Thanks for the return of the Forum. I've been missing it. Of course, with the mountain of grading I am buried under, I won't have time to read or post, but that's life.
At last, another forum! Hi again, I last dropped in a previous one. I previously posted the following under another alias, which wasn't the wisest thing to do. Sorry...
About our Orthodox brothers again. Regarding Peter and the keys of heaven, how should one respond to their claim that all the apostles received the keys - which isn't differentiated with the power to bind and loose as we do? In it they claim some Church Fathers and even a pre-Great Schism prayer say so:
"Greatly merciful Sovereign Lord Jesus Christ our God, Who after Your holy, third day resurrection from the dead gave to Your holy Disciples and Apostles the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, and also the authority of Your Grace both to bind and to loose the sins of men, so that bound in Heaven would be whatsoever things through them might be bound on earth, and likewise loosed in Heaven whatsoever things; through them might be loosed; and gave also that as their successors, we, Your deficient and unworthy servants, should have, by Your unutterable and manbefriending love, this same exceedingly holy Gift and Grace from You, so that we in like manner should both bind and loose the things that happen to be done among Your people."
Doesn't the Cathecism say only Peter received the keys? (Others have tried to explain it by saying the other apostles received certain powers symbolized by the keys and Peter got these and more.)
It's in this Catholic Answers forum thread:
http:// forums.catholic.com/ showthread.php? t=226262&page=4 (mind spaces)
Also, how much would you (all) agree with the following, from the thread:
"Comparing Christ's church to vaguely-defined sports, didn't he (the coach) largely leave the organization to the team? As long as the team conducts itself in ways which do not contradict certain principles or instructions of the coach - even if they do not exactly do the same things in different quarters of the game (concentrating the play on the team captain more and more, for instance) - aren't the ways of play all valid?"
Referring to church organization.
I have a feeling certain Orthodox people hate us more than Protestants ever have. Argh.
One problem with the team analogy can be seen in the Anglican Communion. There, a large number of the bishops have clearly gone over the line and there is no leader who has not only the will but the AUTHORITY to step in. The fact that Shelby Spong has not been criticized officially (that I know of) or at least come up on charges of heresy shows how problematic this is.
A collegue of mine, in talking about the Orthodox made the comment that after the nationalization of the various churches, there has been little doctrinal movement. This is because the national chruches can't agree when they meet. I'm not sure about the keys...I'll have to ponder that one.
BTW, I am writing because I was able to finish one set of papers and am procrastinating on grading another set. Oh well.
Hi WOOHL, If you look closely at Mt. 16:19, only Peter is given the "keys". In koine Greek, the "you" used here is in the singular. At Mt. 18:18, all of the apostles are given the power to bind and loose (the koine Greek you here is in the plural ), but notice that they aren't given the keys there. Thus, Peter was given something that the other apostles weren't. The authority granted by the keys is more vast than merely the power to bind and loose.
That is a short answer that I hope helps.
What's with the wrong dates? "April 30, 2008"? I mean, isn't today only the 2nd?
That's right. I post-date the two permanent posts at the top and (for a month at a time) the Open Forum so that they'll stay pinned to the top. A little trick I learned a while back . . . the remaining seven posts rotate down and off the page.
WOOHL,
What might be confusing you is the idea of a huge gap in authority between the pope and the bishops. In some ways there is and in some ways there isn't. So the blessing of "binding and loosing" is similar to the blessing of the keys. In practice a bishop runs his diocese with very little input from the Vatican. He relies on scripture, tradition, and his own authority. The pope is there as first among equals. Look at Is 22:22:
I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open
That is a much more absolute authority. Others may open and shut things the pope has not touched, which is almost everything. But in the case he does touch it the bishop can do nothing.
I was really hoping to get some comments on another post of mine but there were no takers so I guess I will try the open forum. I asked Dave to have a look, but he is too busy. Here are my comments from last week:
I think the "newest" Christological/Trinitarian heresy is the classical Protestant view of the Atonement. They believe that God the Father PUNISHED Jesus with the punishment that our sins deserved. This is critical for their doctrine of imputation and faith alone to work. The fact is it is utter blasphemy and heresy to suggest Jesus was "punished". This is also why some early Protestants suggested the Apostle's Creed "He descended into hell" meant divine punishment. Further ramifications to this blasphemy is the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit is sometimes described as the "love between the Father and Son", yet that couldnt exist if the Father was punishing the Son.
And I am not alone in this either, many non-Calvinist types out there are calling the Lutheran/Calvinist (historical Protestant) view "Divine Child Abuse".
........
Google the term "divine child abuse" and you will see the Calvinist type condemning the non-Calvinists Protestants who are teaching this.
Look at what Calvinist Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason ministries says:
http://www.str.org/site/News2?pa...2?pa...Article&
id=7059
Quote++++++++++
There I go into detail on what the Bible teaches about what Jesus of Nazareth accomplished on the cross. My point there was that the biggest suffering on the cross was not at the hands of men, but at the hand of God during those three hours when darkness shrouded the cross, the greatest agony was when the Father poured out His wrath on His son.
I want you to see that the Bible actually teaches that there was an exchange that took place on the cross, that the Father poured out His anger on the Son, as if guilty of our sins.
++++++++++++
That is pure blasphemy. The Catholic Church has always taught the tortures Jesus endured was at the hands of wicked men, not the Father's Wrath.
I talk about this a little bit on my webpage, but I wanted to get more input because Im thinking about writing an article specifically on this issue which as far as I can tell is heretical.
It's a great topic, but too huge for me to feel that I have time to get into it. I'm workin' on my new book today. There was some comment on the general topic on the CHNI board recently:
http://www.chnetwork.org/forums/...rum15/
3677.html
Some real meaty stuff there, from Aquinas and others.
Nick, "Penal substition" is an excellent subject for an article. In my opinion, this theory is the "orginal sin" of Calvinist Protestantism and lies at the basis of such theories as the imputation of Christ's righteousness and limited atonement. It's founded on a false concept of sacrifice.
You may want to point out that penal substitutionary atonement has no support in the Bible and is in fact repugnant to the picture of God presented in the Bible. The very few verses cited in support of the doctrine actually contradict it. The most frequently quoted is II Cor. 5:21: "For he hath made him to be sin for us." The word translated "sin" is best understood as "sin offering," as in Romans 8:3 and frequently in the Septuagint. Jesus Christ is made a "sin offering," not "sin." They also use the account of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53, but to no avail, because God is never said in that passage to "punish" the Servant. On the contrary!
Those who believe in penal substitution frequently confuse Jesus Christ with the scapegoat sent into the desert on the day of atonement, claiming that sins are transferred to Christ as they were to the scapegoat. However, Jesus is never compared to the scapegoat in the NT, but only to the sin offering.
The Letter to the Hebrews, which has the fullest explanation of the atonement, contradicts penal substitution flat out.
The theory is repugnant to the biblical depiction of God. It holds that God punishes an innocent person for others' sins. But the Hebrew scriptures define an unjust judge precisely as one who condemns the innocent; e.g., in Proverbs 17:15: "He who acquits the guilty and condemns the righteous is an abomination to the Lord." God can hardly act in a way He condemns.
Penal substitution presupposes a false concept of sacrifice. Believers in it assume the purpose of sacrifice is to "punish" a victim to appease an offended deity. In fact, Hebrew sacrifice never had this aim: Its purpose was to use the life of the victim (in the blood), made holy by being given to God, to cleanse sin. No culture ever conceived of the victim of a sacrifice as "punished." The "Reformers" were so vehemently opposed to what they called the resacrifice of the Mass because to them sacrifice meant that Christ was punished over and over again. (It is a mystery to me where the Protestants came up with the notion of sacrifice as punishment, since it had absolutely no historical precedent.)
Finally, there was no payment made to Father. God cannot forgive a debt and have it paid off at the same time. It's one or the other.
Hope you find some of these thoughts useful.
It is a mystery to me where the Protestants came up with the notion of sacrifice as punishment, since it had absolutely no historical precedent
It's insane, and it results from sorry voluntarist metaphysics. And people actually argue that Calvin wasn't a voluntarist! Better to say that Calvin never admitted to being a voluntarist, but he never articulated any coherent and intelligible concept of nature that would have saved him from it. Of course, why anyone would trust the word of someone who was so senseless as to deny Nicene orthodoxy in favor of the completely incoherent autotheos concept is beyond me. I guess there are still Nestorians too.
Jonathan,
Penal substitution wasn't an incidental detail in the Calviniist system: It was the foundation. They got it from Luther. I guess it emerged out of Luther's Unconscious.
Can the idea have had a genesis? Maybe this: Christ can be said to have been punished in the sense that he was executed as a criminal. But in that case he was punished unjustly by wicked men, not justly by the Father. At the same time, his death was an element in his sacrifice (just an element; death is incidental to the true sacrifice, which is the offering of life to God, as the Letter to the Hebrews points out).
So, his death was both a punishment (albeit unjust) and a sacrifice. I imagine the Reformers conflated these two ideas, and so made sacrifice and punishment synonymous, and then they somehow shifted the perpetration of the punishment from wicked men to God. How they pulled this last move off, I can't say. They certainly weren't thinking clearly.
By the way, while Luther was perhaps the first to advance the theory of penal substitution, he did so in his characteristically neurotic and haphazard way. The Lutherans appeared to have dropped the idea, if I can judge from my perusal of the Augsburg Confession. Calvin, on the other hand, dogmatized it, and it passed down from him to American Fundamentalist Protestants. To Fundamentalists, it simply IS the gospel.
God the Father punished Jesus. I never knew they beleived that. Am flabbergasted.
It's linked (is it?) with the wrathful God of the OT?
Terrible thing to even contemplate
in Christ
penal substitutionary atonement -- that is what the Greek word "propitiation" means = "satisfying the wrath of" or "extinguishing justice". Romans 3:25-26 God is both just and the justifier of those that have faith in Jesus. God is just because He holy justice was satisfied. The son voluntarily gave His life as a ransom for many. John 10:18
The Lord was pleased to crush Him (the Father's wrath was satisfied, justice was accomplished) -- if He would render Himself as a guilt offering" - Isaiah 53:10
The Hebrew term for "guilt offering" is the same word group in Leviticus 5:4-6; 5:17-19
The priests laid their hands on the lamb, goat, sheep, or bull and confessed the sins of the people signifying transfering of sin from the guilty humans to innocent victim and the sacrificial victim took the punishment. (Leviticus 16:21; 1:4; 3:2; 3:8; 4:4; 4:33; 5:5)
Anselm developed this doctrine further from these texts. Christ died for our sins; He died in the place of us, who deserved the punishment. Very astonishing that you don't see this.
Jesus cried out, "My God, My God why have You forsaken Me? on the cross. Why? Two reasons, 1. He was quoting Ps. 22:1 proving prophecies of His death and agony ( Psalm 22:16-17); and 2. God the Father laid all the punishment, justice, wrath against sin on Him and He bore it; causing the Father to turn away -- He who knew no sin became sin for us -- all of our sin was transfered to Him -- 2 Cor. 5:21, Mark 10:45, Galatians 1:4 "who gave Himself for (huper= in place of) our sins".
very surprising you don't beleive this. It is not cosmic child abuse. It is pure love and pure justice both meeting each other.
Jesus, "who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, counting as nothing the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God (the Father).
Hebrews 12:2
His joy was He knew He would be vindicated by resurrection and ascension, so it was worth it to Him to endure the punishment.
What Ken said is what I understand to be true. Christ lovingly and willingly suffered God's wrath which would've been directed towards us had there been no one to take our place.
Do Catholics not believe in the wrath of God? that God is so holy He cannot abide with sin in His presence and must, because of His just nature make a way for sinners to be in His Holy Presence?
Since Cardinal Newman believes in the development of doctrine, could it be possible that Calvin may have progressed further in this area? Maybe?
Sorry, I made a mistake, "huper" the Greek word for 'for" in Galatians 1:4 is more in the sense of "on behalf of"
but "anti" is the one that means "in the place of" and that is found in Mark 10:45, " a ransom in the place of many" ( lutron anti pollwn)
II Cor. 5:21: "For he hath made him to be sin for us." The word translated "sin" is best understood as "sin offering,"
It is both, as the sin offering is only effective as it takes on sin, or the sin is imputed to the innocent victim. That is the Hebrew background of the words in Leviticus 5 and Isaiah 53:10 and 2 Corinthians 5:21. Sin was imputed to Christ as the innocent victim. He was the sin offering because He took our sins in Himself (imputed to Him).
as in Romans 8:3 and frequently in the Septuagint. Jesus Christ is made a "sin offering," not "sin." They also use the account of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53, but to no avail, because God is never said in that passage to "punish" the Servant. On the contrary!
"the punishment for our well being fell upon Him"
. . .
The Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him." Isaiah 53:5-6
Kim,
I am glad you see that! God bless you!
I don't understand why people can't seem to understand a basic distinction between punishment and payment.
From below:
Appeasing or satisfying wrath is the same thing as taking the punishment for sin.
No, it isn't. Appeasing through payment is appeasing through payment. Taking punishment for sin is taking punishment for sin. They are two distinct concepts, and there is no inherent logical equivalence between the two. If you are going to assert that they are identical, then you need to show why this is the case.
We are saved from the wrath of God because Jesus paid the debt to justice.
Yes, he PAID the debt and appeased the wrath. Payment is not being punished, just as paying a parking fine for someone else voluntarily is not you being punished for what someone else did. No one is imposing the fine on you as punishment; you are simply acting freely to save someone else from the imposition of the fine on that person as punishment.
penal substitutionary atonement -- that is what the Greek word "propitiation" means = "satisfying the wrath of" or "extinguishing justice".
Yes, and satisfying the wrath against sin can be through payment OR punishment.
The Lord was pleased to crush Him (the Father's wrath was satisfied, justice was accomplished) -- if He would render Himself as a guilt offering
Same thing. You just wrote in the concept of wrath, when the context is a voluntary offering.
The priests laid their hands on the lamb, goat, sheep, or bull and confessed the sins of the people signifying transfering of sin from the guilty humans to innocent victim and the sacrificial victim took the punishment.
Adomnan already pointed out below that the sacrificial victim bore the sins (cf. Isa. 53:5-6), which is not the same thing as the victim being *punished* for them. You insert punishment and wrath where it is not mentioned.
The Hebrew term for "guilt offering" is the same word group in Leviticus 5:4-6; 5:17-19
Again, a sacrifice is not punished.
...God the Father laid all the punishment, justice, wrath against sin on Him and He bore it; causing the Father to turn away
It is simply your bizarre theology of divine justice in which he gets angry and has to vent against someone, a theology alien to St. Anselm, that makes you invent this.
Christ died for our sins; He died in the place of us, who deserved the punishment. Very astonishing that you don't see this.
You need to recognize the distinction between dying FOR us and dying IN PLACE OF us. He died as ransom, as satisfaction, as payment. But He was not in our place; His payment was in place of our punishment for sins, which is literally what Gal. 1 and Mark 10:45 say. You are collapsing a distinction that is made in the Biblical language itself; you are taking out words that make a difference and ignoring the context (and indeed, you recognize that you blew in on Galati
(cont.)
very surprising you don't beleive this. It is not cosmic child abuse. It is pure love and pure justice both meeting each other.
On the contrary, it is a twisted and deranged concept of justice that contradicts the pure love of the Trinity. You are speaking nonsense.
Kim:
Christ lovingly and willingly suffered God's wrath which would've been directed towards us had there been no one to take our place.
You must distinguish payment from punishment. Christ voluntarily paid our fine; that does not mean that he was being punished. If the fine is paid, there is no NEED for anyone to be punished. It's not as if someone has to be punished in our place, because the debt to divine justice has been paid. Indeed, that is precisely the thing from which Christ is saving us: the need for sins to be punished.
Do Catholics not believe in the wrath of God? that God is so holy He cannot abide with sin in His presence and must, because of His just nature make a way for sinners to be in His Holy Presence?
Absolutely we believe this; this why why we believe we must *actually* be holy and not merely by imputation! Christ actually purges us from sin and evil and pays the penalty to divine justice so that no one needs to be punished.
Since Cardinal Newman believes in the development of doctrine, could it be possible that Calvin may have progressed further in this area? Maybe?
No, because the idea that Christ was being punished by the Father violates the inter-Trinitarian love and the doctrine of the common divine will. You can't develop in a way that contradicts orthodox Nicene and Chalcedonian doctrine. That's why is is absolutely essential to maintain the distinction between a voluntary payment to appease divine justice and a person or sacrifice being punished in place of someone. If being punished is place of someone were required to satisfy divine justice, then atonement itself would violate orthodox Trinitarian dogma; God could not save us, because He cannot make Himself a sinner such as could be punished.
italics closed.
This discussion of whether Christ “merely” suffered or was “punished” piqued my curiosity. This is something I’d never considered, let alone explored, before.
I think all of us would agree that Christ did indeed, suffer. However, to suggest that he was somehow “punished” like a common criminal seems, to say the least, to be an exceedingly inappropriate (blasphemous??) way to describe the so-called “wrath” of the Father toward the Second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity.
I think Jonathan, Adomnan et al are correct in their assessment: Christ suffers, but he is not punished, at least certainly not in the usual sense of the word.
And it occurs to me that, if Christ were truly being punished by the Father at the cross, such punishment could conceivably be inconsistent with that passage in the Apocalypse where Christ is said to be the Lamb, "slain from the foundation of the world" (Rev. 13:8 )
Consider:
Christ is the Lamb "slain from the foundation of the world.” His priesthood therefore has both a temporal and an eternal aspect to it (the Catholic Encyclopedia says that, “Christ's priesthood is eternal, heavenly, and spiritual.” “Salvation” - http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/...hen/13407a.htm)
Further, his priesthood must necessarily relate all that he did at the cross (in time), and to all that he does now in heaven (eternally). [Christ of course being both God and man (human and Divine), Priest and Victim, Altar and Incense.]
St. Cyril of Alexandria calls Christ “the altar, the offering, and the priest."
And now, what is crucially important here is that Christ’s eternal priesthood can never be separated from his eternal VICTIMHOOD - see for example, http://books.google.com/books?id...lient=firefox-
a
Just as he remains, a priest forever, he remains, a victim forever (he is portrayed in revelation 5: 6 as “a Lamb standing, as if slain” i.e. a LIVING VICTIM or, perhaps better still, a “living sacrifice,” Rom. 12:1)
Now, if it were truly necessary for him to endure a temporal “punishment” at the cross (because he is an eternal Priest-Victim) would it not also be just as necessary for him to endure an eternal “punishment” punish in heaven (because again, he is an eternal Priest-Victim)?
And how would all this relate to the Protestant notion of "the finished work of Christ?"
Searching for answers.
Ok, trying to understand your distinctions here. You wrote that Christ's death, "appeased the wrath of God through payment".
Right?
Did not the wrath of God fall on Jesus and the Father turned away from Him on the cross? "my God My God, why have you forsaken Me?"
We deserved the wrath and punishment of sin; Jesus paid the debt to divine justice.
Revelation chapters 5-6
chapter 6, the seals are broken and wrath is poured out; but in chapter 5, Jesus is worthy to break the seals, thus releasing the wrath (divine justice against sin); He is worthy because He was slain, (Like the OT lambs) and He purchased some from all tribes, langugages, peoples, and nations (Rev. 5:5-6; 5:9; 6:16-17; 7:9; 7:14)
Exodus 12:12; 12:1-7; 12:25-29 -- God smote the Egyptians, struck all the first-born, executed judgment against all the gods of Egypt -- judgment is punishment. Those with the blood did not get the punishment/judgment/wrath/violence that sheds blood to death. The lambs took the punishment/debt/payment/justice and so the judgment was averted away from them.
You guys make my brain hurt. lol Thinking and chewing...
Ken: Did not the wrath of God fall on Jesus and the Father turned away from Him on the cross? "my God My God, why have you forsaken Me?"
Adomnan: No, this verse is not evidence that "the wrath of God fell on Jesus." Jesus is praying for delivery using psalm 22. By quoting the first line, he is evoking the whole psalm. By the end of the psalm it is clear that the psalmist, who was after all asking a question not making a positive statement, has not in fact been forsaken, but only appeared to be. As a footnote in the New Jerusalem Bible puts it: "A cry of real distress but not of dispair: this lament which Jesus takes from the scriptures is a prayer to God and is followed in the Psalm by an experssion of joyful confidence in final victory."
Ken: We deserved the wrath and punishment of sin; Jesus paid the debt to divine justice.
Adomnan: No, Jesus didn't pay anything to God or to his justice. God can't be paid to forgive sin. Forgiveness of debt NECESSARILY means the debt was NOT paid. And justice is not a person and cannot be paid. The fact that we may have an English idiom that suggests otherwise is neither here nor there; "Paying debts of or to justice" is not a concept that any NT writer employs and does not enter into God's dealing with us.
I don't have much to say about your "evidence" from Revelations. None of your citations show the Father pouring wrath out on Christ. You apparently think there's some implication in these passages for the topic under discussion, but I certainly don't see it and I doubt anyone else does.
Ken: Exodus 12:12; 12:1-7; 12:25-29 -- God smote the Egyptians, struck all the first-born, executed judgment against all the gods of Egypt -- judgment is punishment.
Adomnan: Okay. This isn't an unreasonable statement. However, I think it's more likely that God is sending the plagues to convince the Pharaoh to let the Jews go rather than to punish the Egyptians. And He broke the statues of the gods to show He was more powerful than they. That can also be a judgment (but it's hardly a punishment, given that the gods didn't exist).
Ken: Those with the blood did not get the punishment/judgment/wrath/violence that sheds blood to death. The lambs took the punishment/debt/payment/justice and so the judgment was averted away from them.
Adomnan: Whoa! Here's where you go off the rails. If the lambs took the "punishment" for the Jews, that implies the Jews deserved to be punished! But you said earlier that it was the Egyptians who were punished, not the Jews.
The real meaning of the Passover blood is that it's a renewal of the covenant and a "reminder" to the angel of death that YHWH had this covenant with the Jews, which is why the angel "passed over" them. It's about covenant, not punishment.
Adomnan (04.04.08 - 7:39 pm),
I FULLY agree with your comments, they were amazing. It is as if they came out of my mouth. You NAILED it when you said how this all ties in to original sin, imputed righteousness, etc. And you are right about the 2 Cor 5:21 stuff as well, it is ASTONISHING to see how much weight Protestants put on that one verse, and the verse doesnt even say that!
One other factor that should be mentioned is that Christ is explicitly called our "Passover Lamb that has been sacrificed" (1 Cor 5:7). If we go back to the OT to see what the Pascal Lamb is Exodus 12:1-13. In that passage there is no reference to punishing the Lamb, rather the lamb is to be eaten (Eucharist!) and its blood is seen by God to deflect His wrath off of man, but does not deflect His wrath onto the Lamb.
Im not really sure where to start on an article, but I am really tempted to write one on this issue.
Thanks to Jonathan, Ben and Adoman for all your comments, I couldnt get to a computer until tonight to get to Ken's stuff but it looks like you got to it for me.
One further comment on Psalm 22, Aquinas points out this "my God my God" passage means multiple things the two important ones are that he is quoting a prophetic psalm 22, and second St Thomas (quoting I think Augustine) said that it means God did not send help (eg Angels [cf Mat 26:53]) to rescue Jesus from his torturers.
One of my favorite anti-OSAS passages that puts a dagger in the penal-substitution model is Heb 10:26-29 " 26If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God."
I think this issue is huge and actually a Christological heresy. The "my God My God" passage (among others) meaning the Father unleashed His wrath for classical Protestantism is as huge as a Jehovah's Witness reading "The Father is greater than I" and concluding Arianism. Im not a theologian by any means, but that is how I see it.
I talk about the Atonment on my webpage, on my justification article chapter 2 if anyone wants a quick rundown.
It cant be emphasized enough how all these wacky teachings tie into Lutheranism and Calvinism (the original Protestants) in order to make "Faith Alone" work itself out. Adoman is so right in saying these "teachings" are NO ACCIDENT, but they are kind of hushed up or re-worded to downplay the sheer blasphemy of the thought of God's Wrath being poured out on His Beloved Son.
Ken,
I would also like to comment on the following observation you made earlier on this thread:
Ken: The priests laid their hands on the lamb, goat, sheep, or bull and confessed the sins of the people signifying transfering of sin from the guilty humans to innocent victim and the sacrificial victim took the punishment. (Leviticus 16:21; 1:4; 3:2; 3:8; 4:4; 4:33; 5:5)
Adomnan: Only in Leviticus 16:21 is it said that the high priest laid the sins of the people on the goat's head, placing both hands on the goat and reciting sins over it. However, this animal, called a scapegoat, is not sacrificed. It is the other animal on the day of atonement that is sacrificed. This is the sin or guilt offering. The scapegoat cannot be sacrificed to God, because it has been "contaminated" by sin. It is unclean. You tend to confuse scapegoat and sin offering, but they are completely different, even opposite. The latter is a sacrifice; the former isn't.
As for the other verses you provide from Leviticus, most of them just instruct the man providing the sacrifice to lay one hand on the victim to demonstrate ownership, not to transfer sin: to declare, in effect, that he is the man who is making the offering (and not, say, the priest). This sort of gesture was very common in ancient sacrificial rituals and was always meant to underscore that the true sacrificer was the person who provided the victim, not the priest who performed the ritual.
Moreover, the victim in Lev 3:2 is a communion sacrifice, not a sin offering, and yet a hand is laid on the victim's head in this instance also, obviously without transferring any sin or guilt. In every case you cite -- except of course for the scapegoat, which is not a victim and is not killed -- the victim is killed to obtain its blood that, once sanctified by contact with the altar, is made holy and thus can expiate (cleanse) sin. There is no hint of punishment in the slaying of the victim, any more than animals were "punished" when they were slain for food.
Please don't conflate the sin offering with the scapegoat! Jesus was a sin offering, not a scapegoat. And, to repeat, scapegoats were not and could not be sacrificed to God.
Sorry, ranting about the Orthodox again. The following is what seems to be a beloved tactic of theirs - taking things out of context:
"St John Chrysostom:
Do you not see that the headship was in the hands of these three, especially of Peter and James? This was the chief cause of their condemnation by Herod (Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, Homily XXVI)"
Headship of what, exactly? (Just as the other James is allegedly the overall chief of 'em all just because St. Chrysostom says he has the "chief rule" ... in Jerusalem.) And this doesn't exactly preclude one person having more authority than other authorities.
"So this disciple is called Rocky from the rock, like Christian from Christ...Why have I wanted to make this little introduction? In order to suggest to you that in Peter the Church is to be recognized. Christ, you see, built his Church not on a man but on Peter’s confession. (St Augustine sermons)"
...So all the other times other people and Augustine himself have supported the Catholic view doesn't count?
And the Orthodox logic at allegedly stopping doctrinal development at a certain point (whenceforth they call it "innovation", which, last I checked, has a positive ring) seems gratuitous. Heck, the church is alive, not in stasis. It can think and reason. The Holy Spirit moves and has moved us as in the past. We're not bereft of His grace, as their position ultimately leads to (my analysis). Insisting that only particular persons ("Church Fathers") who lived before a certain date are the be-all and end-all of certain things is just wrong. Again, we're not without grace.
Reference: http://forums.catholic.com/ showthread.php? t=230556
Also, Charlton Heston has died. :-(
Ben M said:
Now, if it were truly necessary for him to endure a temporal “punishment” at the cross (because he is an eternal Priest-Victim) would it not also be just as necessary for him to endure an eternal “punishment” punish in heaven (because again, he is an eternal Priest-Victim)?
We have a winner! Accepting this punshment theory of divine justicem, either Christ is subject to infinite and eternal punishment (which no one believes) or some finite amount of human suffering can atone for sin (which is Pelagian). The Epistle to the Hebrews is generally aimed at refuting this false view of sacrifice, which is exactly the idea that the Judaizers have.
As to the rest, Adomnan and Nick have covered it. Revelation does not involve Christ pouring wrath on Himself; Christ being Judge and Savior of the world does not prove your point. Neither does the fact that God judged the guilty Egyptians and Jews who refused to follow His commands. Even then, the Passover does not involve the lamb being punished.
Adomnan has covered the use of OT sacrifices, none of which were punished. Adomnan's observations about Jesus being "forsaken" in the sense of being allowed by God to be subject to evil men are dead on. There is no reason to suppose any meaning beyond that, much less a separation from God that would divide the hypostatic union and shatter the Trinity, even if it lasted for just an instant.
The only point of clarification is in the notion of payment to divine justice. I agree with Adomnan that this was likely not in the minds of the Hebrew authors of the Old Testament, but I think St. Anselm's philosophical reasoning about the meaning of OT sacrifice is sound. However, it is important to remember that St. Anselm includes in divine justice the very same concept of forgiveness Adomnan lays out. It simply says that divine order requires that an adequate payment be given to preserve the honor due to the divine sovereign. However, God freely gives this payment as a man on behalf of men, so the payment is still something thoroughly gratuitous, not an exaction being made of Christ as payment to forgive.
Adomnan, Jonathan, et. al., is this a good explanation of what you're talking about? Or is there another example that's better? Something us common people can understand? 
I DO want to understand where you're coming from. If my thinking is wrong, I want it to be made right. I'm not too proud to say so. But it needs to make sense to me. I don't think there's anything wrong with expecting it to make sense from the Scriptures, so please show me this way of thinking via the Scriptures, preferably in a paper or book so I can see the whole thing fleshed out in an orderly fashion rather than getting it piecemeal in a combox. Thankee! 
Kim,
Here are my thoughts as I read through the link you provided:
-The author appears to be rejecting the Protestant concept of Penal Substitution, he includes as an equivalent phrase "Satisfaction" but he could be confusing this with the Catholic idea of Satisfaction which is not the same as Penal Substitution.
-In part 1 he is more or less attacking the classical Protestant notion of God in regards to dealing with sin, rather than the Catholic notion.
-He puts a lot of blame on the "Medieval legalistic" thought (ie Catholic), but the truth is the idea of the Son being Punished is a Lutheran-Calvinist concept.
-In Part 1 towards the end he attacks the separation of Justification (legal) and Sanctification (innner transformation), this is the approach Protestants take but not Catholics. The author of that article is pretty much inline with Catholic theology, though he is mistakenly thinking Catholics teach penal-sub.
