Why did Jesus have to die? [Archive] - Monachos.net Discussion Community

Mourad Mankarios

13-04-2006, 02:08 AM

With Easter approaching, we come to reflect on the meaning and importance of Christ's death. Perhaps no other Christian doctrine has been misunderstood with profound consequences as that as the passion and death of Christ. So, I was just wondering, how people understand the passion and death of Christ. What was its purpose, was it necessary and are there theories that are simply way off?

Here are some quotes from scholarly works which emphatically attack popular understandings of Christ's redemptive work which include such notions as:

- God's honour was damaged by human sin
- God demanded a bloody victim--innocent or guilty--to pay for human sin
- God was persuaded to alter God's verdict against humanity when the Son of God offered to endure humanity's punishment
- The death of the Son thus functioned as a payoff; salvation was purchased

"How cruel and wicked it seems that anyone should demand the blood of an innocent person as the price for anything, or that it should in any way please him that an innocent mna should be slain--still less that God should consider the death of His Son so agreeable that by it he should be reconciled to the whole world!" (Peter Abelard, Epistle ad Rom)

"God's love offering a sacrifice to appease God's justice--is destructive of monotheism. What security can there be in being saved by such a divided God? It echoes such notions as Luther's doctrine of 'God against God': a compassionate Son having to bargain with a stern and inscrutable Father, not the message that Jesus wanted to convey about 'My Father and your Father' (Jn 20:17)." (Stephen Finlan, Problems with Atonement)

"The atonement is the central reason for the oppressiveness of Christianity...Christianity is an abusive theology that glorifies suffering...We must do away with the atonement, this idea of a blood sin upon the whole human race...this blood-thirsty God" (Brown and Parker, "For God So Loved")

"I find Wink's placement of the theory of scapegoating at the center of God's intent throughout scripture in conflict with his vital interest that Jesus reveals a nonviolent God...A compassionate God is...incompatible with all atonement theories." (Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, "Jesus Against Christianity: Reclaiming the Missing Jesus")

Ian Leyda

01-11-2006, 05:20 PM

Byron Jack Gaist

13-12-2007, 01:05 PM

Dear Mourad, Ian and all,

I'm taking this thread up again in the hope of receiving responses from doctrinally informed forum members on the question below:

What is the acceptead Eastern Orthodox teaching on the Atonement?

I have just finished reading Frederica Matthews-Green's essay "The Meaning of Christ's Suffering" (http://www.frederica.com/writings/the-meaning-of-christs-suffering.html) on this topic. The essay is well-written; it presents an image of Christ as a "young policeman" raiding a criminal's lair where hostages are being kept (representing our human condition of slavery to sin, death and the devil before Christ's redemptive sacrifice on the cross). In the process of setting the hostages free, Christ receives wounds and humiliation, but these are not "ransom" paid to the criminal (the devil); they are the wounds of a hero on a rescue mission.

I think what is causing me confusion is that St Gregory of Nyssa and others, including (I think) the Pauline Epistles do talk about Christ's suffering and death as ransom. So if Christ is 'only' a victorious hero, do his sufferings have no specific value, are they 'only' the general consequences of his efforts in the "harrowing of hell"?

Also related to Ian's post and to the above, is our teaching on the Atonement sufficiently described by Gustaf Aulén's "Christus Victor" theory, as wikipedia suggests (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christus_Victor)?

Clarification of the above issues will be much welcomed!

In Christ
Byron

Mary

13-12-2007, 05:14 PM

Thanks for bringing this back up, Bryon!

This is something that's not completely clear in my mind either, having always been taught that Jesus paid the ransom for the debt that I owned God, etc.

My understanding now is, that there is no ransom to pay, because God isnt' an angry judge demanding justice, but rather, that suffering is good medicines that heals me from the deadly disease of sin. And Jesus, since he had no sins, didn't need any healing for himself, but by going through the path of suffering, made a way for us to follow, so we could be healed.

And from trying to teach my kids to behave, I know that I cannot get them to go down a path that I myself haven't travelled on. I need to go before them, so I can teach them from my own experience, how to live out their life. But is that what Jesus did? It seems to me, that there must be more.

I was also wondering about a related thing a few days back. I was taught that when Jesus was on the Cross, He bore the sins of all the world, and therefore, He was separated from God at that time. That's why He cried out... "Why have you forsaken me..." etc. Was He really separated from God when He was dying? Did God really forsake Him and turn His back on Him because He was covered up with my sins?

In Christ,
Mary.

Byron Jack Gaist

14-12-2007, 08:56 AM

Dear Mary,

Thank you for your response. I also have the impression that suffering is a medicine which helps us heal our sinful inclination. Wouldn't it then make sense that Jesus, being without sin, did 'pay a ransom' for us by willingly undergoing suffering? I don't know, that's why I'm asking the monachos forum. I guess it also relates to whether one perceives the suffering to be 'punishment' for our sins or not - must we suffer because we are sinners? This would be the perspective of Job's 'comforters', one not embraced by Orthodoxy in my understanding of it. Instead, might it be more appropriate to suggest that although suffering may be a direct consequence of some sins, and an indirect consequence of sinfulness as a whole, 'consequence' here does not equate with 'punishment'? Our own expulsion from Paradise is sometimes perceived as punishment, but it occurred so that we would not become both evil and immortal, therefore it was also an act of divine care and providence. Suffering certainly feels like punishment to us subjectively, but maybe we also need to distinguish between punishment as vengeance and retaliation, and 'punishment' as curative discipline - if God is at all 'wrathful' and punitive (words which do not come spontaneously to mind wrt our generous and loving Creator), then perhaps He is so only in this latter sense.

I'm digressing. You follow up your suggestion that Christ suffered in order to show us a way forward, as we need to show our own children, with the appropriate question:
But is that what Jesus did? It seems to me, that there must be more.I agree there must be more, and that, in a nutshell, is what I'm also trying to find out. Quoting from the wikipedia article
The third metaphor is that of healing, associated with Pierre Abélard in the eleventh century, and Paul Tillich in the twentieth. In this picture Jesus’ death on the cross demonstrates the extent of God’s love for us, and moved by this great act of love mankind responds and is transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. This view is favoured by most liberal theologians as the moral influence view, and also forms the basis for Rene Girard’s “mimetic desire” theory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonement) This is not exactly identical to what you said, but it does suggest that the purpose of the Crucifixion was the voluntary undergoing of suffering as a demonstration of love and a model for imitation. I think as Orthodox we do believe more than this, but I'd like to know what.

Finally, wrt your related question on the Father forsaking the Son from the cross, I don't know for sure, but it would seem odd that God would distance Himself from His Son because Jesus took on our sins and suffered for them, which was after all doing the Father's Will in the first place. I was reading Metropolitan Anthony on this recently, and he suggested (if I'm not misunderstanding him) that what Jesus demonstrated with those last words from the cross was His perfect solidarity with every condition of the human soul, including its feeling of separation from God in the state we in modern times call 'atheism'. So the sentence "My God, why have you forsaken me?" seems more of a (voluntary) cry from Jesus' perfect humanity than from His impassible divinity. Again, if I'm not thinking correctly on this important issue, I'd like to be informed by our respected forum.

In Christ
Byron

Herman Blaydoe

14-12-2007, 02:22 PM

Finally, wrt your related question on the Father forsaking the Son from the cross, I don't know for sure, but it would seem odd that God would distance Himself from His Son because Jesus took on our sins and suffered for them, which was after all doing the Father's Will in the first place.

Eli, eli, lamach sabathani is nothing more (and nothing less) than the first line of Psalm 22. It starts out in agony but ends on a note of praise and triumph! Remember that the Jews were generally well educated and put a great deal of effort into knowing the Psalms. As instruction, the rabbi would simply recite the first line of a particular Psalm, expecting his students to simply know the rest of it from their studies. I suggest you read that particular Psalm with the thought of Christ on the Cross. See if you don't get the "chills" as you read it. Even from the Cross, He was instructing us!

Mary

15-12-2007, 02:29 AM

Eli, eli, lamach sabathani is nothing more (and nothing less) than the first line of Psalm 22. It starts out in agony but ends on a note of praise and triumph! Remember that the Jews were generally well educated and put a great deal of effort into knowing the Psalms. As instruction, the rabbi would simply recite the first line of a particular Psalm, expecting his students to simply know the rest of it from their studies. I suggest you read that particular Psalm with the thought of Christ on the Cross. See if you don't get the "chills" as you read it. Even from the Cross, He was instructing us!

Dear Herman,

Thank you so much! That was something I didn't know. So, when Jesus said the first line of Ps 22, he was probably saying the rest of it in his heart, and so was every other Jew who heard him! So, only the most stubborn of them could've been able to say that He wasnt' the fulfillment of that prophetic psalm!!

It was indeed good to read the whole psalm while thinking of Christ on the Cross. Always before, only the parts that directly refered to the crucification were pointed out to me as the prophetic parts. And I never questioned why some of the verses where prophetic and the rest weren't, or how one could know which verses to pick and choose to label as prophetic. It makes so much more sense when read all in one piece!

Now my appetite has been whet. I want more... I think I'll add Ps 22 to my daily reading list. I like it, I like it, I really, really like it!

Thank you!!

Mary

Byron Jack Gaist

17-12-2007, 08:51 AM

Dear Herman,

Quotation:
Finally, wrt your related question on the Father forsaking the Son from the cross, I don't know for sure, but it would seem odd that God would distance Himself from His Son because Jesus took on our sins and suffered for them, which was after all doing the Father's Will in the first place.

