Hello, Derek,
Please pardon my tardy response. So many threads to manage....
Quote: For what it is worth, the church never historically declared an "orthodox" explanation of how Jesus accomplishes salvation (in contrast to its taking a stand on the Trinity and the nature of Christ). There have been multiple understandings over time, and although substitutionary atonement is popular in many circles today, it cannot claim to be the Christian doctrine in this department.
Agreed. I am not stating that it is the doctrine, and have made clear that I thinnk that the idea Todd is expressing is part of the atonement.
I was responding to your statement that "
I have understood your [
i.e., Todd's]
view of "salvation" to be quite different than the historical view, so I guess you are just being consistent. The language of "
the historical view" suggests a unitary tradition of atonement theology, but the church did not establish one, and different understandings have been put forth by sundry persons in different historical contexts.
I understand this verse in light of Mark 10:45: "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many."
I see the ransom as another way of saying "payment", which very much fits the Chrisitian idea of atonement. Christ gave his life to purchase our redemption.
Once again you speak of "
the Christian idea of atonement," as if there were only one.
I am not contesting that the New Testament employs the diction of "ransom." The question is: to what extent was that meant to be figurative language?
The pre-eminent event in Jewish salvation-narrative was (and is) the Exodus. In that narrative, the blood of the firstborn in Egypt could be spoken of as having "bought" the Israelites their opportunity to depart from Egypt. But such language should not be construed in an overly literal manner: the "purchase-price" of that opportunity was not actually
paid to anyone as part of an economic deal. God's mighty deliverance was not contracted for by that blood, and Pharaoh did not request that blood in exchange for allowing the slaves to go free.
Similarly, Jesus' death could be spoken of as "buying" the opportunity for those who encounter it to be profoundly touched and repent from their death-bound vector. But as with the blood of Egypt's firstborn, such language would be figurative.
Quote: And your citation from Galatians 3:13 may be understood in the same vein. When this speaks of Jesus being made a curse in hanging on a tree, this is not reminiscent of any sacrificial motif in the Torah, but rather of the bronze serpent being pilloried in Numbers 21:8f. (cf. John 3:14); the raising of the image on the pole was an iconic curse upon the power of the poisonous snake. When the people witnessed it, they were healed; in parallel, when people look upon Christ's costly witness, they can be healed of the poison that putrefies their hearts
Although I agree with your assesment of Numbers 21/John 3, I don't think that that is what Paul is speaking of in Galations.
Paul, (quoting the OT), says: "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." and then goes on to show how Christ frees us from that curse in the above mentioned verse by "becoming a curse for us". Christ takes upon Himself the curse that rightfully belongs to us. However you look at it, it's substitutionary.
Your argument is undercut by Paul's diction in Galatians 3: "
Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, becoming a curse for us." He speaks first of "
the curse" and then of "
a curse." If he had meant to imply direct substitution, then he could have articulated it in the words you have used: "
tak[ing] upon himself the curse." But he did not use your words - he used his words. And his words fully afford the interpretation I have posited.
Quote: Such poses a remarkable argument on your part, inasmuch as you quote Ezekiel 18:4 ("God has revealed that the 'soul that sins, it shall die'") and without blinking assert the very antithesis of that verse - i.e., that in fact it is not the sinning soul that will die, but some innocent party! Astounding! While you yourself say that "Unless He has somehow changed His mind, (which I am not aware of), He has not changed the decree from Ezekiel above...."
But this fits perfectly with the understanding that Christ put Himself in our (the soul that sins) place. The Father treated Christ as if He had sinned, because Christ gave Himself for that reason. That is why it pleased God to bruise Him, because He layed on Him "the iniquities of us all". In this way, there is a sense, in which God looked upon Christ as if He had sinned, imputing to Him our tresspasses, while (if we place our faith in Chirst) He imputes the righteousness of Christ to us.
Perhaps you need to read the full chapter of Ezekiel 18. The fundamental theological point of that chapter is diametrically opposed to what you have written here.
Quote: Now we may turn to your citation from II Corinthians 5:21, which could be rendered "For he made the one not knowing sin [to be] sin for us, that we might become God's righteousness by him." Once again, we must note the Hebraic parallelism in this verse: Jesus becoming sin paired with Christians becoming divine righteousness. But how can this be so? How can Christians be an attribute of God?
I would interpret this in the same way as I explained above, about God imputing the righteousness of Christ to us, etc.
The problem with imputation is that it is fictional; it is not a real solution to a real problem. The sin still exists, however masked it may be, and God is not a liar, so he will not deceive himself or render a fictional judgment.
Quote: Pardon me if I have missed this along the way: where is there a text that explicitly speaks of God appeasing himself? Seems a bit masturbatory, doesn't it?
Propitiation (what Christ was/made):
1. The act of appeasing wrath and conciliating the favor of an offended person; the act of making propitious.
Let me clarify: where is a
biblical text that explicitly speaks of God appeasing himself.
Shlamaa,
Emmet
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