all - we punish ourselves by the choices we make.
My understanding is that when scripture states Christ died for your sin the word "for" is used as "because of." Christ died, because of your (mankinds) sins.
Christ is not with man because of the sin of all mankind. Christ returns to mankind when the sin is removed. All is the work of God with whosoever allows God to perform His works of promise. The "death" of Christ does not, and never did, remove sin from man. The man Jesus of Nazareth did not take any one's place. Each and every person must follow the way of salvation in order to be saved.
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"Imagine." If you can imagine, you can dream, and if you can dream, you can hope and if you have hope, you may seek and if you seek; you will find.
Posts: 75 | From: Lancashire | Registered: Apr 2010
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Rosina
Shipmate
# 15589
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by PaulTH*:
quote:
Originally posted by Rosina:
Why do you believe our chance to respond is eternal Paul?
OK, I'll qualify that statement! During the 11 years that I've been a member here, I've several times mentioned my love for the medieval, mystical German treatise known as the Theologia Germanica. Luther described it as, next to Scripture and Augustine, the most influential book in his life. It was on Calvin's hate list, so it can't be all bad. From chapter 51:
"In hell everyone wants to have a self-will. Therefore all is misery there, and wretchedness.....Supposing a denizen of hell surrendered his self-will, and were released from his desire to call something his own. he would then come out of hell into the kingdom of heaven."
Many, though not all mystics, when they touch the hem of God's robe, experience such an overwhelming love, that they know that God doesn't, can't and never will condemn anything He made. People put themselves in hell by their selfish attitudes. The only possibility of hell being eternal in this way of thinking, comes from asking what God could do with an eternally recalcitrant creature. Personally I believe that, given the sacrifice of Christ, and the intercessions of the BVM and the saints, even the darkest recesses will come into the light of God's love.
Ah thanks for this clarification - I've experienced that "overwhelming love" and there words fail. ![[Angel]](graemlins/angel.gif)
As is written "God wills not the death of one sinner" and "It is the will of God that all come into the knowledge of truth."
I believe God's will cannot fail, however He does not force anyone into believing. Salvation of God is offered not commanded. It is a free gift by the Grace of God to those who ask and receive from God.
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"Imagine." If you can imagine, you can dream, and if you can dream, you can hope and if you have hope, you may seek and if you seek; you will find.
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Rosine: Death is the result of sin - not punishment - I don't believe God punishes at all - we punish ourselves by the choices we make.
You have a perfect right to your opinion though in this case there is a logical problem. You might like to look at what is stated about the origin of death in Genesis. It was the consequence of sin. If death would not have happened but for sin, then whatever you call it, consequence or punishment is irrelevant.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Christ has no sin deserving of death but for our sakes he bore sin in the sense of death as brought on himan nature by sin.
If death is a punishment for sin and it is..and Jesus embraced it and he did..and we benefit from it and we do..then God has punished Jesus in our place.
Jesus dying is not the same as penal substitution. Likewise Jesus sharing our punishment is not the same as Jesus being punished instead of us.
[ 18. April 2012, 04:02: Message edited by: Starlight ]
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Starlight:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Christ has no sin deserving of death but for our sakes he bore sin in the sense of death as brought on himan nature by sin.
If death is a punishment for sin and it is..and Jesus embraced it and he did..and we benefit from it and we do..then God has punished Jesus in our place.
Jesus dying is not the same as penal substitution. Likewise Jesus sharing our punishment is not the same as Jesus being punished instead of us.
You are happy, nevertheless, for Jesus to suffer death so you may live spiritually. Is the argument about what he did in dying and what he achieved by doing it or about some linguistic tangle to solve your problem of a God that punishes the innocent?
PSA has it that Jesus, though innocent and sinless consented to have the burden of sin laid on him and God willed it so the world could be saved. Without it, no salvation was possible since Jesus prayed for the cup to pass..and it didn't. There was no plan B. (Hard to believe Augustine didn't know that.)