-In part 2 he attacks the classical Protestant notion of salvation involving the need to live a 100% perfectly sinful life and focuses on restoration through a legal transaction rather than a relationship.
The author actually is very in line with Catholic teaching (main emphasis on Adoption) here.
-The rest of the sections carry on the theme that Penal-Substution is un-Biblical. The author appears to be a Wesleyan Protestant.
Overall, the main points he made can be harmonized with the Catholic model of the Atonement.
Thanks, Nick, for taking the time to read the link and to patiently respond. Can you point me to a place where I can read the Catholic position fully presented? Is it in the Catechism? Elsewhere?
If someone has already linked to a good source and I missed it, please forgive me for asking again.
Jonathan Prejean wrote at the post at the bottom of the page with the title : James Swan: Quite Possible According to "Romanists" That Apostles Could Be In Hell
What St. Anselm said was that there was a debt to divine justice that needed to be paid. Christ lovingly paid it, offering His own life in accordance with the determinate plan and will of the Father, and the Father accepted this offering, which was sufficient to pay the debt to divine justice and to appease His wrath against sin.
(my emphasis added)
So how did Christ pay the debt to divine justice and appease His wrath against sin ? This is the same thing as voluntarily taking the penalty for sin for us in our place.
Your distinction between payment and punishment makes no sense at all. Wrath and justice and judgment and punishment in hell and the curse (Galatians 3:10-13) are the same thing.
If you agree that Christ paid the debt of sin and that He satisfied justice and that He appeased the wrath of God against sin; then all of that is the same thing as taking the punishment for us in our place. Without that, you cannot explain the exchange. What did he pay ? Who did He pay the debt to?
As for the scapegoat in Leviticus 16, both of them are illustrations (the blood sacrifice and the releasing of the scapegoat into the dessert) and aspects of atonement. One is substitutionary sacrifice and the other is removal, release, sending away. Psalm 103:12 -- as far as the east is from the west, He has removed our sins from us.
If Christ did not fulfill both (both goats on the day of atonement) , then what was the purpose of the scapegoat? Surely you don't think it was to "Azazel" (the Hebrew word for the scapegoat, which others have interpreted as a demon ; or some kind of "goat demon" ?
It seems to me the RCC doctrine of the atonement is very very weak and you have watered down the atonement and taken away the satisfaction of justice there. Pure justice and Pure Love was both accomplished at the cross. I have learned that you guys have a very weak doctrine of the cross and the atonement.
continued:
The wages of sin is death ( Romans 6:23) If death is the punishment for sin -- the second death in hell; and faith in Christ saves us from the second death in hell; then Christ took the punishment we deserved. That is beautiful and pure love and pure justice and does no harm to the Trinity and the philosophical language that some of you used to justify that with no Scripture.
You have killed the doctrine of the cross and make it void. ( Galatians 2:21) No wonder you don't have assurance of salvation and you are dependent in the end on your righteousness and goodness to finally get you in to heaven.
I never realized how deficient and lacking the RCC view of the cross is; and how the RCC view of the cross guts it of its meaning. I have been enlightened as to what your church teaches though. I did not know you rejected so much of what is a vital and crucial and essential truth of Christianity.
So how did Christ pay the debt to divine justice and appease His wrath against sin ? This is the same thing as voluntarily taking the penalty for sin for us in our place.
Your distinction between payment and punishment makes no sense at all. Wrath and justice and judgment and punishment in hell and the curse (Galatians 3:10-13) are the same thing.
Yes, they are all the same thing, and they are all taken away by Christ's sacrifice. But Christ obviously did not suffer eternal punishment in hell, so the fallacy of your equivalence is obvious. By your reasoning, Christ would have to have been damned to hell for eternity to atone for sin. He was not, so your premise is false. It must therefore be possible to make payment to take a penalty away without actually suffering that penalty.
Again, the logical problem is clear. It's only a question of whether you will accept what logic demands or whether you prefer to have an illogical faith.
If you agree that Christ paid the debt of sin and that He satisfied justice and that He appeased the wrath of God against sin; then all of that is the same thing as taking the punishment for us in our place. Without that, you cannot explain the exchange. What did he pay ? Who did He pay the debt to?
The statement is simply false. One can understand the payment as being made from one person of the Trinity to another. What did Jesus Christ Himself say?
Luke 23:46 Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit!" And having said this he breathed his last.
And this has the same meaning as the Gospel of John
John 19
[28] After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfil the scripture), "I thirst."
[29] A bowl full of vinegar stood there; so they put a sponge full of the vinegar on hyssop and held it to his mouth.
[30] When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, "It is finished"; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
The payment he gave was His own death. It was not punishment, but His own voluntary death. He says nothing about suffering punishment at the hands of the Father, but giving His own life to Him. You can't interpret His quotation of the Psalm in the other Gospels in a way that contradicts what He Himself says in these Gospels, and what He says is that He is giving over His spirit to the Father. As Jesus says in the Gospel of Matthew, "You know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God."
If Christ did not fulfill both (both goats on the day of atonement) , then what was the purpose of the scapegoat?
The type of the scapegoat shows the same thing that I am saying: that sins can be taken away (by Christ) without the bearer of sins being punished! It is your view that makes no sense of the scapegoat. You have to confuse two thing that are types of Christ in different senses into one, just as you confuse punishment with payment.
It seems to
It seems to me the RCC doctrine of the atonement is very very weak and you have watered down the atonement and taken away the satisfaction of justice there.
And it seems to me that you have manufactured based on your own defective theology of divine justice the notion that Christ must suffer punishment in your place, which is a blasphemous separation of the Trinity. As between denying the Trinity and denying some made-up, illogical, anthropomorphic concept of divine justice, it's not a hard choice for me.
The wages of sin is death ( Romans 6:23) If death is the punishment for sin -- the second death in hell; and faith in Christ saves us from the second death in hell; then Christ took the punishment we deserved.
To say that Christ was damned is blasphemy, plain and simple. God cannot be damned; that should be obvious. Christ did not suffer any "second death" in hell; He did not suffer damnation at all. It is shameful for someone who believes in the divinity of Christ to suggest such a thing.
That is beautiful and pure love and pure justice and does no harm to the Trinity and the philosophical language that some of you used to justify that with no Scripture.
God being DAMNED is beautiful? Nonsense!
And here comes the accusation of "philosophical language," when you are the one who has philosophized this made-up concept of divine justice that requires Christ to be punished for us, when both the Biblical types and Christ's own words from the Cross deny it. He does not say "Punish me, Father!' He says "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!" But you don't want to listen to what He says. You prefer your man-made concept of divine justice in which God is damned for the sake of humanity.
It's a simple question: do you believe Christ was damned? Do you believe that He suffered the "second death?" If you do, then you are a blasphemer who denies the divinity of Christ at least implicitly, whether your reasoning is clear enough to see it or not. Look at the number of logical leaps you have made in justifying this, and I think you should be able to see that you are deceiving yourself. God is NOT damned, and I will not stand silent, much less be accused of denying the Scriptures, in the face of such blasphemy.
Ken: If Christ did not fulfill both (both goats on the day of atonement) , then what was the purpose of the scapegoat? Surely you don't think it was to "Azazel" (the Hebrew word for the scapegoat, which others have interpreted as a demon ; or some kind of "goat demon" ?
Adomnan: If Christ did "fulfill both goats," as you put it, then why does the author of the Letter to the Hebrews, who explains the Day of Atonement and applies it to Christ, never mention the scapegoat? Why does no NT writer ever apply the scapegoat type to Christ?
And, yes, the scapegoat is sent out to a desert demon, where it belongs because it was burdened with sin and so unclean.
Ken: The wages of sin is death ( Romans 6:23) If death is the punishment for sin -- the second death in hell; and faith in Christ saves us from the second death in hell; then Christ took the punishment we deserved.
Adomnan: Nonsense. Is not this second death a spiritual death? If you claim that Christ "tooK" the punishment of the second death and the second death is a spiritual death, then Christ died spiritually, which means He was separated spiritually from God, spiritually dead, and so really and truly a sinner, and not just reputed to be so.
Ken: That is beautiful and pure love and pure justice and does no harm to the Trinity
Adomnan:So it's "beautiful and pure" for the Father to damn an innocent man? Well, the Bible doesn't call it "beautiful and pure," the Bible calls it an "abomination:" Proverbs 17:15: "...he who damns the innocent is an abomination to the Lord."
Ken: and the philosophical language that some of you used to justify that with no Scripture.
Adomnan: HOW DARE YOU? Our responses were SOAKED with Scripture.
Pastor Wright said, "God damn America" and was almost universally execrated. You Fundamentalists say, "God damned Jesus," and we're all supposed to call that "beautiful and pure?"
Ken: You have killed the doctrine of the cross and make it void. ( Galatians 2:21)
Adomnan: We've killed your lie about the cross and made it void. You cite a scripture. Let's see what it says: "I am not setting aside God's grace as of no value: It is merely that if righteousness comes through the Jewish Law, Christ died needlessly." So I see that you are misrepresenting the Bible again: This verse says nothing about your penal substitutionary "doctrine of the cross."
Ken: I never realized how deficient and lacking the RCC view of the cross is; and how the RCC view of the cross guts it of its meaning.
Adomnan: Translation: With all my obsessing about religion, I've never before really examined my own beliefs about the atonement in the light of the Bible and history, and it's never occurred to me that there is another way of looking at it. I'm having a hard time accepting that and so I'll insult and abuse the Catholics who brought it to my attention.
Kim,
On the link you provided to Derek Flood's article on the atonement: I thought it was generally very good, but I concur with Nick who pointed out that Mr. Flood confuses Anselm's teaching with the Reformers' penal substitution.
Interestingly, Mr. Flood interprets what he calls the Satisfaction Doctrine as a sort of "bloodlust," to use his word, on God's part. That God "demands blood," but without this necessarily being a punishment. But he also writes: "The (true) motivation (for the atonement) was not bloodlust, or even a need for punishment, but love." So he realizes some of the theories involve punishment.
Of course, Anselm and the Medievals taught neither a bloodlust nor a punishment, so he's off on that. On the other hand, he has a separate article on his blog for September 27, 2007, in which he accurately describes Anselm's theory. I guess his ideas on this subject are still evolving (and rapidly, in a Catholic direction).
The section entitled "The Temple System," in which he describes how JC fulfills the OT sacrificial rites, is quite good. And he does an excellent interpretation of Isaiah 53, about which he writes, it's "a miscarriage of justice that Isaiah is painting" and "What it is not about is God in the role of the mob demanding punishment." Also, "the Servant (in Isaiah 53) did not suffer because God demanded a punishment, but because hatred did."
Mr. Flood has essentially an exemplary view of the suffering and death of Christ -- the same I Peter describes -- which is that Christ's love and patience in his passion serve as an example for all of us. Here's how Peter puts it: "Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow his steps." (I Peter 2:21)
My own take on the atonement is a combination of Peter's exemplary view and what I see brought out clearly in Paul and John, what I'd call a sacramental view: The primary reason for Christ's passion was to provide us with the sacraments through which we participate in God's life: We are baptized into His death and rise in baptism with Him, and in the eucharist we share in His sacrifice, too. For me, the sacraments are why the Scriptures say "Christ died for our sins" -- to give us the sacraments that cleanse us from sin and unite us to God. (And there's nothing legal about it, no satisfying justice or honor, nothing like that).
Wow, this discussion is going great!
Im honestly not here to bash Ken or anything like that, but like Jonathan said once you realize this Penal-Sub situation is heretical and blasphemous at its very core we Catholics cannot keep silent!
I believe this issue needs to be trumpeted from the roof tops, in the forums and in the blogs. We are living in a time when all the Biblical tools are yielding evidence pointing in the Catholic direction. When I started looking into these issues I went in not knowing what to expect, as I read and thought more and more I realized that the Lutheran-Calvinist gospel is a mangled twisted heap of metal, with its foundational pillars like imputed righteousness and the atonement built on sand.
Im not saying they are built on sand to be mean, but the honest to God truth is that those concepts are not found in Scripture. All this time we were told it was Catholics inventing and reading things into the Bible, my goodness...it turns out it was the other way around the whole time. And these errors have been passed on from generation to generation so that the average Protestant doesnt see it. The Faith Alone glasses cause the whole Bible to be misread to fit (and salvage) Faith Alone.
One other good example is the phrase "COVERED by the Blood of the Lamb". HOW MANY times have we heard that phrase by Protestants and why they are saved? (google the phrase!)
Guess what!...the phrase NOR concept appears in Scripture! On the contrary, we see the Blood of Christ "CLEANSING US from all unrighteousness" (1 Jn 1:7-9; Heb 9:12f; 10:29; 13:12; Rev 1:5; etc)...this goes against the Protestant idea of "imputed righteousness of Christ" (another unbiblical phrase/concept).
Over the last few months I have come to the point where I think the key to getting through to Protestants now is to lay these issues on the table and have the Protestant pick what they feel is more Biblical, logical and moral, no more Romans 3 versus James 2:24, instead the issues that are kept quiet like imputed righteousness and the atonement need to take center stage.
I have found very strong evidence in my discussions on popular forums that when you present the true Lutheran-Calvinist view most of the Protestants reading it are repulsed and are shaken up. Some even are willing to take a fair look at the situation and see what the Catholic Church really teaches, and that it goes much deeper than James 2:24.
(end rant)
Over the last few months I have come to the point where I think the key to getting through to Protestants now is to lay these issues on the table and have the Protestant pick what they feel is more Biblical, logical and moral,
Go for it, Nick! I'm willing to listen and think about what you're saying. I'm trying to keep my own glasses off to see things outside of what I've always understood. That may scare some people to hear, but I no less love the truth. I just want to make sure I'm getting it. No matter what I believe, there will be someone who says I'm wrong. So I can't go by public opinion. I must weigh it out for myself.
We all come with pre-fitted glasses, and it's hard to take them off sometimes. But I want the truth wherever it can be found.
Thanks, Adomnan, for pointing out those posts on Mr. Flood's blog. I'll check them out. And thanks also for pointing out where he was right and wrong. That was very helpful.
Ken, you said: "It seems to me the RCC doctrine of the atonement is very very weak and you have watered down the atonement and taken away the satisfaction of justice there."
T o start off, You need to actually read St. Anselm's "Cur Deus Homo", Bk 1, Chapter 8: "God the Father did not treat that man [Jesus] as you seem to suppose, nor put to death the innocent for the guilty. For the Father did not compel him [Jesus] to suffer death, or even allow him to be slain, against his will, but of his own accord he endured death for the salvation of men.
It is obvious to this attorney that St. Anselm's words could not in any way be interpreted to come up the notion of "penal substitionary atonement". There is no way anyone can properly say that Anselm was claiming that God was punishing His son for our sins. Nowhere does God try Jesus, impute guilt to Christ, and then sentences Him to death as punishment for the crimes (sin) of man. The whole notion of "penal substitionary atonement" does violence and negates Jesus' sacrifice on the Cross.
As a Catholic, I can assure you that as a matter of dogmatic faith I believe in substitutionary atonement, that is Jesus Christ suffered for the sins of mankind which is entirely biblical. In OT sacrifices, the victim suffered for those for whom the offering is made; the victim was never punished. The sacrifice was never made to pay a price. The closest one could come to finding such a notion in the OT is in the sacrifices to Moloch which the Jews considered an abomination. See, Micah 6:7: "Shall I give my first-born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?" What does God say at Micah 6:8, "NO, the Lord has told us what is good. What he requires of us is this: to do what is just, to show constant love, and to live in humble fellowship with our God." (emphasis added) And what is the greatest love that one can show-to give their life for another. Jn. 15:13. Jesus' death on the cross was not a punishment by a wrathful God, but the ultimate fulfillment of His own Commandment of love.
(Cont. from last note)
Further, if one is to believe in this notion of penal substitutionary atonement, can you explain why we still suffer death? If Jesus was already punished for our sins, why do men still die? Isn't the wages of sin, death? Also, why does Scripture say that Christ will judge us at Final Judgment? After all what would be the point if He already took the hit for our crimes or wasn't His punishment sufficient for all of our sins? Or are we to say (since we are talking legal notions here), that Jesus by redeeming us, purchased the rights to punish us Himself like a collection agency does when it buys an assignment of bad debt from the bank? Also, if Christ was punished for our sins, why does Christ say to take up the Cross with Him? And where does St. Paul get off telling us that if we are to live with God, we, too, must be nailed on the Cross? Since you say we are already vicariously punished for our sins through Jesus Christ, why do we need to be nailed on the Cross with Him?
Your man-made tradition from the 16th century is fraught with so many problems, only a lawyer could parse or nuance his way out of it. No thank you, I will try to repay the Lord for suffering and dying on the Cross for my salvation by taking up my own Cross, and seeking to suffer with Him (Mt. 16:24; Gal. 2:19).
Adomnan!! What in the world?!? I haven't "seen" you since like 2002 or something. Do you remember me, I used to be a regular on Steve Ray's old message board, under the name "Pope_St_Peter"? It used to be you, I, "SecretAgentMan," and "Aurelius."
I guess I would've meet up with you if I came to this site. I do not, however. Google gave me this site as an entry for some debate info. I was looking for. I see that just like back then you are hammering away of the Atonement!
Shoot me an e-mail, man.
Me again. The post you mentioned was on Sept. 27, 2006, rather than 2007. Here's the link if anyone is interested.
(Had to post these separately - Haloscan thought I had too many links.)
Also, here are the links to the Temple posts one, two, and three.
Dear Ken Temple,
But He didn't do anything wrong?
Dear me,
Dear Way out of his league
I am very sorry to hear of the death of Charlton Heston as well. He really was a great screen actor but more importantly for me he was a great theatrical actor as well; especially in Shakespeare.
His playing of Mark Anthony comes to mind and his fine delivery of the 'Friends, Romans, countrymen...'speech from Julius Ceaser. It is notoriously difficult to get the the rythm of it right but also to get the sense of the speech over as a speech. I mean you have to show/reveal what rhetoric is using rhetoric.
He played Michaelangelo in 'The Agony and the Ecstasy'.
Because he had many times in his life had contact with the Catholic things/life I always thought he might one day become a catholic.It would have softend his hard edges. And maybe we would never have had ''in my cold dead hands'.
Not to be.
RIP
The best of America
Now back to the nonsense,
So God the father punished God the Son. At the risk of flippancy how are they getting on now? Well, we have The Holy Spirit to intervene, keep the peace.
Hi Ken,
Just wondering, why do you suppose that Christ remains a priest forever?
I ask only because it seems Protestant theology requires the Lord’s atonement to end completely at the cross.
Now of course, with regard to the temporal offering of himself, it indeed does end at the cross (Consummatum est - Latin, Tetelestai – Greek, i.e. it is finished!). But this only begs the question: for if he has offered himself “once for all,” at the cross, why does he then still remain a priest (and a High Priest at that!)? What does he, as a priest, still need to offer (and indeed he still needs to offer something for, as Philip Schaff has rightly pointed out, “[a] literal priesthood requires a literal sacrifice”)?
History of the Christian Church, V. 7, ch. VII, sec. 101, The Sacramentarian Controversies. http://ecclesiasticalhistory.com/
Now I know we are agreed that Christ most certainly is a “literal” priest. And we are also agreed, I’m quite sure, that he holds his priesthood forever.
But what I’m trying to understand is how, how the eternal aspect of Christ’s priesthood can possibly be reconciled with this so-called business of “Penal Substitutionary Atonement” (PSA)? Again, keeping in mind that, “a literal priesthood requires a literal sacrifice.”
Where then, is this sacrifice, this offering, in Protestant theology?
Looking at the Lord’s atonement from another perspective: clearly, an infinite offense (which is indeed what our sins are) against an infinitely Holy God, requires an infinitely perfect sacrifice to repair the damage, so that the demands of Divine Justice might be satisfied. In other words, sin, because it is so horrific, so offends the divine majesty, can never be atoned for by anything short of an eternal, perpetual sacrifice. Do you agree?
Indeed, sin is so horrific, so infinitely outrageous that, in fact, Christ must, as Sacred Scripture tells us, ETERNALY OFFER HIMSELF to the Father in order to atone for so great an offense!
Now think about this, Ken, think about this: Our Lord, who is so full of goodness and mercy, and who is so kind, even to the wicked and the ungrateful Lk 6:35), must offer himself to the Father for all eternity, because of what I have done, because of what you have done, because of what we all have done. Yet He does so willingly, out of love, out of a love so vastly incomprehensible, that we could never, even in eternity, possibly hope to fully grasp it! And yet, in a certain sense, He has no choice: for God is Love, and what else can Love - what else can Infinite Love - do? And such love is what the Catholic Church teaches and proclaims.
For my part, I’m just trying to reconcile Catholic love with Protestant law.
For my part, I’m just trying to reconcile Catholic love with Protestant law.
Ben, I'm working on educating myself on the different views of the atonement (there are many) and ran across this blog post which explains each one pretty well. I see good in each one of them. Once again, I think we are trying to understand things by dividing them up (as in the faith/works issues), when really all parts come into play.
Penal substitution by itself may not be a good overall representation of the atonement, but it does cover certain aspects of the bigger picture. The sacrificial view certainly gets its validity from the book of Hebrews.
I think there is truth in each view, depending on which Scripture verses are being read; but taken separately, these views seem to go off on tangents and neglect certain other aspects of the bigger picture. Perhaps it would be better to draw the good and true out of each one and hold firmly to the most accurate views which I think are a combination of the penal sub and the sacrificial views.
Whatever the view one espouses, isn't it totally amazing that our Savior, who loves us so much, went to such great lengths to make a way to God regardless of the mechanics involved?
I repeat-He didn't do anything wrong. He was sinless. How could it possibly be 'just' to punish the innocent?
This all goes to show once again the dangers of private interpretations of the Bible. To me it's almost on a par with those crazies in America picketing dead soldiers funerals. That comes from THEIR interpretaion of the Bible.
Protestants always get it wrong. Please, leave the Biblical exegesis to the professionals-the Catholics.
in Christ
James, do you really care about changing hearts and minds or is it only important for you to think you're always right? Sheesh! In Christ, indeed!
Kim,
There is not "truth to each view" in the sense it is so complicated that each view describes a different true aspect which the other views fail to address. In the case of Penal-Substitution God the Father is unleashing His Wrath on His Beloved Son. That is disunity in the Trinity right there and that is gravely heretical. This view is unChristian and UnBiblical at its very core and Catholics say it is unacceptable.
It also goes against the basic principles of justice which Protestants insist they are upholding. If a murderer is sentenced to be executed would the justice be served (and would the judge be just) if an innocent man stepped in an got executed in place of the murderer? No, but that is precisely what Penal-Sub is saying.
Whatever the view one espouses, isn't it totally amazing that our Savior, who loves us so much, went to such great lengths to make a way to God regardless of the mechanics involved?
Yes, that's very true. I believe that viewing satisfaction in separation for one of these other views is erroneous, just as many heresies are simply exaggerating one piece of the puzzle to the exclusion of others. But even this exaggerated view is still based in the truth in some way, so we should at least be able to agree on what you said above.
You have correctly identified the central theme that Jesus's sacrifice on the Cross is an incredible outpouring of love to make a way to God for us. At this point, it's just a matter of taking that theme and giving it a completely coherent explanation according to all of the themes you mentioned (sacrifice, victory, and satisfaction of divine justice). I would, of course, share the sentiment that the best way to do this would be to follow the guidance of the Fathers and the Magisterium, but that doesn't mean that we Catholics can't "meet people where they are," so to speak. And where you are, Kim, is at a place where you have recognized a great deal of truth; in charity, I have to say that.
Nick, can you direct me to the Catholic Church's teaching on this unity in the Trinity I keep hearing about? I'm unfamiliar with it. In all my 18+ years as a Christian I've never heard of it as you've described it. Are Catholics the only ones who see it this way?
Thanks Jonathan. I really do want to understand the Catholic perspective. Sometimes I despair of ever knowing what that is (on other subjects, as well). I see so many different viewpoints that I wonder if Catholics are any different than Protestants in having so many differences of opinions. I will keep trying, though.
The sacrificial view seems very familiar to me. I used to be involved in Pentecostal churches early in my Christian walk and that seemed to be the direction they took in explaining Christ's atonement. I learned a lot about the whole temple system and the priesthood through them, although I'm a bit rusty on it now. It's a fascinating study.
Were the Church Fathers united on how to see the atonement? Any books, links, papers you could direct me to?
I am finding a lot on my own, but it helps if I am directed to trustworthy sources by those "in the know".
"I have a feeling certain Orthodox people hate us more than Protestants ever have. Argh."
There certainly is a fair amount of anti-Latin, anti-Catholic disdain present there. The most vitriolic are, of course, ex-Catholics.
In "the disapora" they have largely shrunken within three generations where there is not growth - they have remained confined to "homelands" and have not conveneneeed a council they accept as ecumenical (in a church that is supposed to be "conciliar) in 10+ centuries.
As a Greek Catholic I used to worry that they are "more authentic easterners" and thought of converting - coming close several times. But after a while the mystique fades and you realize that there is no real authority there, there is no clear teaching on a number of important matters, and increasingly anti-Catholic protestant baggage is entering the shrinking "American Orthodox Scene" as numbers of Evangelicals co-opt different jurisdictions.
meant to type "where there is not growth through immigration"
Jonathan, this is good -- your response to my first statement here:
Your distinction between payment and punishment makes no sense at all. Wrath and justice and judgment and punishment in hell and the curse (Galatians 3:10-13) are the same thing. Ken
Yes, they are all the same thing, and they are all taken away by Christ's sacrifice.
That is the same as what I am saying.
But Christ obviously did not suffer eternal punishment in hell, so the fallacy of your equivalence is obvious.
I agree, I do not believe that Christ suffered "eternally in hell" (but only 3 days), or that He died spiritually or went to hell. I agree that that doctrine of suffering in hell and being born again that the Word of Faith teachers teach is heresy.
By your reasoning, Christ would have to have been damned to hell for eternity to atone for sin.
not at all, I agree with you here and disagree with any idea that you seem to extrapolate out by "reasoning" or "arguing" towards a conclusion I never wrote.
He was not, so your premise is false. It must therefore be possible to make payment to take a penalty away without actually suffering that penalty.
It seems you only believe in the physical sufferings of Jesus, that the guilt of sin was not imputed to Him.
The innocent suffered for the guilty; which is what the lambs and goats were doing, dying in the place of the sinner. I agree with Kim, your argumentations are making my brain hurt.
"the Father to damn an innocent man?" Adoman
I don't believe that, God the Son voluntarily came out of love for His people to pay the price for them. John 10:18
The Father did not force it or damn Jesus, rather Jesus voluntarily laid His life down for us.
Why doesn't the writer to the Hebrews mention the scapegoat? That is a good question, I don't know. It seems like another illustration of taking away our sins, and the two Hebrew words (az = goat) and "azel" (to go away, to send away, to release) are shown in verbs like "He took away our sins" and "He released us from our sins". It is not necessary for every detail to be repeated in the book of Hebrews; it is just another aspect of taking away our sins.
I admit I am being forced to think about this more.
Adomnan: No, Jesus didn't pay anything to God or to his justice. God can't be paid to forgive sin. Forgiveness of debt NECESSARILY means the debt was NOT paid.
Jonathan Prejean disagrees with you here and agreed that Anselm taught that Jesus paid a debt owed to justice and appeased the wrath of God; his only qualm (it seems to me; along with his talking that reasoning too far with all sorts of extensions of the words and implications on the Trinity, etc. ) was with my using the word "punishment" or "penalty". He even said that Anslem wrote that Jesus paid the debt owed to justice and that His death appeased the wrath of God. That is what I am saying. He paid for our sins on the cross. The Son of God died physically, not Spiritually ( God cannot die in His Divine nature.) His human nature and life died and He raised Himself up fromt he dead, along with the Father and the Spirit.
Curious, what do you think it means, "he was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the Spirit" ?
I Peter 3:18
Again, I agree that there was no "going to hell" to pay any ransom to Satan, etc. (what the goofy Word of Faith teachers teach. -- Copeland, Hagin, Creflo Dollar, etc.)
"He descended into hell" was a later addition to the apotles creed based on I Peter 3:19; which can either be that He went and proclaimed victory over the spirits in prison and released believers who died before the cross (led captivity captive) Ephesians 4; or that He was preaching through Noah "in the spirit" in the days of Noah. I don't know what the official RCC take on that is.
First off-- thanks Paul Hoffer for the Anselm quote. I was lucky enough to study some Christology under a good Dominican brother who also saw fit to point out such passages when we were reading through Cur Deus Homo. Anselm explicitly rejects the basis of the penal substitution theory.
He also offers the proponents of penal substitution a rather serious dilemma.
“If God could not save sinners except by condemning a just man, where is his omnipotence? If, on the other hand, he was capable of doing so, but did not will it, how shall we defend his wisdom and justice?”
I think anyone who holds penal substitution theory ought to answer this dilemma.
What should also be emphasized is the first fork in the dilemma. "Condemning a just man" is the problem which a Thomistic analysis (like Philippe de la Trinite in "What is Redemption?") will focus on. Retributive justice is the type of justice which focuses on punishing the guilty. As such, it by definition targets the guilty, and cannot rightfully be inflicted on the innocent. But Christ Jesus is Innocence Himself. It is abhorrent to think that the Father could exercise retributive justice on His own innocent Son.
A further wrinkle appears. Who is the priest in the sacrifice?
The misunderstanding of the penal substitutionary view, I think, is to misunderstand what true sacrifice is. Throughout the Old Testament, especially the Psalms, we can see a pure ideal of sacrifice-- it is made with a pure heart and a clean conscience. For instance, in Psalm 51.
The wrong idea is that sacrifice consists essentially in destruction. If this were the case, we might have to ask ourselves what exactly is the point of sacrifice. But it is this idea that destruction is primary which gives rise to the insidious notion that suffering is what makes Christ's sacrifice what it is essentially.
No doubt, it is important. But it is not paramount. Love must be paramount. It must be essential. It must be primary. Only if love is primary can sacrifice have any real meaning. Destruction or suffering-- these are only secondary or subordinate aspects of true sacrifice.