Eli, eli, lamach sabathani is nothing more (and nothing less) than the first line of Psalm 22. It starts out in agony but ends on a note of praise and triumph! This is true. Psalm 22 does bring "chills" when one reads it from the perspective of the cross.

While I accept the point, I would still like to know why the Lord chose that specific psalm at that particular moment. What was He trying to teach us through it? Presumably since the psalm ends in triumph, He was teaching us mainly about the Resurrection. Not losing hope is at least partly what our faith is all about. Surely, however, it is legitimate to also respectfully search for further meaning in Christ's choice of words, as in the example I gave from Metropolitan Anthony. Moreover, how may these words be pertinent to our question about the Orthodox understanding of the Atonement?

In Christ
Byron

Byron Jack Gaist

19-12-2007, 08:24 AM

Dear all,

I hope that I'm not pursuing a question which is uninteresting or false in the perception of other forum posters. The question of an Orthodox understanding of the Atonement is still with me (strangely, as we are currently approaching the feast of the Incarnation).

In today's epistle reading from Hebrews 10:1-18, St. Paul states the following:
BRETHREN, since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices which are continually offered year after year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered? If the worshipers had once been cleansed, they would no longer have any consciousness of sin. But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year after year. For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. [...]And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this one had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, then to wait until his enemies should be made a stool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds," then he adds, "I will remember their sins and their misdeeds no more." Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin. St. Paul contrasts the sacrifices made in the Jewish temple according to Mosaic law, with the single perfect offering of the body of Jesus Christ 'once for all'. Moreover, he says that the former sacrifices were unable to remove sins, leaving the faithful with a consciousness of sin; whereas the sacrifice on the Cross - and here is the point where I seek elucidation - somehow relieved mankind of the burden of sin, and has somehow become the event by which we may be perfected through sanctification.

What I'd like to know, if it would not be unfruitful to know this in a 'rational' way, is the doctrinal Orthodox account of the 'how' of those 'somehows' above.

Furthermore, when Holy Communion is offered, the priest says "Thine own of Thine own we offer unto Thee, on behalf of all and for all". Is this not a 'sacrifice'? And if this sacrifice is perfect (I say this for the sake of the discussion, since it is beyond doubt perfect in fact), then why do we still have, to quote St.Paul above, "consciousness of sin"?

I look forward to your responses.

In Christ
Byron

Jonathan Michael

19-12-2007, 01:12 PM

First of all, thank you to Byron for bringing this topic back up, and also thanks to Herman pointing us to Psalm 22. Amazing, and quite in keeping with the period of repentance and fasting before the feast of the Nativity.

I don't want to bring in too many scholastic and/or Latin terms - partly because I am not qualified to use them - but there is the idea of Calvary being a "Superabundance of Grace". So, Christ's death was not so He could descend into Hades, and it wasn't so that He could pay any ransom, nor was it so He could show us the way to Heaven; it was all of these (and probably much more).

Christ is described as the second Adam, but that doesn't mean that Christ and Adam are equals as one is created and the Other is the co-Creator (with the Father and the Holy Spirit). As this description of Christ is insufficient to describe the totality of Christ, so to is the description of the Passion as a sacrifice insufficient to describe the event fully - but it is not wrong despite that.

It also seems that the Early Fathers used terms such as "Punishment" and even "the Law" rather differently to how we might see them now. There is an Orthodox teaching that "Hell" is merely what the presence of God feels like to unrepentant sinners - it seems like a punishment, and frigtening, but the same presence will feel as bliss for the righteous who are close to God. In this sense, what has already been mentioned regarding Christ showing us the way of purification through suffering rings true. Certainly I've never been under the impression that Orthodoxy teaches Christ suffered so that we don't have to, which is popular teaching in more Protestant circles:

A sorrowless earthly life is a true sign that the Lord has turned His face from a man, and that he is displeasing to God, even though outwardly he may seem reverent and virtuous
(St. Ignatius Brianchaninov)

I am also reminded that the first instance of bloodshed described in the Bible involves the sacrifice of life to cover the sins of man; and the sacrifice is performed by God. After God found Adam and Eve cowering in the Garden, He made for them clothes from animal skins to cover their shame. It is not said explicitly, but implicit to this is that God shed the blood of animals to cover the sins of Adam. So, it does seem that the remission of sins requires the shedding of blood - it is not that God likes or desires this, but that it is a fundamental truth. This is probably what lies behind the words of Our Lord when He stated that there is no greater love than for a man to lay down his life for his brother. Sacrifice is, or at least can be, an act of love - the sacrifice of time, money, the blood of an animal (if it is considered as part of our property), and so on - with the ultimate sacrifice being the shedding of our own blood, and our own life.

God the Word became human so that we may become God. The Incarnation was certainly necessary then, but death on the Cross? I think it is a mystery, but one thing is certain - God knew the outcome before it happened, and knew that He would be murdered for revealing His awesome power in such a way. But He did it anyway. It comes down to love, and for me I am satisfied with that answer. Any replies I read here that expand upon the nature of the Cross will be an extra blessing.

Anyway, I am not certain of many of the above thoughts because too many of them are personal reasonings, which should always be suspect. I put them out here because I know that anything heterodox will be found by other posters and commented upon. Apologies for anything that is heterodox in the above, and thanks in advance for correcting them.

Byron Jack Gaist

20-12-2007, 04:56 PM

Dear Johnathan,

Thank you for your response. You write that
It is not said explicitly, but implicit to this is that God shed the blood of animals to cover the sins of Adam. So, it does seem that the remission of sins requires the shedding of blood - it is not that God likes or desires this, but that it is a fundamental truth.
By willingly obeying the Will of His Father to the end, Jesus Christ victoriously triumphed over sin, death and the devil. While His tormentors and persecutors believed that by sending Him to the cross they were gaining a worldly victory and sending an enemy to His demise, they were in fact suffering a heavenly loss, albeit one which God in His unfathomable divine mercy forgave them for, so that even the soldier who pierced His side with a spear could become a saint. Even today, in purely psychological terms, torturers are unaware of the harm they do to their own psychological well-being by inflicting pain and suffering on others, even if in the frenzy of their hate they actually think they are enjoying vengeance; only if they repent, tearfully pleading divine forgiveness for their crimes against their fellow men, will their souls be released from the psychological bondage in which they bound themselves through sin.

Anyway, I am not certain of many of the above thoughts because too many of them are personal reasonings, which should always be suspect. I put them out here because I know that anything heterodox will be found by other posters and commented upon. This is one of the many blessings on this website. I look forward to precisely the same thing regarding my own comments above. It seems to me that the more "theology" one does in one's head, the more responsibility he bears to check it with others who are more experienced.

In Christ
Byron

Byron Jack Gaist

21-12-2007, 09:39 AM

Dear all,

From today's "Dynamis" list:

The Lord Jesus, as our great High Priest, was chosen by God to share the same role before God as did the high priests of the Old Covenant: "to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins" (Heb. 5:1). Notice that when Aaron was led before the assembly of Israel to be consecrated as high priest, "the calf for the sin-offering, and the two rams, and the basket of unleavened bread" also were brought to the ceremony (Lev. 8:2). Why? So that Aaron would have gifts to offer and a sacrifice for the people's accumulated sins. Christ, on the other hand, knowing full well that God takes no eternal pleasure in men's imperfect burnt offerings for sins, came, instead, truly to accomplish God's eternal perfect will - to offer the one, unique and ultimate sin offering of Himself, once and for all in His Own body (Heb. 10:6,10). Just as Aaron did not present himself to serve as high priest but was chosen of God (Lev. 8:1,2), so also the Lord Jesus was chosen to do God's will (Heb. 10:7). Here, however, ends the likenesses between Aaronic high priests and Christ. Christ is an eternal High Priest, holding "His priesthood permanently, because He continues for ever"(Heb. 7:24). Furthermore, our great High Priest's offering for sin was offered not just on earth (on the Cross), and "not into a sanctuary made with hands, a copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf" (Heb. 9:24).

This goes perhaps some way towards further explanation of the nature of the Sacrifice of sacrifices. As Johnathan suggested above,
it does seem that the remission of sins requires the shedding of blood Depending on the way we shed blood, the shedding of blood can be as sacrifice for sin, or as sin itself. Obviously the shedding of a fellow human being's blood, even in self-defense or to protect others, can never consitute a 'sacrifice': we are not Aztecs, and God is not Moloch! But what about the sacrificial shedding of one's own blood in this context of protecting others? Can a person's accumulated sins be wiped off the books for such sacrifice? Hence perhaps also King David in Psalm 50(51):
Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, The God of my salvation, And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, And my mouth shall show forth Your praise. For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it; You do not delight in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, A broken and a contrite heart — These, O God, You will not despise. Following Christ's perfect sacrifice - the shedding of God's own blood for mankind - further blood sacrifices for sin are rendered unnecessary. Yet martyrs who shed their blood for the faith surely make of themselves acceptable sacrifices - or is this idea mistaken? Why did God ever accept blood, be it from bullocks, rams, doves - or from His own Son, in the first place? This is the image that is most awesome, the one I'm having difficulty getting my head around.

In Christ
Byron

P.S. My apologies for discussing such a brutal topic a few days before Christmas.

Herman Blaydoe

21-12-2007, 01:59 PM

We often pray "the blood of the martyrs has clothed Your Church in fine robes, as of Purple Linen, O Lord!"