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Rosina:
I believe God's will cannot fail, however He does not force anyone into believing. Salvation of God is offered not commanded. It is a free gift by the Grace of God to those who ask and receive from God.
Herin lies a paradox which I've never managed to resolve to my own satisfaction. I'm a long term believer in apokatastasis, the restoration of all things. For several reasons. All Christians believe that the whole of creation has one source, God alone, so there is no dualism in our origins. However, sin and rebellion against God entered into creation. So we now have a secondary dualism of good and evil. For Isaiah, this doesn't imply any real dualism;
" I am the LORD, and there is no other.
I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things. "(Isa 45.6-7)
If good and evil are perpetuated into eternity, which is the logical outcome of a belief in eternal damnation, the the universe which began unified, will end in an eternal dualism. That would be a failure on God's part, because God desires all to be saved(1 Tim 2.4). You say that God's will cannot fail, so He cannot fail to find a way to unify His creation in the end times.
Two things have come to temper my universalism as I get older. God said to Moses:
"I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." (Ex 33.19)
Here, He is clearly saying that it is His call, not ours, on whon he chooses to show mercy. None of us can gainsay that. Then there is the question of free will. What to do with an eternally rebellient sinner? so I have evolved into a completely orthodox view on this. I hope and pray for the salvation of all. I believe that love will, in the end, reach and redeem everyone, so I pray, with the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
"1058 The Church prays that no one should be lost: "Lord, let me never be parted from you." If it is true that no one can save himself, it is also true that God "desires all men to be saved" (1 Tim 2:4), and that for him "all things are possible" (Mt 19:26)."
For Him all things are indeed posible!
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
If death is a punishment for sin and it is..and Jesus embraced it and he did..and we benefit from it and we do..then God has punished Jesus in our place.
I grew up in the Baptist Church which I faithfully attended from the age of 4 until my rebellion against it at 15. I was nurtured on this stuff. I rejected it then and I reject it now. Fortunately PSA is neither the oldest, nor the most widely held view in the Christian Church, either historically, nor even today. Though it has its genesis in Augustine's Manichaen and Platonic ways of thinking, it came to full fruition only among the Protestant reformers. It has never been the majority view at any time in the history of the Church, and I'm no more inclined to accept it now, than I was 40 years ago.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
Sorry to come late to this discussion.
I would highly recommend a book by the (now sadly departed) Tom Smail, called "Windows on the Cross".
His image, which I have always found helpful, is of a cross in a courtyard, surrounded by walls on all four sides. In each wall there are a series of windows. As we walk around the outside, we can look through each window in turn at the cross. And every time we do so, we are seeing the cross from a different angle. but we are seeing the same cross each time. No one window gives us the complete picture of the cross - we actually need to see all the available angles.
He then goes on to talk about such windows as PSA, Christus Victor and so on.
I'm someone who drank deeply of the PSA theory when young but now feel it to be morally repugnant. Or rather - the full-blown theory is. But there is something there (which we can see in Scripture), which does have something to say about what the cross "does". It's not the only answer. It's not the best answer. It is simply one aspect - one window - onto something that defies complete comprehension.
This brings me to a cautionary note. I think it is highly inadvisable to presume that ONE theory is THE theory. Nor is it advisable to presume that we will be able to fully comprehend this matter. There must always be the humility to say "here are some windows - some glimpses - but they are only partial and incomplete. The rest is mystery."
For me, any "theory of atonement" must begin and end with two indisputable things:
1. The love of God, which is higher, wider, deeper and more consistent than we can ever conceive.
2. The cross cannot be separated from the resurrection. (One of my biggest gripes about "pure" PSA is that it makes the resurrection almost irrelevant.) What God did for us lies in Jesus crucified AND risen.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
Sorry to come late to this discussion.
I would highly recommend a book by the (now sadly departed) Tom Smail, called "Windows on the Cross".