But if it is destruction and the infliction of suffering which are primary, then we must ask ourselves... who is the real priest in this sacrifice? The Christian tradition says that Jesus is the ultimate priest. But if destruction is what makes a sacrifice, then the Roman executioners are. Both Philippe de la Trinite and Cardinal Ratzinger (in Intro to Christianity) make this very point.
It would seem to make God the Father the priest as well, for supposedly He would have ordained or sanctioned such a cruel evil.
But we know that it is absurd to think that God ordained that His Son's executioners kill Him.
Ken: The Innocent One suffered *for* the guilty, not *in place of*. He suffered on behalf of us, not instead of us.
It would seem that if Jesus, who is the Lamb of God who takes away
Jonathan,
Your quotes from John 19 and Luke 23 are fine, they are the historical record of what happened at the cross; but the epistles like Romans and Hebrews and I Peter and others; and prophesies (Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, lamb sacrifices in Lev.; Passover Lamb in Exodus 12, etc.) full out the theological interpretation of the cross.
I don't see much difference in what you or I am saying, except you have taken the implications too far for issues dealing with the Trinity, the word punishment and damn and created a lot more that what I was saying.
Psalm 22, of course the Father did not completely forsake the Son, for He (all three persons of the Trinity raised up Jesus) was vindicated and not forsaken ultimately by the resurrection. The sacrifice was effective and accepted by God as payment towards justice. God's wrath was appeased, you agree with that. That is all. It is not necessary to interpret those things as "The Father punishing the Son", or the Father damning the Son", no; God was judging the sin that was imputed onto Christ. He who knew no sin made Him to be sin (imputed to sin to Him, even though he has none), so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor. 5:21
Just leave it at that; don't try to take things too far about the relationships in the Trinity and that they are "broken" or other blasphemous things. God cannot be split up.
It would seem that if Jesus, who is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins *of the world*, and who came to save us on behalf of the God who *wills all men to be saved*, suffered *instead of us* that no one could go to Hell, for it would involve God in a sort of double-jeopardy. It would seem that we'd have to reject either that 1. Jesus' sacrifice is sufficient to save all men, 2. That God wills all men to be saved, or 3. penal substitution, for God couldn't then damn anyone, having already given the punishment we justly deserve to Jesus (but God *can* damn someone who hasn't been regenerated by grace-- whether or not He in fact *does* do so).
I think the problem with penal substitution is exactly this obsession with punishment as the mode of atonement, rather than Christ's surpassing obedience and love, by which he merited mercy from the Father.
If Jesus is a scapegoat, He is the scapegoat of sinners, who place their sin on Him. It was certain Jewish and Roman leaders, and the crowd, who 'scapegoated' Him. He is not the scapegoat of the Father.
Kim,
The teaching of the unity in the Trinity stems from the fact God is one and that God is Love. There is no disagreement or anger between Father and Son and Spirit. Protestants agree with this as well, except for the time when it comes to the atonement when Lutheranism-Calvinism has the Father unleashing His wrath on Jesus.
Ken and Kim, see my very first quote on this commentbox at the top. I have a clear quote from popular radio host and Calvinist Grek Kukol, here is the quote once again:
+++++++++++
My point there was that the biggest suffering on the cross was not at the hands of men, but at the hand of God during those three hours when darkness shrouded the cross, the greatest agony was when the Father poured out His wrath on His son.
I want you to see that the Bible actually teaches that there was an exchange that took place on the cross, that the Father poured out His anger on the Son, as if guilty of our sins.
+++++++++++
Ken you need to realize that your Calvinist position has God's wrath turned from sinful man onto His Beloved Son. Read the Calvinist Kukol quote above. Either you dont get what we are saying or you dont see anything wrong with it.
As for your comments about the OT sacrifices and Passover lamb and Scapegoat and such, we have already demonstrated there was no wrath unleashed on them.
RobNY,
I love you posts here and on Catholic Answers Forums. Im not sure if you caught this but Lutheranism-Calvinism needs Penal-Sub to make Imputation work leading to Justification by Faith Alone.
Hi Nick! What's your handle on CA. I'm not sure I recognize you.
And, I did miss that part about the necessity of penal substitution underlying Faith Alone theology. Could you show me that point?
Thanks,
Rob
I agree, I do not believe that Christ suffered "eternally in hell" (but only 3 days), or that He died spiritually or went to hell.
Then let's follow the logic. By your reasoning, divine justice demands that someone be punished. The punishment for sin is the "second death," spiritual death, eternal damnation. But you say that Christ never had the second death. So how has divine justice been satisfied, if no one bore the punishment?
not at all, I agree with you here and disagree with any idea that you seem to extrapolate out by "reasoning" or "arguing" towards a conclusion I never wrote.
That won't get you off the hook, because you are committed to the logical implications of your position as well. You are suggesting that divine justice demands that someone suffer the punishment for sin. So who suffered eternal damnation for those saved from damnation?
It seems you only believe in the physical sufferings of Jesus, that the guilt of sin was not imputed to Him.
I'm not saying that there was no psychological component of Jesus's suffering; there certainly was. Indeed, it was probably amplified so that He experienced in some way all of the suffering inflicted by human sin if the agony in the Garden was any indication. But this certainly never included any subjective sense of His own guilt, which would have been impossible.
The scapegoat bore the sins metaphorically, not literally. The goat did not become guilty, just as Christ did not become guilty. There is not any question from my perspective that the notion of "bearing" sins or guilt is metaphorical and not literal.
The innocent suffered for the guilty; which is what the lambs and goats were doing, dying in the place of the sinner.
They weren't dying in the place of the sinner. Their lives were given (by their owners) for the sinner. And what do you think Jesus was saying when He said "No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again; this charge I have received from my Father" (John 10:1
. His was the life to give, just as the owner of the animals had their lives to give.
Jonathan Prejean disagrees with you here and agreed that Anselm taught that Jesus paid a debt owed to justice and appeased the wrath of God; his only qualm (it seems to me; along with his talking that reasoning too far with all sorts of extensions of the words and implications on the Trinity, etc. ) was with my using the word "punishment" or "penalty".
I'm not convinced you understand my qualms if you think it is a difference of words. These words matter. Jesus simply wasn't punished under divine law; He never had the legal status of criminal under the divine law and giving Him that status would in and of itself violate the divine nature and the divine justice. St. Anselm never suggested such a thing.
The Son of God died physically, not Spir
The Son of God died physically, not Spiritually ( God cannot die in His Divine nature.) His human nature and life died and He raised Himself up fromt he dead, along with the Father and the Spirit.
What does the fact that He cannot die in His divine nature have to do with it? The question is whether Christ was condemned spiritually in His human nature. But because He was a divine person, He could not possibly be subject to such condemnation, even in His human nature. And that goes back to the original point: if payment does not require Christ to be punished in our place, then why would you think that He is in any sense?
As for your comments about the OT sacrifices and Passover lamb and Scapegoat and such, we have already demonstrated there was no wrath unleashed on them.
Killing them by a knife -- slitting the throat and shedding blood is not taking punishment or wrath?
If we are saved from sin and from going to hell because of Christ's death and our faith in Him and His perfect work; and hell is the wages or results or punishment for sin; and Christ willingly sacrificed Himself in our place; then yes, He took the punishment and wrath and satisfied justice.
"For what the law could not do, in that it was weak in the flesh; God did; by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as a offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh; in order that the requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." Romans 8:3-4
. . . He condemned sin in the flesh"
There is no no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:1 We are saved from judgment/wrath/punishment/hell/condemnation because Christ took our place and willingly and voluntarily took the wrath and punishment for us.
But that does not break up the Trinity; does not teach anything about going to hell; and does not mean that the Father punished the Son in the sense of His whole being and out of any kind of sinful anger; no. God's anger and wrath are holy and pure and good; in other words, justice. The Father condemned sin in the flesh of Jesus, not His spirit or divine nature, etc. He condemned (judged, poured wrath on) the sin.
Your quotes from John 19 and Luke 23 are fine, they are the historical record of what happened at the cross; but the epistles like Romans and Hebrews and I Peter and others; and prophesies (Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, lamb sacrifices in Lev.; Passover Lamb in Exodus 12, etc.) full out the theological interpretation of the cross.
None of those say anything different than what I have said, so I'm not sure what the point is.
Psalm 22, of course the Father did not completely forsake the Son, for He (all three persons of the Trinity raised up Jesus) was vindicated and not forsaken ultimately by the resurrection. The sacrifice was effective and accepted by God as payment towards justice. God's wrath was appeased, you agree with that. That is all. It is not necessary to interpret those things as "The Father punishing the Son", or the Father damning the Son", no; God was judging the sin that was imputed onto Christ. He who knew no sin made Him to be sin (imputed to sin to Him, even though he has none), so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor. 5:21
To make it as clear as I possibly can, here it is in all-caps:
THE CROSS WAS NOT A DIVINE JUDGMENT OF SIN.
Not by imputation and not otherwise. Christ's death was IN NO WAY a divine judgment on Christ or anyone else. All of these weasel-phrases like "not completely forsake" and "not forsaken ultimately" obscure the fact that Christ was not forsaken AT ALL in that sense. Not partially, not temporarily, not at all. There was absolutely no divine judgment on Christ. There could not even possibly be a divine judgment upon sin in Christ.
So one more time, so it can't possibly be missed:
THE CROSS WAS NOT A DIVINE JUDGMENT OF SIN. There is no judgment at the Cross, only love. I don't care whether you call it punishment, penalty, or judgment; the point is that it wasn't there on the Cross. That is the doctrine of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
Jonathan Prejean wrote:
What St. Anselm said was that there was a debt to divine justice that needed to be paid. Christ lovingly paid it, offering His own life in accordance with the determinate plan and will of the Father, and the Father accepted this offering, which was sufficient to pay the debt to divine justice and to appease His wrath against sin. "
This is all the same thing I am saying, except you just don't use the word "punish". That seems to the only difference. If Christ paid the debt to divine justice and to appease His wrath against sin; you have admitted that He took the punishment for sin, without allowing the word "punishment" in your formulation. There is really no difference; if you just let it alone and don't try to draw out all the other implications that you (and others) have created. Christ was sinless, but our sins were imputed to Him -- He condemned sin in the flesh. The soul that sins shall die. Christ died for our sins. There is no other way to understand substitution and justice and how God maintained His justice and holiness against sin and His love and mercy towards sinners. Romans 3:25-26 clearly shows this, God is both just and the justifier of those that have faith in Jesus because of Christ's death on the cross; a propitiation in His blood.
Ken,
I think JP's comments about wrath, punishment and justice are interesting. If Jesus was taking the punishment for us due to sin, because the basis of atonement is that he take it *instead* of us, then it would seem that He would have to suffer its full consequences, which are bodily death and eternal damnation. I'm very interesting in hearing how one can moderate this position that penal substitution seems to entail. When I read Calvin's theory in the Institutes (Bk. II, chapter 16?) he most definitely says that Christ suffered the pains of hell, and I think that he says he suffered the eternal torment (but somehow... only between the Cross and the Resurrection).
Now, as to what you say about the Father condemning the sin in Jesus' holy Flesh, what exactly do you mean by this? Please be as precise as possible. In what sense did the Father, "condemn," "judge" and "pour wrath on" the Son? Please be specific. The reason why we're so touchy about this subject is that we've read Calvin's view on this, and we know precisely what Calvin thinks this means-- it means that the Father tortured the Son with the punishment due to the reprobate! It seems that you deny this, which is good, but I can't seem to make heads and tails of in what sense the Father *did* punish the Son if He didn't do it in the sense Calvin suggested.
-Rob
Ken,
Perhaps the problem is this. Jesus took the 'penalty' due to sin, in the sense that He willingly laid down His life-- which was completely His and which death had no claim over--out of love for us.
The problem with punishment is that it suggests *agency* in the suffering Jesus underwent. Punishment seems to suggest the agency of some person who does the punishing. And if we say that there is any sort of divine agency behind the 'punishment' of Jesus Christ, then we are saying that there was divine agency in evil. But this is both incoherent and blasphemous.
Catholics utterly reject that there was any sort of divine agency which condemned Jesus, because we know that an all-loving, all-good God could never do evil. But we do accept that Jesus 'suffered the pain of the penalty' (cf. Philippe de la Trinite in, "What is Redemption?").
-Rob
I can't imagine a more backward reading of Romans 8:3-4. Because Christ was innocent and NOT condemned, in the likeness of sinful flesh but not sinful, He Himself does what the law weakened by the flesh could not do: stand as a judgment against the sin of those in the flesh and not in the Spirit. I can't even fathom what you are thinking in reading this passage, which says nothing about sin being condemned in Christ's flesh.
The problem with punishment is that it suggests *agency* in the suffering Jesus underwent.
Exactly. It suggests some sort of divine judgment against Jesus at the Cross, which is patently absurd.
THE CROSS WAS NOT A DIVINE JUDGMENT OF SIN.
Wow. Now you are being more clear. Sorry, but here you are clearly wrong. Yes it was, "He condemned sin in the flesh" Romans 8:3 It was both love and justice. They meet together beautifully and completely at the cross. You really do have a deficient and incomplete atonement, which is no atonement at all.
Having made peace through the blood of the cross. Colossians 1:20
Forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of death consisting of decrees against us and which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Colossians 2;13-14
". . . by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the law of commandments contained in ordinances that in Himself . . . reconcile them both in one body to through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity. . . . Ephesians 2:15-16
"for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate his righteousness (justice) , because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
Romans 3:23-28
Amazing that you don't beleive the cross was a divine judgment on sin; only love --
this is why your view, in my opinion and many others is deficient. You have eliminated justice completely. The cross was 100% love and 100% justice. That is why it is so wonderful. God did not wink at sin.
Pure Justice against sin; and Pure love for sinners.
Beautiful and complete and satisfying. Yours in incomplete and lacks truth and holiness and is not satisfying.
Ken,
You're missing JP's point. He's saying that the infliction of crucifixion on Jesus was not a divine judgment on Jesus' sin. Not that it doesn't judge *us.*
Every Catholic believes that the Cross is a divine judgment on *our* sin. That's why we have a crucifix in every church.
And to clarify myself-- the Cross judges us in the sense that it reveals how innocent Jesus is, and how guilty the rest of us are in his death.
But I'm not sure in what sense Ken thinks it is.
And one further clarification, JP explicitly says that its not,
"a divine judgment... on anyone else"
And I think it's pretty clear that he means that God doesn't punish or torture innocent people so that we 'get it.' It's the same problem of divine agency which I mentioned before.
But we do accept that Jesus 'suffered the pain of the penalty'
RobNY -- you are getting closer.
Amazing that you (and others) extrapolate that the Father does evil ! Acts 2:22 and 4:27-28 shows that God the Father ordained and predestined the cross and the work of Christ, but Herod and the Jewish elders and leaders and Pilate and the soldiers who nailed Him to the cross are the godless and evil men.
Jonathan,
Your reading of Romans 8:3-4 is just strange to me. It clearly says, ". . . He condemned sin in the flesh" All the other verses I quoted above in Colossians and Ephesians say this also.
Both justice and love are preserved at the cross, not only love demonstrated. You have a half atonement, which is no atonement.
As for Calvin, I need to read that; ( I have never actually read the Institutes all the way through, only bits and pieces, I have honestly depended on other Calvinists who have written theological books for my understandings -- Louis Berkhof's Systematic Theology, R. C. Sproul, John Piper, all Cavlinists, and others whom you guys don't like but I do.) but that is the classic understanding, without all the emotional extrapolations who are making about it. If sin was imputed to Christ, and He paid the penalty, bore our sins, and God demonstrated His love for us (Romans 5:8.) and "the Father loves the Son and the Son loves the Father" (Gospel of John); then there is nothing but purity and love in the Trinity and relationships and the judgment is poured out on sin; and Christ bore our sins.
Anyway, Jonathan Prejean's statement is still shocking, that the cross is not a demonstration of Divine judgment on sin.
In all my 18+ years as a Christian I've never heard of it as you've described it. Are Catholics the only ones who see it this way?
That doesn't surprise me, because patristics simply aren't considered a "big deal" in most Protestant circles. But in response to your question to me, yes, the Fathers were all on the same page about this issue. Most Fathers emphasizes the Christus Victor aspect of salvation (Christ died as a man and emerged victorious over death, thus saving all humanity from death), but other Fathers, particularly those in the West and in the Syrian tradition along with St. Athanasius, also emphasized the payment of a penalty. Some were so committed to the divine love in this act as to think that God could not demand a ransom, so they said that the ransom mentioned in the Bible must be paid instead to Satan, which is the error that St. Anselm was concerned to correct.
The real problem is that you have to understand what it means for Christ to have two wills, one human and one divine. That falls into a period that isn't studied a great deal: the Monothelite (one will) controversy involving St. Maximus the Confessor. The orthodox doctrine is that Christ, in one person, has two wills according to His two nature, which is necessary to affirm that Christ is really fully man and fully God. As the Third Council of Constantinople declares:
"And we proclaim equally two natural volitions or wills in him and two natural principles of action which undergo no division, no change, no partition, no confusion, in accordance with the teaching of the holy fathers."
What a lot of people miss is the essential part of this doctrine: that Christ's divine will is shared in common with the Father and the Holy Spirit. This is extremely clear in Gregory of Nyssa; the reason that the three persons are not three separate gods is that they have one common divine nature including a common divine will. The reason this idea of the Father judging Christ is not possible is that the Father cannot act in His divine will in a way separate from Christ Himself without fracturing the Trinity into multiple gods. Now, a lot of people don't know that because they aren't familiar with Gregory of Nyssa or the doctrine of two wills, so they don't realize that having a divine will means that Christ must always be a co-actor in every divine act. So the notion of one divine person judging another divine person simply doesn't make sense; Christ would have to be simultaneously judging Himself as guilty and presenting Himself as an innocent sacrifice, which is impossible.
Unfortunately, because this area is understudied, lots of the best works are scholarly, difficult to read, and expensive (see, e.g., Michel Rene Barnes The Power of God, the best book on this subject). However, you can get an excellent survey in Christ in Eastern Christian Thought by John Meyendorff. Because he is not Catholic, you don't have to worry abou
(cont.)
However, you can get an excellent survey in Christ in Eastern Christian Thought by John Meyendorff. Because he is not Catholic, you don't have to worry about bias.
Fitting St. Anselm into this whole picture is even more complicated, because Catholics and Orthodox quibble among themselves about whether he is orthodox. But this should help you understand why Calvin's theology of the Cross represented a fundamental break from the Christology of the ecumenical councils.
On Calvin:
When we were, “estranged from God,” etc, “Christ interposed, took the punishment upon himself and bore what by the just judgment of God was impending over sinners” (Institutes II, 16, 2).
Hence, we, “remember this substitution in order that we may not be… in trepidation and anxiety, as if the just vengeance which the Son of God transferred to himself, were still impending over us” (Institutes II, 16, 5).
The idea I mentioned before of the problem with double jeopardy is definitely here.
, “when he is placed as a criminal at the bar, where witnesses are brought to give evidence against him, and the mouth of the judge condemns him to die, we see him sustaining the character of an offender and evil-doer” (Institutes II, 16, 5). Hence, “he might bear the character of a sinner, not of a just or innocent person, inasmuch as he met death on account not of innocence, but of sin” (Institutes II, 16, 5).
Calvin is confident that if Christ only endured bodily death that, nothing would be accomplished (Institutes II, 16, 10). In fact, “in order to interpose between us and God’s anger, and satisfy his righteous judgment, it was necessary that he should feel the weight of the divine vengeance” (Institutes II, 16, 10). Because of this, “it was necessary that he should engage… in close quarters with **the powers of hell and the horrors of eternal death**” [emphasis mine] (Institutes II, 16, 10). Calvin interprets the suffering servant passages of Isaiah 53 to mean that, “he endured the death which is inflicted on the wicked by an angry God” and that, **“he bore in his soul the tortures of a condemned and ruined man”** [emphasis mine] (Institutes II, 16, 10).
Calvin says of Christ that “he bore the weight of the divine anger, that, smitten and afflicted, he experienced all the signs of an angry and avenging God” (Institutes II, 16, 11). Calvin returns to his legal analogy when he says that we must, “infer how dire and dreadful were the tortures which he endured when he felt himself standing at the bar of God as a criminal in our stead” (Institutes II, 16, 12).
Get the point?
You're missing JP's point. He's saying that the infliction of crucifixion on Jesus was not a divine judgment on Jesus' sin. Not that it doesn't judge *us.*
That is not what he wrote, he even wrote, ". . . or any one else"
JP's shocking statement again:
Not by imputation and not otherwise. Christ's death was IN NO WAY a divine judgment on Christ or anyone else. All of these weasel-phrases like "not completely forsake" and "not forsaken ultimately" obscure the fact
[no, the resurrection proves this against your claim]
that Christ was not forsaken AT ALL in that sense. Not partially, not temporarily, not at all. There was absolutely no divine judgment on Christ. There could not even possibly be a divine judgment upon sin in Christ.
So one more time, so it can't possibly be missed:
THE CROSS WAS NOT A DIVINE JUDGMENT OF SIN. There is no judgment at the Cross, only love. I don't care whether you call it punishment, penalty, or judgment; the point is that it wasn't there on the Cross. That is the doctrine of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
You have no forgiveness, no atonement, because you have no justice being satisfied, no wrath being extinquished, you have made the cross void of its power and truth.
RobNY,
Yes, that (what Calvin writes, but I would not have written it that way) is also my understanding, basically; but without all the implications or twisting s that you guys make out of it. I think Calvin exaggerates a little; and Calvin was unclear in these statements that you have picked out. Christ was purely innocent; but He became like a guilty person, (but He is not guilty) because the sin was laid on him, imputed to Him and He voluntarily took the penalty. Calvin is trying to communicate the justice/judgment part of the atonement and admittedly speaks in language that perhaps goes overboard. But He is trying to communicate the sense in which "justice was served, or paid, and the wrath of God was appeased." JP even used these words or something similar, and siad that Anselm taught this also. Then he shocked me with "The cross is not a divine judgment on sin".
Otherwise, (without Christ taking the punishment(justice) for sin); your side is the side that is not specific as to how it satisfied God's judgment on sin and is an atonement and how God forgives our sins. He can forgive out of love, because justice was paid. Both love and justice, not one alone or the other alone.
RobNY:
And to clarify myself-- the Cross judges us in the sense that it reveals how innocent Jesus is, and how guilty the rest of us are in his death.
Oh, absolutely. And in that it does exactly what the law weakened by flesh could never do, condemning the sins committed by those in the flesh (Rom. 8:3-4). From the Cross, all sin is judged. But at the Cross, in Christ Himself, there is no judgment but only love.
Rev. Temple:
Wow. Now you are being more clear. Sorry, but here you are clearly wrong. Yes it was, "He condemned sin in the flesh" Romans 8:3 It was both love and justice.
Where does it say that sins were condemned in Christ's flesh. By the Cross, God condemns the sins of those "in the flesh," but Christ is not one of those. Certainly, Christ's sacrifice on the Cross removes the enmity and judgment between divinity and humanity in Himself, but that does not require Christ to be judged. There simply is nothing there about a divine judgment on sin in Christ. This is simply your concept of divine justice that requires sin to be judged and punished. I have no idea where that idea originated, but it isn't in the Bible or the Fathers. Because you assume that divine justice requires judgment and punishment of sin, you read passages that do not require the condemnation of sin in Christ as if they require it.
I do find it interesting that you spin off into the doctrine of grace, because that is precariously close to an admission that your doctrine of faith and works is a result of your (defective) theology of the atonement. I certainly agree that these things are related, and that understanding the mechanism of how Christ saves us is essential to correctly grasping grace as participation in Christ and deification (being made righteous). Once you take away the prop of imputation, the whole structure collapses, and the orthodox doctrine can fill the void.
So I repeat:
THE CROSS IS NOT A DIVINE JUDGMENT ON SIN
You have no forgiveness, no atonement, because you have no justice being satisfied, no wrath being extinquished, you have made the cross void of its power and truth.
But it's not necessary for sin to be judged and punished for divine justice to be satisfied and divine wrath to be appeased. That's just your own philosophy. If that is not necessary for salvation, then the Cross is not made void by denying it.
Otherwise, (without Christ taking the punishment(justice) for sin); your side is the side that is not specific as to how it satisfied God's judgment on sin and is an atonement and how God forgives our sins.
It's paid by voluntary sacrifice, voluntary payment. God's own divine law says that payment is permissible in place of punishment; it's all over the Old Testament. If you've got a problem with that idea and you think that God needs to judge and punish sin in order to be just, take it up with God, and see what He thinks of your "vain philosophy."
Here the problem is put in glaring terms:
Calvin is trying to communicate the justice/judgment part of the atonement and admittedly speaks in language that perhaps goes overboard.
The concepts of "justice" and "judgment" are so confused that they are made into one word. There is no "judgment" part in the atonement. That's not required for the "justice" part.
Jonathan P. wrote:
Where does it say that sins were condemned in Christ's flesh.( ?)
in the context of Romans 8:3. Ever heard of context?
For what the law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh , and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin the flesh . . .
also, Ephesians 2:13- 15-16 (verse 13 - "blood of the cross" . . . "by abolishing in His flesh the enmity (God's hatred of sin and judgment on sin), which is the law of commandments . . . (God's law, the soul that sins shall die) "having put to death the enmity"
Romans 5:9 also, along with John 3:36.
I would love to continue this discussion, but my but hurts from sitting here for so long and engaging in this dialogue. I appreciate it and all your opinions. I am still amazed; especially at Jonathan's understanding that the cross was not a divine judgment on sin. Amazing.
But when I have time; I will try to read both Anselm and Calvin on these things more closely. Others have summarized them and quoted from them; and I honestly do not enjoy reading some old authors who have difficult syntax and long complicated sentences. Jonathan Edwards is an example of that -- I like his stuff; but he gives me a headach. I need Sproul and Piper to make him and Calvin easier for me.
Ken, I understand your frustration. Personally, I think we're trying to divide something up into understandable pieces that cannot be understood in an isolated fashion. Here is another person who feels there is some truth in all views, but that it is not wise to isolate any one view. Perhaps I shouldn't say "some truth", but "another aspect" in each view.
I still say that I see truth in all views. Shoot me.
in the context of Romans 8:3. Ever heard of context?
Errr, yeah. I kind of thought that was why the "likeness" part was being contrasted with the "sins in the flesh" in the second half of the sentence. The Law didn't work to condemn them; the Incarnation did. But at least there was a point you took away that I think a lot of Evangelicals just don't get: that sins weren't judged on the Cross according to Catholic theology. Maybe that will help.
Rob,
I go by "Catholic Dude" over at Catholic Answers, CARM, etc. You know me already.
About the penal-substitution issue being a cornerstone of Justification By Faith Alone, I and Adomnan briefly touched upon it above, but for a more in depth look I wrote up an article on my homepage:
http://catholicdefense.googlepag...com/
article.htm
Ken,
Here is how Lutheranism-Calvinism sees the Atonement:
A guilty murder is about to be executed by a gun. But the executioner will allow Jesus, who is totally innocent, to take the bullet and be executed instead.
THIS is situation is what Catholics REJECT. God did not direct His wrath on sinners and turn in onto Jesus.
But this is why Calvinists also believe in Limited Atonement. They believe Jesus could have taken the punishment for all men's sins of all time, but He only took the punishment for a select few. This punishment includes ALL of the sins that Christian would ever commit. This leads to another blasphemous concept, that Jesus in a sense pre-paid for sin because He took the punishment for murders and rapes that any given Christian had not yet been committed.
Here is the Catholic view of the atonement.
Ken,
I've got to do my taxes tonight; so I don't have a lot of time for posting. But I can make a few remarks.
First, I shouldn't be speaking for Jonathan, who can explain himself quite well, but I don't want this excellent discussion to degenerate into a pointless argument about words. When Jonathan said that the cross is not a divine judgment on sin, he clarified that he meant it's not a judgment on sin in Christ (or imputed to Christ or whatever). However, the cross is a condemnation of sin in the sense that "the Father passed definitive judgment against sin in that the death that Christ died on the cross 'in the flesh' sentenced to impotence sin that reigned in human flesh" (i.e., human nature). That's how the Pauline scholar Fr. Joseph Fitzmyer puts it. Of course, sin wasn't "punished," just condemned.
I was happy to see you deny at one point that the Father condemned or punished Jesus, but you still evince a lot of confusion. You wrote, "It is not necessary to interpret those things as 'The Father punishing the Son', or the Father damning the Son", no; God was judging the sin that was imputed onto Christ. He who knew no sin made Him to be sin (imputed to sin to Him, even though he has none), so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor. 5:21."
This is incoherent. On the one hand, you rightly say that the Father didn't punish Jesus Christ, and then you say in later postings on this thread that JC "took the punishment" and "paid the penalty." This is an outright contradiction. Either God punished JC or He didn't. Jesus Christ cannot be unpunished and "take the punishment" at the same time.
Sometimes, you seem to be trying to say something like "God punsihed sin in Christ, but didn't punish Christ." But this is absurd. "Sin" cannot be punished; only sinners can be punished. When people say, "the sin was punished," they always mean "the person who committed the sin was punished."
Moreover, you go on to quote 2 Cor 5:21 as if it supports your point, completely ignoring that Nick and I have already shown that this verse has nothing to do with penal substitution.
Well, now I have to repeat myself. In 2 Cor 5:21, "sin" means "sin offering," the very same meaning your Bible translation gave the expression in Romans 8, the same meaning that you earlier acknowledged the word carries. NOTHING was "imputed" to the animal that was a sin offering! Sin was transferred (not "imputed") to the scapegoat, but the scapegoat is NOT a sin offering and Christ is NEVER compared to the scapegoat in the NT.
Anyway, gotta go. By the way, I don't understand why you asked me for my understanding of I Peter 3:18. I don't see the relationship this verse has to our discussion, and I don't wan't to go off on some tangent.
Nick,
Ok, you're right. I do know you.
Ken,
Thanks for your comments. Earlier you said:
"Amazing that you (and others) extrapolate that the Father does evil ! Acts 2:22 and 4:27-28 shows that God the Father ordained and predestined the cross and the work of Christ, but Herod and the Jewish elders and leaders and Pilate and the soldiers who nailed Him to the cross are the godless and evil men."