We are purchased at a price, and that price was paid in blood. We talk about not being able to get something from someone as "can't get blood from a turnip". We might complain when we have to work hard that the boss wants the "last drop of blood". The "dot" on the forehead of a native if India means that someone has pledged to defend that person with their last drop of blood.

But blood really means life. It is the life that blood represents that has the "value". It is the LIFE of Christ that the blood represents, the two are obviously tied together. No blood, no life. The giving of one's life (blood) is called the supreme sacrifice and we honor those who "pay the ultimate price" with their "life's blood"--the civil servants who protect us like the police, firemen and such, the soldiers who defend us, and the martyrs who die defending the Faith.

Fr Raphael Vereshack

21-12-2007, 03:15 PM

It's also important to keep in mind that the theme of the Book of Hebrews is how the New life in Christ fulfills that Old life which centred on the Law. The New supplants the Old not because the latter had no worth but because of the way in which the New leads us to the actual goal of the Old.

There is always in the Book of Hebrews the implicit understanding (and this must have reflected wider Christian understanding at this point of the early Church) that left to itself the Law could not save, it could only prepare.

The Book of Hebrews focuses on this by describing the physical temporality of the Old Law sacrifices which explains their need for constant repetition. It is in the very need for repetition, the need for the sacrifices of the Law on a continual basis, that Hebrews sees the sign of the Law's inability to reach the goal in itself.

It is the sacrifice of Christ however which completely fulfills the sacrifices of the Old Law. St Paul at an earlier time had already described this in terms of the faith of the believer in Christ fulfilling & supplanting the Law. But now in Hebrews we see this description drawn out so that the New fulfills the Old in the sense that it more faithfully is in the image of the Divine reality & replicates the heavenly pattern.

This sense of the patterning image of early Christianity, that the New supplants the Old in the sense that it more closely approximates us to the Divine, was very strong, and especially affected our ascetic sense up to present times. This is why Hebrews works with the image of entering into the Holy of Holies. The implication is that not only does Christ enter the Holy of Holies as High Priest through His Blood- ie stand continuously before the presence of God. He also brings us before His Father so that we too may enter more fully into that Divine reality.

In any case, what Hebrews is suggesting by the eternal sacrifice of Christ's blood is the way in which it fulfills the temporality of the former physical sacrifices.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Byron Jack Gaist

25-12-2007, 06:25 PM

Dear Herman , Fr Raphael,

Merry Xmas to those on the new calendar!

The above explanations go some way towards answering my question. In an (over)simplified nutshell, Herman has pointed out that blood = life, and Fr Raphael has pointed to the context of Hebrews, the way Christ's holiness has come to fulfil the Law, rendering animal sacrifices unnecessary. I agree with both these points, but I think for me there is still a question about why God would wish either his creatures or His own Son to sacrifice themselves or indeed be sacrificed for sin? This may not be a legitimate or even a pious question to ask - especially on a day like today - but I won't be offended by a flat negative response, and I'm sure the Lord can take my minor whingeing! I suppose at some level it's the old chestnut about the relation of God to evil, but I'm not sure in which way exactly this paradox is in operation here. Talking about which, how about this for a question: is God unable to do evil?

In Christ
Byron

Paul Cowan

25-12-2007, 06:39 PM

Hi Byron.

Christ is Born.

Yes, God is unable to do evil. Evil came into the world through sin which began with Lucifer and manifested itself in the Garden. God did not create evil or sin. It is a manifestation of free will of His creatures. We can choose to love Him or not. To not love Him ultimately results in sin as the opposite of love is hate which leads to evil thus sin.

It is my limited understanding that God allowed man the dispensation in the killing of animal sacrifices as a way to allow man to "take ownership" of his repetence. I mean that when man sinned he did not know really how to show his repentence so God allowed him to kill an animal and offer it up to Him in conjunction with his prayers. A tangible repentence if you will.

If you also read closely the verse, God/ Christ did not ask to be crucified. He was crucified because we, man, demanded it. Yes, He knew it was coming and He allowed it to happen, but WE are the ones that wanted His blood.

This murder then became the ultimate sacrifice for all time as we killed God incarnate. No other sacrifice could ever trump this blood offering. I will admit the Jews of the time did not offer it to God as they did goats and other animals in the form of repentence. But as the apostles and Church Fathers explain and interrpret His sacrifice for us, it becomes clear that His death did away with all other sacrifices.

humbly,
Paul

John Wilson

26-12-2007, 12:32 PM

If I might add my unworthy reply, the reason Jesus had to die was because it was the cost of entry into Hades.

Fr Raphael Vereshack

26-12-2007, 04:29 PM

Byron wrote:

is God unable to do evil?

God is unable to do evil, obviously not as a result of external compulsion but nor as a result of the compulsion of His own nature.

Rather God as transcending all nature and as the source of all good is unable to do evil simply as part of Who He is.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Byron Jack Gaist

27-12-2007, 07:44 AM

Dear Fr Raphael, Dear Paul,

Thank you for your responses concerning Christ's sacrifice and God's ability to do evil.

Although we sadly did not intend the crucifixion of our Lord as a sacrifice offered up for repentance (it seems in fact to have been very much a case of murder posing as the legitimate public execution of a 'troublemaker' and 'blasphemer'), it seems God accepted it as a Sacrifice anyway? Is it then permissible to say that until then we had knowingly sacrificed goats and oxen for our sins, but when it came to the Son of God, he was sacrificed by us without our conscious participation in the event as a sacrifice?

I think Fr Raphael points to something very important when he explains that, although God is unable in His all-good nature to do evil, this inability is not a result of any compulsion, internal or external. Were God compelled to be good, He would be compelled by a principle superior to Himself and His ominpotence (which would then not be omnipotence). Since God is unable to do evil simply because He is goodness itself, it seems self-sacrifice is an eternal part of His nature, even from before the crucifixion of His own Son. How little this world values those people who lose out of sheer kindness; yet how similar such people are to the all-giving Creator of this world.

Dear John Wilson,

You write that
the reason Jesus had to die was because it was the cost of entry into Hades. I have heard the opinion elsewhere that the 'ransom' was not in fact paid to the devil (God doesn't owe him anything, nor needs to pay him anything to overstep his dark domain of authority). If I'm not entirely mistaken however, even some Church Fathers did think the ransom was paid to the devil, but simultaneously advised against focusing on this aspect of soteriology. I'd like to hear some more opinions on this, as I'm quite confused.

In Christ
Byron

Fr Raphael Vereshack

27-12-2007, 03:57 PM

Byron wrote:

I have heard the opinion elsewhere that the 'ransom' was not in fact paid to the devil (God doesn't owe him anything, nor needs to pay him anything to overstep his dark domain of authority). If I'm not entirely mistaken however, even some Church Fathers did think the ransom was paid to the devil, but simultaneously advised against focusing on this aspect of soteriology. I'd like to hear some more opinions on this, as I'm quite confused.

It is important to understand that the Patristic description of Christ's redemption of mankind is rarely meant to be systematic or mechanical. Rather the language they use is meant to convey a given point which in their minds would not contradict some other point also.

Thus references to a ransom paid to the devil can I think be found. This refers however to the specific point of how we have enslaved ourselves to the devil through our willing acquiescence to sin.

Before Christ's Incarnation, according to the Patristic vision, (and one already sees this strongly described by St Paul), there is an aspect of this sin, the bonds of which man is incapable of freeing himself from. The Law is there as a moral marker, but in itself cannot free man from his slavery.

Only Christ as God and through His sacrifice offers man the freedom to escape this slavery to sin. And through both but especially through His sacrifice, Christ breaks the bonds of man's slavery to the devil.

Thus what man 'owes' to the devil because of willing enslavement is 'paid' by Christ. The idea here isn't literally one of the devil being given what is owed him but rather of the bond of slavery (ie the power of sin & death) to the devil being broken.

Many other images are used to describe Christ's redemption of mankind. Although these do not sit easily in a systematic way beside each other each image does convey an extremely important point.

The one image we do resist however is that of the atonement where Christ satisfies the outrage of the Father concerning man's sin. Precisely as a systematic scenario it has major Trinitarian weaknesses and also shifts the Patristic focus of redemption from the issue of freedom to that of necessity. None of this is as intentionally clear cut as we may at times depict it, but the change in focus is there nevertheless.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Byron Jack Gaist

28-12-2007, 08:07 AM

Dear Fr Raphael,

Thank you for clearing things up.

I suppose, correct me if I'm mistaken, that the unsystematic manner of Patristic writings is in fact intentional, since it makes a life of prayer and participation in the sacraments absolutely necessary and in fact primary to faith? In Orthodoxy, paradoxically perhaps since 'Orthodoxy' means 'right belief', one is in fact unable to turn Christianity into a fixed set of beliefs which are a mere series of philosophical propositions logically consequent upon one another.

In Christ
Byron

M.C. Steenberg

28-12-2007, 10:40 AM

Dear friends,

Here is a relevant passage on the question, from the On the incarnation of the Word by St Athanasius of Alexandria (http://www.monachos.net/library/Athanasius_of_Alexandria%2C_On_the_Incarnation_of_ the_Word). He writes:
CHAPTER 9: The Word, since death alone could stay the plague, took a mortal body which, united with Him, should avail for all, and by partaking of His immortality stay the corruption of the race. By being above all, He made His flesh an offering for our souls; by being one with us all, He clothed us with immortality. Simile to illustrate this.