His image, which I have always found helpful, is of a cross in a courtyard, surrounded by walls on all four sides. In each wall there are a series of windows. As we walk around the outside, we can look through each window in turn at the cross. And every time we do so, we are seeing the cross from a different angle. but we are seeing the same cross each time. No one window gives us the complete picture of the cross - we actually need to see all the available angles.
He then goes on to talk about such windows as PSA, Christus Victor and so on.
I'm someone who drank deeply of the PSA theory when young but now feel it to be morally repugnant. Or rather - the full-blown theory is. But there is something there (which we can see in Scripture), which does have something to say about what the cross "does". It's not the only answer. It's not the best answer. It is simply one aspect - one window - onto something that defies complete comprehension.
This brings me to a cautionary note. I think it is highly inadvisable to presume that ONE theory is THE theory. Nor is it advisable to presume that we will be able to fully comprehend this matter. There must always be the humility to say "here are some windows - some glimpses - but they are only partial and incomplete. The rest is mystery."
For me, any "theory of atonement" must begin and end with two indisputable things:
1. The love of God, which is higher, wider, deeper and more consistent than we can ever conceive.
2. The cross cannot be separated from the resurrection. (One of my biggest gripes about "pure" PSA is that it makes the resurrection almost irrelevant.) What God did for us lies in Jesus crucified AND risen.
Coming in late too, to say I like what Oscar says here.
It's another of those things about which, the older I get, the more content I am to say "it is a mystery."
In the past I have wanted to decide things definitely (comes from my Roman Catholic beginnings) --ok,if that doctrine is not true, then this other one must be, and I need to decide...need to know where "truth" is......
How daft that seems now, as the older I get the more I see we can know less and less for sure!
cara
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Pondering.
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
Excellent post Oscar!
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Paulth:It has never been the majority view at any time in the history of the Church, and I'm no more inclined to accept it now, than I was 40 years ago.
Fair enough though With all those miles on the clock you will be aware that truth is not necessarily determined democratically. If you are recanting youur universalism, what do you base your hope on?
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
Jesus was Jewish. The gospel writers were Jewish. The idea of forgiveness of sins due to sacrifice was embedded deep in their faith stories. It's no wonder that a sacrificial slant was put on the crucifixion.
If Jesus had happened to have been born into another faith (and why not?) the story would have been different.
Jesus himself forgave and taught forgiveness with no sacrifice involved, so that'll do for me. My Church tends to go heavily on the PSA model, but I don't go with them on it.
(They just see me as 'out of line' and pray for me to come back to a right understanding)
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
Boogie wrote: quote:
If Jesus had happened to have been born into another faith (and why not?)...
You know the answer to this question, Boogie!
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Anglo-Cthulhic
Posts: 4857 | From: the corridors of Pah! | Registered: May 2001
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Jesus himself forgave and taught forgiveness with no sacrifice involved,
The gospel of Jesus before the cross was about faith in himself. To believe his messianic claim was to include oneself in his future death and resurrection. He did predict his own death after all.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
The gospel of Jesus before the cross was about faith in himself. To believe his messianic claim was to include oneself in his future death and resurrection. He did predict his own death after all.
If you were going into Jerusalem at that time, with a huge following, preaching what he was - you'd predict your own death too.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Jamat
Shipmate
# 11621
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
The gospel of Jesus before the cross was about faith in himself. To believe his messianic claim was to include oneself in his future death and resurrection. He did predict his own death after all.
If you were going into Jerusalem at that time, with a huge following, preaching what he was - you'd predict your own death too.
I've often wanted a tardis ..to be a fly on the wall.