I think it's clear that we have to interpret the first Acts passage carefully. Acts 2:23, and 4:28 perhaps do not say as much as you think they do.
The Bible is explicit that the action done by Jesus' killers is evil. Now, your thesis says that God the Father ordained that act. Hence, you say that God the Father ordained an evil act.
I'm not the one saying that the Father did something evil. You are. You are saying that He did by giving responsibility for the same evil action to both Jesus' killers and the Father.
Now, since this is obviously abhorrent, I think we need to find a different interpretation of these verses. Hence, I think we should do the standard process of interpretation at this point: distinguish between God's ordaining and permissive will.
You used the word 'ordained,' but that's importing your view onto the text. God 'willed' it, but the crucial question is, in what sense?
Whenever the Bible asserts that God willed evil, we must say that He willed it in the permissive sense. That is, He allowed it but did not positively ordain it. In this way we piously interpret the Scriptures by not saying that God is the author of evil. When we say God's ordaining will, we mean what He positively does and creates (e.g., creation, grace). When we say God's permissive will, we mean what He allows but does not support (evil actions of men, like sin).
Now, this is a case in which the Scriptures say God willed evil. Hence, we must say that God did this in His permissive will.
Perhaps God the Father ordained Jesus' positive ministry, but we cannot say that God the Father willed the evil actions of killers in his ordaining will.
In the case of God "ordaining the fall". That means God knew when sending Jesus the people wouldnt like it, He knew what would happen to Jesus, He didnt send angels to save Jesus.
The undeniable fact is that humans inflicted the pain on Jesus, BUT humans are unable to inflict Divine Wrath. Thus if Protestants want to claim Penal-Sub they have another problem because the only source of Divine Wrath is God. THAT is why people like Calvinist Greg Kukol say: "the biggest suffering on the cross was not at the hands of men, but at the hand of God during those three hours when darkness shrouded the cross, the greatest agony was when the Father poured out His wrath on His son"
I'm going to leave it to Nick, Adomnan, and RobNY from here, because they are saying what I would say as well as I could say it. Nice quote from Fr. Fitzmyer, which is exactly how I take Romans 8 to read (viz., Christ dying on the Cross as the standard by which all sins are judged and condemned).
Rob and Nick,
To underscore your point that the Father did not perpetrate the murder of Christ, but merely permitted it for a greater good, let me quote the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 312, which sums it all up very well:
"In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures: 'It was not you,' said Joseph to his brothers, 'who sent me here, but God.... You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive.' (Gen 45:8; 50:20) From the greatest moral evil ever committed -- the rejection and murder of God's only Son, caused by the sins of all men -- God, by his grace that 'abounded all the more,' (Rom 5:20) brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good."
Now THAT is "beautiful and pure!"
Hi, Frank (Kepha),
How are you doing? It's been a while.
I haven't posted on the Internet (except once or twice) since 2002, and I've been here for less than a week. I don't plan to make a habit of it; it's too time-consuming. I may post occasionally as the spirit moves me.
I'm delighted to see that Nick and others have taken up the cudgel for a truly Christian view of the atonement. With Nick, Jonathan, Rob and others manning the ramparts, I can in good conscience resume my retirement from forums and blogs.
I see you've been causing mischief on the Reformed Catholic board. Tsk, tsk. Well, at least your involvement acts as a catalyst for discussion, which is (almost) always a good thing.
Best,
Adomnan
Adomnan,
I'm doing alright. Yes, I've been causing trouble. It hasn't been intentional, tho'. I began having doubts about the Faith a year ago; since then I've been researching and studying to find the Truth of it all. Anyway, this is definitely not the place to get into all that, but it is, in short, this quest of mine that is causing the trouble. Shoot me an e-mail: st_padre_pio@hotmail.com
Hi all, I wanted to throw two more cents into this discussion. Ken quotes from the NASB which states Rom 8:3-4 as follows:
Rom. 8:3-4 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. (NASB)
I would note that most of the other versions of the Bible I have in my library (my 1941 Confraternity NT and 1954 Douay-Confraternity edition excluded) do not contain the term "sin-offering".
Rom. 8:3-4 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh; God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh and of sin, hath condemned sin in the flesh; That the justification of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. (Douay-Rheims)
Rom 8:3-4 God has done what the Law, because of your unspiritual nature was unable to do. God dealt with sin by sending his own Son in a body as physical as any sinful body, and in that body God condemned sin. He did this in order that the Law’s just demands might be satisfied in us, who behave not as our unspiritual nature but as the spirit dictates. (Jerusalem)
Rom 8:3-4 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do; sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (RSV)
Rom. 8:3-4 What the Law could not do, because human nature was weak, God did. He condemned sin in human nature by sending his own Son, who came with a nature like our sinful nature, to do away with sin. God did this so that the righteous demands of the Law might be fully satisfied in us who live according to the Spirit, and not according to human nature. (Good News)
Rom. 8:3-4 There was something the law could not do, because flesh and blood could not lend it the power; and this God has done, by sending us his own Son, in the fashion of our guilty nature, to make amends for our guilt. He has signed the death-warrant of sin in our nature, so that we should be fully quit of the law’s claim, we, who follow the ways of the spirit, not the ways of flesh and blood. (Knox)
In fact my 1954 version of "The Interpreter's Bible" Vol. 9 , pg. 508, a Protestant commentary if there ever was one, specifically states that while the term used by St. Paul here is often translated as "sin-offering" the actual words literally translates as "and concerning sin".
On the other hand I have also seen these words used here: Expiation, "the act of making atonement; the means of redress or atonement; amends"; Propitiate- "to conciliate, to appease"; Atone-"to make amends"; Amends-"to remove the faults or error; to correct, to rectify". None of these definitions use the word punish to deine the word nor is punish given as a synonym.
Additional problem, it is all well and good to cite to Rom 8:3, but the verse must read in context with the next verse as well since it is the second half of the sentence. What is the requirement of fulfillment of the Law that St. Paul is talking about? Rom. 13:10 states, "[L]ove therefore is the fulfillment of the law." (NASB) Gal. 15:14 opines, "For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (NASB) Jesus Christ, Himself said the same thing at Mt. 5:17; 20:35-40. Jesus' death on the Cross was not the incurrance of a divine punishment, but a supreme act of love.
For another interesting perspective on this topic, I might suggest an Old English poem, titled, "The Dream of the Rood" which is a poem told from the perspective of the Cross itself. There Jesus is not necessarily portrayed as a victim being punished, but as a conquering hero.
Ken,
Just one last comment. I was thinking, and perhaps the crux of the problem is with this statement here. You said:
"Otherwise, (without Christ taking the punishment(justice) for sin); your side is the side that is not specific as to how it satisfied God's judgment on sin and is an atonement and how God forgives our sins. He can forgive out of love, because justice was paid. Both love and justice, not one alone or the other alone."
I was looking at what Calvin wrote, and I think this is the pivot which separates the generally accepted Catholic doctrine from the penal substitution doctrine. I ask you to seriously consider the truth value of this statement.
Calvin begins by saying that man cannot but descend into himself and know that he is liable to the wrath of God. And there's not much to complain about there-- it's true that we are subject to eternal punishment unless we are forgiven of our sins. But it's where he takes it next that makes it problematic.
He says:
“God… as a just judge, cannot permit his law to be violated with impunity, but is armed for vengeance” (Institutes II, 16, 1).
This is the move which you made above: we are in such a state, before Christ, that we will be subject to divine punishment when we die. But the objectionable part isn't there. It's the conclusion that the only way God can stop being angry with us, that the only way He can forgive us, is by exercising His vengeance (via punishment).
The Anselmian model does not take this turn. Anselm sees how man is hopeless and needs salvation. But he doesn't thereby conclude that God needs to exhaust His vengeance in order to forgive.
The opposition in Anselm is definitely one between mercy and justice. He offers the divine dilemma-- to let sinners off the hook would seem to fulfill justice, but not mercy, and vice versa.
The problem is that by the time we get to Calvin's theory, justice has subtly morphed into vengeance. This is the key problem-- it's ridiculous to think that God can only be placated by exercising his wrath-- really, His vengeance-- on a victim. That really makes Him no better than some type of abusive magistrate
Ask yourself: in order to forgive, does God *have to* hit someone? Is punishment necessarily tied to forgiveness?
And I think the answer we need to say it-- no. God doesn't have to do any of that. God, being all-powerful, could have saved us in any way He wanted. He could have done anything. Of course, He chose the best way, by giving Himself freely for our sins.
Anselm seems to go wrong by saying that the Incarnation was absolutely necessary. But even then he doesn't go to Calvin's mistake-- he still thinks that God relents on His punishment of man when man can make reparations for the sin he committed.
The idea that God only relents on punishment when punishment has been dealt is an idea we must ask ourselves... is this possibly true? What reason do we have
The idea that God only relents on punishment when punishment has been dealt is an idea we must ask ourselves... is this possibly true? What reason do we have to believe this?
And I ask you to examine the Scriptures. Again and again God threatens Israel with destruction, and tells them that if they repent, so will He. Jeremiah is the best instance of this, for no matter how strong the prophetic words He places in Jeremiah's mouth, it's always soon thereafter that He says that if they would only repent, He would not destroy them.
This is the error we must turn away from. What do you think, Ken?
God bless,
Rob
Er, I said:
"The opposition in Anselm is definitely one between mercy and justice. He offers the divine dilemma-- to let sinners off the hook would seem to fulfill justice, but not mercy, and vice versa."
That should read: it would seem to fulfill mercy, but not justice, and vice versa.
As I said earlier the God of this sub-penalty (or whatever the phrase is) is the wrathful God of the OT ('an eye for an eye'), not the loving God the Father of the new.
'The cross was 100% love and 100% justice' Ken temple wrote. Hold on that's 200%!!! How can it be 100% love and 100%jutice?
Kim, I am beginning to see my role here as the person who has little theology and even less Biblical knowledge putting his twopeno'rth in.
This debate has encouraged me to contine for, when I read (for the first time) that Calviists and the rest hold that the Crucifixion was a punishment on Jesus, I didn 't immediately run off and get my Bible . I just sat there for a moment and thought-'that can't be true'. And likewise if Ken had considered a moment such an idea purely from a human point of view instead of going off to the Bible and his interpretations and deliberations and he would have come to the same conclusion I did, in a moment.
That can't be right. He didn't do anything wrong.
Theology is the 'science of God' . And you need experts trained in the discipline. I believe you find them in the catholic church.
'aspects of the truth' whoa,..how can you have aspects of the truth? Jesius is the Son of God. How can there be two different aspects of that?
I maintain my contribution are
in Christ
'The cross was 100% love and 100% justice' Ken temple wrote. Hold on that's 200%!!! How can it be 100% love and 100%jutice?
In the same way that Christ is 100% God and 100% man. Slam dunk.
In the same way that Christ is 100% God and 100% man. Slam dunk.
...exactly like how the means of our salvation are 100% God (grace) and 100% man (obedience to the commandments). Slam dunk. In fact, it's an even clearer case because it is a unity of the same things (divine nature and human nature).
I have hope for you, Rev. Temple. Your earlier shock was probably the first time I saw you really get surprised or shaken up by Catholic doctrine, like you actually learned something new. If you keep making remarks like this, you might eventually see what it's about.
Adoman wrote:
I was happy to see you deny at one point that the Father condemned or punished Jesus, but you still evince a lot of confusion. You wrote, "It is not necessary to interpret those things as 'The Father punishing the Son',
I admit I sounded confusing to you; but I was only trying to quell the wrong emphasis that you guys were taking the concept of Jesus suffering punishment for sin toward injustice, evil, and splits in the Trinity. I probably should not be afraid of that statement, “The Father punishing the Son”. I am Reformed and agree in essence with what Calvin and Greg Kokul and other say, but you make it into something it is not. God is powerful and knows the future, so “for the joy set before Him (of being reunited with His Father after the price was paid) He endured the cross, counting as nothing the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God.” (Hebrews 12:2) Jesus is God, He voluntarily willingly took the punishment, justice for sin. God Himself takes His own justice. There is no evil or injustice in that. The Trinity is united and unified in their goal and mind each with other, in the persons. There is no need to then say “that is horrible or unjust, or splits the Trinity” etc. because you are deducing things that Reformed folks do not deduce from the doctrine. God is pure and without sin and Jesus suffered as an innocent person, but He bore the sins of His people. They were imputed to Him, because He really did not do them. He was not guilty, but He suffered in the place of the guilty.
God the Son willingly and voluntarily took the punishment. The reason for the confusion (on your part) is that you are separating the Father and the Son too much in the act of redemption; taking things too far without acknowledging that both love and justice are there at the cross; and the three persons in the one God, the Trinity is fully united with each other in their redemptive work. I backed off the statement “The Father punishing the Son” because you guys were making too much out of it and extrapolating injustice and evil to God, and also splits within the Trinity and calling penal substitution heresy and blasphemy and such. You have to believe in all the truth of the atonement at the same time, love and justice. JP wrote very clearly, “ONLY LOVE”. And he wrote that the cross was not a divine judgment on sin. Amazing! God Himself took the punishment; because Jesus is fully God. This is the point you are missing. It is pure love and pure justice. The Lord was pleased to crush Him, if He would render Himself a guilt offering. Isaiah 53:10
“The LORD has caused the iniquity of as all to fall on Him.” Isaiah 53:6
It is your view that is confusing and makes no sense.
Paul Hoffer wrote alot about Romans 8:3-4, etc.
I would say the OT background of both Leviticus and Isaiah 53 help us in this and this also shows us the meaning of substitutionary atonement in 2 Cor. 5:21. No one proved that 2 Cor. 5:21 has nothing to with substitutionary atonement. It has everything to do with it.
The key is that one has to understand that phrase, "concerning sin" or "for sin" (peri harmartias) with the OT background in Leviticus 4:3 and 5:6 and other places. The Hebrew term behind the Greek LXX is one word, "Khata'aT" or sometimes with the preposition "L" (towards, to, for, -- the Hebrew is very open on that). It makes no sense to translate it as "a bull without defect as a sin" (Lev. 4:3) unless there is imputation of the sin onto the animal. Lev. 5:6 -- "a lamb or goat as a sin". The word "offering" is not there. It becomes "sin" because it was imputed with the sin of the guilty human. That is also the background of Romans 8:3 and 2 Cor. 5:21. It is an effective sin offering, because sin was imputed to the innocent victim.
The scapegoat in Lev. 16 and laying on of hands and confession of sins and transfer of sins is the proper interpretation of all the other "laying on of hands" back in Lev. 1, 4 and 5, but perhaps not in Lev. 3 about the fellowship offering. Apparently, in Hebrew, the writer, (Moses) did not feel the need to spell all that out because it was obvious by the words "atonement" for sin and that in Hebrew it says, "if is offered as a sin". We have to interpret it, meaning an offering for sin, in place of the sinner, because the sinners sins are transfered to the innocent victim by imputation and symbolically by the laying on of hands.
Thanks Jonathan for having hope for me. Yes, your statements are still shocking, and a lot of your argumentation is so filled with philosophical concepts and unclear implications; that I admit; I cannot understand a lot of what you say completely. It is too high and mysterious and leaves dots unconnected.
But, to me, you never do explain clearly one of your original statements in which you acknowledge that Christ's work on the cross paid a debt to justice and also appeased the wrath of God. All you did was leave out the word "punishment".
How did Christ appease the wrath of God?
How did He pay the debt to justice?
Yes, because He was innocent, but also because He being innocent took in Himself the sins and guilt of the humans by imputation; and He willingly did this as both God and man and so as God, there is no injustice, if He willingly and lovingly chooses to take the punishment. There is no idea of "The Father God forcing Jesus to pay for others sins, which would be injustice. It is just because God the Son does it out of love, both for His Father and for the sinners of the world, some from all the nations. Revelation 5:9
You did not respond to the 100% God, 100% man issue in the natures of Christ and His work on the cross; but instead changed the subject to man working out his salvation and RCC distinctives and opposition to "Faith Alone" -- you changed the subject from the cross and substitutionary atonement to faith and works and the responsibility of man and role of man in salvation.
No, salvation is 100% of the Lord. But the evidence that one is truly saved in this life is a life of change and good works. Sanctification involves effort and good works and striving and doing. Justification does not. Salvation is from the Lord. Jonah 2:9
"So it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy." Romans 9:16
Oh man!! I get busy for a week and miss an excellent discussion. Oh well, Ken seems to have done ok without my help. : ) I hope everyone else laughed as hard at that as I did.
.
Ken,
I'm still very interested in how you'd answer my posts.
But, as regards your response to Jonathan, I think we'd all like to know what you mean *specifically* by "The Father punished Jesus." I think if you answered this directly then we'd be able to agree or disagree on it, depending on the sense you gave to it. Unless you are willing to clarify your concepts ("punishment" in this context) then we're going to have a very hard time have an authentic dialog-- let alone convince each other.
I think it may be advisable to drop the discussion of faith and works, for it may threaten to overwhelm this discussion.
-Rob
"Yes, because He was innocent, but also because He being innocent took in Himself the sins and guilt of the humans by imputation; and He willingly did this as both God and man and so as God, there is no injustice, if He willingly and lovingly chooses to take the punishment."
That's the thing... it *is* unjust that Jesus suffered. Everything about Jesus' passion and death was unjust, because He was completely innocent. He didn't deserve any of it. What's so awesome is that He lovingly and obediently underwent it.
I would only say its not "unjust" in the sense that its morally a good thing to willingly endure suffering for the sake of loved ones.
It is, unjust, however, to inflict suffering on innocent people. And the injustice we are by and large denouncing is the idea that the *Father* inflicted suffering on the Son, not the idea that the Son willingly underwent suffering.
My discussion above about punishment and forgiveness I think really hits at the heart of the issue. When Ratzinger discusses this in Intro to Christianity he asks ). “Why should God take pleasure in the sufferings of his creature, indeed his own Son, or see in it the currency with which reconciliation needs to be purchased from him?” The problem comes back again and again to the conception of sacrifice as being essential pain and destruction, not love and obedience. It's quite obvious on any view that it's not as if suffering is the essential basis of sacrifice. But if we throw that out, we also throw out penal substitution.
-Rob
I haven't had time to get into this huge discussion (obviously) but here are some more-or-less related papers of mine:
The "Ransom Theory" of Atonement in the Fathers: Development in the Doctrine of the Work of Christ
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...in-
fathers.html
2 Corinthians 5:21: Was Jesus Christ Literally Made Sin on the Cross? Did He Suffer the Horrors of Damnation? Luther and Calvin vs. the Church Fathers
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...sus-
christ.html
Reflections on Luther's Novel Soteriology
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...hers-
novel.html
Dialogue With Four Lutherans Concerning Certain "Nestorianizing" Tendencies in the Lutheran Conception of Jesus' Descent Into Hell
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/
2...concerning.html
Regarding Romans 8:3, the part about "sent His son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin" is how we are to interpret 2 Cor 5:21 where it says He was "made sin".
This of course does not say nor intend to say that Jesus took a punishment, it means he became man and lived a perfect life of love and obedience. He overcame sin because sin never got a hold of Him to bring Him down.
Here is a quote from St Thomas I like to point to:
+++++++++++++
He properly atones for an offense who offers something which the offended one loves equally, or even more than he detested the offense. But by suffering out of love and obedience, Christ gave more to God than was required to compensate for the offense of the whole human race. First of all, because of the exceeding charity from which He suffered; secondly, on account of the dignity of His life which He laid down in atonement, for it was the life of one who was God and man; thirdly, on account of the extent of the Passion, and the greatness of the grief endured, as stated above (46, 6). And therefore Christ's Passion was not only a sufficient but a superabundant atonement for the sins of the human race; according to 1 John 2:2: "He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world." (ST 3:48:2)
+++++++++++++
Jesus satisfied God's wrath not by taking the wrath (as if stepping in to take the electric chair in place of a guilty murderer), but by appeasing it (NOBODY got punished) though an act of love and obedience. And leaving us an example to do likewise.
Here is the example I use:
Lets say some children are messing around with their Father's expensive artwork after being warned not to touch it. Yet the children through disobedience damage the artwork. The Father's wrath flares up against the children and the children deserve to be punished. However before the children get punished the mother of the home steps in to help, and here is how:
The Protestant would understand this to mean that the mother stepped in and received the equivalent beating that the children deserved, thus satisfying the Father's wrath.
The Catholic would understand the mother's intercession in a different matter. The mother would spend all day preparing the Father’s favorite dinner, sacrificing her time and energy to please the Father. The Father was so pleased at this act of love that in turn He would allow the children to get off with a sincere apology.
'In the same way that Christ is 100% God and 100% man. Slam dunk.'
So Christ as God is 100% just, no love in Him. So Christ as man is 100% love, no justice in him.
'God the Son willingly and voluntarily took the punishment.' How can you persist in such a terrible idea? It hurts me to hear you say it.
All you have to do is change the word punishiment for sacrifice. God the Son willingly and voluntarily sacrificed himself as atonement to His Heavely Father for the sins of all mankind. See, there's no need to bring in such a repugnant idea as God the Father punishing God the Son.
It's all quite clear.
in Christ
Yes, your statements are still shocking, and a lot of your argumentation is so filled with philosophical concepts and unclear implications; that I admit; I cannot understand a lot of what you say completely. It is too high and mysterious and leaves dots unconnected.
I agree with Ken. I feel we are on different planets trying to communicate. Very frustrating. I'm fighting a headache trying to comprehend this discussion.
Still trying to understand.
OK, I'm going to have to dig into some extremely complicated theology to explain what I said before, but I can't see any way to get the distinction clear otherwise.
I am Reformed and agree in essence with what Calvin and Greg Kokul and other say, but you make it into something it is not. God is powerful and knows the future, so “for the joy set before Him (of being reunited with His Father after the price was paid) He endured the cross, counting as nothing the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God.” (Hebrews 12:2) Jesus is God, He voluntarily willingly took the punishment, justice for sin.
OK, here's the problem. Why would Jesus need to be "reunited" with the Father if He was never separated from Him? The doctrine of the Trinity requires the Father and the Son to be one God, inseparable for all eternity. So it can't be the case that the Son was separated from the Father for any period of time at all, even if there was a reunion anticipated.
To get more technical, the anticipation of reunion would be a mere moral unity between the Persons behind a plan, not a natural unity whereby they have a single divine will. A mere moral unity between the wills would mean tri-theism (not coincidentally, this is what Calvin's autotheos doctrine entails). And the notion that the union between Christ's natures is constituted by a moral union between the human will of the man Jesus and His divine will in moral unity with the Father is classic Nestorianism (specifically, Nestorian-type monotheletism).
So there's the problem: the doctrine of the Trinity requires the Son to remain eternally in the bosom of the Father even while Incarnate, and that is not philosophical musing but revealed truth straight from the Bible: "No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known." (John 1:1.
His human nature can't be separated from His divine nature as if it were a separate person, so there is also no human Jesus that can be separated from the Father either. It doesn't make sense to speak of them being "reunited" when the unity between them can't be broken.
Instead, because of this union that cannot be broken even by death, and the Glory of the Lord shines forth in the ressurrection and exaltation of the Son. Christ is the instrument by which the power of suffering and death, the power of the devil, the power of the elemental forces, is broken forever. It appears that Christ has been defeated, but He is vindicated in the Ressurrection, showing that even death could not separate Him from the Father. This is not showing re-union, but rather than the power of sin and death could not even touch the union in the first place. That also is not a philosophical doctrine but straight from the Bible (note Paul's use of "likeness"/homoioma; cf.Rom. 8:4).
Php. 2
[5] Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,
[6] who, though
(cont.)That also is not a philosophical doctrine but straight from the Bible (note Paul's use of "likeness"/homoioma; cf.Rom. 8:4).
Php. 2
[5] Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,
[6] who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
[7] but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
[8] And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.
[9] Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name,
[10] that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
[11] and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
If you believe that the Son was separated from the Father, however, then you believe that sin and death had the power to break the union, at least temporarily, which is precisely what the Ressurrection denies. That is why we consider it blasphemy.
So it's not just extrapolation here. You speak of being reunited after some sort of separation, and that is clearly not the kenosis that Paul has in mind. And it seems your idea of divine judgment and punishment involves this sort of separation, and that can never be. What we want you to explain, specifically, is how Christ could be spiritually separated from God even in His human nature without breaking the hypostatic union or the physical union of the divine will (viz., not merely moral union, such as having a common plan among three people).
I can see no way that divine judgment of sin in Christ could possibly avoid splintering the hypostatic union or dividing the Trinity. And it seems pretty clear to me that St. John and St. Paul both insist on the doctrines of the Trinity and the hypostatic union exactly the way that I have articulated them.
I feel we are on different planets trying to communicate. Very frustrating. I'm fighting a headache trying to comprehend this discussion.
I know it's hard, and the reason it's hard is because this is dealing with two doctrines that we can't fully grasp even at the peak of human reason: the Trinity and the Incarnation. The problem in what Ken is saying is that He is thinking of the union between Christ's divine will and the Father's divine will as if it were like having some sort of common plan and foreknowledge. But that is an improper analogy, because a common plan is between three separate persons with three different wills. But the Trinity is not like that. In the Trinity, the divine persons have ONE divine will, not three. Thus, every exercise of the divine will is the communal action of all three Persons. It is not enough for the divine Persons to merely agree on what to do; they have to have the exact same will at all times. This means that there is no divine will of the Father separate from Christ's own divine will, unless we want to make the Trinity into three gods.
So when one speaks of the Father as punishing Christ, what that really means is that Christ in His divine will is punishing Christ in His human will. And the question is how Christ can simultaneously will to punish Himself in His divine nature while simultaneously knowing that He is innocent and willing not to sin according to His human nature. That would be a direct conflict between the divine and human wills in Christ, which would break the hypostatic union. There can be distinction between the wills, but not contradiction, so they can't simultaneously will A and not-A (for example, "I am punishing myself as a sinner; I do not will to sin.").
The point is that the Father can't view anything differently from Christ Himself without breaking the Trinity. So if we say that the Father has a certain viewpoint, we must ask "Could Christ Himself have that same viewpoint?" The Father can't view Himself as a sinner, because Christ can't view Himself as a sinner. God can't punish Himself, so He can't "take the punishment on Himself" either.
Put it this way: the mystery of the Cross is powerful enough simply in the fact that God died without having to introduce this speculative stuff about divine judgment.
Note to everybody:
But first, to Kim,
Kim, Jonathan said earlier essentially what I was going to say. He concluded by saying,
“And where you are, Kim, is at a place where you have recognized a great deal of truth; in charity, I have to say that.”
To which I add simply, Amen!
Jonathan Prejean wrote:
“God is NOT damned, and I will not stand silent, much less be accused of denying the Scriptures, in the face of such blasphemy.”
Nick wrote:
“Im honestly not here to bash Ken or anything like that, but like Jonathan said once you realize this Penal-Sub situation is heretical and blasphemous at its very core we Catholics cannot keep silent!”
I agree with both Jonathan and Nick.
Now I’m quite sure (I know Jon and Nick would agree) that all good Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant, have no desire to ‘bash’ the other’s side. However, I believe strongly that charity itself does indeed demand we bring certain unpleasant facts to light in the service of truth, of love and of genuine Christian ecumenicism.
That said, I’d like to post here a few of Johann Eck’s 404 Theses for everyone’s perusal (I’ve linked to the rest, which I think everyone should look at as time permits). I do this only because they seem to indicate - to me at any rate - that Protestantism has, from it’s very beginning, had a propensity towards the immoral and the blasphemous in many of its beliefs. And this unfortunate propensity ( the very spirit of Protestantism? ) is, I would submit, in large measure responsible for the almost complete inability on the part of Protestants to perceive the truly degrading nature of certain of their beliefs.
I do hope we all can examine these Theses calmly and charitably. Keep in mind that Luther tried to make them out to be a pack of lies. He said,
“…Eck has published against us the most diabolical slanders Against these I have decided to oppose a remedy.” – p. 28
In response, I would just say that one need only read Luther’s know writings (or the ravings of modern anti-catholics for that matter) to see just how accurately Eck does indeed portray Luther’s beliefs.
Anyway, here are some of Eck’s 404 Articles:
288.When a man is impotent let the wife seek a divorce but if he be unwilling let her with the consent of her husband have intercourse with another or the brother of her husband in secret marriage and let the offspring be accounted those of the reputed father The woman is safe in a state of safety. Luther.
(should anyone doubt this one, I’ll be happy to provide the documentation, as well as for a number of Luther’s other statements).
289 For I prefer bigamy to divorce. Luther. (as the Lutheran monks have shown effectually)
290 If a wife do not obey her husband when he asks for the conjugal debt let him call in a servant girl Yea on this account he can ask for a divorce. Luther
291 Divorce occurs not only on account of adultery but for other more gr
291 Divorce occurs not only on account of adultery but for other more grave reasons Suppose a husband be under sentence of death a madman quarrelsome withdrawing from his wife without her consent and long absent Thuringians on Epithal. Luther
292 When the divorce has been decreed it is allowable for the innocent party to marry unless the guilty party should be hindered Luther Melanchthon 293 It is an error to break the marriage if before it has been consummated one of the couple enter a monastery or convent. Luther
295. Ordination does not hinder marriage or break the contract, but celibacy has been introduced by the devil. (Luther).
299. It is allowable for a priest, for a bishop, not only to marry, but the second, third, and fourth time, whether the bride be a virgin or one who has been corrupted.
305. To become a monk is to apostatize from the faith, to deny Christ, and to become a Jew; their vows, accordingly, are worthless (Luther) .
306. For a man to be continent is an impossibility; but just as it is necessary for man to eat and drink, and to sleep, so also is it to have sexual intercourse. Hence no man can
be without a woman, nor any woman without a man (Luther).
287. If any one violate a virgin, he will not be obliged to give her anything except a pair of shoes (A new Thuringian law that fell from heaven).
357. There is no ecclesiastical authority over men (Bucer). Hence the bishops have usurped the jurisdiction which belongs to the secular princes (Luther, Rieger, Zwingli, Blaurer).
358. Ecclesiastical power is not of God (Luther).
359. Christ subjected himself and his Church to secular power (Haller). This immunity of churches and freedom of the clergy has ceased (Luther).