1. For the Word, perceiving that no otherwise could the corruption of men be undone save by death as a necessary condition, while it was impossible for the Word to suffer death, being immortal, and Son of the Father; to this end He takes to Himself a body capable of death, that it, by partaking of the Word Who is above all, might be worthy to die in the stead of all, and might, because of the Word which was come to dwell in it, remain incorruptible, and that thenceforth corruption might be stayed from all by the Grace of the Resurrection. Whence, by offering unto death the body He Himself had taken, as an offering and sacrifice free from any stain, straightway He put away death from all His peers by the offering of an equivalent. 2. For being over all, the Word of God naturally by offering His own temple and corporeal instrument for the life of all satisfied the debt by His death. And thus He, the incorruptible Son of God, being conjoined with all by a like nature, naturally clothed all with incorruption, by the promise of the resurrection. For the actual corruption in death has no longer holding-ground against men, by reason of the Word, which by His one body has come to dwell among them. 3. And like as when a great king has entered into some large city and taken up his abode in one of the houses there, such city is at all events held worthy of high honour, nor does any enemy or bandit any longer descend upon it and subject it; but, on the contrary, it is thought entitled to all care, because of the king's having taken up his residence in a single house there: so, too, has it been with the Monarch of all. 4. For now that He has come to our realm, and taken up his abode in one body among His peers, henceforth the whole conspiracy of the enemy against mankind is checked, and the corruption of death which before was prevailing against them is done away. For the race of men had gone to ruin, had not the Lord and Saviour of all, the Son of God, come among us to meet the end of death.
This text is found in its entirety in the Monachos Patristics Library (http://www.monachos.net/library/Patristics_Master_List), and is well worth the read on this theme. St Athanasius treats of the death of Christ from a number of different perspectives throughout.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Fr Raphael Vereshack

28-12-2007, 03:39 PM

Byron wrote:

I suppose, correct me if I'm mistaken, that the unsystematic manner of Patristic writings is in fact intentional, since it makes a life of prayer and participation in the sacraments absolutely necessary and in fact primary to faith? In Orthodoxy, paradoxically perhaps since 'Orthodoxy' means 'right belief', one is in fact unable to turn Christianity into a fixed set of beliefs which are a mere series of philosophical propositions logically consequent upon one another.

I do not think that the way in which the Fathers write is purposeful in that manner. Rather more as a general statement we can say that the Fathers often use images or analogies in a suggestive way and not in a way that seeks to exhaust all meaning.

One interesting point connected to this: the writings of the Fathers are usually far more suggestive in style. Whereas our interpretation of these same writings are often very systematic in presentation.

This is a very interesting difference for the most part occurring I think in the last century or so. I think it comes from a different understanding of theology than what is found in the original. We need to ask ourselves whether we have not distorted what is actually being said.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

Mina Mounir

01-01-2008, 12:48 AM

peace,

dear father Raphael (do u remember me ? ) and everyone ,

is there a recommended book compares Orthodox doctrine of salvation and the Juridical western theory? (no problem if the book is not free )

thanks in advance
in ICXC
Mina

Fr Raphael Vereshack

01-01-2008, 05:07 PM

Dear Mina,

I have a book with the title The Ancestral Sin by Fr John Romanides. On the book cover it says that it is a "comparative study of the sin of our ancestors Adam & Eve according to the paradigms and doctrines of the first and second century Church and the Augustinian formulation of original sin."

But I haven't had a chance to read it yet so I'm not able to say anything more about it.

Has anyone else read this book or does anyone have any other suggestions?

In Christ- Fr Raphael
PS: I think that in general the books by Metropolitan Hieotheos Vlachos which deal with doctrine are very good.

Father David Moser

01-01-2008, 07:15 PM

Dear Mina,

I have a book with the title The Ancestral Sin by Fr John Romanides. ... I haven't had a chance to read it yet so I'm not able to say anything more about it.

Has anyone else read this book or does anyone have any other suggestions?

I have read this book and found it to be a very good comparative treatment. It is not an "easy read" so one has to take time with it. One of my friends (also a priest) suggested that it helps to read the last chapter first and then go on with the rest of the book, but I did not do that so I can't say whether or not it helps.

Fr David Moser

Mina Mounir

02-01-2008, 01:35 AM

dear fathers,

thanks for the reply ... actually I ordered that book from TWO MONTHS! from holy cross bookstore , and it did not arrive yet ... a professor of theology recommended it to me since long time ... I hope I could receive it this year ! :)

actually it is important to have books which could explain Orthodox pure theology in a language that can deal with the modern mind.

yes, Metropolitan Hierotheos Vlachos has a very interesting book called (orthodox mind = Orthodoxos Phronima) which was translated into arabic by st. John of Damascus Balamand seminary . it compares the eastern view of cross to the satisfaction theory of Anselm ... Metrop. Hierotheos says it clear that Anselm's theory can be considered as a heresey... I think the medieval approach was quite Juridical !

thanks
in ICXC
Mina

Anthony S.

25-10-2008, 03:42 PM

The Lord had to die on the cross because "the wages of sin is death". When Adam sinned, death came into the world. God could not simply have forgiven all sins, without punishment because His Word is true, and ignoring it would make His Word meaningless, and because those who had ignored His Law and those who had tried to live it -and failed would have all been judged equally--saved.

Justice requires salvation for the obedient and condemnation for the sinner. But all men fall short because through Adam we find that all men sin. Jesus was the one "person" (100% man and 100% God) who could stand in for all men and take the punishent that was required under law; "the wages of sin is death".

Now, there is a way for sinful man to be saved because the "wages" of his sin have been paid--if he accepts God's offer of salvation in the manner prescribed, because Christians, through the blood of Christ have their sins continually washed away.

Justice requires punishment of sin and only Jesus Christ could have stood in for every man who accepts..

Death Through Adam, Life Through Christ

ROMANS 5 12Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— 13for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. 14Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the one to come.

15But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! 16Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. 17For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. 18Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. 19For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.

Father David Moser

25-10-2008, 05:58 PM

The Lord had to die on the cross because "the wages of sin is death". When Adam sinned, death came into the world. God could not simply have forgiven all sins, without punishment because His Word is true ...

This whole approach to redemption (law, condemnation, punishment, etc) plays a relatively minor role in Orthodoxy. As has been mentioned previously in this thread, Fr John Romanides' book The Ancestral Sin is a really excellent treatment of the Orthodox teaching in contrast to the Western teaching on this issue.

Another book on this that comes from the West is Christus Victor by Gustav Aulen (a bishop in the Swedish Lutheran Church). Aulen, very interestingly, maintains that Martin Luther himself firmly held to the Orthodox teaching on the redemption, but that his successors in the Lutheran confession reinterpreted and restated Luther's teaching in the light of the Augustinian/Anselmian doctrines of Rome.

Fr David Moser

Paul Cowan

25-10-2008, 11:15 PM

Jesus was the one "person" (100% man and 100% God) who could stand in for all men and take the punishent that was required under law; "the wages of sin is death".

I dont think this is quite accurate. If it were it would perpetuate God with a big baseball bat waiting to whack us on the head.

God who is Jesus willing died for oursakes so He could overcome death since we could not. Thus making it possible for us to be reconciled to Him. It was His creation;man, who demanded His death. NOT God the Father. Jesus knew it was going to happen and He allowed it. This was NOT punished but He had to endure it. As He said, He could have called down 10 legions of angels to help Him. He did not because He knew this was the only way His creation could ever be redeemed.

He did this out of love for us though we nailed Him to a cross.

Paul

Anthony S.

26-10-2008, 01:38 AM

I dont think this is quite accurate. If it were it would perpetuate God with a big baseball bat waiting to whack us on the head.

Dear Paul,

I'm not sure that I understand your point. Sure, Jesus had foreknowledge that He would die on the cross. Men killed Him, and it was the devil who orchestrated it. But as we learn in 1 Cor 2:None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
1 Corinthians 2:7-9 (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=2&verse=7&end_verse=9&version=31&context=context)

Ephesians 6:2 tells us that these rulers, powers and authorities are in the Heavenly realms.

Justice under the laws of all nations calls for crime and punishment. This is the basis of law. Law without punishment is just a fortune cookie. I don't know that one would say that a judge is waiting for us with a baseball bat if we are convicted of a crime....

The Lord does not want to condemn anyone but He will:2 Peter 3

7By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
8But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Ant

Herman Blaydoe

26-10-2008, 02:49 PM

Dear Paul,

I'm not sure that I understand your point. Sure, Jesus had foreknowledge that He would die on the cross. Men killed Him, and it was the devil who orchestrated it. But as we learn in 1 Cor 2:None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
1 Corinthians 2:7-9 (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=53&chapter=2&verse=7&end_verse=9&version=31&context=context)

Ephesians 6:2 tells us that these rulers, powers and authorities are in the Heavenly realms.

Justice under the laws of all nations calls for crime and punishment. This is the basis of law. Law without punishment is just a fortune cookie. I don't know that one would say that a judge is waiting for us with a baseball bat if we are convicted of a crime....

But God is not man, He does not need the laws of nations. According to The River of Fire (http://www.geocities.com/trvalentine/orthodox/riveroffire.html) by Alexander Kalomiros;

This juridical conception of God, this completely distorted interpretation of God's justice, was nothing else than the projection of human passions on theology. It was a return to the pagan process of humanizing God and deifying man. Men are vexed and angered when not taken seriously and consider it a humiliation which only vengeance can remove, whether it is by crime or by duel. This was the worldly, passionate conception of justice prevailing in the minds of a so-called Christian society.