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Jamat ..in utmost longditude, where Heaven
with Earth and ocean meets, the setting sun slowly descended, and with right aspect
Against the eastern gate of Paradise. (Milton Paradise Lost Bk iv)
Posts: 3228 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Jul 2006
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by PaulTH*:
Herin lies a paradox which I've never managed to resolve to my own satisfaction. I'm a long term believer in apokatastasis, the restoration of all things. For several reasons. All Christians believe that the whole of creation has one source, God alone, so there is no dualism in our origins. However, sin and rebellion against God entered into creation. So we now have a secondary dualism of good and evil. For Isaiah, this doesn't imply any real dualism;
" I am the LORD, and there is no other.
I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things. "(Isa 45.6-7)
If good and evil are perpetuated into eternity, which is the logical outcome of a belief in eternal damnation, the the universe which began unified, will end in an eternal dualism. That would be a failure on God's part, because God desires all to be saved(1 Tim 2.4). You say that God's will cannot fail, so He cannot fail to find a way to unify His creation in the end times.
Two things have come to temper my universalism as I get older. God said to Moses:
"I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." (Ex 33.19)
Here, He is clearly saying that it is His call, not ours, on whon he chooses to show mercy. None of us can gainsay that. Then there is the question of free will. What to do with an eternally rebellient sinner? so I have evolved into a completely orthodox view on this. I hope and pray for the salvation of all. I believe that love will, in the end, reach and redeem everyone, so I pray, with the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
"1058 The Church prays that no one should be lost: "Lord, let me never be parted from you." If it is true that no one can save himself, it is also true that God "desires all men to be saved" (1 Tim 2:4), and that for him "all things are possible" (Mt 19:26)."
For Him all things are indeed posible!
I'll throw a few ideas into the pot here, if I may:
If the earliest books of the Bible, derived from oral tradition, are written from the worldview of people who think that gods are in control and make all things happen, for the good or for the bad, we have a simple take on the one God who is seen to be happy with people when they thrive and angry with them for some reason when things go awry. The book of Job is brilliant as it turns this view upside down.
Satan is shown to be under the control of God in Job, in fact the OT Satan has a job to do by testing people out, so that they will be made stronger in faith.
Nobody is perfect. Every single one of us has done something harmful to ourselves or to other people, even if it is to neglect what we should have done. Sin is alive and kicking, the cross didn't get rid of it. I suggest that it is the necessary alternative which provides us with the free will choice to take the righteous path or go the other way. In the Genesis story, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was deliberately planted by God.
I agree that judgement is God's call and it's not for us to judge others. Where reconciliation with God is about response to his invitation into relationship, if people don't respond and remain outside of that relationship it is surely their call.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
We're in danger of talking past each other here, because we're referring to different things. The doctrine of the atonement is concerned with God's forgiveness of sins:
That's what I thought on reading this thread. Unless I have grossly misunderstood what he's saying, I have trouble recognising Starlight's take on Moral Influence as an atonement theory at all - he seems to me to be more denying that Christianity needs a specific theory of atonement, than asserting his preferred model.
Every other theory - satisfaction, recapitulation, victory, ransom, substitution... - is an attempt to explain how God uses the work of Jesus to forgive us, and say why it was, if not absolutely required, at least fitting, that he should do so. Starlight's MI theory doesn't seem to be doing the same sort of thing at all.
I'd agree that it is a dominant Christian idea that Jesus is a good example and a good teacher, and that this should change the way that we live. I'd expect pretty much every Christian to agree with that, and for every Christian teacher and preacher to say something like it. Different traditions would disagree on how fundamental to salvation that is, but almost all of them would think it important.