326. We have no command to pray for the dead; you may, therefore, pray once or twice for a dead person, but afterwards cease lest you tempt God or distrust Him (Luther).
338. That the Pope has transferred the power from the Greeks to the Germans is either the chief or greatest mark of Antichrist, and is most deceptive (Luther).
And so on. For my part, I can scarcely believe such unrelenting abuse and blasphemy.
Source: Text of Dr. John Eck’s 404 Theses, or 404 Articles. Samuel Macauley Jackson, ed., Papers of the American Society of Church History, Second Series, Volume II, pp. 21-81, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York and London, the Knickerbocker Press, 1910.
http://books.google.com/books?id...eses%22+eck&
lr=
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Joh...ohann_Eck#Notes
I do wish everyone here, Peace. And may we all pray for one another, and may we pray and work for true unity.
I'd rather not get away from the faith-works thing, at least so long as we can stick to this one particular concept, because they are really the same thing.
Rev. Temple says:
You did not respond to the 100% God, 100% man issue in the natures of Christ and His work on the cross; but instead changed the subject to man working out his salvation and RCC distinctives and opposition to "Faith Alone" -- you changed the subject from the cross and substitutionary atonement to faith and works and the responsibility of man and role of man in salvation.
No, salvation is 100% of the Lord.
The problem is that the same concerns are implicated in Christ's actions on the Cross that are implicated in human action generally. Christ's human sacrifice is 100% in His human will and 100% in His divine will, without contradiction. The fact that His action is 100% human takes nothing away from the fact that it is 100% divine. It's only when you create conflict between humanity and divinity that this becomes a problem. But Christ on the Cross shows that there is no conflict between humanity and divinity (at least if you don't think He was being punished!) and that the same human action can also be 100% divine. That is the path that we follow through the Cross.
But exploring this issue wasn't my idea; it was yours. See your words from above:
Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
Romans 3:23-28
That's a Christological text, and it's the same idea as Romans 8:4. What Christ shows in His very body is that there is no conflict between human and the divine, but rather, the union between the divine and the human in Christ defeats the power of sin and death. The law couldn't do that; only the grace of God given in becoming Incarnate, fully God and fully man, could.
The point is that salvation isn't a question of "distinctives" in Catholic thought. The question of who Christ was and what He did is inseparable from how He saves us in Himself. What we believe about Christ on the Cross is what we believe about Christ in the Church and in our lives. The idea that you can take some piece and say "well, we believe the same thing about this, but our beliefs are distinct on this other thing" is utterly foreign to Catholic thought. If you believe what we believe about Christ, then you should believe what we believe about salvation.
Kim,
Like Jonathan said, this stuff can be hard. I studied penal substitution last fall, and I really had trouble grasping what exactly was wrong with it as I was researching it and writing on it. It took me an appreciable amount of time to sit on it and integrate it with everything else I know.
Jonathan,
Thanks for the excellent posts. You're right about the theology being thick, but I think you presented it very clearly. If you could, I'd appreciate pointers for books I can read so I can get a grasp of the theology on this subject better.
I didn't quite see the connection between the faith/works comment and this issue, but I think I understand why you brought it up.
I found an interesting difference between what you and Ken said. You just said:
"I know it's hard, and the reason it's hard is because this is dealing with two doctrines that we can't fully grasp even at the peak of human reason: the Trinity and the Incarnation."
But Ken said before:
"; I cannot understand a lot of what you say completely. It is too high and mysterious and leaves dots unconnected."
And perhaps that's part of the drive that leads towards problematic theology of atonement. I think Anselm fell into this very problem, when he wanted the atonement to be so logically airtight (to *his* understanding) that he tried to dialectically force it to be necessary (via the divine dilemma). And while its clever, and very insightful, it ultimately falls short because we know God wasn't absolutely necessitated to do what He did.
Perhaps that's part of the problem behind penal substitution theory. It's much more graspable than satisfaction theory is, for we can talk about what precisely was paid or bargained for (pain and suffering). It's much more concrete. But the problem is that's exactly as Ken described it, "too high and mysterious." Far too high and mysterious for us to understand exactly how it *did* make satisfaction. We know that it did, but it's not necessarily obvious how or why it did.
Perhaps I'm just off the mark. I don't want to go to the other extreme-- that we ought not treat mysteries with theology. I just think that it's possible to cross the line by not treating divine mysteries as... well... mysteries.
-Rob
Thank you, Ben! Your observation that Protestantsm has had a propensity toward immorality and blasphemy from the beginning is spot on.
And the reason for this is simple: People who will believe that it is "just" for God to punish an innocent man for the sins of others can believe that any injustice is just. For them "justice" is divorced from common sense or goodness, from what language means by the word justice. Justice isn't justice for them. Goodness isn't goodness. Reason isn't reason.
After Ken's short excursion into lucidity, when he conceded that the Father didn't punish Jesus, he's back to asserting that He did.
In all of Ken's prophesyings about how wonderful penal substitution is, he never explains how God can "satisfy" His justice by pouring out his wrath on the one man who didn't sin. I can't imagine a more complete inversion of every principle of justice, and no amount of Calvinoid sophistry is going to change the fact that "he who condemns a righteous man is an abomination to the Lord." (Proverbs 17:15)
From the Ken Temple Version of the Bible (KTV): "for the joy set before Him (of being reunited with His Father after the price was paid) He endured the cross, counting as nothing the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God.” (Hebrews 12:2)
Ken, it's hardly surprising that you will find your views in the scripture when you write them into it.
But please just explain this one thing, simply and coherently: How exactly does punishing the wrong man satisfy God's justice? Thank you.
Ken: The key is that one has to understand that phrase, "concerning sin" or "for sin" (peri harmartias) with the OT background in Leviticus 4:3 and 5:6 and other places. The Hebrew term behind the Greek LXX is one word, "Khata'aT" or sometimes with the preposition "L" (towards, to, for, -- the Hebrew is very open on that).
Adomnan: The preposition "L" means "for" in this context. The fact that it is often prefixed to khata'at, as you helpfully point out, is to show that word for "sin" is being used as an adjective clause modifying an unspoken "offering;" i.e., offering for sin.
Ken: It makes no sense to translate it as "a bull without defect as a sin" (Lev. 4:3) unless there is imputation of the sin onto the animal. Lev. 5:6 -- "a lamb or goat as a sin".
Adomnan: The word "khata'at" or "lekhata'at" is used to differentiate this particular offering from other offerings, such as the communion, votive or thanksgiving offerings. It specifies the offering "for sin."
Ken: The word "offering" is not there.
Adomnan: Because it is understood. Why use the preposition "L" if the khata'at isn't modifying a word that is omitted? It's a kind of shorthand.
Ken: It becomes "sin" because it was imputed with the sin of the guilty human.
Adomnan: No, the text doesn't say this. You're reading this into it. It's called "for sin" because it's the offering for sin. If the sin offering was regarded as being laden with sin, then it would be unholy and couldn't be offered to God.
Ken: That is also the background of Romans 8:3 and 2 Cor. 5:21. It is an effective sin offering, because sin was imputed to the innocent victim.
Adomnan: The fact that the "sin offering" is called "sin" or "for sin" is the background for why "sin" means "sin offering" in 2 Cor 5:21 and Rom 8:3, but your assertion that this implies that sin was imputed to anyone or anything is false. "Sin" or "for sin" was simply shorthand in Hebrew for the sin offering, just as "thanksgiving" could be shorthand for the thanksgiving offering.
Ken: The scapegoat in Lev. 16 and laying on of hands and confession of sins and transfer of sins is the proper interpretation of all the other "laying on of hands" back in Lev. 1, 4 and 5, but perhaps not in Lev. 3 about the fellowship offering.
Adomnan: If the same gesture occurs in Lev. 3 as in Lev. 1, 4 and 5, and you admit that it doesn't transfer sins in Lev. 3, then how can you assert that it does in the other cases?
In Lev. 3, the laying on of one hand indicates "this is the offering I'm making." That's what it means in Lev 1, 4 and 5 as well.
The scapegoat episode in Lev. 16 is different, because confession of sin is made OVER the goat while BOTH hands are laid on it, and the text explicitly says that this transfers (not imputes) the sins. Note the difference in the gestures, by the way: In Lev. 16, both hands are used; in the other cases, only one. These are not the same gestures and so cannot be assumed to convey the same meaning because of some partial similarity.
Besides, laying on of hands signifies many things in the Bible. No sin was transferred when hands were laid on Timothy. There is no evidence whatsover in Lev 1, 4 and 5 that any transfer of sin is taking place, unless one already assumes your "imputation" theory, which we Catholics don't.
Ken: Apparently, in Hebrew, the writer, (Moses) did not feel the need to spell all that out because it was obvious by the words "atonement" for sin and that in Hebrew it says, "if is offered as a sin".
Adomnan: Apparently, from what you write above, the Hebrew says "offered le khata'at," which means "offered for sin," not "offered as a sin." But let's not pretend we're Hebrew scholars, when we're not. Okay? (I do speak Arabic fluently, though, and I see parallels between the two languages that enable me to draw some conclusions. The same preposition "L," apparently with the same meaning, exists in Arabic.)
Ken: We have to interpret it, meaning an offering for sin, in place of the sinner, because the sinners sins are transfered to the innocent victim by imputation and symbolically by the laying on of hands.
Adomnan: I agree that khata'at or le-khata'at can be interpreted as "offering for sin," but not "in the place of the sinner." Sins are never transferred to sacrificial victims. The only time sin is transferred is to the scapegoat in Lev. 16, but the scapegoat is not sacrificed and cannot be because it has been made unclean with sin. The Hebrews would never offer a sin-laden animal to God.
Secondly, sins weren't imputed to the scapegoat, they were thought of as being transferred to it, so that it could carry them away.
Thirdly, imposition of hands can mean many things in the Bible. It signifies ordination in Timothy and healing in James. You yourself admit that it doesn't transfer sins in the communion sacrifice of Lev. 3, and so you cannot conclude that it does so in Lev. 1, 4 and 5. It is evident that the gesture means the same thing in every case that it is used with respect to an offering -- and, to repeat, the scapegoat wasn't an offering -- namely, "I am giving this animal to be offered."
I trust that's clear enough.
Adomnan
short excursion into lucidity
Ha! Tried that once myself; just gave me a headache!
RobNY
Perhaps I'm just off the mark. I don't want to go to the other extreme-- that we ought not treat mysteries with theology. I just think that it's possible to cross the line by not treating divine mysteries as... well... mysteries.
And indeed, they are mysteries!
“And the fulfilment of the mystery of our atonement, which was ordained from all eternity” –Leo the Great, letter 31:2 http://www.newadvent.org/fathers...ers/
3604031.htm
A Victim had to be offered for our atonement Who should be both a partner of our race and free from our contamination, so that this design of God whereby it pleased Him to take away the sin of the world in the Nativity and Passion of Jesus Christ, might reach to all generations: and that we should not be disturbed but rather strengthened by these mysteries, which vary with the character of the times, since the Faith, whereby we live, has at no time suffered variation. – Leo the Great, sermon 23:3
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers...hers/
360323.htm
Note to everyone.
The enormous subtlety and complexity of the sacred mysteries being discussed here have served, I think, to very effectively highlight and to bring into even sharper relief the great deficiencies of those two great Protestant dogmas viz, Sola Scriptura and private interpretation.
For who could possibly, after reading all that has been said here, come to the conclusion that men, separated from “the bosom of the Church our Mother,” should hold forth even a scintilla of hope of arriving at the fullness of truth in these most sacred matters?
So again we see how the extent to which the experiment of Protestantism, now half a millennium old, has failed provide men with that truth and love and life which can only be had in their fullness withing the one Church which the Lord, in his mercy, founded, and into which, He would have all men come.
“Remembering then the danger, we ought not only to observe this ourselves, but to confirm it by our general consent, that all heretics who come to the bosom of our mother the Church be baptized, that the heretical mind, which has been polluted by long-continued corruption, may be reformed when cleansed by the sanctification of the laver."
- Augustine, On Baptism, Against the Donatists, Bk. VI http://www.newadvent.org/fathers...thers/
14086.htm
“Let the Church our Mother, weep for you, and wash away your guilt with her tears.” –St. Ambrose, Concerning Repentance, Bk. II. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers...thers/
34062.htm
Ben,
Thanks so much for your eye-opening quotes from St. Leo. Naturally, His Holiness nailed it.
I have long seen very clearly, of course, that penal substitution is sub-Christian, but I was somewhat vague in my own mind about how the Atonement "worked" in fact. I understood that Christ's sacrifice was a victory over death, sin and the devil, and I understood its value as a moral example.
In the course of these discussions, however, the deepest meaning of the Atonement dawned on me in a flash, and it is the meaning that St. Leo gives to it: " we should not be disturbed but rather strengthened by these mysteries."
The atonement is a mystery that is a pattern for the sacraments, those mysteries by which we are saved and deified. The two greatest sacraments derive their meaning and efficacy from Christ's passion, death and resurrection. And that is why his sacrifice took place, not to settle any balance sheet in heaven or to pay for a forgiveness that by definition is gratuitous, but to provide us with the mysteries that effect our salvation.
Christ is the Second Adam. His life is archetypal, the pattern for all of us who follow him. We are conformed to it. He is the captain of our salvation. He had to die and rise so that we could die and rise with him in baptism. He had to become a sacrifice so that we could partake of that sacrifice in the eucharist.
The sacrifice of Christ has other meanings (particularly that of servng as a model of love and patience, as I Peter says), but the most fundamental meaning is that it is the source of the sacraments, the source of our life.
Thanks guys for going to so much trouble to help me understand the differences between Calvin and the Church. Still trying to process it all...
Nick,
I thank you for noting that imputation of righteousness is an incorrect view under Catholic theology. I had this wrong after reading the Catholic Catechism, and appreciated having my view corrected.
Like Kim, I find it very hard to unwrap my Reformed presuppositions from what I hear Catholicism saying. I think this is a better talking point between Protestants and Catholics than, say Romans 3 and James 2. We use so many of the same words in this context (though meaning different things to us) that it's hard to know how far apart we may be.
Peace in Christ,
Thos.
Adoman,
Takalam Arabi ?
Tasharafna!
Khata and Khatat are very close. I speak Farsi fluently and can usually recognize Arabic words. 40 % of Farsi is from Arabic.
Are you from an Arabic speaking country? Are you Melkite or Maronite Catholic or what ? Just curious.
the Hebrew says "offered le khata'at," which means "offered for sin," not "offered as a sin."
"offering" is not even there. "Sin" and "for sin" are the same word except for the preposition, "L" ( toward, for, to ) --
How exactly does punishing the wrong man satisfy God's justice? Thank you.
Because Jesus, God the Son, God Himself, voluntarily, willingly, and with love for sinners chose to pay the price for justice. That is just not hard to understand. Lots of verses I already gave. Romans 3:25-26 is one of key ones. God is both just and the justifier of those that have faith in Christ.
The Lord caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.
Isaiah 53:6
If Jesus was only human, He would have been the wrong man; but because He was God and the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world, He was the right man, because He was the God-Man.
John 10:18
It was the greatest act of evil of men on an innocent man; but at the same time the greatest work of love for sinners and the greatest work of justice.
Like Genesis 50:20 "you meant it for evil; but God meant it for good."
Ken, you wrote:
"The key is that one has to understand that phrase, "concerning sin" or "for sin" (peri harmartias) with the OT background in Leviticus 4:3 and 5:6 and other places. The Hebrew term behind the Greek LXX is one word, "Khata'aT" or sometimes with the preposition "L" (towards, to, for, -- the Hebrew is very open on that). It makes no sense to translate it as "a bull without defect as a sin" (Lev. 4:3) unless there is imputation of the sin onto the animal. Lev. 5:6 -- "a lamb or goat as a sin". The word "offering" is not there. It becomes "sin" because it was imputed with the sin of the guilty human. That is also the background of Romans 8:3 and 2 Cor. 5:21. It is an effective sin offering, because sin was imputed to the innocent victim."
I do not read the passages you cite the way you do. As I read Lev. 4 and 5, sin is not imputed to the sacrifice at all. Instead, sin is purged from the offeror by the spilling of blood. The blood, being holy and belonging to God, cleansed the soul of the offeror. See also, Lev. 17.
Further, it sin was imputed to the sacrifice, there would be no reason for the offeror to confess the sin. As Lev. 5:5 shows, the sacrifice wasn’t even efficacious without the offeror also confessing his sins as well.
In short, I see an indication from the text that sin is purged by the sacrifice which is more in line with Catholic thinking as opposed to merely imputation. The sin was removed by the shedding of blood which was holy to God. The actions of sprinkling, etc. with the blood washed the sin away thereby allowing man and God to come closer together (which is the real meaning of korban-a sacrifice or gift that enables man to become closer to his God). You might want to read the Jewish Encyclopedia on-line articles on sacrifice and atonement. I found the articles to be a good starting point for researching this further.
One other thing, I also have a hard time reconciling your notion of sin-offering with the OT application of sin-offering. Sin-offerings appear to be sacrifices offered for unintentional sins. Intentional sins required a different type of sacrifice. Assuming, arguendo, that you are right and sin was imputed to victim in a sin-offering, how does that help us here? Jesus' sacrifice could not have been a sin-offering because that would mean His suffering and death on the Cross redeemed us from unintentional sin only. And I do not think that any Christian, whether Catholic or Protestant, could possibly believe that and still call themselves Christian.
The Jewish Encyclopedia states in the article on "Atonement" found here: http://www.jewishencyclopedia.co...d=2092&
letter=A :
"Thus there is in Scripture a successive spiritualization of the idea of Atonement. Following the common view, David says (I Sam. xxvi. 19): "If the Lord have stirred thee up against me, let him accept an offering [to appease the anger of God]." But while this cruder view of sacrifice underlies the form of worship among all Semites (see Robertson Smith, "Religion of the Semites," pp. 378-388 ), the idea of Atonement in the priestly Torah is based upon a realizing sense of sin as a breaking-away from God, and of the need of reconciliation with Him of the soul that has sinned. Every sin—whether it be "ḥeṭ." a straying away from the path of right, or "'avon," crookedness of conduct, or "pesha',"—rebellious transgression—is aseverance of the bond of life which unites the soul with its Maker. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die," says Ezek. xviii. 20 (compare Deut. xxx. 15-19; Ps. i. 6; Jer. ii. 13). It is the feeling of estrangement from God that prompts the sinner to offer expiatory sacrifices—not only to appease God's anger by a propitiatory gift, but also to place his soul in a different relation to Him. For this reason the blood, which to the ancients was the life-power or soul, forms the essential part of the sacrificial Atonement (see Lev. xvii. 11). This is the interpretation given by all the Jewish commentators, ancient and modern, on the passage; compare also Yoma 5a; Zeb. 6a, = "There is no Atonement except with blood," with the identical words in Heb. ix. 22, R. V.: "Apart from shedding of blood there is no remission [of sins]." The life of the victim was offered, not, as has been said, as a penalty in a juridical sense to avert Heaven's punishment, not to have man's sins laid upon it as upon the scapegoat of the Day of Atonement, and thus to have the animal die in his place, as Ewald thinks ("Alterthümer," p. 68 ), but as a typical ransom of "life by life"; the blood sprinkled by the priest upon the altar serving as the means of a renewal of man's covenant of life with God (see Trumbull, "The Blood Covenant," p. 247). In Mosaic ritualism the atoning blood thus actually meant the bringing about of a reunion with God, the restoration of peace between the soul and its Maker. Therefore, the expiatory sacrifice was accompanied by a confession of the sins for which it was designed to make Atonement (see Lev. v. 5, xvi. 21; Num. v. 7; compare Maimonides, "Yad," Teshubah, i. 1): "no atonement without confession of sin as the act of repentance," or as Philo ("De Victimis," xi.) says, "not without the sincerity of his repentance, not by words merely, but by works, the conviction of his soul which healed him from disease and restores him to good health."
Adoman,
Takalam Arabi ?
Tasharafna!
Adomnan: Naam. Etakallamu billughat-ilarabiyya. I prefer al-fusha. As you know, it's hard to write Arabic in the Latin alphabet; so I'll stop now.
Ken: Khata and Khatat are very close.
Adomnan: Yes, khata' in Arabic (verbal noun) means sin or mistake, wrongness.
Ken: I speak Farsi fluently and can usually recognize Arabic words. 40 % of Farsi is from Arabic.
Adomnan: That's great. I've seen enough Farsi to note the frequent occurrence of Arabic words, but I don't speak it at all.
Ken: Are you from an Arabic speaking country? Are you Melkite or Maronite Catholic or what ? Just curious.
Adomnan: I learned Arabic in connection with my work. I'm an Irish American Catholic. Hence the name: an Irish saint, also sometimes spelled Adamnan. I speak another 12 languages besides Arabic and English.
Adomnan: the Hebrew says "offered le khata'at," which means "offered for sin," not "offered as a sin."
Ken: "offering" is not even there. "Sin" and "for sin" are the same word except for the preposition, "L" ( toward, for, to ) --
Adomnan: My point, Ken, is that the presence of the preposition implies that this is an adjective phrase modifying a noun that is understood. It's as if the Hebrew had "offered the 'for sin.'" One would immediately understand that the phrase "for sin" implied an unspoken noun, which is "offering."
In any event, it's somewhat pointless for the two of us to be discussing Hebrew. I have some basis to do so because of the resemblance of the language to Arabic. Just let it be said that many Biblical scholars understand "khata'at" or "Lkhata'at" in this context to mean "sin offering" and not "sin," and none of the reputable ones think these two separate meanings are interchangeable in a given context.
Here's what Fr. Joseph Fitzgerald says about the word "hamartia" in the phrase "peri hamartias" in Rom 8:3:
"Some commentators, however, take 'peri hamartias' to mean 'for the sake of (being) a sin-offering,' i.e., as a sacrifice for human sin, because hamartia often occurs in the Septuagint in this sense (e.g., Lev. 4:24; 5:11; 6:18; Ps 40.6; compare 2 Cor. 5:21). So Sanday and Headlam, Kaesemann, Moo, Wright, and Greene."
Nowhere does the Bible or any reputable scholar say that the use of hamartia to mean both sin and sin offering in different contexts implies penal substitution or imputation or any other anachronistic Calvinist doctrine. Trying to build a case for the doctrine on this one word won't succeed.
Adomnan: How exactly does punishing the wrong man satisfy God's justice? Thank you.
Ken: Because Jesus, God the Son, God Himself, voluntarily, willingly, and with love for sinners chose to pay the price for justice.
Adomnan: It's not a question of whether or not Jesus was willing to be punished by the Father. The moral opprobrium occasioned by this theory doesn't fall on Jesus, but on the Father. The Father would be unjust to punish an innocent man as if he were guilty, whether that man wanted to be punished or not.
Secondly, God's justice or righteousness is free, gratuitous. Nothing has to be paid for it. What would you call paying a judge for "justice?" Bribery!
Ken: That is just not hard to understand.
Adomnan: It's impossible to understand because it's absurd. You don't even "understand" it. You can say you "feel" it if you want, but please don't say you comprehend what is incomprehensible.
Ken: Lots of verses I already gave. Romans 3:25-26 is one of key ones.
Adomnan: Look, Ken, if you're just going to keep claiming verses for your position that have no relevance whatsoever to penal substitution, you can list every verse in the Bible, but it's not going to advance your case.
Ken: God is both just and the justifier of those that have faith in Christ.
Adomnan: For Paul, the righteousness (justice) of God, a phrase he uses often, is not retributive justice, nor is it a justice he imparts to us; the experession means "God's faithfulness to his promises."
Many Protestants believe that when Paul speaks of God being "just and the justifier of those who have faith in Christ," he is suggesting a contrast being God being "just" and "the justifier," a dilemma they say is resolved through penal substitution. However, Paul implies no contrast; he uses no contrasting conjunction, but rather the coordinating conjunction "and." God is just/ righteous (i.e., faithful to his promises) BECAUSE he is the justifier of the those who have faith -- this is what he promised Abraham he would do.
Paul,
Thanks for those excellent thoughts on the meaning of sacrifice and sin offering, and for that magnificent citation from the Jewish Encyclopedia. It shows that the Jews, who should know what their own sacrifices meant, agree entirely with the Catholic faith on this point.
I copied this whole conversation into a Word document (71 pages at size 11 Times New Roman font! Should I print this "book" out? lol). I'm going to read and reread it and really try to comprehend what you guys are saying. I need to "get" this. Thanks again.
Adomnan: I learned Arabic in connection with my work. I'm an Irish American Catholic.
Interesting! Are you a missionary? Amazing that you know 12 languages! Wow! Cool.
Paul Hoffer wrote:
Instead, sin is purged from the offeror by the spilling of blood. The blood, being holy and belonging to God, cleansed the soul of the offeror. See also, Lev. 17.
"Yes, but how is sin is purged? and how is the soul cleansed? "blood" in sacrificial contexts means "blood-shed to death", "violence", "bloody", "killing", etc. The life is in the blood, Lev. 17 and Hebrews 9:22. It is not just spilling the blood and pouring it out, like a glass of wine or grape juice or baptism in water like a bath; it is the violence and the substitution that "cleanses", not some kind of parallel with a cleansing kind of thing as in soap in water.
a. violence and shedding of blood to the point of the death shows that there was an execution for sin -- the soul that sins shall die. Exekiel 18:20, the wages of sin is death. Romans 3:23. This is the justice, judgement, wrath (God's holy violence against sin). The "curses" of Deut. 28-30 and Galatians 3:10-13
b. There is a substitution, Lev. 17, life is in the blood, an innocent sinless life for the guilty, sinful life.
Again, the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. Isaiah 53:6
No one has dealt with this verse -- the iniquity was indeed laid onto Christ by God the Father. (imputed)
and
the LORD was pleased to crush Him, if He would render Himself a guilt offering. Isaiah 53:10, pointing back to Leviticus 4-5.
The life of the victim was offered, not, as has been said, as a penalty in a juridical sense to avert Heaven's punishment,
That Jewish article made sense until that statement.
They are just wrong, as they were in rejecting Christ, the Messiah, and their general fear of Isaiah 53 confirms this.
Was not the passover an averting of the judgment of God on the first - born of each household? (Exodus 12) The death angel was the blood shedding angel. The substitution of an innocent lamb and the blood on the door posts pointed to the innocent suffering the punishments of the guilty. It makes no sense to speak of the expiation and forgiveness aspect without the propitiation/ satisfaction of justice/ appeasement of wrath against sin aspect of the substitutionary sacrifice.
Sin-offerings appear to be sacrifices offered for unintentional sins.
Yes, but later theology in Isaiah 53 and Romans and the rest of the NT takes all sin into account and so it developed and filled out every need and aspect for justice and sacrifice for all kinds of sin and iniquity, intentional and unintentional. Part of the Law's purpose was to show the Jews that they could not be clean or keep the law, that the sin nature was still alive and kept coming back. (Romans 3, Romans 7) Hebrews and Romans shows us that Christ's sacrifice was for all sin for all kinds of peoples from all nations. (Rev. 5:9) The NT does not, nor Isaiah make any distinctions between intentional and unintentional sins. They take the concept of death and penalty and judgment and substitution (that blood shed to death must happen) and point back to the sacrifices in Lev. 1-5, 16-17, etc. but NT develops it further.
The Father would be unjust to punish an innocent man as if he were guilty, whether that man wanted to be punished or not.
Secondly, God's justice or righteousness is free, gratuitous. Nothing has to be paid for it. What would you call paying a judge for "justice?" Bribery!
Not if the person paying for the justice is Himself. You miss the beauty of the Trinity here. God Himself in the Son, God the Son pays the penalty for divine justice. The Father does not force the Son as if they are two different gods or beings. The are two persons, but One God. God Himself lovingly and willingly pays the price for justice. "No one takes My life from Me, I lay it down voluntarily on My own authority. I have authority to lay it down and take it up again . . . " John 10:18
You sound like a Muslim here. This is why they generally reject the cross. They feel it was unjust in their understanding. Many Arabs, Iranians, Turks, and other Muslims have said to me over the last 25 years, "You must pay for your own sins; not rely on Jesus to pay for them for you". The reason they reject the cross is because it is foolishness and a scandal -- humans think they have to work and do something to pay for their sins. Maybe that is why RCC has that element of "works-righteousness" in it ? (semi-Pelagianism) (Even though officially denying it)
http://www.the-highway.com/
cross...oss_Packer.html
"The logic of Penal Substitution" by J. I Packer
Good books -- Leon Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross
Google it and buy it and meditate on it. Also
John Stott, the Cross of Christ
Ken,
You said:
" it is the violence and the substitution that "cleanses", not some kind of parallel with a cleansing kind of thing as in soap in water. "
Do you really think that violence cleanses our souls? What sense does that make?
Please read my comments above about whether God must punish someone in order to forgive.
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...6247733/
#161592
and
http://www.haloscan.com/comments...6247733/
#161593
It is never violence that cleanses our souls.
You may be able to make a better case for suffering. But only suffering undergone with love and obedience, never suffering merely undergone. That's why God rejects sacrifices done pridefully and in sin (e.g., Ps. 50-51). Love, not suffering, is primary.
http://www.aplacefortruth.org/cr...org/
creeds7.htm
Explanation of the Council of Orange (529 AD) and its problem and how Semi-pelagianism crept back in through baptism, ex opera operato, and Gregory’s development of the sacraments and penance.
One of the problems with the Council of Orange:
“The reception of grace is so bound to baptism that the sacramental quality of grace and the merit of good works are put in the foreground. "We also believe this to be according to the Catholic faith, that grace having been received in baptism, all who have been baptized, can and ought, by the aid and support of Christ, to perform those things which belong to the salvation of the soul, if they will labor faithfully" (in Latin known as 'ex opera operato') (emphasis mine).
The sharp points of Augustines were blunted and therefore this would lead to a great deal of error during the Medieval period of the Church.
The growth and acceptance of Semi-Pelagianism in the Medieval Church
Gregory the Great- The interpreter of Augustine to the Middle Ages. He is called one of the Doctors of the Latin Church . . .