Western Christians thought about God's justice in the same way also; God, the infinite Being, was infinitely insulted by Adam's disobedience. He decided that the guilt of Adam's disobedience descended equally to all His children, and that all were to be sentenced to death for Adam's sin, which they did not commit. God's justice for Westerners operated like a vendetta. Not only the man who insulted you, but also all his family must die. And what was tragic for men, to the point of hopelessness, was that no man, nor even all humanity, could appease God's insulted dignity, even if all men in history were to be sacrificed. God's dignity could be saved only if He could punish someone of the same dignity as He. So in order to save both God's dignity and mankind, there was no other solution than the incarnation of His Son, so that a man of godly dignity could be sacrificed to save God's honor.

The Lord does not want to condemn anyone but He will:2 Peter 3

7By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
8But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Ant

Kalomiros says further on this:
Does this conception of justice have anything to do with the justice that God revealed to us? Does the phrase justice of God have this meaning in the Old and New Testaments?

Perhaps the beginning of the mistaken interpretation of the word justice in the Holy Scriptures was its translation by the Greek word δικαιοσύνη. Not that it is a mistaken translation, but because this word, being a word of the pagan, humanistic, Greek civilization, was charged with human notions which could easily lead to misunderstandings.

First of all, the word δικαιοσύνη brings to mind an equal distribution. This is why it is represented by a balance. The good are rewarded and the bad are punished by human society in a fair way. This is human justice, the one which takes place in court.

Is this the meaning of God's justice, however?

The word δικαιοσύνη, justice, is a translation of the Hebraic word tsedaká. This word means the divine energy which accomplishes man's salvation. It is parallel and almost synonymous to the other Hebraic word, heséd which means mercy, compassion, love, and to the word, eméth which means fidelity, truth. This, as you see, gives a completely other dimension to what we usually conceive as justice. This is how the Church understood God's justice. This is what the Fathers of the Church taught of it. How can you call God just, writes Saint Isaac the Syrian, when you read the passage on the wage given to the workers? 'Friend, I do thee no wrong; I will give unto this last even as unto thee who worked for me from the first hour. Is thine eye evil, because I am good?' How can a man call God just, continues Saint Isaac, when he comes across the passage on the prodigal son, who wasted his wealth in riotous living, and yet only for the contrition which he showed, the father ran and fell upon his neck, and gave him authority over all his wealth? None other but His very Son said these things concerning Him lest we doubt it, and thus He bare witness concerning Him. Where, then, is God's justice, for whilst we were sinners, Christ died for us!

So we see that God is not just, with the human meaning of this word, but we see that His justice means His goodness and love, which are given in an unjust manner, that is, God always gives without taking anything in return, and He gives to persons like us who are not worthy of receiving. That is why Saint Isaac teaches us Do not call God just, for His justice is not manifest in the things concerning you. And if David calls Him just and upright, His Son revealed to us that He is good and kind. 'He is good', He says, 'to the evil and impious.'

I recommend our friend Anthony spend some time with this article.

Herman the Pooh

Father David Moser

26-10-2008, 03:12 PM

Justice under the laws of all nations calls for crime and punishment. This is the basis of law. Law without punishment is just a fortune cookie.

But God does not act towards us with justice, but rather with mercy. What you describe in your previous post presumes that there is some immutable justice that even God must satisfy before He can extend mercy to us. This is not the case - God does not act out of necessity, but out of love. He does not "fulfill justice" but rather sets justice aside and extends mercy to us. Consider the parable of the servant who owed his master 10,000 talents (Matt 18:24). The master, in forgiving the debt did not pay the money to himself (as though to fulfill some necessity of accounting) and so discharge the debt - but rather he forgave the debt outright. So also God forgives us without some legal fiction to satisfy a necessity of justice; He simply forgives us.

Again, I would refer you to the other writers mentioned previously who explain the dogma of redemption and the meaning of the death and Resurrection of Christ much better than I. Or better yet, attend the services of Great Lent and then of Holy Week and Pascha in an Orthodox Church. Listen carefully to they hymns - first of the depth of our sinfulness and then of the victory of the Resurrection. Let the whole experience of the Paschal drama flow over you. This will explain better than my poor words the true understanding of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection of Christ and how, by our participation in it we are saved.

Fr David Moser

Morten Kock Møller

26-10-2008, 04:59 PM

Evan

26-10-2008, 09:14 PM

Dear all,

I have recently joined the Monachos community. One of the reasons was my desire to find out what our Lord accomplished on the cross according to the Orthodox Church. So I am glad to see that there is an ongoing discussion of this at the moment!

Last Easter I read an article by a Danish Orthodox Christian addressing why Christ had to suffer and die. It was quite shocking for me that he rejected the idea of penal substitution (Christ suffering the penalty for sin that we sinners deserve) altogether. And I had been taught that this is the essence of the Atonement! In my ignorance, I thought this was an absolutely fundamental teaching uniting all Christians.

I want to ask some questions to improve my understanding of the Orthodox position: Is the article I read representative of Orthodoxy? Or did the author go too far?

In "The Orthodox Church" Timothy Ware writes that the differences between the Western and the Orthodox view of the Atonement should not be pressed too far (p. 229). Is he too vague in this statement? It seems to me that he sometimes tries to minimize the differences between East and West. If Roman Catholics and Protestants say that Christ died to propitiate the wrath of God, and Orthodoxy says that this is totally mistaken, then there surely is a great gulf between the two, isn't there?

Best regards,
Morten

I admit to being somewhat confused as to why the Orthodox literature I've read insists on portraying the God of Roman Catholic Christianity as a tyrant demanding blood, punishing Christ to appease His divine wrath. It's my understanding that Christ died for four reasons.

1.) To reconcile God and Man and thus enshrine humanity in the Heavens-- that we might be able to become gods.
2.) To show us how to conduct ourselves as obedient to the Father, even unto death, and to become gods in so doing.
3.) To preach the Gospel to the souls in Hades, and make possible the salvation of those who died before the Incarnation.
4.) To remit, by a single, perfect, spotless sacrifice, the sins of mankind that under the Old Law had to be remitted by the priests through animal sacrifices that were effectual, but imperfect.

Granted, I only converted to Catholicism a couple of months ago, so it's possible that I'm missing out on something. But it seems to me as if the "honor-driven" or "juridical" aspects of Catholic doctrine concerning the question at hand that purportedly seperate East from West are overstated by many Orthodox theologians.

Father David Moser

27-10-2008, 05:45 PM

Last Easter I read an article by a Danish Orthodox Christian addressing why Christ had to suffer and die. It was quite shocking for me that he rejected the idea of penal substitution (Christ suffering the penalty for sin that we sinners deserve) altogether. And I had been taught that this is the essence of the Atonement! In my ignorance, I thought this was an absolutely fundamental teaching uniting all Christians.

I want to ask some questions to improve my understanding of the Orthodox position: Is the article I read representative of Orthodoxy? Or did the author go too far?
R
Morten,

In a previous message in this discussion I mentioned a book that I think might make good reading for you. It is "Christus Victor" by Gustav Aulen. Aulen writes as a Lutheran and in fact was a bishop in the Swedish Lutheran Church. He compares the Roman penal substitution model with the Orthodox freed from captivity model of redemption (which he identifies as Ireanaean) and makes the point that Martin Luther held to the Orthodox doctrine rather than the Roman doctrine. It was only after his death when his teaching was reinterpreted by his followers that Lutheranism reverted to the Roman "penal substitution" model of redemption.

Fr David Moser

M.C. Steenberg

27-10-2008, 06:08 PM

Mina Mounir

28-10-2008, 02:09 AM

I would add the following thoughts:

God's justice is his love, and the true measure of his just response to sin is not punishment but sacrifice. Sacrificial love is the measure of true justice. Only such justice is unbound by necessity; only such love is truly just.

The cross is the place of offering.

There is a favourite quotation of mine from St Isaac, which I quoted in another post (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showpost.php?p=43787&postcount=39):
"The entire purpose of the Lord's death was not to redeem us from our sins, or for any other reason, but solely in order that the world might become aware of the love which God has for creation. Had all this astounding affair taken place solely for the purpose of the forgiveness of sin, it would have been sufficient to redeem us by some other means."

Beautiful quote , father Mathew , many thanks !

dear father David Moser,
you referred more than once to fr. Romanides book . I tried to buy it but unfortunately it is out of print. I even payed the money but they sent it back to me coz they are not going to republish it .
could u tell me how to get it and if there 's an ability to have a digital copy ? I'm deeply interested to read it.
by the way , there's an interesting book called " the idea of atonement" written by Hasting Rashdall , an English theologian i think, it is available free on www.archive.org , it gathers all the teachings of the fathers + the different schools and medieval theories without suggesting or recommending any one , just showing them .

I think it can provide very good material for this critical point.

thanks again.

Owen Jones

28-10-2008, 04:07 AM

For our non-Orthodox members let me say something which, in Orthodoxy is called theologoumena. Theologoumena refers primarily to Patristic sayings, but is open to any member of the faithful who is deeply formed in the faith, regarding the meaning of Scripture and the Church's teachings on it, and on things that are not defined in absolute terms by Church counsels. Thus, St. Isaac has the freedom to speak in his terms, based on his experiences, his illuminations, in a way that would seem to even contradict formal doctrines, but he is giving what we would call today his "spin" on things.

It is important to note, I think, that atonement for sins is not defined, as far as I know, in any Church council. This is perhaps because it is a mystical doctrine that is not subject to discreet definition. Whereas it was necessary to define the Incarnation and the Trinity in certain precise terms, largely because in the imperial Church it became a matter of necessity. One finds, however, from pre-conciliar times to the present, a kind of freedom and suppleness as it were when it comes to speaking of our Orthodox theological vision. Because it is not data, but rather a visionary revelation as to its hidden meaning. And such hidden meanings can only be expressed in sublime ways that are not subject to precise definition.