I'd need a lot of convincing that this idea was or has ever been a dominant idea of the atonement. The idea that Jesus was (or saves us by being) ONLY a good example and teacher is surely a rarity. I can't see it anywhere in the New Testament, which plainly teaches that the Christ's death was purposive and effective, even if it's hard to say exactly how the writers intended that to be understood. It doesn't explain why the first appeal of Christianity and especially of Jesus was not to people who lived well and needed a morality masterclass, but to people who knew themselves to be moral failures - that is, the gospel was essentially one of redemption, not solely one of sound teaching. It would also leave unexplained the fact that no other Christian teacher or martyr has reached anything remotely like the status of Jesus, even though we have many who taught and died well enough to be celebrated as examples of holiness. Stephen is an inspirational saint and a fine example, and a Christian could do very well by taking him as a model, but no one ever suggested that he died "for our sins", as the Church always has of Christ. Jesus is more than the pre-emininent martyr, and the suggestion that his saving work can be reduced to that of being a good influence strikes me as an oddity, rather than the dominant idea of any orthodox Christian tradition.
As far as PSA is concerned, it's a minor part of my understanding, but I wouldn't want to give it up altogether. If a sin (my own or, more likely, someone else's) ever strikes me as so detestably wicked that it screams to heaven for vengeance, knowing that Jesus has paid for it helps me. It may be that holier people than I don't see any need for any sin ever to be paid for, and PSA might therefore be something we are supposed to outgrow, but I haven't outgrown it yet, and while it still helps me to forgive and accept forgiveness, I'm keeping it.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
We're in danger of talking past each other here, because we're referring to different things. The doctrine of the atonement is concerned with God's forgiveness of sins:
That's what I thought on reading this thread. Unless I have grossly misunderstood what he's saying, I have trouble recognising Starlight's take on Moral Influence as an atonement theory at all
Atonement just means "at one ment". How we become one with God.
If it is only the forgiveness of sins then Christ didn't need to come at all.
The Jews had a very effective and long standing means of removing sin once a year through Yom Kippur.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I'd need a lot of convincing that this idea was or has ever been a dominant idea of the atonement. The idea that Jesus was (or saves us by being) ONLY a good example and teacher is surely a rarity. I can't see it anywhere in the New Testament, which plainly teaches that the Christ's death was purposive and effective, even if it's hard to say exactly how the writers intended that to be understood.
Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.
Matthew.
As for the whole sacrifice thing? Many verses and understandings come through in the Epistles. Not very present at all in the passion narratives of the gospels. It's there, but it's not as prominent.
The gospels are more concerned with proving what happened was prophesied.
The whole meaning of the death thing came later.
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a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
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Evensong
Shipmate
# 14696
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Jesus himself forgave and taught forgiveness with no sacrifice involved,
The gospel of Jesus before the cross was about faith in himself.
No. The earliest was about God coming to rule the world in the coming Kingdom. (Mark 1:14)
Jesus was part of this, but it was a separate thing.
It was about announcing the Good News of the jubilee year ( Isa 61) . All the losers of the world were to be healed.
the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers* are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.
As for receiving the Holy Spirit and the forgiveness of sin?
All you have to do is ask.
‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you
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a theological scrapbook
Posts: 9481 | From: Australia | Registered: Apr 2009
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Ender's Shadow
Shipmate
# 2272
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Atonement just means "at one ment". How we become one with God.
If it is only the forgiveness of sins then Christ didn't need to come at all.
The Jews had a very effective and long standing means of removing sin once a year through Yom Kippur.
No, now there Hebrews, and I(!) strongly disagree: the idea that the sacrifice of some animals pays for sin really doesn't work. Sin's a bit more serious than that.
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
As for the whole sacrifice thing? Many verses and understandings come through in the Epistles. Not very present at all in the passion narratives of the gospels. It's there, but it's not as prominent.
The gospels are more concerned with proving what happened was prophesied.
The whole meaning of the death thing came later.
It's interesting to consider that the gospels DON'T major on the meaning of the cross given the importance of the issue; lots of other things are assumed by scholars to be inserted into the gospels in order to legitimate the views of their church at the particular time, but an atonement theory doesn't get so inserted.
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Test everything. Hold on to the good.
Please don't refer to me as 'Ender' - the whole point of Ender's Shadow is that he isn't Ender.