Gregory's Theology- Augustinian by profession, but with another emphasis than that of Augustine, although the Medieval church would have this teaching interpreted to them as Augustinian. He developed Augustine's ecclesiastical teaching. He held that the number of the elect is fixed, and depends upon God, he had no such interest in predestination as had Augustine. He speaks of predestination as simply divine foreknowledge (prescience). "Man is fettered in Original Sin, the evidence of which is his birth through lust…Man is rescued from this condition by the work of Christ, received in baptism…but sins after baptism must be satisfied…works of merit wrought by God's assisting grace make satisfaction…The good that we do is both of God and of ourselves; of God by prevenient grace, our own by good will following." Penance becomes the cure for sins after baptism (or in the words of Aquinas: "the second plank of salvation for those who have shipwrecked in their faith"). "The church has many helps for him who would seek merit or exercise penance…the greatest is the Lord's Supper, which Gregory viewed as a repetition of the sacrifice of Christ, available for the living and the dead (Fourth Lateran Council-1215: The doctrine of transubstantiation is officially accepted by the Roman Church)…there is also the aid of the saints…Those who trust in no works of their own should run to the protection of the holy martyrs…for those who, while really disciples of Christ, make an insufficient use of these opportunities to achieve works of merit, fail to do penance, or avail themselves inadequately of the helps offered in the church, there remain the purifying fires of purgatory."
RobNY,
there is evil violence and there is holy and just and righteous violence. God ! Exodus 15:3 God is a warrior. Rev. 19:11 Jesus will wage war in righteousness and justice and truth.
Rev. 14:10 The damned are punished forever and ever and it is in the presence of the Lamb (His holy wrathful presence).
Mark 9:48 "where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched".
Yes, hell is justice and violent. God's excecution of sin; the bloody sacrifices are revolting because they are meant to show how bad sin is. It is the sin that caused the anger and justice and holy violence of God to strike the victims.
Both love and justice are together perfectly. God is pure; the cross was horrible and awesome and violent and judged sin; but love and mercy and grace towards sinners.
yes, God's violence is good violence. God's anger and wrath is good and pure and holy. As the girl (Lucy, right?) in Chronicles of Narnia asked about Aslan, "Is he safe?" No, He is not safe . . . but He is good."
Do you really think that violence cleanses our souls? What sense does that make?
Please read my comments above about whether God must punish someone in order to forgive.
That is what Hebrews 9:22 and Lev. 16 -17 (specially 17:11) says -- without the shedding of blood (violence) there is no forgiveness.
Otherwise, why can't God just forgive just like that without any sacrifices at all? That is what the Muslims say, "Allah just decides to forgive when He wills or wants to". It is arbitrary and capricious and without justice or law or principle. That is what your view logically extends out to.
Do you really think that violence cleanses our souls? What sense does that make?
God's holy violence makes perfect sense; not man's sinful violence. That is why God Himself has the death penalty. Genesis 9:6; Romans 13:1-8
Genesis 2:17 "In the day you eat of it, you shall surely die"
Romans 6:23 The wages of sin is death. (execution, death, violence)
That is the whole point of the shedding of blood. The red wine is to remind of the violence the innocent victim went through. When you read Leviticus with all the gory details and sprinkling blood everywhere, can you imagine the stench and gore and entrails ?
A Muslim friend years ago invited me to the feast of Sacrifice in Turkey (1987) -- I almost wretched, threw up because of the smell and violence done to the poor innocent cute lambs, sheep. The writhed and squirmed and I heard bones crunch and tendons snap and blood squirted and then that final breath went out of them. The OT came alive to me; I understood. Genesis 22 also.
Muslims don't know the true meaning of the feast of sacrifice; but it is right there in the Quran. Surah 37:107-108 "We have ransomed you with a mighty sacrifice."
Christ took the violence for us.
I haven't read through all of the comments I've printed out yet, but I think I'm starting to get it...I hope. If we look at the Jewish understanding of the meaning of atonement (as in Day of Atonement), we will understand the Catholic meaning. In other words, the Jewish model is the Catholic model. Am I close?
'God's holy violence'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What a choice of words,
yes, God's violence is good violence. God's anger and wrath is good and pure and holy. As the girl (Lucy, right?) in Chronicles of Narnia asked about Aslan, "Is he safe?" No, He is not safe . . . but He is good."
Absolutely. It is also completely within God's discretion. Otherwise, you made God's mercy unjust (evil).
Matthew 20:11-16
And on receiving it they grumbled at the householder, saying, `These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.' But he replied to one of them, `Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you, and go; I choose to give to this last as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?' So the last will be first, and the first last."
Romans 12:19-21
Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God; for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord." No, "if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head."
John 12:47
If any one hears my sayings and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world.
God can punish or not as He chooses; His divine justice does not restrict His divine freedom. Note the passage from John defeats your interpretation of the Cross, because Christ Himself says that He did not come to judge sin, and His divine will is one with the Father. If Christ were judging the sin of the world in Himself on the Cross, He would have contradicted His own statement that He came not to judge.
"Yes, but how is sin is purged? and how is the soul cleansed? "blood" in sacrificial contexts means "blood-shed to death", "violence", "bloody", "killing", etc. The life is in the blood, Lev. 17 and Hebrews 9:22. It is not just spilling the blood and pouring it out, like a glass of wine or grape juice or baptism in water like a bath; it is the violence and the substitution that "cleanses", not some kind of parallel with a cleansing kind of thing as in soap in water.
But this has nothing to do with violence. It has to do with complete giving. The sacrifice is not intended to show that the soul that sins shall die, but rather to stave off that consequence temporarily. Something is given to God freely, so that God will look favorably on the person and exercise His discretion not to take judgment. It is an appeal to God's free mercy, not a demand on His justice. Indeed, your appeal seems to be identical to the Judaizers (well, I made this sacrifice, and someone has been punished for my sins, so it would be unjust for you to kill me now).
The sacrifice is an appeal to God's mercy, not a demand on His justice, and this is true even of Christ's own sacrifice. In is in that sense, and ONLY that sense, in which the divine wrath is moved to mercy and appeased. St. Anselm's concept of "satisfaction" simply points out that the value of the offer made to appeal to God's mercy must be of equivalent value to what is being asked to avoid insulting the honor of the divine sovereign, asking Him to forgive without having given Him restitution to the wrong done.
The fact that blood is shed to the point of death simply shows the completeness of the giving. And BTW, you aren't dealing with the most relevant passage regarding Jesus being pierced for our transgressions. It wasn't the shedding of blood that killed Jesus, but the blood of the sacrifice was shed AFTER He died, to become "the Blood of the new and everlasting covenant shed for you and for many so that sins may be forgiven." This is what is prophesied by the regard of the one pierced for our transgressions (Isa. 53:5). Thus, the Fathers said "From His side, salvation flowed!"
John 19:32-34
So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him; but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water.
You can't punish a dead man, so if your theory of sacrificial blood-shedding were true, this would not have been the blood-shedding that saved humanity from sins. But the Gospel of John and the prophet Isaiah say it was.
No one has dealt with [Isa. 53:6] -- the iniquity was indeed laid onto Christ by God the Father.
We already said that this was no different than saying that someone is made an offering for sin. Your literal
No one has dealt with [Isa. 53:6] -- the iniquity was indeed laid onto Christ by God the Father.
We already said that this was no different than saying that someone is made an offering for sin. Your literal interpretation of the passage is just as idiosyncratic as your literal interpretation of Jesus "becoming sin" in 2 Cor. There's no linguistic warrant for taking that statement as literally viewing the suffering servant as a sinner. This simply means that the suffering servant "bears" the sins in terms of being offered for them, exactly as I have described. And we can see that the piercing by which He bore our sins was not such a punishment anyway, so your interpretation is clearly unwarranted.
God's holy violence makes perfect sense; not man's sinful violence.
If it can be directed against an innocent man, then it certainly does NOT make sense. All those passages about divine justice in the OT become senseless if directed against innocents.
That is the whole point of the shedding of blood. The red wine is to remind of the violence the innocent victim went through. When you read Leviticus with all the gory details and sprinkling blood everywhere, can you imagine the stench and gore and entrails ?
...
A Muslim friend years ago invited me to the feast of Sacrifice in Turkey (1987) -- I almost wretched, threw up because of the smell and violence done to the poor innocent cute lambs, sheep. The writhed and squirmed and I heard bones crunch and tendons snap and blood squirted and then that final breath went out of them. The OT came alive to me; I understood. Genesis 22 also.
Hey, just because you're more squeamish than a rancher or butcher doesn't mean your sensibilities are reasonable. There's nothing more gruesome there than in the consumption of animals for food, and indeed, it's arguably a lot LESS messy than conventional carnivory if you look at the kosher laws regarding removal of blood.
It's ironic that you cite Genesis 22, because it is God's promise that He won't demand sons as payment. It's odd that you then turn around and take God's divine justice as if it required His son. That's why the sacrifice ultimately has to be a free offering and an appeal to God's mercy.
Regarding the necessity of shedding blood particularly, note especially Hebrews 9 in the context of the ratification of the covenant, and then think about what I said regarding the piercing of the Lord coming AFTER His death. "This is the cup of my Blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant, which will be shed for you and for many so that sins may be forgiven." This is not about the death of the sacrifice as a punishment on the sacrifice.
If you understand the Epistle to the Hebrews, then you *really* understand Catholicism. It's been made a text on justification, but it never was intended that way. Albert Cardinal Vanhoye, arguably the greatest scholar on this Epistle and whose work was first mentioned to me on this very board, has an excellent (and extremely brief) book Our Priest in Christ on what it IS about. I'd recommend anyone trying to understand this concept of offering to take a look at it.
In other words, the Jewish model is the Catholic model.
Very close. The Epistle to the Hebrews outlines the superiority of the Christian covenant to the Jewish covenant, which was a type or shadow. But the concepts of "offering" and "holiness" (being cleansed to appear before God) are extremely close.
The Epistle to the Hebrews outlines the superiority of the Christian covenant to the Jewish covenant, which was a type or shadow.
Thanks Jonathan. That helps a lot! I think I should've stuck with learning under Zola Levitt rather than John Calvin!
What a choice of words,
James Morris
You don't see that in the Scriptures? God is a warrior - Exodus 15:3?
Jesus makes war in justice and truth -- Rev. 19:11
Rev. 14:10 -- the unbelievers suffer forever in the presence of the Lamb -- ??
another:
The Lord kills and the Lord makes alive" - I Samuel 2:6
all violence is not evil. Executing serial murderers is justice. Genesis 9:6
Common
John 12:47
If any one hears my sayings and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world.
You left out verse 48; and John 3:18 "he who has not believed has been judged already"
I think I should've stuck with learning under Zola Levitt rather than John Calvin!
... or Roy Schoeman, Marty Barrack, or Scott Hahn, all of whom have examined this area from the Catholic perspective.
If you're interested in the Jewish-Catholic connection, you might want to give Hahn's A Father Who Keeps His Promises and The Lamb's Supper: The Mass as Heaven on Earth a look.
You left out verse 48; and John 3:18 "he who has not believed has been judged already"
Only because the post was becoming too long, and I didn't want to pile on.
John 3:47-50
If any one hears my sayings and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. He who rejects me and does not receive my sayings has a judge; the word that I have spoken will be his judge on the last day. For I have not spoken on my own authority; the Father who sent me has himself given me commandment what to say and what to speak. And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has bidden me."
Just as I said, the divine will is not to judge sins on the Cross but to open the path to eternal life and to thereby establish the standard against which sins are judged, the divine judgment against sin (not sinners or any particular sinner, but sin itself; see Fr. Fitzmyer on Rom. 8:3). As you said, those who reject Christ have condemned themselves (John 3:1, and the Father will judge them on the last day according to this judgment against sin.
This is just digging the hole deeper for you.
Ken,
Drop the "Semi-Pelagian" nonsense, hop off your usual hobby horse about "work righteousness," and stick to the point: penal substitution.
Your'e trying to change the subject. You also repeat your irrelevant verses and ignore the responses we have already made. This is getting tedious.
And don't drag the Muslims into this. They are right to reject your notion that God has to be paid to forgive sins, which is nonsense. Once again for the slower students, repeat after me: A sin, like a debt, CANNOT be forgiven and paid at the same time.
If I owed Bill $5 dollars, and Jack paid Bill for me, who would be such an idiot as to say that Bill forgave me the debt? The same is true with the Father. If Jesus paid Him the debt we owed Him, then the Father did NOT forgive us.
And yet Jesus teaches us to pray to God that He forgive us: "Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." So anyone who says that God is paid for our sins is calling Jesus a liar.
NO PAYMENT WAS MADE TO THE FATHER.
You gutted the gospel with this paragraph. (at bottom) Christ died for our sins; I Cor. 15:3, etc.
Yes, there is pure love and complete giving, etc. But you leave out half of the work of atonement. Love means nothing unless you understand God's hatred of sin and justice. Grace means nothing unless the law drives you to cling to Christ; being our school-master/tutor who leads us to Christ. Galatians 3:24
Kim, I don't see how you can be persuaded by the RCC position. Pure love and Pure justice together on the cross is more attractive and beautiful. Truth is beautiful. Remember, the Jews are embarrassed by Isaiah 53 and Daniel 9:24-27 also -- the Messiah is first "cut off" (see Isaiah 53:8.) and then the temple is destroyed. This is the "finishing of transgression", "making an end of sin", "making atonement for iniquity", etc.
Stan Telchin, a Messianic Jew writes of his experience and shows how Daniel 9 was one of the things that convinced him, -- it proves Messiah came before 70 AD, the destruction of the Temple by Titus. That was fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.
"Betrayed" by Stan Telchin, Chosen books, (division of Baker), 1981. He also some powerful messages on D. James Kennedy's programs, Truths that Transform. Do a google and search for the materials.
Only the late Rabbinic and rejection of Christ fits in with the RCC atonement view; not the true Biblical view, a combination of Satisfying Justice and Pure Love.
The fact that blood is shed to the point of death simply shows the completeness of the giving. And BTW, you aren't dealing with the most relevant passage regarding Jesus being pierced for our transgressions. It wasn't the shedding of blood that killed Jesus, but the blood of the sacrifice was shed AFTER He died, to become "the Blood of the new and everlasting covenant shed for you and for many so that sins may be forgiven." This is what is prophesied by the regard of the one pierced for our transgressions (Isa. 53:5). Thus, the Fathers said "From His side, salvation flowed!"
Jonathan Prejean
Zola would have agreed with me and Calvin.
Adoman,
Adding the issue of the Council of Orange and Semi-pelagianism shows why you have those tendencies in RCC toward "works-righteousness" and legalism because without the sufficient and full atonement of both satisfaction of justice/appeasement of wrath AND pure love and sacrifice and suffering, etc.; humans and your Church will always be adding to the finished work of Christ, which is what penance and the mass and transubstantiation and the repetition of the presentation of the sacrifice and infant baptism does in RCC practice.
Not trying to be offensive or change the subject, but one can see the logical consequences of that defective view of the atonement.
NO PAYMENT WAS MADE TO THE FATHER.
Adomnan
That is what redemption means, "to buy back and to set free". I Cor. 6:19-20 -- "you have been bought with a price". I Peter 1:18-19 redeemed . . . with precious blood, unblemished and spotless"
Ephesians 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood . . .
Rev. 5:6 "purchased for God (very clear here) by Your blood out from every tribe and nation and people and tongue . . .
He is worthy to break the seals and thus unleashing the wrath of God ( 6:1 -- 15:1 "the wrath of God is finished") The Song of Moses -- points back to Exodus 15:3 --God is a warrior and His wrath and justice in judging the Egyptians, killing them and drowning them and judging all the gods of Egypt. Exodus 12:12
Ken: Was not the passover an averting of the judgment of God on the first - born of each household? (Exodus 12)
Adomnan: NO! Of course not. Why should the firstborn of the Jews be judged or punished? They weren't doing anything worthy of punishment and judgment. It was the Pharaoh (and maybe the Egyptians in general) who was guilty.
Tell me, Ken, what did the Jews do in this episode that merited judgment?
Ken: The death angel was the blood shedding angel.
Adomnan: I don't see any blood being shed by the angel in Exodus 12. You made this up. It's irrelevant anyway.
Ken: The substitution of an innocent lamb and the blood on the door posts pointed to the innocent suffering the punishments of the guilty.
Adomnan: So according to you, the firstborn of Israel were the guilty ones, who deserved death and had to have a substitute to be killed in their place. And here I thought it was the Pharaoh. No wonder he was giving them such a hard time, the little blackguards!
Ken: It makes no sense to speak of the expiation and forgiveness aspect without the propitiation/ satisfaction of justice/ appeasement of wrath against sin aspect of the substitutionary sacrifice.
Adomnan: And so when Jesus says we should "forgive our debtors" AS GOD FORGIVES US and that we should forgive 70 times 7, what he means is that we should only forgive if our wrath is appeased or if we're paid back? And don't say that God's forgiveness is different from ours, that he demands payments while we shouldn't. Jesus taught us to pray to the Father: "Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." In other words, we are to forgive in exactly the same way that the Father forgives.
By the way, as I explained earlier (and you ignored), the purpose of the Passover sacrifices was to recall the covenant with Israel, which was founded on a sacrifice, not to punish the lambs or the firstborn (vicariously) or anything like that.
You gutted the gospel with this paragraph. (at bottom) Christ died for our sins; I Cor. 15:3, etc.
I didn't say that Christ didn't die for our sins. I said that you have misunderstood the purpose of the blood-shedding involved, which is how you justified the notion of sacrifice as violence. If sacrifice were violence and punishment, then shedding the blood of a dead man doesn't really make sense, does it? The point is that it isn't the violence of the death that makes death sacrificial. Nor is bloodshed sacrificial only when it leads to death (see, e.g., 1 Pet. 2:24 citing Isa. 53:5 and referring to the healing quality of the entire Passion, including the scourging at the pillar). The problem is that you have equated the purpose of bloodshed with the death of the sacrifice, and in Christ's case, the relevant shedding of blood came after His death.
I don't see any blood being shed by the angel in Exodus 12.
It is implied by "The Lord struck them" - judgment - Psalm 105 and 135 also.
You are trying to force God to say more that He already has there. The substitution and vicariousness of the lambs and the slaughter of htem is enough to show this.
He will fill them with corpses -- Psalm 110:6 and the whole Psalm, a Messianic Psalm.
Rev. 19 -- at the second coming and final judgment -- it is war and killing and wrath (verse 15, sword, the fierce wrath of God) -- results in carnage and calls it "the supper of God" - calls the birds to come and eat the flesh of the dead bodies -- the wicked and the false prophet and the beast are seized and thrown into the lake of fire.
Amazing that you don't see all this all over the place from Genesis 3 and the shedding of blood to provide skins for clothes for Adam and Eve to the end of Revelation. Amazing
Adomnan: Secondly, God's justice or righteousness is free, gratuitous. Nothing has to be paid for it. What would you call paying a judge for "justice?" Bribery!
Ken: Not if the person paying for the justice is Himself.
Adomnan: Oh, now I get it. It goes like this: Joe did me wrong. I punish myself for Joe's wrongdoing and now Joe is off the hook. Hm. That's makes a lot of sense, doesn't it? Yep. That's "justice" all right. Clear as mud.
Ken: You miss the beauty of the Trinity here. God Himself in the Son, God the Son pays the penalty for divine justice.
Adomnan: The "beauty of the Trinity" doesn't consist in the Father using the Son as a whipping boy because He's angry and He has to take it out on someone, innocent or guilty, doesn't really matter whom. Sounds like the Father needs anger management and the Son is an abused child and maybe an enabler.
If you have children, I'm sure you don't treat them this way. Why should you be a better father than God the Father?
Look at the Lord's prayer again in Matthew 6 and compare with Ephesians 4:32, etc. Yes, all those things are true in the sense that we can forgive, because God forgave us first at the cross in Christ; and that includes the payment to justice. My sin put Christ on the cross, and so I am no better than others, therefore I can forgive.
Anyway, no more time for this. Got to get back to work.
That is what redemption means, "to buy back and to set free". I Cor. 6:19-20 -- "you have been bought with a price". I Peter 1:18-19 redeemed . . . with precious blood, unblemished and spotless"
Ephesians 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood . . .
But we weren't redeemed under justice, but mercy. That's the entire problem with your view of the atonement. You think Christians are "bought and paid for" in the sense that Christ's sacrifice had "paid off" divine justice so that Christians are no longer liable to judgment. But that's not what the payment means; it has simply successfully provoked God's mercy, a mercy that God is entirely within His power to revoke.
That's why St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas taught the distinction between predestination to grace and predestination to glory: you could receive mercy and then have it taken from you for sin. We continue to be in the need of God's mercy, even *after* we have been bought and paid for. Being adopted sons doesn't mean that you can't be disowned from the inheritance that is waiting for you, and if you are disowned, then being marked with having received grace only redounds to a more severe judgment. Because we were saved by mercy in the first place, we have to continually pray for that mercy to save us to the end from judgment according to our deeds.
That's what the rejection of Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism means. It doesn't mean that human action is irrelevant to salvation or that God does all the operating. It means that there is no time that human nature can be saved to the point where it is not dependent on God's mercy. Reformed theology is perfect Pelagianism, because it means that when someone is saved, they no longer need mercy to avoid judgment, which is exactly the opposite of what St. Augustine taught.
the Father using the Son as a whipping boy because He's angry and He has to take it out on someone, innocent or guilty, doesn't really matter whom. Sounds like the Father needs anger management and the Son is an abused child and maybe an enabler.
If you have children, I'm sure you don't treat them this way. Why should you be a better father than God the Father?
Adomnan |
One final comment on all that -- you are using emotional and abusive language and drawing conclusions that are no where in the doctrine of the atonement of satisfying the wrath of God. It is offensive and unfair.
Obviously, all other Scripture regarding family relationships, children etc. is a different context that the work of Christ on the cross.
You miss the beauty of the Trinity here. God Himself in the Son, God the Son pays the penalty for divine justice.
That actually makes it worse. Condemning an innocent man would be a monstrosity, but condemning the Son of God would be the worst possible injustice.
One final comment on all that -- you are using emotional and abusive language and drawing conclusions that are no where in the doctrine of the atonement of satisfying the wrath of God. It is offensive and unfair.
Sorry, Rev. Temple, but this language is exactly accurate. There is a clear theological reason for the analogical term Father being applied to the First Person of the Trinity, and it is to invoke the very similarities that Adomnan mentions. Indeed, Jesus Himself does this in the context of divine mercy: "What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!" (Luke 11:11-13). The context of sparing children is itself in Genesis 22, which you yourself cited.
This isn't about an emotional appeal but a rational and a Biblical one.
Adomnan: NO PAYMENT WAS MADE TO THE FATHER.
Ken: That is what redemption means, "to buy back and to set free". I Cor. 6:19-20 -- "you have been bought with a price". I Peter 1:18-19 redeemed . . . with precious blood, unblemished and spotless"
Adomnan: Oh! And here I thought all along that Christ redeemed us from sin and death, but it turns out, according to you that he redeemed us from the Father! And he set us free from the Father to boot.
I repeat: NO PAYMENT WAS MADE TO THE FATHER.
Ken: Ephesians 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood . . .
Adomnan: Redemption from sin and death, not from the Father.
Ken: Rev. 5:6 "purchased for God (very clear here)
Adomnan: Yes, you're right. Very clear. We're purchased FOR God, not FROM God.
Ken: He is worthy to break the seals and thus unleashing the wrath of God ( 6:1 -- 15:1 "the wrath of God is finished") The Song of Moses -- points back to Exodus 15:3 --God is a warrior and His wrath and justice in judging the Egyptians, killing them and drowning them and judging all the gods of Egypt. Exodus 12:12
Adomnan: You're repeating yourself, Ken. Well, at least you now have God judging the Egyptians. A few postings ago He had to be appeased so as not to judge the Israelites!
This is progress.
Ken: One final comment on all that -- you are using emotional and abusive language and drawing conclusions that are no where in the doctrine of the atonement of satisfying the wrath of God. It is offensive and unfair.
Adomnan: Is that so? So nowhere does your doctrine of the atonement say that the Father punishes and "pours His wrath out" on the Son? You call this "beautiful," which is an emotional statement. I call it "ugly." I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Ken: Obviously, all other Scripture regarding family relationships, children etc. is a different context that the work of Christ on the cross.
Adomnan: So God as a Father is not a model for all fathers? Why do we even call Him Father then? Why did Jesus call Him Father? Was he just shooting the breeze?
Ken,
To answer your question: I'm not a missionary, just an ordinary Catholic laymen who thinks YOU are a Pelagian.
Adomnan: I don't see any blood being shed by the angel in Exodus 12.
Ken: It is implied by "The Lord struck them" - judgment - Psalm 105 and 135 also.
Adomnan: You can strike someone dead without drawing blood. The psalms you cite don't speak of blood either.
Ken: You are trying to force God to say more that He already has there. The substitution and vicariousness of the lambs and the slaughter of htem is enough to show this.
Adomnan: To show what? That the firstborn had to be redeemed from guilt or be punished? I don't think so.
Ken: He will fill them with corpses -- Psalm 110:6 and the whole Psalm, a Messianic Psalm.
Adomnan: Talking about the firstborn of the Israelites here? I don't think so.
Ken: Rev. 19 -- at the second coming and final judgment -- it is war and killing and wrath (verse 15, sword, the fierce wrath of God) --, blah, blah, blah.
Adomnan: And how exactly does this prove that the firstborn of the Israelites were guilty and deserving of punishment?
Ken: Amazing that you don't see all this all over the place from Genesis 3 and the shedding of blood to provide skins for clothes for Adam and Eve to the end of Revelation. Amazing
Adomnan: See what? That the firstborn of the Israelites are guilty, just like Pharaoh? That IS what we're discussing here, you know.
What is truly amazing is that you don't see that you're reading your kooky penal substitution theory into the Bible, when it obviously isn't there.
Ken:Look at the Lord's prayer again in Matthew 6 and compare with Ephesians 4:32, etc.
Adomnan: The Lord's Prayer and Eph 4:32 say the same thing; namely, to quote Eph, "Forgive each as God forgave you." Note it says "as," not "because." In other words, our forgiveness is supposed to be like God's: gratuitous, no payment.
Besides, the idea of forgiving and getting paid off are contradictory notions. A debt cannot be forgiven and paid at the same time. To say a debt is forgiven is to say, necessarily, that it is NOT paid. Ken, this is simple logic; there's nothing complicated about it.
Ken: Yes, all those things are true in the sense that we can forgive, because God forgave us first at the cross in Christ;
Adomnan: But the texts don't say "because." The King James Version says "even as" God forgave us in Christ.
At any rate, even if we could say that we forgive someone because God forgave us in Christ, that in no ways implies that God is paid to forgive, which is a contradiction.
Ken: and that includes the payment to justice. My sin put Christ on the cross, and so I am no better than others, therefore I can forgive.
Adomnan: And so if you were better than others, you couldn't forgive?
Adomnan,
I like where you are going... please don't stop...
IC XC
Cearnaigh
JP and Adomnan-- great responses. I think I was starting to get lost with the track with where it's going. Lots of excellent and appropo Scripture quotes.
-Rob
Dave,
What happened to your article with the Monkeys about James White and Steve Gregg's debate?
If you're interested in the Jewish-Catholic connection, you might want to give Hahn's A Father Who Keeps His Promises and The Lamb's Supper: The Mass as Heaven on Earth a look.
Thanks for the reading tips, Jonathan. I do love to listen to Scott Hahn on his Letter and Spirit show. I try to catch it every week.
I'll keep the others in mind in my reading selections, as well. Btw, I was only half serious about Zola. He helped me to see many things of the faith through Jewish eyes, and I'm grateful for it. But I don't subscribe to everything he taught, only because I'm unsure about his eschatology. That's a whole 'nother bucket of worms of which I'll leave the lid on for now.
Cearnaigh and Rob,
We may be coming to the end of this long and fascinating thread. My interest is beginning to flag. Ken is repeating himself. Jonathan and the others are doing a great job of defending the Catholic truth about the atonement. I think almost everything that needs to be said has been said.
But I'll be back if claims are advanced that cannot go unchallenged.
I am preparing a response to the article that Ken linked above. I am 90% done writing it and hope to post it later tonight.
You repeated yourselves also and did not refute anything for Propitiation -- the Satisfaction of God's Justice, His Wrath against sin was paid for at the Cross -- both love and justice met together perfectly.
Jonathan was absolutely refuted by saying shockingly that the cross was not a judgment on sin. All of Scripture that I gave refuted that position and all you do is say, "You are just quoting Scripture", etc.
Galatians 3:13 -- He became a curse for us -- He took on the judgement, penalty, punishment, wrath
Ephesians 2:15-16 "by abolishing in His flesh the enmity . . . through the cross He put to death the enmity . . . "
Colossians 2:14 'having nailed it to the cross" (the hostility/wrath of God against sin/judgment of laws/justice
Ken,
I must say that, even though I disagree with your position (which almost seems blasphemous), nevertheless, I must admit that I do very much admire you for your passion and your forthrightness. Whatever you do, dear friend, do stay on fire! At the very least, it keeps people like me on our toes. And pray, pray for me. And know that the Good God will supply.
Now, one of the big problems here, as I see it, is that of interpretation. You, of course, are following Calvin’s (IMHO, wretched) interpretation. But surely you would agree that nothing - absolutely nothing - Calvin ever said or taught could in any way bind men's consciences.
How then, are we to resolve this and other theological questions? So glad you ask. The answer, of course, is what it has always been from the time of the apostles - we must follow the teaching of the Church! Ah, but you will say, the Church has erred, has strayed, has introduced new doctrines. Heaven forbid!
No, the Church, for the umpteenth thousand time, has not and cannot err! But you, you my friend, prefer (or are compelled) to follow Calvin in his rage against the Lord’s Church. But hear, now, what the holy Pacian of Barcelona says of the Church. Hear this holy and saintly Father. Listen to him. Let his words sink deeply into your soul.