The problem as I see in the Church of Charlemagne, if you will, is an undue stress on defining things in precise detail, which in fact goes against the Orthodox spirit. No one lives that way. And no one is saved that way.

God is all things to all people and salvation for me may require of me certain things that are not required of you, the development of something in me, perhaps, that is already present in you, but by the same token, I bring to the altar something that you lack. And so through all of the holy sayings we are led deeper into the mystery of salvation and discover an inexhaustible well of spiritual knowledge and power.

As an aside, I read a wonderful book by a famous Hassidic writer (whose name temporarily escapes me) about a Kotzker rebbe who, while holding forth among his followers during a meal discovered a contradiction in his own thinking. He collapsed and was taken to bed where he remained for three days!

Father David Moser

28-10-2008, 05:44 AM

dear father David Moser,
you referred more than once to fr. Romanides book . I tried to buy it but unfortunately it is out of print.

Amazon has a listing (http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0970730314/sr=/qid=/ref=olp_tab_new?ie=UTF8&coliid=&me=&qid=&sr=&seller=&colid=&condition=new) that says there is one available copy

Fr David Moser

Morten Kock Møller

28-10-2008, 04:11 PM

R
Morten,

In a previous message in this discussion I mentioned a book that I think might make good reading for you. It is "Christus Victor" by Gustav Aulen. Aulen writes as a Lutheran and in fact was a bishop in the Swedish Lutheran Church. He compares the Roman penal substitution model with the Orthodox freed from captivity model of redemption (which he identifies as Ireanaean) and makes the point that Martin Luther held to the Orthodox doctrine rather than the Roman doctrine. It was only after his death when his teaching was reinterpreted by his followers that Lutheranism reverted to the Roman "penal substitution" model of redemption.

Fr David Moser

Dear David,

Thanks for referring me to Aulens book. Actually, I am going to read it later in my studies (I study Theology). I look very much forward to it! Even though it might be a bit premature, not having read his book yet, I would like to dispute the claim that Martin Luther did not subscribe to the theory of penal substitution. That is a very surprising claim to me. The Augsburg Confession, penned by Melanchthon but approved by Luther, states "Also they teach that the Word, that is, the Son of God, did assume the human nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin Mary, so that there are two natures, the divine and the human, inseparably enjoined in one Person, one Christ, true God and true man, who was born of the Virgin Mary, truly suffered, was crucified, dead, and buried, that He might reconcile the Father unto us, and be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also for all actual sins of men." (Article III) (my emphasis)

Doesn't this teach penal substitution? It sounds very Anselmian to me. I believe it is possible to find many, many quotes from Luther that affirm penal substitution.

I think that Luther believed both in penal substitution and in "Christus Victor", that our Lord by his death and resurrection has freed us from sin, trampled upon death and defeated the devil. But it is probably true that the tradition after Luther tended to forget how important the "Christus Victor" idea was for him.

My question still remains: Does Orthodoxy reject the idea of penal substitution altogether (like the Danish Orthodox Christian I read), or does it just downplay it and put more emphasis on others models of the Atonement?

Best regards,
Morten

Father David Moser

28-10-2008, 06:31 PM

Even though it might be a bit premature, not having read his book yet, I would like to dispute the claim that Martin Luther did not subscribe to the theory of penal substitution. That is a very surprising claim to me.

I suggest that you read the book, the argument is Aulen's not mine. He does address some of your concerns. Jaroslav Pelikan says in his preface that he is not sure he agrees with Aulen either, so you may well have a strong point.

I wouldn't say that Orthodoxy absolutely excludes the aspect of penal substitution, but it is not the primary focus of the dogma of redemption in the Orthodox Church. It's kind of like a minor variation on the theme - and even then it is reinterpreted in the light of the rescue from captivity theme.

Fr David Moser

Herman Blaydoe

28-10-2008, 07:46 PM

Morten Kock Møller

28-10-2008, 09:52 PM

I wouldn't say that Orthodoxy absolutely excludes the aspect of penal substitution, but it is not the primary focus of the dogma of redemption in the Orthodox Church. It's kind of like a minor variation on the theme - and even then it is reinterpreted in the light of the rescue from captivity theme.

Fr David Moser

Thank you for the answer. I am glad to read that Orthodoxy doesn't exclude the aspect of penal substitution. Perhaps the article I read overstated things because of its polemical nature.

I would like to know, if it is possible to find penal substitution in the writings of the Holy Fathers.

I believe to have found an example of it in St. John Crysostom's Homily XI on 2 Corinthians (the book "Pierced for our transgressions" led me on the track). I would like to know, if you guys see it as well (I am very biased, being a Protestant!). He writes:

"Ver. 21 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.iiCor.5.html#iiCor.5.21). “For Him who knew no sin He made to be sin on our account.”
‘I say nothing of what has gone before, that ye have outraged Him, Him that had done you no wrong, Him that had done you good, that He exacted not justice, that He is first to beseech, though first outraged; let none of these things be set down at present. Ought ye not in justice to be reconciled for this one thing only that He hath done to you now?’ And what hath He done? “Him that knew no sin He made to be sin, for you.” For had He achieved nothing but done only this, think how great a thing it were to give His Son for those that had outraged Him. But now He hath both well achieved mighty things, and besides, hath suffered Him that did no wrong to be punished for those who had done wrong. But he did not say this: but mentioned that which is far greater than this. What then is this? “Him that knew no sin,” he says, Him that was righteousness itself, “He made sin,” that is suffered as a sinner to be condemned, as one cursed to die. “For cursed is he that hangeth on a tree.” (Gal. iii. 13 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.Gal.3.html#Gal.3.13).) For to die thus was far greater than to die; and this he also elsewhere implying, saith, “Becoming obedient unto death, yea the death of the cross.” (Philip. ii. 8 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.Phil.2.html#Phil.2.8).) For this thing carried with it not only punishment, but also disgrace." (my emphases)

Later, he gives a parable of a king and a criminal:

"If one that was himself a king, beholding a robber and malefactor under punishment, gave his well-beloved son, his only-begotten and true, to be slain; and transferred the death and the guilt as well, from him to his son, (who was himself of no such character,) that he might both save the condemned man and clear him from his evil reputation; and then if, having subsequently promoted him to great dignity, he had yet, after thus saving him and advancing him to that glory unspeakable, been outraged by the person that had received such treatment: would not that man, if he had any sense, have chosen ten thousand deaths rather than appear guilty of so great ingratitude?" (my emphasis)

Doesn't he say here that the criminal is saved because of the son being a penal substitute?

Best regards,
Morten

Herman Blaydoe

29-10-2008, 06:38 PM

Thank you for the answer. I am glad to read that Orthodoxy doesn't exclude the aspect of penal substitution. Perhaps the article I read overstated things because of its polemical nature.

I would like to know, if it is possible to find penal substitution in the writings of the Holy Fathers.

I believe to have found an example of it in St. John Crysostom's Homily XI on 2 Corinthians (the book "Pierced for our transgressions" led me on the track). I would like to know, if you guys see it as well (I am very biased, being a Protestant!). He writes:

"Ver. 21 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.iiCor.5.html#iiCor.5.21). “For Him who knew no sin He made to be sin on our account.”
‘I say nothing of what has gone before, that ye have outraged Him, Him that had done you no wrong, Him that had done you good, that He exacted not justice, that He is first to beseech, though first outraged; let none of these things be set down at present. Ought ye not in justice to be reconciled for this one thing only that He hath done to you now?’ And what hath He done? “Him that knew no sin He made to be sin, for you.” For had He achieved nothing but done only this, think how great a thing it were to give His Son for those that had outraged Him. But now He hath both well achieved mighty things, and besides, hath suffered Him that did no wrong to be punished for those who had done wrong. But he did not say this: but mentioned that which is far greater than this. What then is this? “Him that knew no sin,” he says, Him that was righteousness itself, “He made sin,” that is suffered as a sinner to be condemned, as one cursed to die. “For cursed is he that hangeth on a tree.” (Gal. iii. 13 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.Gal.3.html#Gal.3.13).) For to die thus was far greater than to die; and this he also elsewhere implying, saith, “Becoming obedient unto death, yea the death of the cross.” (Philip. ii. 8 (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bible/asv.Phil.2.html#Phil.2.8).) For this thing carried with it not only punishment, but also disgrace." (my emphases)

Later, he gives a parable of a king and a criminal:

"If one that was himself a king, beholding a robber and malefactor under punishment, gave his well-beloved son, his only-begotten and true, to be slain; and transferred the death and the guilt as well, from him to his son, (who was himself of no such character,) that he might both save the condemned man and clear him from his evil reputation; and then if, having subsequently promoted him to great dignity, he had yet, after thus saving him and advancing him to that glory unspeakable, been outraged by the person that had received such treatment: would not that man, if he had any sense, have chosen ten thousand deaths rather than appear guilty of so great ingratitude?" (my emphasis)

Doesn't he say here that the criminal is saved because of the son being a penal substitute?

Best regards,
Morten

I am not sure that is exactly what is being said. Similar is not same. At any rate, the Orthodox Church chooses to emphasize that sin is a sickness to be healed, not a crime to be punished. If we stay sick we will suffer the consequences, just as a person with a cancer will suffer if he never seeks treatment. Suffering and punishment are certainly similar. Release from suffering is comparable to being released from prison. Therefore, I do not see a conflict here.