Posts: 5018 | From: Manchester, England | Registered: Feb 2002
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Leprechaun
Ship's Poison Elf
# 5408
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Posted
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Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
It's interesting to consider that the gospels DON'T major on the meaning of the cross given the importance of the issue; lots of other things are assumed by scholars to be inserted into the gospels in order to legitimate the views of their church at the particular time, but an atonement theory doesn't get so inserted.
Have you read Morna Hooker on Mark? She says that the story of Barabbas so clearly teaches Penal Substitution that Mark must have made it up!
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He hath loved us, He hath loved us, because he would love
Posts: 3097 | From: England - far from home... | Registered: Jan 2004
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Rosina
Shipmate
# 15589
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Jesus himself forgave and taught forgiveness with no sacrifice involved,
The gospel of Jesus before the cross was about faith in himself.
No. The earliest was about God coming to rule the world in the coming Kingdom. (Mark 1:14)
Jesus was part of this, but it was a separate thing.
It was about announcing the Good News of the jubilee year ( Isa 61) . All the losers of the world were to be healed.
the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers* are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.
As for receiving the Holy Spirit and the forgiveness of sin?
All you have to do is ask.
‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif) I do think "you" do have to do 'something'. You have to "take up your cross and follow" My understanding of cross here is body.
Rapters eye wrote: "Sin is alive and kicking, the cross didn't get rid of it"
Yes it does. "The Cross" is the crossing over - Whosoever crosses over is the "overcomer" the one who has come over to be 'atonement'with God; coming over the firmament, wall, veil, to the waters from above.
By your words Rapters Eye you say God cannot perform His Works of transformation ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
There is a Way to know the truth of and from God - it is the Way Jesus taught and lived.
This "crossing over" is also seen as the spiritual journey from Babylon to Jerusalem.
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"Imagine." If you can imagine, you can dream, and if you can dream, you can hope and if you have hope, you may seek and if you seek; you will find.
Posts: 75 | From: Lancashire | Registered: Apr 2010
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Atonement just means "at one ment". How we become one with God.
If it is only the forgiveness of sins then Christ didn't need to come at all.
Who says it's "only" forgiveness of sins? It certainly includes forgiveness, but there's always been more to the gospel than being let off the hook for misbehaviour.
quote:
Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.
And in the same way, the gospel isn't "only" about becoming perfect like God. That, without forgiveness, would not be good news. It would be a death sentence. A moral influence theory that has "be perfect" as its main teaching is as close to bad news as I can imagine. I can't "be perfect" just as a result of good teaching and a good example. I might as well give up in despair.
And yet the gospels don't record people with shitty lives giving up in despair when they met Jesus. They threw parties. They wept with gratitude. They gave back all their stolen wealth. They poured priceless bottles of perfume over his feet. They saw a lot more in him than another Pharisee telling them to "be perfect".
That's not to deny that Jesus did teach, and did give an example. Of course he did. And of course that's important, and becoming perfect is an indispensible part of our salvation. My objection is only to a theory which doesn't let the gospel do anything more than teach. That, it seems to me, is false to scripture and false to every Christian tradition from the start.
quote:
As for the whole sacrifice thing? Many verses and understandings come through in the Epistles. Not very present at all in the passion narratives of the gospels. It's there, but it's not as prominent.
The gospels are more concerned with proving what happened was prophesied.
Yes, prophesied. Planned by God. That's what I mean by ‘purposive' - Jesus's death and resurrection were part of his mission, something that he came to earth to accomplish. There was a reason for that. It's not just how the story happened to end, it was supposed to take place.
In as much as the gospels only hint as why this was, rather than spell out a detailed theory, they are consistent with substitution, and ransom, and satisfaction, and all the rest of them EXCEPT pure moral influence, because on that theory it is not "necessary for the Christ to suffer" provided that he is obeyed.