“’The Church is a holy virgin with the purest feelings, the spouse of Christ.” A virgin, it is true, but also a mother. A spouse, it is clear, but also a wife and mate, ‘taken from here husband (Gen. 2:23), and for that reason, ‘bone of his bones, and flesh of his flesh’ (Gen 2:23 cf. Eph 5:30). For about her, David says, ‘Your wife [shall be] like a fruitful vine on the walls of your house; your children like the young olive branches around your table’ (Ps. 128.3). Abundant, therefore, is the progeny of this virgin, and without number are her offspring, by which the whole world is filled, by which the populous colony invariably swarms the encircled hives. Great is the care of that mother for here children, and tender is her affection. The good are honored, the haughty are chastised, the sick are cared for; no one perishes, no one is despised, the young are kept safe under the indulgent protection or the mother.” - from vol. 99, p. 43, Fathers of the Church, Letter 3:4:3
Iberian Fathers: Pacian of Barcelona and Orosius of Braga. Series: Fathers of the Church, A New Translation, vol. III/99, tr. Craig L. Hanson, Catholic University of America, 1999. ISBN 0813200997
http://books.google.com/books?hl...F-8&sa=N&
tab=wp
http://thumbsnap.com/v/JlXgnzzP.jpg
I just found some additional works of the Fathers online. Included is the above letter 3 of Pacian.
http://www.tertullian.org/
father...ndex.htm#Pacian
All of Scripture that I gave refuted that position and all you do is say, "You are just quoting Scripture", etc.
Galatians 3:13 -- He became a curse for us -- He took on the judgement, penalty, punishment, wrath
Ephesians 2:15-16 "by abolishing in His flesh the enmity . . . through the cross He put to death the enmity . . . "
Colossians 2:14 'having nailed it to the cross" (the hostility/wrath of God against sin/judgment of laws/justice
But then, as now, you didn't quote Scripture. You paraphrased it. "Becoming a curse for us" doesn't entail suffering the judgment, penalty, punishment, or wrath. That is not necessary for the curse to be removed, so the words you added can't be found in the passage. Neither does abolishing the enmity in His flesh or through the Cross. Neither does nailing the decree against us to the cross.
You are basically saying that the only way Jesus's death on the Cross could have done these things if he suffered the punishment. But that is simply assuming what you believe, which the passages themselves don't say. Quoting Scripture is not the problem; it's quoting Scripture to show more than it says that is pointless.
I understand that it must be frightening to think this way, to realize that what you saw in Scriptures all this time simply wasn't there. But where are the passages that say Christ was punished or suffered God's wrath? There aren't any, or at least I've never seen them. I think Adomnan has a point that flailing about won't do much. Find a passage that says what you are saying, not one that you have to paraphrase.
Besides, there's a very clear passage of Scripture on what being "pierced for our transgressions" is (John 19:32-37), and it's very clear that the bloodshed in that passage is not punishment, since it occurs after Christ's death. You might start with explaining the passage that has already been quoted.
Ken cites: Galatians 3:13 -- He became a curse for us -- He took on the judgement, penalty, punishment, wrath
Adomnan: Paul is talking about the curse of the Jewish Law here. Gal 3:10 says: "So as many that are of the works of the Jewish Law are under a curse." The works of the Jewish Law are circumcision, first of all, and other Jewish observances. We Christians do not come under the Jewish Law and so we are not under a curse. In fact, no Gentiles are under this curse.
Paul goes on to say in the verse you quoted, "Christ redeemed us from the (Jewish) Law," making it unnecessary that any Gentile (or Jew for that matter) follow the Law anymore. He did this by becoming not what God calls a curse, but WHAT THE LAW CALLS A CURSE. And he is a curse only in the sense that he was hanged, any hanged person being a curse on the land under the Law, whether that person deserved hanging or not. Jesus is not cursed by God; He is a "curse" as a hanged man according to the Law. That's why Paul writes, "He became a curse for us." (Gal 3:13)
And notice how Paul puts distance between God and the Law in Gal 3:20 by pointing out that Law was given through intermediaries, while the promise comes directly from God. The curse that Christ bears is the curse of the Law, not the curse of God. That's Paul's whole point in this passage. By becoming what the Law calls a curse, Christ abolishes the Law.
Ken cites: Ephesians 2:15-16 "by abolishing in His flesh the enmity . . . through the cross He put to death the enmity . . . "
Adomnan: The enmity here is not an enmity between us and God, as you suggest, but an enmity between Jews and Gentiles, caused by the Law, which Christ has now abolished, ending the enmity.
So this verse has no conceivable connection to your theories about penal substitution.
Ken cites: Colossians 2:14 'having nailed it to the cross" (the hostility/wrath of God against sin/judgment of laws/justice
Adomnan: Same as in Ephesians and Galatians. What is nailed to the cross is "the document containing ordinances that was against us," in other words the Jewish Law, not any "wrath or hostility of God." Christ's sacrifice abolished the Law by inaugurating a new covenant. He nailed it to the cross. so to speak. And you can't say that it is Christ who is depicted as nailed to the cross in this passage (and so somehow identified with the document), since He is the one who does the nailing. It is the cross as triumph.
Quoting Scripture is not the problem; it's quoting Scripture to show more than it says that is pointless.
Well, as we used to say back in my hippie days (ha, I’m showing my age [52]!), right on , Jonathan, right on!
To put it another way, dead on, Jonathan, dead on! If only our beloved (though sometimes maddening as hell) Protestant friends could only see this. If only.
Now, maybe I’m operating in some kind of parallel universe, but here goes anyway.
This problem of private interpretation is as old as Christianity itself. The Fathers, as I'm sure we're all aware, did mortal combat with innumerable heretics who espoused their own private interpretations.
Augustine, I’m sad to report, become an embittered and, quite frankly, less than edifying old man in his later writings because of such people, particularly the Pelagians (dear God, what that poor saintly man had to endure! But more about this later).
Anyway, we know that in the 16th century, self assertion and “the pride of heretics”(Augustine) reached a fever pitch, and, quite frankly, has even yet to abate. And this has been nothing short of ruinous. I mean, what do you call an idea, a teaching, which has had a 100% failure rate? And baby, when I say 100%, I mean just that - 100%!
Now, you know, anyone familiar with aviation will tell you that, when an aircraft is stalled, the worst possible thing is to keep adding more “back stick.” This will only exacerbate the situation. To get the aircraft “flying” again, the pilot must “let go of the stick.”
Now sure, so long as you are at altitude, and know what you are doing, you can stall (almost) any kite (be it a Cessna 150 or an F-16) to your heart’s content. No prob.
However, if you allow your altitude to dwindle, at some point, you’re going to need to react - and react fast (I speak from experience!).
Now the Protestant “flying machine” has, as it were, been “stalled” ever since it tried to fly on its own in back in the 16th century. The only reason it hasn’t yet struck the ground and killed all souls on board is because it has had, as it were, the tremendous “altitude” of the Church (with her holy Fathers, martyrs, saints, Doctors, Sacred Mysteries, centuries of experience etc.) to begin with.
But that “altitude” has been steadily decreasing ever since the 16th century.
The frantic instructor (the Church) has repeatedly begged, pleaded, warned, even ordered these “pilots” (Protestant pastors and theologians) to - - “let go of the stick, let go of the stick!” i.e. “let go of your pride, let go of your pride.” But to no avail.
Of course, at 40, 000 ft, the danger seemed remote to them. So too, at 30,000 ft and even at 20,000 and on down to 10,000 ft. But as time went by and "altitude" dwindled, even the most benighted of Protestant “pilots” began to discern the rapidity with which their flying machine was loosing altitude (doctrine), and how quickly the ground (of error and apostasy)
was rushing up. Yet despite this obvious fact, many remain as committed as ever to the notion that they can still fly without the wings (of Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium ), without the help from their instructor (The Church, founded by Christ). Thus they continued to abuse the fragile wings of Sacred Scripture. Their unwary passengers (their congregations) needless to say, were never to be informed of the danger ( i. e., the degree to which their teachers and pastors had diverged from the Fathers).
But now (in the morning of the 21st century), it is beginning to dawn, even on the most hardened Pilots of the Protestant flying machine, just how quickly the ground (of their folly) is rushing up to meet them. Yet, incredibly, many still remain obstinate and continue to pull back (as if possessed) even harder than ever on the “stick” (of error). Thus their wings (of bible alone ) remain, as they ever have, completely unable to generate the lift (of truth, unity and love). As a result, they now find themselves in very real and imminent danger of impact (with total apostasy and total error).
If only they would “let go of the stick (of pride).” If only they would “let go of the stick (of pride).”
I think JP and Adomnan do a good job of putting the Scriptures in context.. Like Ben, I greatly admire Ken's forthrightness and zeal. But I think that perhaps his zeal is not discerning.
As Adomnan showed... the Scriptural texts have been wrenched from their meaning.
Especially Colossians 2:14, which he quotes against us. In full quotation, the verse says:
"obliterating the bond against us, with its legal claims, which was opposed to us, he also removed it from our midst, nailing it to the cross;"
And it is quite clear that it is the bond... what bond? The bond "with its legal claims." And *that* was nailed to the cross. With all due respect to Ken, the Scriptures must be treated according to their integrity.
I think I understand why the penal substitution theory is so appealing. Especially the way that the link Ken gave worded it... "the logic of penal substitution." The 'logic' seems to suggest a grasping for an understanding of the mystery which reveals its necessity. But this is wrongheaded. There is no necessity in the Incarnation, nor in the passion and Cross of our Savior.
The type of necessity it affords gives some mental comfort, because it puts God into a convenient box. But it's ultimately untrue to revealed truth. The atonement is not some type of trick whereby God obligates Himself to save us. If salvation was necessary, it wouldn't be grace. It is all free. Totally a free gift, precipitated by a totally free giving of Jesus on the Cross.
It's taken me so long to see how wonderful this freedom is, but I think I'm just starting to get it. Understanding it chiefly in terms of a mystery of the purest love chafes our minds because it doesn't explain it in terms of absolute necessity, but it is the only explanation that ultimately makes sense. And I have no idea how to make anyone understand it except to tell them to life the sacramental life of the Church faithfully.
May God enlighten out intellects and fire our hearts with His love.
Ken,
I read the link you gave from respected Reformed Pastor JI Packer. I finished my response (I was up all night) and I posted the article on my webpage.
I HOPE I didnt make any significant errors so if others find any please inform me ASAP.
Here is my article on Penal Substitution:
http://catholicdefense.googlepag....com/
PenSub.htm
Adomnan: Paul is talking about the curse of the Jewish Law here. Gal 3:10 says: "So as many that are of the works of the Jewish
you added the word "Jewish" here to the text. The word is not there in the Greek nor in any English translation that I have. Not in NASB, nor NIV, nor NKJV. Of course, it is Jewish law, but the Jewish law is God's law! At the cross Christ fullfilled the ceremonial law and the civil law of Israel, but also took away the punishment of the violations of the moral law. Paul just calls the whole law, "the Law". The curses in Deut. that Paul is quoting from are the judgements for disobedience, all of them are moral laws, all based on the 10 commandments. Deut. 27:9-27
Furthermore, God almost killed Moses for not circumcising his son -- Exodus 4:24 - ". . . The LORD met him and sought to put him to death." Zipporah "saved" him by circumcising their son. All of the Jewish law was God's law. Because Christ took the curse, the punishment, of all the law, those who are justified by faith don't go to hell; the eternal punishment, or curse.
Law are under a curse." The works of the Jewish Law are circumcision, first of all, and other Jewish observances. We Christians do not come under the Jewish Law and so we are not under a curse. In fact, no Gentiles are under this curse.
Yes, because Christ paid the price and took the curse upon Himself; of all the law. The law was fullfilled in Christ. Amazing that you guys don't see this.
He did this by becoming not what God calls a curse, but WHAT THE LAW CALLS A CURSE.
If the Law said it, then God said it. The Law was Jewish law, yes, but it was also God's law.
The stuff you wrote about the hostility between Jew and Gentile and the hostility are basically true, but you have go deeper than that in those contexts. (Ephesians 2 and Colossians 2) The reason there is hostility between peoples and cultures is because there is hostility with God first. All are sinners and under the wrath of God. (John 3:36; Ephesians 2:1-3) The main hostility is the war that we all, Jews and Gentiles have with God. And God has hostility towards our sin. What makes peace and us one in Christ is realizing we are not better than anyone; and when all realise they are sinners and that racism, hatred, etc. is wrong, and we come to the cross of Christ and repent and put our trust in Him, we are justified and have peace with God. (Romans 5:1) Christ made the peace with God first at the cross by extinquishing the hostility between God and man first. ( He propitiated God and reconciled us to God.) Those commandments and decrees, the dividing wall of hostility was broken down because all of the law was fulfilled in Christ. Ephesians 2:11-22 There is unity in the body of Christ between all cultures because Christ made peace so we are all equal, realizing we are all sinners and need peace with God. Christ fulfilled all the law. Matthew 5:17, Romans 3:27-31
Colossians 2:13-17 -- "having forgiven us all our transgressions". All includes everything, not just the Jewish cultural distinctions and barriers with the Gentiles about food and entering the temple and circumcision and feasts and Sabbath days, etc. Because Christ fullfilled all the judgment of the law, cultures can be one and love each other in the church. We are not under law, means we are not under the law as a principle of gaining salvation or grace or the love of God, which the Pharisees and others (and all humans who are Pelagian by nature) wrongly try to do. (salvation by human effort and doing ceremonies). We are not under the condemnation of the law. Romans 8:1 Condemnation is God's judgment.
RobNY wrote:
There is no necessity in the Incarnation,
"Therefore, He had to be (Greek: opheilen, "was obligated") make like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people" Hebrews 2:17
"For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendant of Abraham."
Hebrews 2:16
God was not obligated to save us, that is true, He could have let us all go to hell, and that would be justice pure and holy. But in order to save us, He had to become flesh; that is why the fallen angels cannot be redeemed, because Christ did not become like them; rather He became flesh and so the incarnation is part of our salvation.
nor in the passion and Cross of our Savior. The context of Hebrews 2 and the priestly work of Christ on the cross etc. and on through chapters 7-10 all show the connection from chapter 2 on the incarnation to the passion; so they are connected and there is no need to type all the verses out. Yes, it was all free grace and love and God's decision, but in order to accomplish what was necessary, to save us from justice (judgment, hell, the curse, the wrath of God); Christ was obligated to do become flesh and suffer for our sins. God is consistent and follows His own nature and rules.
The type of necessity it affords gives some mental comfort, because it puts God into a convenient box. But it's ultimately untrue to revealed truth. The atonement is not some type of trick whereby God obligates Himself to save us.
I agree that God was not obligated to save us; but IF God wills to save, then He followed His own rules, based on His holy nature. This makes the doctrine of the atonement so wonderful. God preserved His justice and holiness and also poured out His love for sinners. Amazing love, amazing Grace, and amazing truth and holiness.
If salvation was necessary, it wouldn't be grace. It is all free.
True, it was not necessary, but in order to save us; the incarnation and the cross was necessary. Do you see the difference?
BenM,
Thanks for your kind words and efforts in the conversation. However, on this issue, the RCC got it completely wrong.
ad fontes! Back to the sources, the Scriptures!
Sola Scriptura! rocks and rules because God rocks and rules, Scripture being His infallible word.
Ken,
I, for my part, see nothing just or beautiful or holy about God murdering Christ (His 'only begotten Son') to exact some kind of blood 'payment' for the sins of the elect...
"He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous, Both of them alike are an abomination to the LORD." [Proverbs 17:15 - NASB]
There is nothing beautiful about slaughtering Christ to exact a payment. Where is the 'grace' in that 'gift'?
If you don't like me quoting Proverbs about this... tell me what's wrong with the morality of this verse of Holy Scripture... ad fontes, indeed.
Cearnaigh
Ken,
I am willing to debate the issue of Sola Scriptura with you, if you'd like.
I have a pair of questions for you...
Am I wrong to deny that the Bible *asserts* the *concept* that the Scriptures are the sole [infallible] rule of faith for the Church? If, yes... can you show me exegetical proof of the scriptural *assertion* of said *concept*?
HINT: Citing verses that as proof when your arguments already assume SS is unhelpful here... and I won't let you get away with it.
I am denying that the concept is asserted ANYWHERE in the Bible. If you can show me that it is, in fact, asserted... I will leave the Catholic Church TODAY. Deal?
When did SS become the law for the Church? After "inscripturation" - like James White says - or at some other point? Does the Bible tell us about this blessed event?
I await your response...
Cearnaigh
However, on this issue, the RCC got it completely wrong.
Please give evidence that you come with the LORD's authority to tell me this. There are many like you who have come to me and have said what you have written above and I can attest to the fact that they do not agree with you or each other. Give evidence that you come in the name of the LORD to correct this Catholic error?
Ken,
I think I was being unclear. I was speaking about the necessity of salvation or not, and you are right to point out the question of the necessity of the means to the end. Quite clearly the end is not necessitated, but supposing that God freely choses the end, is the means to the end necessitated?
Taking as our absolute starting point God's omnipotence, we must answer that God is not in fact constrained by *absolute* necessity is the means to the end of saving us. Either we deny God's omnipotence or we deny the *absolute* necessity of this.
But, we can still talk of necessity in another way. Thomas Aquinas discusses this, and I think I agree with him. There's necessity in two senses. One is necessity as it pertains to absolute necessity. The other is necessity meaning, the necessity of the best possible way.
He gives a rather interesting syllogism:
"Since the Word of God is perfect God, no power was added to Him by the assumption of flesh. Therefore, if the Incarnate Word restored human nature, He could also have restored it without assuming flesh." (III, 1, 2)
But, Thomas does argue that the Incarnation was necessary in another sense.
Hence, he answers that:
"A thing is said to be necessary for a certain end in two ways. First, when the end cannot be without it; as food is necessary for the preservation of human life. Secondly, when the end is attained better and more conveniently, as a horse is necessary for a journey. In the first way it was not necessary that God should become incarnate for the restoration of human nature. For God with His omnipotent power could have restored human nature in many other ways. But in the second way it was necessary that God should become incarnate for the restoration of human nature. Hence Augustine says (De Trin. xii, 10): "We shall also show that other ways were not wanting to God, to Whose power all things are equally subject; but that there was not a more fitting way of healing our misery."
And he enumerates many, many reason why the Incarnation was necessary in this sense.
You can read it here:
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4...umma/
4001.htm#2
So I don't disagree that it "was necessary," but I disagree with the sense in which it is taken, for I wish to respect God's omnipotence.
-Rob
Cearnaigh,
Thanks for bringing up Proverbs 17:15 – excellent ! That is a juicy medium- rare sirlion steak!
Romans 4:5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly , his faith is accounted for righteousness.” (New King James Version)
Since Romans 4:5 says that God does justify the ungodly, but Proverbs 17:15 says that when humans do it, it is sin and an abomination; there must be some way for God to do this without a contradiction and without impugning His divine nature and character.
God can justify the ungodly because of the cross; but humans cannot justify the ungodly. I Peter 3:18 “. . . the just for the unjust . . . “
That is why the cross is both justice and love. You are focusing only on the injustice of it from the point of view that the wicked men who put Jesus on the cross perpetrated the greatest evil ever, and they did. You are then paralleling that with God, that if God the Father planned it and allowed Jesus to pay the penalty for sin, you are saying that is somehow equal to the sinfulness of Judas, Annas, Caiaphas, the elders and chief priests, Herod, and Pilate; and somehow equal to cosmic child abuse, etc..
You are not allowing God to be God in the fellowship of the Trinity.
No, this points to the problem with the RCC system; it is unbiblical. God is both holy and just and He can enter into creation and pay the penalty if He wants to. There is no injustice with God! Romans 9:14 God the Son can and did do it. It was voluntary and love and justice at the same time.
Adomnan: Paul does quote the Torah as saying that those who are under the Law and fail to keep it are cursed. But this isn't the "curse" that Christ became. Paul is very specific that Christ is a "curse' only in the sense that he was hanged on the cross and every hanged person is a curse on the land, according to the Law. Paul doesn't say Christ Himself was cursed, he says he became a curse. In any event, He is a curse only in terms of the Law, not in God's eyes. He was the curse who took away the curse.
Ken,
Interesting point...
You wrote:
"Since Romans 4:5 says that God does justify the ungodly, but Proverbs 17:15 says that when humans do it, it is sin and an abomination; there must be some way for God to do this without a contradiction and without impugning His divine nature and character."
What if God doesn't do things the way the Reformed keep insisting that He does...
I await your answer on SS.
Cearnaigh
Ken: Romans 4:5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly , his faith is accounted for righteousness.” (New King James Version)
Since Romans 4:5 says that God does justify the ungodly, but Proverbs 17:15 says that when humans do it, it is sin and an abomination; there must be some way for God to do this without a contradiction and without impugning His divine nature and character.
Adomnan: You've got this completely wrong, Ken. Proverbs 17:15 calls a judge an abomination who justifies the guilty, not the so-called "ungodly." The word translated "ungodly" here (asebes in Greek) does not mean guilty in a judicial sense, or any sense. It means "lacking in proper religious observance." And it refers solely to Abraham when he was a Gentile (i.e., before he was circumcised). Reread the whole passage. You'll see that.
Now, here is the key thing: Abraham was not guilty in God's sight when he was a Gentile. On the contrary, Paul says he was already justified, by faith, not by circumcision. However, Abraham was "asebes" IN THE VIEW OF THE JEWISH LAW, as every Gentile is.
Thus, an accurate interpretation of this verse, one that preserves the meaning without confusion, is "God who justifies the Gentile (Abraham), " before circumcision, not "God who justifies the guilty." Abraham was a Gentile, and so "asebes," non-observant, in terms of the Law. But he was not guilty.
So Romans Rom 4:5 does not conflict with Proverbs 17:15 at all. You are confusing "asebes" with guilty, based on a vague English translation that does not truly capture the meaning of the Greek word. And Proverbs 17:15 still stands: "he who justifies the guilty is an abomination." God does not justify the guilty, although he will certainly justify the Gentile.
Am I wrong to deny that the Bible *asserts* the *concept* that the Scriptures are the sole [infallible] rule of faith for the Church? If, yes... can you show me exegetical proof of the scriptural *assertion* of said *concept*?
I have already debated that subject with many of you over the years here, with Dave A. and many others. You can google me and the subject and there are even some whole articles that DA did on our exchange, on Mary and Athanasius and the early church fathers, etc.. I believe I am right and you believe you are right. You don't accept the Protestant answer and I don't accept your view.
HINT: Citing verses that as proof when your arguments already assume SS is unhelpful here... and I won't let you get away with it.
You already assumed I had lost before I even said anything, so what is the point? You demand a verse from the Bible, but then before I answered, you knocked it down.
2 Timothy 3:15 is about OT
2 Timothy 3:16 expands it to all and includes all the NT books written to that time.
2 Peter 3:16 affirms Paul's letters.
2 Timothy is the last letter Paul wrote.
Peter and Paul were martyred in 64-66 AD? under Nero. So everything, Matthew, Mark, Luke, Acts, and all Paul's letters and Peter's letters, and James since it was written early around the same time as Galatians 48-49 AD.
That leaves Gospel of John, 1-3 John, Revelation, Hebrews, Jude. Hebrews was written before 70 AD, probably 68-69 AD, and bears the qualities of apostolic authority. Tertullian said Barnabas wrote it and I think he was right. Acts 14:4 -14 calls Barnabas an apostle. John is an apostle so all his books are included and a good case can be made that they were also written before 70 AD. Only Jude is left. It says "contend earnestly for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints." All of this points to Sola Scriptura. Jesus said He got His words from the Father and delivered them to the apostles. John 17:8
That is the shortest version without rehashing all the other long (several years of debate) articles on this subject. Jesus did not include Apocrypha in the canon. Luke 24:44, 11:51, and Matthew parallel.
Ken,
I appreciate what you said about SS, but NOTHING in the verses you cited tells me that the Bible asserts that the Scriptures are the sole [infallible] rule of faith... is there a biblical reason (i.e. a biblical citation of the assertion I asked for) you can give me to choose your SS system OVER AND AGAINST the system I currently hold? Just asking...
You can "prove" "Rome" wrong all day long.. that won't make the Bible assert the concept I am asking your to show me is asserted... so... it's sort of a dead end line of argumentation...
I still hope you can offer me more than others have been able to...
Cearnaigh
Adoman,
Ungodly (asebn) and unrighteous or guilty (adikaiou) are synomyms, as are "sinners", "helpless", "enemies" as Romans 5:6-10 shows, which is the followup to Romans 4. You have no point.
Furthermore, we are saved from the wrath of God by being justified by His blood. (His substitutionary atonement for the penalty of sin -- satisfying the justice and wrath of God). verse 9 "justified by His blood". Taken all together, all of Romans 4 through 5:11, your argument fails and the Reformed view of the cross and atonement prevails.
Adomnan,
Thanks for pointing out the grammar issue between Proverbs 17:15 and Romans 4:5.... I was JUST looking at that myself...
You actually introduced me to this topic years ago... after you jumped into a brief discussion I was having (along with some others) with James White.... I still have all the emails you've sent me...
Thanks again!
IC XC
Cearnaigh
Intesting comment from a new aux bishop in Denver James Conley:
I have chosen for my episcopal motto: cor ad cor loquitur which means “heart speaks to heart”. Some of you may recognize that this is the same motto chosen by the great 19th century English convert to the Catholic faith, the Venerable John Henry Cardinal Newman. Cardinal Newman had a huge influence on my own conversion and in my vocation to the priesthood. He continues to be a kind of spiritual mentor to me.
Something tells me he is going to be a good one!
Check in out at
http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/
Adomnan: Paul is talking about the curse of the Jewish Law here. Gal 3:10 says: "So as many that are of the works of the Jewish Law"
Ken: you added the word "Jewish" here to the text.
Adomnan: Yes, because the word Law here means only and specifically the Jewish Law.
Ken: "the word is not there in the Greek nor in any English translation that I have. Not in NASB, nor NIV, nor NKJV. Of course, it is Jewish law, but the Jewish law is God's law!
Adomnan: Okay, then you agree with me it is the Jewish Law. So what's your problem with my translation?
Sure, the Jewish Law is God's law in a sense, but it's not any kind of absolute law. That's why Christ can abolish it. And that's why Paul underscores that the Jewish law came through intermediaries, while God's promise in the Gospel comes directly from God and is absolute.
I think you're trying to confuse the Jewish Law with some kind of absolute divine law or law of right and wrong, as the Reformers did. This is very far from Pau's meaningl
.
Ken: At the cross Christ fullfilled the ceremonial law and the civil law of Israel, but also took away the punishment of the violations of the moral law.
Adomnan: Paul differentiates between the works of the Law (which he sometimes refers to in an abbreviated way as just "works") and the "just requirement" of the Law (Roms 2:26). The whole Law is abolished by Christ, but the "just requirement of the Law" is taken up in what Paul calls the new law of Christ (Gal 6:2), which Christians are indeed "under" and must keep. We are not under the Jewish Law, however. '
Ken: Paul just calls the whole law, "the Law".
Adomnan: Yes, the whole Jewish Law, which is now abolished. However, he differentiates between the "works of the Law," like circumcision, which don't of course justify and the "just requiement" of the Law, which does. That's why he doesn't contradict himself when he says in Roms 3:20 that the works of the Law don't justify, but in Rom 2:13 that "the doers of the Law" will be justified. Evidently, one can be a doer of the Law by fulfilling the just requiement of the Law without doing "the works of the Law" (i.e., circumcision and other Jewish observances).
This is Paul's whole point and his only point on this score.
Ken,
You interpret the verses based on the system you are following... how you see justification in Paul's letters... colors you view of the atonement... of everything...
I think you are wrong on these things... look again at the Hebrew and Greek... there is more to the interpretation of these passages that your favorite lexical definitions, friend... you talked earlier about digging deeper... time to take your own advice...
Cearnaigh
Since "all Scripture is God-breathed" -- 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and sufficient to equip us (v. 17) and all the other points above are true; then it follows that Scripture is infallible, because God is infallible. Everything must be tested by God's standard of truth. Since the Scriptures equip for every good work, to be adequate; then it is sufficient and enough. Even Athanasius recognized this and used a clear word for sufficient.
"For indeed the holy and God-breathed Scriptures are self-sufficient for the preaching of the truth." (Contra Gentiles 1:3)
The Scriptures are enough for instruction . . . Life of Antony 16
But since the Scripture is of all things most sufficient for us . . . " To the Egyptian Bishops (volume 4, p. 225 NPNF)
"for the tokens of truth are more exact as drawn from Scripture, than from other sources " Decretis 32
"Vainly then do they run about with the pretext that they have demanded Councils for the faith's sake; for divine Scripture is sufficient above all things. . . " De Synodis 6
. . . that the man of God may be adequate, fully equipped for every good work." 2 Tim. 3:17 Same concept, sufficient.
The principle is implicit by all the apostles constantly saying, "for it is written" and Jesus challenging the Pharisees, "have you not read what God says to you?" ( Matthew 22:29-31. Jesus held them accountable to the standard of being able to read the Scriptures and listen to the voice of the Spirit in the Scriptures. He did not invoke an ecclesiastical authority to be the final arbiter.
Ken,
Look at how the Hebrew word translated as "ungodly" in the NASB was translated into Greek for the LXX...
Cearnaigh
hint:
akayartov
Ken,
Cribbing quotes from that Webster and King (via White, et al?) gleaned from the Fathers... not helping you make the biblical case for the assertion of SS...
I suggest you try that before you try referencing the 'scholarship' of patristic 'scholars' like Webster and King...
Cearnaigh
Ken: Ungodly (asebn) and unrighteous or guilty (adikaiou) are synomyms,
Adomnan: No they're not. I deny that outright. Why are different words used if the same meaning is always intended? "Elegant variation?" I don't think so. "Asebes" means "not religiouslly observant." It refers specifically to the sphere of religion, piety, ritual. It does not mean "unrighteous" (adikaios) in general.
Ken: as are "sinners", "helpless", "enemies" as Romans 5:6-10 shows, which is the followup to Romans 4. You have no point.
Adomnan: Some exegesis! Just smoosh all the words together into some mishmash and pull whatever you want out of the resultant mess. No thanks, I'll be a bit more careful than that.
And my point, again, for the slower amongst us, is that Abraham ALONE is referred to as "asebes" in this verse and he is only "asebes" or unobservant in the view of the Jewish Law, not in God's sight. That's precisely why Paul can say Abraham is righteous even though he is still a Gentile, uncircumcised (asebes).