Herman

Owen Jones

30-10-2008, 09:00 PM

Salvation for the Christian, according to Origen, is the passing through the Red Sea waters for the Jews, their escape from bondage in slavery in Sheol, so to speak, to their entry into the Promised Land. Only in our case, the Promised Land is not a geographical entity which, as one philosopher I like puts it, has imposed a perpetual mortgage on the Jewish people. For us, Pascha is the Exodus, from bondage to sin and death, to eternal life with God. Pascha does not, according to Origen, pertain to the sacrifice, either of Christ's sacrifice, or the sacrifice of the lambs blood for the Jews, when the angel of death passed over their homes in Egypt, but it refers to our passage, our Exodus from this world to the next. He says this is true linguistically, historically, and theologically. He says this in response to some Christians who were equating the world pascha with sacrifice.

The way I like to put it, atonement for sins is not salvation from sin and death. It is what makes true salvation possible, but they are not one and the same. If all we needed was atonement for our sins, a sacrifice by God as a legal substitute for whatever, then there was no reason for the bodily resurrection on the Third Day. We all would have been saved by the Cross, QED. And, in fact, there was considerably less emphasis in the early Church on the cross than there is today. Every day, and of course every Sunday, is the feast of the Resurrection. We observe Good Friday only once a year. So our liturgical life is centered entirely on the Resurrection, then, now and on the last day.

Michael Stickles

01-11-2008, 03:57 AM

If all we needed was atonement for our sins, a sacrifice by God as a legal substitute for whatever, then there was no reason for the bodily resurrection on the Third Day. We all would have been saved by the Cross, QED.

That was a major point that helped bring me into Orthodoxy. I could not figure out how Paul's statement that "if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins" (I Cor 15:17) made sense in the context of the penal substitutionary model of salvation (at least in the form I'd learned it). The Orthodox understanding (especially as I read it in St. Athanasius' On The Incarnation) made much more sense to me scripturally.

I was re-reading On The Incarnation recently, and noticed there are some parts (particularly in section 20) which imply a substitutionary aspect to Christ's death, but I can't tell if there's a penal aspect to that or not.

In Christ,
Mike

Mina Mounir

01-11-2008, 06:42 AM

in his recently published book " Jesus of Nazareth " , I found an interesting quotation .. Pope Benedict XVI says :

the disciple who walks with Jesus is thus caught up with him into communion with God . And that is what redemption means : this stepping beyond the limits of human nature, which had been there as a possibility and an expectation in man , God's image and likeness, since the moment of creation
What do u think , friends ?

Morten Kock Møller

04-11-2008, 08:35 PM

I am not sure that is exactly what is being said. Similar is not same. At any rate, the Orthodox Church chooses to emphasize that sin is a sickness to be healed, not a crime to be punished. If we stay sick we will suffer the consequences, just as a person with a cancer will suffer if he never seeks treatment. Suffering and punishment are certainly similar. Release from suffering is comparable to being released from prison. Therefore, I do not see a conflict here.

Herman

Dear Herman,

Thanks for the answer.

But how exactly does what St. John Chrysostom writes differ from penal substitution? It is identical with my understanding of what penal substitution means. But I might have misunderstood him.

I certainly agree with you that sin is a sickness. But isn't it also a transgression of God's law that will result in His judgement? Doesn't this entail that we, being in a sinful state, need a penal substitute to save us from the wrath of God? The Apostle write several times that we are to be saved from "the wrath". It seems very central to him.

Please forgive me all these questions (you guys probably hear them all the time from Protestants!). I am just trying to understand the Orthodox position in these matters.

Best regards,
Morten

Michael Stickles

04-11-2008, 09:01 PM

But how exactly does what St. John Chrysostom writes differ from penal substitution? It is identical with my understanding of what penal substitution means. But I might have misunderstood him.

Well, from the first highlighted phrase:

But now He hath both well achieved mighty things, and besides, hath suffered Him that did no wrong to be punished for those who had done wrong.

As I see it, to understand this as referring to penal substitution is to see "for" as meaning "instead of"; to see it otherwise is to interpret it as "on behalf of" or "for the benefit of". We would see it as referring to Christ entering into the fulness of suffering and the punishment for sin, not to be a penal substitute, but to enter completely into our fallen nature (without falling Himself) so as to completely redeem it.

As for the king and the criminal - the point is not the mechanism of salvation, but the moral obligation of gratitude for salvation. Later in the same section St. John Chrysostom writes:

For among men too, when one that has been smitten on the right cheek offers the left also, he more avenges himself than if he gave ten thousand blows; and when one that has been reviled, not only reviles not again but even blesses, he has stricken [his adversary] more heavily, than if he rained upon him ten thousand reproaches. Now if in the case of men we feel ashamed when offering insults we meet with long-suffering; much rather, in respect to God, ought they to be afraid who go on continually sinning yet suffer no calamity. For, even for evil unto their own heads is the unspeakable punishment treasured up for them. These things then bearing in mind, let us above all things be afraid of sin; for this is punishment, this is hell, this is ten thousand ills.

His point here is the same in the previous parable - that we ought to be ashamed to continue sinning against God after receiving such grace and compassion from Him. It is dangerous to stretch a parable beyond its intended point.

I'm going to look up a few half-remembered selections from the Fathers and try to post more later.

In Christ,
Mike

Anna Stickles

05-11-2008, 01:13 AM

Dear Herman,

Thanks for the answer.

But how exactly does what St. John Chrysostom writes differ from penal substitution? It is identical with my understanding of what penal substitution means. But I might have misunderstood him.

I certainly agree with you that sin is a sickness. But isn't it also a transgression of God's law that will result in His judgement? Doesn't this entail that we, being in a sinful state, need a penal substitute to save us from the wrath of God? The Apostle write several times that we are to be saved from "the wrath". It seems very central to him.

Please forgive me all these questions (you guys probably hear them all the time from Protestants!). I am just trying to understand the Orthodox position in these matters.

Best regards,
Morten

Just a quickie here that I thought of recently. When we think of 'law' what comes to our modern mind is some impersonal and objective set of rules. But I don't think that this translates well when speaking of God's law and this isn't precisely the Patristic idea of law. To break God's law is not to break some objective set of rules that God made up and now enforces and He will get angry if we don't obey them. To break God's law is to 1) rebel against the One who set the law, 2) to go against the law of our own nature.

It is not like God gives us death in response to our sin in the same way that we get a ticket for speeding from the govt. Rather it is that in separating ourselves from God we separated ourselves from that which was giving us life. When God says the wages of sin is death it is more along the lines of saying the person who tries to starve themself is going to get sick and eventually die.

Likewise when we sin, we are not breaking some objective rule and having the consequences then put on us from the outside, but rather when we sin we wound ourselves causing ourselves pain. God's justice is intimately part of His relationship with the individual and their response to Him.

This is why you don't see penal substitution used in Patristic theology -- it presupposes God making an impersonal, objective rule that has impersonal objective consequences which as far as I have read is just not the way they understood justice.

I hope this isn't too confusing.

Byron Jack Gaist

06-11-2008, 08:20 AM

This is why you don't see penal substitution used in Patristic theology -- it presupposes God making an impersonal, objective rule that has impersonal objective consequences which as far as I have read is just not the way they understood justice.

I hope this isn't too confusing.

Dear Anna Stickles,

Although I'm no expert on this topic, I want to say that I found your response, and the other responses so far, to the question of penal substitution in patristic writings, clear-headed and sober; to me as an ordinary believer, they make sense. Many thanks.

In Christ
Byron

P.S. I'd like to add that, as an Orthodox Christian, it isn't my personal wish to caricature or diminish the perspective of other denominations. These other perspectives, can help us to focus more clearly on what we as Orthodox Christians believe in, and why we believe it. I'm sure that the fulness of the faith is there, in the Church Fathers and in the wisdom of Orthodox tradition; and, to me personally, Protestants and Roman Catholics may share in this wisdom, and even bring their own special contributions to it - but the fulness of Christianity is nevertheless already expressed completely and sufficiently (as far as humanly possible) within Orthodox Church doctrine, it is just a question of 'searching the archives', to use a metaphor, to come to the right answer in faith. Just a thought.

Luke

13-12-2008, 04:32 AM

I have found that this thread is a fountain of knowledge through dialogue. I am very privileged to have been able to read it.

Most of the thoughts about the ransom theory which I have come across, and which I believe, come down to not attributing the ransom as owed to God (the Father) or even the Devil; rather they are a ransom paid to love in the way that love requires action and as others have said sacrifice. That is, one has to go through trials in this world (suffer if you will) to show love and make paths for others to love and be loved. I know this is abstract but this is the general sense of the world we currently live in --- its beauty lies in the paradox that we have anguish over having to die but through faith we are made stronger in death, having lived and experienced a death to this world into the immortal to commune with Christ, who taught us such things in order to understand our purpose in living.

Morten Kock Møller

14-03-2009, 12:06 AM

Dear all,

I would like to bring this thread back to life again. I have just resumed my search for the doctrine of penal substitution in the writings of the Holy Fathers. Today I read an interesting quote in Eusebius' "Proof of the Gospel", book 10:

"And the Lamb of God not only did this, but was chastised on our behalf, and suffered a penalty He did not owe, but which we owed because of the multitude of our sins; and so He became the cause of the forgiveness of our sins, because He received death for us, and transferred to Himself the scourging, the insults, and the dishonour, which were due to us, and drew down on Himself the apportioned curse, being made a curse for us. And what is that but the price of our souls?"

I would appreciate your comments on this.