I'm not arguing, of course, that Jesus does not have (or should not have) a tremendous moral influence on all Christians, just that it seems to me obvious in Scripture and in almost every Christian response to Scripture that this is not all he does. Even if we can't all agree on an account of it, there is something else there to be accounted for.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Is the argument about what he did in dying and what he achieved by doing it or about some linguistic tangle to solve your problem of a God that punishes the innocent?
It's both/and.
Answering "What Jesus achieved" describes Christianity.
Answering "some linguistic tangle" describes a specific atonement theory within Christianity, of which PSA is one.
You seem to be making the mistake of assuming that PSA is Christianity, and that all texts describing that Jesus did that are consistent with PSA therefore teach PSA.
It seems to me that we just don't know whether, for example, Paul, would have believed in PSA because no one had exactly formulated that idea when he was writing. If some super-bright student had done so, he might have said "Yes, that's it! That's what I was trying to say" or "Yes, I suppose, but not just that" or "No, that's close, but not quite it". We don't know. I think there's more than PSA in the New Testament, but mostly I'm arguing against people who seem to think that there's less.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Rosina:
Rapters eye wrote: "Sin is alive and kicking, the cross didn't get rid of it"
Yes it does. "The Cross" is the crossing over - Whosoever crosses over is the "overcomer" the one who has come over to be 'atonement'with God; coming over the firmament, wall, veil, to the waters from above.
By your words Rapters Eye you say God cannot perform His Works of transformation
There is a Way to know the truth of and from God - it is the Way Jesus taught and lived.
This "crossing over" is also seen as the spiritual journey from Babylon to Jerusalem.
Are you saying that there is no sin in the world any more? Are you saying that once we have accepted God's invitation and 'crossed over' into relationship with God we are perfect? By observation, I disagree on both counts.
If you are saying that we will be perfect once we have died and are resurrected into paradise (or not, if we're not ![[Eek!]](eek.gif) ) then we must wait to find out.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Every other theory - satisfaction, recapitulation, victory, ransom, substitution... - is an attempt to explain how God uses the work of Jesus to forgive us, and say why it was, if not absolutely required, at least fitting, that he should do so.
I disagree. Recapitulation and Ransom are not about "forgiveness" in any straightforward sense. Satisfaction and PSA are the only atonement views that are directly about forgiveness, so I think that if you assume the atonement is about forgiveness you are making a huge leap and implicitly assuming that one of them must be true.
I accept that it is possible to define "atonement" in such a way that MI doesn't qualify as being about the "atonement". I have seen MI advocates work with such a definition, and hence they state that they reject the need for an "atonement".
I don't find such arguments over definitions useful. What relevance does it have whether the word "atonement", which has only been around for a few hundred years, includes or excludes the MI view? I would prefer to speak of "what Jesus did", but am happy to use the word "atonement" as synonym for that.
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The idea that Jesus was (or saves us by being) ONLY a good example and teacher is surely a rarity.
Historic examples of people taking this view are: Most ante-Nicene Church Fathers, many followers of Peter Abelard, Socinians during the Reformation and the Unitarians subsequent to it, most German theologians of the 18th century, and various liberals during the 19th and 20th centuries.
But, yes, you are right: The vast majority of Christians in history who have endorsed a Moral Influence view have also endorsed some other view of the atonement in addition to it. The Eastern Orthodox Church, for example, from Nicea to the present has unanimously endorsed Moral Influence extremely strongly. They have also tended to teach, in addition to it: Ransom from Satan and/or Christus Victor and/or Recapitulation.
The moral influence view is easily combinable with Ransom / Recapitulation or CV because those views don't contradict the MI view - they don't prescribe ways for humans to pass God's final judgment. Thus the MI view that humans pass God's judgment through doing good by following the teachings and examples of Christ can be endorsed, and it can also be taught that Christ did something else, eg fought the devil, destroyed death etc. Whereas Satisfaction and PSA tend to be formulated in a way that is irreconcilable with MI in the sense that they endorse a mutually exclusive method of an individual passing God's final judgment - namely on the basis of what Christ has done.
quote:
I can't see it anywhere in the New Testament, which plainly teaches that the Christ's death was purposive and effective, even if it's hard to say exactly how the writers intended that to be understood.
