Rich Mouw has a blog post on atonement, touching both on the question of N. T. Wright’s atonement theology in particular and the need for substitution more generally. Here’s the opening salvo:
I am no expert on N. T. Wright’s theology, but I know enough to reject those charges of his critics that he is weak on “the substitutionary atonement.” Here is the clincher for me, from one of his meditations in The Crown and the Fire: “Jesus, the innocent one, was drawing on to himself the holy wrath of God against human sin in general, so that human sinners like you and me can find, as we look at the cross, that the load of sin and guilt we have been carrying is taken away from us.”
(Note to self: I love Fuller.)
The article goes on to talk about the importance of substitution–not as the end-all, be-all of atonement theory, but as one important part of what happened on the cross.
One question I continue to wrestle with is the extent to which “Jesus died for me” entails substitution in general and penal substitution in particular. When working through the New Testament texts in class, I often step back and ask: does this passage really say that Jesus took the penalty, or are we bringing that with us? And if Jesus is in some sense substitute, what sense is that, exactly?
There are lots of good questions being asked, and lots of proposals being made. In part, I think that coming out with a robust biblical and theological answer will depend on keeping in view a full-orbed vision of both sin and redemption. We cannot allow the reality of sin as guilt be entirely eclipsed by sin as power. We cannot discount a narrative in which God hopes to use the discipline and punishment of exile to recreate a new and faithful people. We cannot discount stories of Jesus in which he forgives sin without sacrifice.
Somehow we have to be able to hold all of these things and myriad others at the same time. We have to be able to say Jesus lived for me. It was necessary for Jesus to live for me. Jesus died for me. It was necessary for Jesus to die for me. Jesus was raised for me. It was necessary for Jesus to be raised for me.
If we can pin that together with “He comes to make his blessings known far as the curse is found,” I think we’ll be well on our way.
I am enjoying Michael Gorman’s Inhabiting the Cruciform God. It deals with some of the questions here.
Sorry. I reject substitution as pagan. I think the loss of Christus Victor after Anselm was a terrible thing. I’m sorry that Wright caved into pressure by the evangelical right to keep in any part of substitution. I’m not surprised at Mouw’s blog, but I disagree.
Let’s say it is pagan. That doesn’t answer the question of whether or not it’s biblical / Christian as well. Biblical religion is always a reflection of its context.
Something pretty substitutionary is going on in verses like “He himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree” (I Peter 2:24) and “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). And a whole long list of others…including pretty much all of Hebrews chapters 9 and 10 (Christ is both priest and Sacrifice…). I agree with Daniel that we shouldn’t “import” penal substitution into texts where it isn’t already, but in many places it (or something very much like it) is plainly there without us having to import anything.
Daniel is onto something here. There is a difference between, on the one hand, noting that different writers at times construe Jesus as a representative figure whose actions (especially death) have effects for others in some way, and, on the other hand, automatically taking every instance of representative-depictions of Jesus to signal an entire penal-substitutionary theological system with all its implied sub-doctrines.
It may be the case that certain passages in New Testament writings work with a “theology” quite similar to the elaborate “penal substitution” theologies of certain Protestant traditions, but this needs to be demonstrated and not simply assumed. We should be able to explore the precise logic (if there is one) of how different writers depicted Christ as a representative figure decisive for others.
It would clear up a lot of confusion if we could differentiate between claims about Jesus as a representative or even substitionary figure and the assumption that those claims necessarily entail entire theological systems (and, implicitly, the hegemony of the cultural conditions in which those theological systems were produced). Looking at this another way, it would be nice if people denying certain aspects of penal-substitionary theological systems could stop automatically being branded as deniers of Christ’s substitutionary or vicarious significance. That is often just a “screaming fire” tactic. It is intended more to caricature and marginalize than to foster interaction and mutual-understanding of the truth.
Hi Stephen,
Well, yes, sure, but I’m not branding anybody anything, or denying that there is all kinds of background and nuance to how the different writers depict Jesus as substitutionary (in this case Paul, Peter, and the author of Hebrews). Great; let’s explore those. Mine was more of a baseline: whatever other angles are being used by the NT writers (Christus Victor, as mentioned by Michael in a previous comment, is a good one), substitution is a frequent and major one. No, that doesn’t (yet) mean that all the sub-doctrines built on PSA are valid. But it means that, according to multiple NT writers, God put our sins on Christ and Christ was “a sacrifice for sin” in some way that harks back to OT sacrifices. That’s all i’m saying…but yes, you’re right, of course screaming fire to scare away honest inquirers is bad.
I must strongly object any time I see someone affirming Jesus “took upon Himself the wrath of God,” for not only is such a thing nowhere taught in Scripture, it is an abominable thought. I think there is some unfortunate baggage that people project onto the Bible, and I think it’s more driven by soteriological presuppositions than actual exegesis.
Daniel Kirk can understand this ‘concept’ since he’s well aware of the tendency to read “active obedience” into the Bible when the notion simply is never taught. Daniel Wallace, who is a great man and scholar, showed this tendency to read “active obedience” into the Bible in his last exchange with Kirk a few blog posts ago. My take is that while “active obedience” isn’t an issue for Christ, at the same time the popular understanding of “passive obedience” (in the form of Penal Substitution) is also off the mark.
I think these soteriological presuppositions have caused folks to not examine the evidence as carefully as they should. For example, it is a very common assumption that the OT Sacrifices operated in a Penal Substitution framework, and since Jesus is the fulfillment of these Sacrifices, how one understands the OT sacrifices directly impacts how one views the Cross. I have written a fair amount on the Biblical problems with Penal Substitution, and I believe more and more people are rightly seeing that it simply isn’t taught.
Here is a short article I wrote doing a simple analysis of the word “Atonement” as it appears in the OT, and the results are very surprising:
http://catholicnick.blogspot.com/2010/07/atonement-according-to-scripture-more.html
Nick, nice to have you back around again. Thanks for these thoughts and the link.
“It is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.” Rom. 2:13
I think you need to find out what this law is and the only Way it can be obeyed. “For when there is a change of the priesthood this change creates the necessary response of making a change of the law.” Heb 7:12 Paul explains that a law has been added to the law causing the trespass of Jesus’ crucifixion, a sin, to increase as a factoid of accountability. Rom. 5:20 Jesus never died in anyone’s place nor was the wrath of God inflicted on him instead of you. Your salvation from the wrath of God is predicated upon the Way each individual is required by law to resolve the sin of Jesus’ crucifixion.