I invite anyone to read Romans 4 and discover this for himself. Ignore Ken's hand waving and denial.
Ken: Furthermore, we are saved from the wrath of God by being justified by His blood. (His substitutionary atonement for the penalty of sin -- satisfying the justice and wrath of God).
Adomnan: Your first sentence here is true. Your second sentence is your usual unbiblical gobbledygook, which has been refuted many times.
Ken: verse 9 "justified by His blood". Taken all together, all of Romans 4 through 5:11, your argument fails and the Reformed view of the cross and atonement prevails.
Adomnan: False bravado.
NASB in Proverbs 17:15 is "wicked" and it is "Ton a-dikon” in the LXX.
Ungodly (asebea) is used in Romans 4:5 and 5:6, and in 5:7 he uses words for a “good man” and a “righteous man” ( dikaiou ) the same positive term without the “a” in Proverbs 17:15.
I am unclear what you mean about the Hebrew word behind “ungodly” – ungodly (asebea, asebwn) is the NT word in Romans 4:5 and 5:6.
Adomnan: Some exegesis! Just smoosh all the words together into some mishmash and pull whatever you want out of the resultant mess. No thanks, I'll be a bit more careful than that.
You don't see the flow of argument that Paul is making in Romans 5:6-10? He uses all those words to describe our lost condition, "sinful", weak, helpless, sinners, enemies, ungodly, etc. and contrasts them with the "good man" and "the righteouness" man in Romans 5:7. the unrighteous in Proverbs 17:15 is the "a- dikon", the same thing as ungodly, sinner, weak, helpless, enemy with God. Amazing that you cannot the connection. It is very good exegesis. Yours does not make any sense.
Is Greek one of the other 12 languages that you speak?
Ken: Furthermore, we are saved from the wrath of God by being justified by His blood. (His substitutionary atonement for the penalty of sin -- satisfying the justice and wrath of God).
Adomnan: Your first sentence here is true.
Glad you see that!
Your second sentence is your usual unbiblical gobbledygook,
Again, so how does God's wrath against sin get appeased and satisfied?
which has been refuted many times.
False bravado. You nor anyone else has refuted it at all; as I have shown.
hint:
akayartov
Where and what is this? I don't see it in Proverbs nor Romans 4-5. ( ??)
Ken,
Have you checked the LXX translation of this verse...?
IC XC
Cearnaigh
You don't see the flow of argument that Paul is making in Romans 5:6-10? He uses all those words to describe our lost condition, "sinful", weak, helpless, sinners, enemies, ungodly, etc. and contrasts them with the "good man" and "the righteouness" man in Romans 5:7.
Yes, but they are NOT contrasted with Abraham. Abraham is not being held out as the wicked man who was justified by God; he is being held up as the man who obtained his righteousness outside the Law (asebes) by acting righteously in accordance with the principle of faith! 1 Macb. 2:52 "Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness?"
The problem is that you've made the leap based on your assumption that judgment of sin is the cause of death. But the reason sin causes death is not judgment of guilt for sin but the fact that nature itself is broken by sin. What we inherit from Adam is subject to death even for a righteous man like Abraham. Abraham was made righteous through faith, but he still died and went down to Sheol because of Adam's sin. Even the righteous die because of Adam's sin.
If death were a punishment for sin under the law, then St. Paul's argument makes no sense.
Rom. 5:13 "sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law."
But as St. Paul says, people still died:
Rom. 5:14 "Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come."
If righteousness could save someone from death, then Abraham would not have died. He was tested and found righteous, but he still died, because he took his (hypostatic) nature from Adam, who sinned.
But Christ has saved the entire human nature from death, even for sinners:
Rom. 5:18 "Then as one man's trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one man's act of righteousness leads to acquittal and life for all men."
So if sin, not judgment under the Law, is the cause of death, why have the Law? It is not to provide the basis of judgment, but simply to show sin for what it is, to reveal what was sin from Adam on.
Rom 5:20-21 "Law came in, to increase the trespass; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."
Note this is consistent with the immediately preceding passage that Jesus comes to save us not only from death but from sin:
Rom. 5:19 "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man's obedience many will be made righteous."
Romans 6 then serves as a warning not to become sinners once again and thus bring ourselves back to the power of sin, where death will bring us judgment.
But all of this really gets brought together in the context of the Law in Romans 7. That is the chapter th
(cont.)
But all of this really gets brought together in the context of the Law in Romans 7. That is the chapter that says most clearly of all that the cause of death is not judgment under the Law, but sin. Rom. 7:13 "Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure."
God Himself says that He did not provide the law for judgment:
Ezek. 33:11 "Say to them, As I live, says the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn back, turn back from your evil ways; for why will you die, O house of Israel?"
2 Pet. 3:9 " The Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is forbearing toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance."
So death is not something that God does to us; it is not God's punishment on us, His judgment under the Law. Indeed, He spares us from death precisely to give us an opportunity to avoid it. But death results from the damage that Adam wrought to our nature and that we ourselves do with our own sin. Christ has provided the path that repairs that damage by His Incarnation, Crucifixion, and Resurrection; He has defeated the power of death, so that it is now only temporary. But those who continue to sin will still come into judgment upon death and suffer the "second death" after their bodily resurrection.
That's how Christ fulfills the Law. He shows that man does not NEED to sin (that he can fulfill the just requirement of the Law), and He shows that He can defeat the power of death that sin put over us. We were helpless as children of Adam, bound to die for his sin no matter what we did (and all sinners in that sense), not to mention our own personal sin bringing the same consequence. But all that has changed now that Christ has defeated the power of death; we still die as a consequence of our inheritance from Adam, but that death lacks power over us.
Ken: NASB in Proverbs 17:15 is "wicked" and it is "Ton a-dikon” in the LXX.
Adomnan: Yes. "adikon" means unrighteous, guilty, precisely my point. "Wicked" is an ambiguous translation. The word is literally "unrighteous." It is NOT the word "asebes."
Abraham was not unrighteous when he was called "asebes" (non-observant) in Rom 4:5. That's Paul's point. Although Abraham did not observse the law, and so was "asebes," he was nevertheless righteous (dikaios) and so not unrighteous (adikos). Therefore, asebes cannot equal adikos.
Ken: Ungodly (asebea) is used in Romans 4:5 and 5:6, and in 5:7 he uses words for a “good man” and a “righteous man” ( dikaiou ) the same positive term without the “a” in Proverbs 17:15.
Romans 5:6 ("Christ died for the asebeis") means "Christ died for the Gentiles, those who don't observe the Law." Of course, Christ died for the Jews as well, but in this verse Paul has the Gentiles primarily in mind. The point of Romans is to prove that Gentiles can be justified without becoming Jews. In 5:8 he expands the benefit of Christ's death from Gentiles (asebeis) to everyone; otherwise he'd just be repeating himself.
Besides, from the point of view of the Jewish Law all we Christians are "asebeis," because we don't observe it. Paul is saying that doesn't matter. (He is not saying, however, that we don't have to observe what he calls in Galatians the law of Christ.)
I doubt that Paul would ever call an observant Jew "asebes."
Ken: I am unclear what you mean about the Hebrew word behind “ungodly” – ungodly (asebea, asebwn) is the NT word in Romans 4:5 and 5:6.
Adomnan: This must be for Cearnaigh.
Yes, I had already looked at the LXX for Proverbs 17:15 "wicked" is "adikon" not whatever that word you typed.
a - "not", "un"
dikon - righteous
"unrighteous", "wicked"
Ken: You don't see the flow of argument that Paul is making in Romans 5:6-10?
Adomnan: I do see it. I understand it differently from you.
Ken: He uses all those words to describe our lost condition, "sinful", weak, helpless, sinners, enemies, ungodly, etc. and contrasts them with the "good man" and "the righteouness" man in Romans 5:7.
Adomnan: I'm not denying that Paul says Christ died for sinners, of course. I'm saying that "asebeis" doesn't mean "sinner" in general, either here or in Rom 4:5. And I don't agree with you that Paul is using a lot of different words for the same thing. I think each word has a different meaning.
Ken: the unrighteous in Proverbs 17:15 is the "a- dikon", the same thing as ungodly, sinner, weak, helpless, enemy with God.
Adomnan: No. "Adikos" is the same as "sinner" perhaps, except when Paul uses "sinners" to refer ironically to Gentiles, as he does in Gal 2:15: "We who were born Jews and not Gentile sinners." Here, "Jews" are definitely not "sinners," only Gentiles are.
Ken: Amazing that you cannot the connection. It is very good exegesis. Yours does not make any sense.
Adomnan: What you're overlooking, Ken, is that the word "asebes" is not a judicial term, like "adikos." It refers to the sphere of religious observance. You fail to see that Paul, the Apostles to the Gentiles, is arguing to the Judaizers that Christ's death reconciles Gentiles (the "asebeis") with God, even while they remain outside the Law.
Ken: Is Greek one of the other 12 languages that you speak?
Adomnan: Yes. In an earlier posting, I shouldn't have picked up and repeated your "adikaios." I knew that the opposite of "dikaios" was "adikos," but I wasn't sure that "adikaios" didn't also exist in ancient Greek. It doesn't.
Ken: Again, so how does God's wrath against sin get appeased and satisfied?
Adomnan: Simple. Through our union with Christ in baptism, our sins are expiated (cleansed) by his blood, as is our sinful condition (that is, separation from God). Sin was what provoked God's wrath (using the anthropomorphic imagery of the Bible). Once they're gone, there's no more reason for wrath, and so we say God's wrath is "appeased" or that He is propitiated. First comes expiation; propitiation is a result.
The cause for the "enmity" is removed, and so there's no more enmity.
God doesn't have to be "paid" for the sins. He just forgives them when we repent and turn to Him.
Ken,
Sorry I mean checking the Greek in the LXX about coneming of the righteous... making I see it as the judge declaring the righteous unclean... ακαθαρτος
I was trying to chime in on Adomnan's 'lacking proper religious observance" theme, but... went to the wrong word... my apologies.
IC XC
Cearnaigh
So if sin, not judgment under the Law, is the cause of death, why have the Law? It is not to provide the basis of judgment, but simply to show sin for what it is, to reveal what was sin from Adam on.
It is true that one of the purposes of the law is to reveal sin and expose sin(Romans 3:19-20, 7:7-9), and even before that the law excites more sin (Romans 5:20; 7:5); but the law also judges sin. Romans 4:15 "for the Law brings about wrath . . .
"in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" Genesis 2:17
It has to be both, sin brings death, which is God's judgment on sin; His law of judgment. The wages of sin (breaking the law) is death -- but the gospel does not promise reversal of the effects of the physical consequences of sin on the world until the new heavens and new earth. Romans 8:20ff and Rev. 21-22
Ken,
Death reigned from Adam to Christ... when was the law given? (see 5:14)
Cearnaigh
p.s.
Also... since you like Romans 5 so... and Greek isn't my strong point (obviously) - can you tell me who condemned ("pantev anyrwpov"?) in Adam in vs. 18? Who is justified though the righteous one? Just asking...
God doesn't have to be "paid" for the sins.
Those are your crude words. But it does use economic concepts, "redemption", "purchased", "bought with a price", "redeemed" I Cor. 6:19-20, Rev. 5:9, which you never really dealt with any of those concepts or contexts, especially the Lamb and His worthiness to break the seals and thus see the pouring out of God's wrath in Revelation 6-19.
Justice must be executed. God doesn't wink at sin.
He just forgives them when we repent and turn to Him.
Adomnan
So why the cross? Why couldn't God just forgive us when we repent and turn to Him without the cross?
That is what the Muslims say, and so they don't see the need for the cross. You have just depleted the cross of it's power over sin, because it judges and executes sin and frees us to no longer live in bondage to sin. Romans 6:6
Your reading (interpretation) of Romans 4-5 makes absolutely no sense. (both Adomnan and Jonathan's)
There is none righteous, no, not one. dikaios
Romans 3:10-11
Ken,
"Justice must be executed" - And by, 'justice' you mean Jesus, the 2nd person of the Holy Trinity?
Cearnaigh
Sorry I mean checking the Greek in the LXX about coneming of the righteous... making I see it as the judge declaring the righteous unclean... ακαθαρτος
Thanks for clarifying that.
Ken,
Would the cross be any less important or powerful just because Luther and Calvin were wrong about it?
Cearnaigh
Death reigned from Adam to Christ... when was the law given? (see 5:14)
yes, so ? What is your point? The law was given through Moses.
Cearnaigh
p.s.
Also... since you like Romans 5 so... and Greek isn't my strong point (obviously) - can you tell me who condemned ("pantev anyrwpov"?) in Adam in vs. 18?
God condemned all men in Adam.
Who is justified though the righteous one? Just asking...
Only those that have faith in Christ alone. verse 17 "those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness . . . " See also John 1:12-13
Ken,
Can you tell me what verse 18 says without interpreting the "those who" in vs. 17 who have faith in Christ alone?
What does vs. 18 say? You have no problem with the first part...
It's just a curiosity I have, I guess...
IC XC
Cearniagh
Ken said:
+++++++++
So why the cross? Why couldn't God just forgive us when we repent and turn to Him without the cross?
That is what the Muslims say, and so they don't see the need for the cross. You have just depleted the cross of it's power over sin, because it judges and executes sin and frees us to no longer live in bondage to sin. Romans 6:6
+++++++++++++++
Here is a brief response from Appendix 1 of my article:
http://
catholicdefense.googlepag....htm#Appendix1a
Ken: It is true that one of the purposes of the law is to reveal sin and expose sin(Romans 3:19-20, 7:7-9), and even before that the law excites more sin (Romans 5:20; 7:5); but the law also judges sin. Romans 4:15 "for the Law brings about wrath . . .
Adomnan: The rest of the verse says, "where there is no Law, there is no transgression." Keep in mind that here, as always in Paul, the Law is specifically the Jewish Law. Those who are not under the Jewish Law may or may not be sinnners, but they are not transgressors. One can only transgress an explicit law, in Paul's view.
Gentiles, whether Christians or otherwise, will not be judged by the Law. How can they be judged by a Law they don't transgress?
In other words, your assertion that the law judges sin is false. It reveals what sin is (to those who are familiar with it), but judges only those transgressors who are under it. As Paul says (Rom 2:12):
"Those under the Law who have sinned will be judged by the Law," but Gentiles are not "under the Law" and so won't be judged by it.
Not all sin is transgression.
Ken cties: in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" Genesis 2:17
Adomnan: This is a warning, not a command, and it foretells a consequence, doesn't threaten a punishment. It proves Jonathan's point that death is not a punishment from God but a result of the damage done to our nature by the fall.
but the law also judges sin. Romans 4:15 "for the Law brings about wrath . . .
They aren't different. The law brings about wrath by bringing about knowledge of sin; that's how the letter kills. Heck, the back half of that same verse says it: "where there is no law there is no transgression." That doesn't mean that there is no sin before the law (Rom. 5:13 "sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law"). What it means is that the law, bringing knowledge of sin, caused the sinners to provoke the wrath of God even more by their greater knowledge.
Paul's point is that if the Law were God's gift of salvation, then the promise of salvation would have been shown "null" and "void," since the real effect was only to bring down more wrath. This isn't about some separate effect of the Law to create death; it is the same thing that St. Paul is discussing in those other verses.
"in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" Genesis 2:17
... which is probably the clearest demonstration of natural law there is.
It has to be both, sin brings death, which is God's judgment on sin; His law of judgment.
No, sin brings death, period. This has nothing to do with God's judgment. God's judgment on sin is the second death, not the first.
The wages of sin (breaking the law) is death
But sin is not defined as breaking the law. Sin was around before the law ever was, and so was death. The law doesn't make the news; it simply reports it. Sin kills you all by itself.
but the gospel does not promise reversal of the effects of the physical consequences of sin on the world until the new heavens and new earth.
Of course. 1 Cor. 15:20-28 and John 6:38-44 are directly on point as well. But because Christ suffered death voluntarily and it could not hold Him, the power is temporary. Death, the result of sin, is ultimately undone by Christ: "The last enemy to be destroyed is death" (1 Cor. 15:26).
The Law couldn't do that, not even if you followed it perfectly your whole life, although Pelagians and Judaizers thought that it could. So why would judgment under the Law have anything to do with death, when you die even if you follow it and when people died before it ever was? On the contrary, Christ is the only one with the power to save us from both death and sin. Even absolutely perfect obedience to the Law leaves us in the same place: dead.
Ken:A Your reading (interpretation) of Romans 4-5 makes absolutely no sense. (both Adomnan and Jonathan's)
Adomnan: These are new ideas for you, Ken. Let them sink in, think them over and you may eventually come to understand what Paul was really talking about.
Ken cites: There is none righteous, no, not one. dikaios
Romans 3:10-11
Adomnan: This isn't a spontaneous thought on Paul's part. It's a quotation from a psalm. And the some psalm goes on to say that some people are indeed righteous. The first verse is a rhetorical exaggeration.
Paul cites this psalm not to prove that every individual is unrighteous, but to show that Jews, who are the only people spoken of here, CAN be unrighteous even though they have the Law:.
"Now we are all aware that whatever the Law says is said to those who are subject to the Law." Rom 3:19
Jews are subject to the Law; Gentiles aren't. Therefore, this statement from the psalm is meant for Jews, period.
Adomnan: God doesn't have to be "paid" for the sins.
Ken: Those are your crude words. But it does use economic concepts, "redemption", "purchased", "bought with a price", "redeemed" I Cor. 6:19-20, Rev. 5:9, which you never really dealt with any of those concepts or contexts,
Adomnan: Sure I did. You just didn't respond to me, because you couldn't. I pointed out that we are redeemed, purchased, etc. from sin, death and the devil -- not from the Father as you would have us believe with your penal theory.
Moreover, these concepts are not generally "economic;" they refer to ancient situations like freeing slaves or ransoming captives.
Ken: especially the Lamb and His worthiness to break the seals and thus see the pouring out of God's wrath in Revelation 6-19.
Adomnan: Really, Ken. I don't know where you're going with this. It has nothing to do with your penal thesis that I can figure. I don't think anyone sees the connection but you. Would you please explain precisely why you think the fact that the Lamb opens seals PROVES penal substitution? Don't make me guess. And please be coherent and to the point without tacitly expecting us to assume your theory a priori.
Man, Adomnan and I practically posted the same response to Romans in parallel without even seeing the other's posts. Are we on the same page or what? I agree entirely with the notion of being bought from from the condemnation that Rev. Temple himself said we brought on ourselves: our love for the darkness, our voluntary servitude to sin. Essentially, we were saved from the consequences of our own actions.
Note that this is not used as an analogy to the Father as judge; the Father is the redeemer with Christ! He is the one who gave His Son to redeem the world. John 3:17 "For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him."
Christ didn't buy us from the Father; He was given us by the Father. John 6:37 "All that the Father gives me will come to me; and him who comes to me I will not cast out." The servitude, the condemnation, was simply the punishment we placed on ourselves by our own sin.
One of the striking things about the Rev. Temple's appraoch is that he sees God's justice as a matter of condemnation and punishment.
How at odds this is from the concept of the righteousness (justice) of God in the Bible, which is God's fidelity to his promise to redeem the world though the seed of Abraham (Jesus). God's justice is a savng, not a condemning, justice.
Ken,
Thanks for your kind words and efforts in the conversation. However, on this issue, the RCC got it completely wrong.
You’re welcome, Ken. And you are absolutely correct: the RCC (Renegade Calvin Church ) does indeed have it completely wrong!
Sola Scriptura! rocks and rules because God rocks and rules, Scripture being His infallible word.
Well, let me just say that this: Sola Scriptura, even if it were true (which of course it isn’t), could only function within the context of the One True Church which the Lord founded. Torn from that context, SS produces only anarchy, only confusion.
Protestantism, with its innumerable sects, its innumerable ‘bodies,’ is irrefutable proof of this. Look at how much confusion reigned in the 16th century just over the words, “Hoc est Corpus meum,” This is My body.”
See: Christopher ( Christophorus, Christoph, Christophoro, Christophe ) Rasperger (Raspergero), Two hundred interpretations of the words: This is my Body, Ingolstadt, 1577.
From Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Euc...Eucharist#Books
Is it not obvious that, just as Christ can have only one head, so too, he must have one, and only one, body, which body is the Church - One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic?
“You O Peter, that rock upon which Christ founded his Church, and you, O Paul, who has laid the foundation, which is Christ, beyond which no one can lay any other; you, O blessed apostles, the pillars and mainstays of truth, you at least respond with holy words to this man…” – Orosius of Braga, Defense against the Pelagians, no. 27, p. 153,
Iberian Fathers: Pacian of Barcelona and Orosius of Braga. Series: Fathers of the Church, A New Translation, vol. III/99, tr. Craig L. Hanson, Catholic University of America, 1999. ISBN 0813200997
http://thumbsnap.com/v/b6vOq9ov.jpg
How at odds this is from the concept of the righteousness (justice) of God in the Bible, which is God's fidelity to his promise to redeem the world though the seed of Abraham (Jesus). God's justice is a savng, not a condemning, justice.
What's weird to me is how at odds it is with the words of the Bible. I don't know how
"I did not come to judge the world but to save the world" (John 12:47)
becomes
"I came to save the world by judging it."
I don't know how
"For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him" (John 3:17)
becomes
"For God sent the Son into the world to save the world by condemning it through Him"
or
"but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water." (John 19:33-34)
becomes
"one of the soldiers pierced his side to shed the blood of the sacrifice to kill him"
It seems so much easier to just read the passage for what it says. You really have to work to get to the level of confusion when you have to ask the question "So why the cross? Why couldn't God just forgive us when we repent and turn to Him without the cross?"
Read the Gospel John. Because He loves us that much. He could have saved us without suffering with us. He chose not to do it in order to demonstrate His love, to shame those who think themselves great so as to exalt themselves above the God of humility.
Dave,
Speaking just for myself, I must say that, on numerous occasions, I have found it difficult - if not impossible - to match combox discussions with the posts to which they belong. I mean, I’ve seen comments appear in the sidebar that, even if my life depended on it, I don't think I could have tracked down which post they belonged to.
So I was thinking; maybe a (partial) remedy would be to simply make the first (or nearly first) combox comment the title and date of the post to which it is attached.
Just a thought.
Posted in the Open Forum dated Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Sounds good to me, if we can remember to do it!
God's holy violence makes perfect sense; not man's sinful violence.
It's the use of words I find funny. God's Wrath yes, God's Anger yes, but God's holy violence?
Violence is unthinking. How can that be an expression of righteous anger if it is unthinking?
And really what Ken is saying in the end is that God the Father has 'done violence' to His Beloved Son.
Then he says it makes 'perfect sense'.
in Christ
So I'm rereading Romans, and it occurs to be that I forgot one of the clearest passages about God's judgment NOT being executed in the present day as an expression of mercy:
Romans 2:2-5
We know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who do such things. Do you suppose, O man, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume upon the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not know that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But by your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.
Ken Temple to us:
God's holy violence makes perfect sense..."
Benedict XVI to Islam .
"Faith in God does not justify violence. The right use of reason prompts us to understand that violence is incompatible with the nature of God, and the nature, therefore, of the soul. Then quoting anancient Byzantine ruler: " God is not pleased by blood, and not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature."
"To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm."
(The speech was followed by riots and by Osama bin Laden's charge that the pope was starting a new "crusade.")
Above Anonymous = Peter
Peter,
That is really unfair to bring human sinful violence into the discussion. Ratzinger's issue and context was trying to talk about human sinful violence and the quote from the Byzantine ruler was context of the Muslims trying to take Constantinople by Holy War.
There is no more holy war. (Matthew 21:43-45; Acts 1:6-8, Matthew 26:51-52; Ephesians 6:12; John 18:36) By humans or the church.
Because of the cross and the satisfaction of justice; there is no more holy war or marriage of church and state. The kingdom of God progresses by love and suffering. I think you would agree with that.
The RCC tried for almost 3 centuries to make holy war. That was a big mistake in history; that is, many aspects of it; not the self-defense aspect. The mixing of the state and church and the faulty theology of indulgences and tying service in war to spiritual points and penance and indulgences were the great mistakes of it. Amazing that you would use that; because it is your church that is the most guilty of that sinful violence and connecting it with earning spiritual points with God.
But, at one time there was a holy war instituted by God in Israel. (again, no more) It clearly says, "God is a warrior" Exodus 15:3
And at the end of time He will make just war against evil and sinners who have not surrendered to the lamb. Revelation 19:11
Which none of you have dealt with. Neither have you dealt with hell, which is God's creation of punishment for the devil and his angels, and all humans who don't follow the lamb. Rev. 14:10; 20:10-15; Mark 9:48; Matthew 25.
http://www.desiringgod.org/Resou...25&
pageNumber=2
John Piper is better than me -- maybe he can convince you guys -- about 9 sermons on the issue on Romans 3:20-28
The right use of reason prompts us to understand that violence is incompatible with the nature of God,...
I am taking this to mean that the pope is not just talking about violence perpetrated by humans.
Peter
Ken: John Piper is better than me -- maybe he can convince you guys -- about 9 sermons on the issue on Romans 3:20-28
Adomnan: Don't sell yourself short, Ken. He's not saying anything different from you, even if he throws in more "gloriouses" about things that are glorious only in his own mind.
Piper claims there's some dilemma created for God because He wants to be merciful and has to be just at the same time. But Paul depicts no such dilemma. For Paul, God is just for the very reason that He is the justifier of those who believe in Christ; in other words,He shows Himself faithful to His promise. And He doesn't need the self-contradictory claptrap of penal substitution to forgive and justify.
Besides, the Bible doesn't teach penal substitution anywhere, as we have shown. In fact, it contradicts it explicitly. One cannot patch together an apology for this false doctrine based on faulty logic and "deductions" from misinterpreted texts, which is what Piper tries to do.
If penal substitution were the gospel, Paul, John, the Letter to the Hebrews and the rest would spell it out clearly. It's just not there.
How is it possible that a book of the Bible (Hebrews) that is dedicated almost entirely to explaining how the Atonement "works" never puts forth anything like penal substitution? Doesn't this bother you? Quite an oversight on the Holy Spirit's part, wouldn't you say?
Oh, and I recommend Nick's article on the subject as an antidote to Piper.
Piper is quick to level charges of injustice against God:
Why did God face the problem of needing to give a public vindication of his righteousness?
Yes, obviously, God is accountable to John Piper because God doesn't judge sin quickly enough.
It's so flaming obvious that this is about God being justified in His promise to save His people that one wonders what on earth Piper has in his head. He thinks sinners are going to think God is unjust because He isn't judging them?! I can't imagine why he would believe something so stupid. But Piper does believe it, even alluding to the same conclusion as the basis for his next sermon. Piper might be a great human being in terms of charity, but as a theologian, he's a fool.
I can't believe people believe this stuff on such scant grounds. As support for a similar position, Doug Moo quotes this argument from Anders Nygren's commentary on Romans (Moo's quote iu in the New Bible Commentary (21st c. ed.), p.1122):
"As long as God is God, He cannot behold with indifference that His creation is destroyed and His holy will trodden underfoot. Therefore He meets sin with His mighty and annihilating reaction."
Non sequitur much? What about forbearance? Forgiveness of sins? Repentance so that there is no sin to annihilate?
It's crazy, and it's not as if this is just something not taught. John, Romans, and Hebrews teach against it, and they just ignore that teaching because it doesn't fit into their bizarre notion about God's alleged "indifference" to sin. Who are they to charge God like this, to demand that God judge more quickly than in His good time? Even in pleading for God's judgment, the imprecatory Psalms NEVER suggest that God is unjust for refraining from judgment of sin, but in John Piper's world, God thereby appears unjust and is forced to make a demonstration to convince people that He isn't tacitly accepting sin! Imagine Paul saying such a thing! Nor is Paul's fellow Apostle Peter any slower to assert that "the Lord is not slow about His promise."
This is just insane. To even think that God APPEARS unjust by His forbearance in judgment is so crazy that you'd have to have a massively defective concept of God to even think it possible, much less writing entire sermons about it.
How do you deal with this sort of madness, where people say God might appear unjust? "What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means!" Rom. 9:14
It's just crazy. I can't imagine any thinking person buying into this; it must all be emotional, so that they can FEEL like they are defending God's justice.
JP,
I liked this...
You wrote:
"It's just crazy. I can't imagine any thinking person buying into this; it must all be emotional, so that they can FEEL like they are defending God's justice."
This is **exactly** how I feel sometimes when I am discussing this issue with certain folks from the Reformed camp...
They do the same sanctimonious 'defense' of God's sovereignty in election/reprobation... etc, etc, etc...
Does all of this stuff have it's root in a faulty Christology? I can't escape that conclusion...
IC XC
Cearnaigh
Jonathan,
You reminded me of an important term that appears in Rom 3:25-
FORBEARANCE
Forbearance means the judge HOLDING OFF on punishing a crime/sin with the intent that a plan can be worked out to correct the sin so punishment can be avoided. This term and concept undermine Penal-Substitution because such a concept has no place in "eye for eye" theology. The very fact God didnt strike Adam dead in the Garden for his sin means God's act was an act of mercy-forbearance and proving that it is a mercy driven plan.
Adomnan,
How is it possible that a book of the Bible (Hebrews) that is dedicated almost entirely to explaining how the Atonement "works" never puts forth anything like penal substitution? Doesn't this bother you? Quite an oversight on the Holy Spirit's part, wouldn't you say?
Well, according to the Wikipedia, there are apparently some Protestants who are quite content with the idea of not finding all their beliefs and practices in the bible. Take, for example, the doxology [“for thine is the kingdom…”]. Wikipedia says
“A minority, generally fundamentalists, posit that the doxology was so important that early manuscripts of Matthew neglected it due to its obviousness…“
“Lord’s Prayer” article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Lor..._ever._Amen_.22
Go figure.
Hey guys,
Excellent discussion still going on.
I have a question on a much different topic. A friend of mine organized a rosary group to pray at a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic.
While I'd like to get the exact information on the laws regarding such things (so that we can always be sure not to break them, and of course, so that they can't push us away from our right to do so), they had some peculiar behavior.
They went around and took pictures of this. I had to ask myself, why? Has anyone else encountered this?
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