The Moral Influence view is perfectly compatible with the idea that Christ's death was purposeful and effective. In my book I argue that Christ's death is best understood as a martyrdom. Martyrdoms are very effective psychologically and emotionally and very powerful at growing movements. They inspire, they teach, they give an example. Many second century Christian documents speak of the Christians being inspired to stand up for their faith and be martyred for it because they had the martyrdom of Christ before their eyes to follow, and others watching them were so impressed by their courage that they too converted.
The NT writings, as you note, are not always very clear as to how they understand Jesus' death. It's my view after studying them, that they are intentionally trying to describe Jesus' death as a martyrdom. It's not like they can say "Jesus was a martyr" because the word hadn't yet been invented - the early Christians did soon invent it to refer to their own martyrs and directly applied it to Jesus.
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It would also leave unexplained the fact that no other Christian teacher or martyr has reached anything remotely like the status of Jesus, even though we have many who taught and died well enough to be celebrated as examples of holiness. Stephen is an inspirational saint and a fine example, and a Christian could do very well by taking him as a model, but no one ever suggested that he died "for our sins", as the Church always has of Christ.
Actually, the second century church seems to have taken pretty seriously the veneration of martyrs. Statements that imply their deaths were atoning are present in this period. I think there's three main reasons veneration of the saints never reached equality with Jesus, (1) that the practice of venerating saints died out, (2) that Jesus was the first martyr and thereby special as he empowered subsequent martyrs with his example, (3) that Jesus was perceived as particularly special, ie sent by God / God's Son / God.
quote:
Jesus is more than the pre-emininent martyr, and the suggestion that his saving work can be reduced to that of being a good influence strikes me as an oddity, rather than the dominant idea of any orthodox Christian tradition.
I think it's accurate to say that the good influence of Christ has been the primary and dominant idea of Christ's saving work in the Eastern Orthodox Church for its entire history. Though ideas of Recapitulation and Ransom have also abounded in the tradition, they have never had quite the same status as the Moral Influence ideas in that tradition. I have seen my book on MI promoted on Eastern Orthodox websites as teaching the Eastern Orthodox understanding of the atonement.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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Starlight
Shipmate
# 12651
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
In as much as the gospels only hint as why this was, rather than spell out a detailed theory, they are consistent with substitution, and ransom, and satisfaction, and all the rest of them EXCEPT pure moral influence, because on that theory it is not "necessary for the Christ to suffer" provided that he is obeyed.
I'm not arguing, of course, that Jesus does not have (or should not have) a tremendous moral influence on all Christians, just that it seems to me obvious in Scripture and in almost every Christian response to Scripture that this is not all he does. Even if we can't all agree on an account of it, there is something else there to be accounted for.
I used to think that way too. Many years ago I deliberately set out to determine which of the views of Christ's effective death was what scripture was teaching. I initially ruled out Moral Influence because I thought it didn't give any explanation of effective death, and so it just wasn't a contender to account for such passages. Having put all the various ideas of Christ's atoning death on the table, I studied scripture, I studied the early Fathers, and I studied what scholars had written, in an effort to determine what it was that Christ did.
After years of study, I think that by far the best explanation is that the writers of scripture had a Moral Influence view. They saw Jesus as a martyr and thought his death was effective in a moral influence way. No other standard view of the atonement works anywhere close to as well as MI at explaining those passages. Some views can explain some of them, but not others, and there often ends up being very little consistency to the explanations. Other people who have recently studied these passages about Jesus' effective death have come to similar views: The works by David Brondos and Stephen Finlan are very good.
Posts: 745 | From: NZ | Registered: May 2007
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