Anna Stickles

14-03-2009, 08:23 PM

Dear all,

I would like to bring this thread back to life again. I have just resumed my search for the doctrine of penal substitution in the writings of the Holy Fathers.

Having been struggling for the last couple of years with the differences between Orthodox and Protestant conceptions of the Atonement, may I make a suggestion?

Don't read the Holy Fathers in such a way as to search for support or refutal of your current understandings. This is not going to work. Instead try to absorb the way they think about God's economia for salvation as a whole. Penal substitution is only the tip of the iceberg. There are underlying doctrines of the Fall, sin and redemption that are very different from Protestant understandings and for the Protestant trying to understand the Fathers we have to allow a whole new edifice of the way we think about these things to be built. In the beginning it is like having lots of pieces to a puzzle we can't seem to fit together. But if we keep reading gradually it starts to pull together into more of a coherent whole.

In modern thought when we hear the words "penal substitution" we think that Christ went in place of us. This thought takes us out of the picture and puts Christ in our place. The words "instead of" are often used.

The Patristic mindset is more one of "participation with" rather then "substitution for". He did not take our place but took on our state. This is because communion is such a foundational concept in Patristic theology.

Here is an example to mull over.

"For it is manifest that those acts which are deemed righteous are performed in the bodies. ... bodies too, which have participated in righteousness, will attain to the place of enjoyment, along with the souls which have in like manner participated, if indeed righteousness is powerful enough to bring thither those substances which have participated in it." St Ireneaus of Lyons, Against Heresies bk 2, ch 29.2

Notice here the emphasis on participation. It is through participation in righteousness that we obtain the reward of the righteous, not because we are made righteous in ourselves, neither is righteousness imputed to us in some legal but invisible sense.

Likewise when the Fathers talk about Christ suffering a penalty - this is not in an invisible legal sense. Rather they are talking about Him participating in the real consequences of our rebellion.

But we have to ask - what were the consequences of that rebellion? In this the Orthodox have a very different answer then others. They do not believe in inherited guilt, but inherited weakness. Here again we see that inherited guilt has to do with an invisible legal state but inherited weakness has to do with our real state as being susceptible to passions and sin.

I appologize for how awkward this reply is but hopefully it is enough to get you started.

Byron Jack Gaist

08-05-2009, 01:26 PM

Dear all,

I'm not sure if this is the right thread within which to ask the questions I'm thinking about, but here goes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acts_of_reparation This article describes a RC practice which seems suited to a 'satisfaction' model of the Atonement. Perhaps a Roman Catholic member of the forum may be able to say more, as I am puzzled by the idea of how we, as Christians, can possibly "repair the sins of others", and whether Love can really be violated or offended. But also, perhaps Orthodox forum members can say what it is we Orthodox do to pay off our own debt to love, if such debt exists; also, on a related theme, can RCs tell us how it is possible to offer the wounds of another, and indeed those of our Saviour (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosary_of_the_Holy_Wounds) for our own healing? I must add that I am sure I am in the presence of a very great and sacred mystery when discussing these awe-inspiring matters, and I would like to emphasize that I am not trying to be flippant, or to imply something negative about Western spirituality, but only hoping to understand further.

Also, Fr Michael Azkoul writes the following
Following the holy Fathers, Orthodoxy teaches that Christ, on the Cross, gave "His life a ransom for many" (Matt. 20:28). "For even the Son of man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). The "ransom" is paid to the grave. As the Lord revealed to the Prophet Hosea (Hosea 13:14), "I will ransom them (us) from the power of the grave, I will redeem them from death." In a sense, He pays the ransom to the devil who has the keeper of the grave and holds the power of death (Heb. 2:14). Now, I think elsewhere in this forum (maybe it was even in this thread, I haven't re-read it all) we discussed the issue of who the ransom was paid to, and I came away with the impression it wasn't to the devil. It also doesn't make 'sense' that a King should pay ransom to a kidnapper in some ways.

I look forward to hearing others' thoughts.

In Christ
Byron

Paul Cowan

08-05-2009, 03:14 PM

Also, Fr Michael Azkoul writes the following Now, I think elsewhere in this forum (maybe it was even in this thread, I haven't re-read it all) we discussed the issue of who the ransom was paid to, and I came away with the impression it wasn't to the devil. It also doesn't make 'sense' that a King should pay ransom to a kidnapper in some ways.

I look forward to hearing others' thoughts.

In Christ
Byron

The idea of a ransom is a PC idea. It is saying God killed his Son to appease His rath. This view of an angry God is not correct. MAN demanded the death of Jesus. He knew this and still voluntarily allowed man to kill him in a horrible way. So if any "debt" was paid it was in love to cover our sins and especially of the one extreme sin of us killing our God.

God owed nothing to the devil. If anything Jesus allowing Himself to be killed was a subterfuge to get access to hell (not that He could not get there alone, but was now "invited" by satan) to break the gates.

Paul

Herman Blaydoe

08-05-2009, 03:33 PM

The idea of a ransom is a PC idea. It is saying God killed his Son to appease His rath. This view of an angry God is not correct. MAN demanded the death of Jesus. He knew this and still voluntarily allowed man to kill him in a horrible way. So if any "debt" was paid it was in love to cover our sins and especially of the one extreme sin of us killing our God.

God owed nothing to the devil. If anything Jesus allowing Himself to be killed was a subterfuge to get access to hell (not that He could not get there alone, but was now "invited" by satan) to break the gates.

Paul

The idea of ransom is not totally a PC idea—making it the end-all and be-all of the Resurrection IS a PC invention however. From Isaiah 35:10 And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, And come to Zion with singing, With everlasting joy on their heads. They shall obtain joy and gladness, And sorrow and sighing shall flee away. And we have Hosea 13:14 “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. O Death, I will be your plagues! O Grave, I will be your destruction! Pity is hidden from My eyes.”

Matthew and Mark both report our Lord as saying "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:28 and Mark 10:45)

So the idea of ransom is, in fact, ONE ASPECT of the Resurrection. The basic meaning of ransom is "to release". A ransom is never something that is "owed", that is a debt, which is something else entirely. Nobody "owes" the Somali pirates the money they are paid to release their prisoners, but it is often paid regardless.

Or so it seems to this bear of little brain.

Herman the Pooh

Vasiliki D.

09-05-2009, 09:31 AM

Hey guys, according to Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, in a nutshell, it would appear that Jesus had to die:

{PG 37 470}

Shall I ask to whom went the blood which Christ shed forth?
If to the wicked one-alas, Christ's blood for him who is
evil!
But if to God-why, when we were under another's power?
For it's always to one who holds power that a ransom is paid.
The truth is this: he offered himself to God.
so as to snatch us from him who had us in his power,
so that, in exchange for him who fell, he might take
the Christ: but he who christens cannot be caught.

Anna Stickles

10-05-2009, 09:43 PM

Reading back over these last few exchanges makes me understand a little why the Father's warn about too much speculative theology. I think we all recognize that when we use concepts like ransom, to describe what Christ did, we are not really describing the full reality, but only attempting to communicate some particular aspect of it, usually in reference to some problem or falsity that would lead us away from a right relationship with God.
It's hard at times, I think, when the Fathers use a figure or parable from human experience like "ransom" to really know exactly how they are seeing this as a type or image of what Christ did and the connection that we are supposed to make. Especially if we do not take into consideration the question or problem they are trying to address.

Anyway, I think that often, because we are looking for the wrong kind of answers we end up asking the wrong question, in the wrong way, and therefore any answer we get to our question is going to be meaningless in any spiritual sense. It will be mere mental flotsom

Byron Jack Gaist

11-05-2009, 07:20 AM

Dear Herman,

So the idea of ransom is, in fact, ONE ASPECT of the Resurrection. The basic meaning of ransom is "to release". A ransom is never something that is "owed", that is a debt, which is something else entirely. I found this quite helpful. In modern Greek, the word lytra (ransom) is obviously cognate to lytrosis (salvation), but it was a connection I hadn't made. In fact, since lytrosis is so central to the whole purpose of having a relationship with God, the idea of "ransom" also becomes extremely important, I suppose. Yet, it would be most ironical if the Saviour Himself actually "owed" anything in absolute, cosmic terms, to His own wayward creature, the devil - but it also makes sense that our own debts are being paid off for us through His sacrifice. This, together with Vassiliki's quotation from St Gregory Nazianzene, goes some way towards clarifying the question of who the ransom is paid out to, but also why, and how this may differ from an account such as that suggested by an overly anthropomorphic understanding of satisfaction theory.

Anna Stickles also seems to be saying something useful, where she points out that none of these concepts can make any more sense to us than the condition of our own relationship with God permits; the questions we ask are indeed prompted by the sort of answers we seek. I guess that's why theology can't limit itself to the methodology of natural science, a fact which for the modern, rationalistic mind, is quite challenging.

If anyone has an opinion, I'd still appreciate some comments on the first part of my question:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acts_of_reparation This article describes a RC practice which seems suited to a 'satisfaction' model of the Atonement. Perhaps a Roman Catholic member of the forum may be able to say more, as I am puzzled by the idea of how we, as Christians, can possibly "repair the sins of others", and whether Love can really be violated or offended. But also, perhaps Orthodox forum members can say what it is we Orthodox do to pay off our own debt to love, if such debt exists; also, on a related theme, can RCs tell us how it is possible to offer the wounds of another, and indeed those of our Saviour (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosary_of_the_Holy_Wounds) for our own healing? I must add that I am sure I am in the presence of a very great and sacred mystery when discussing these awe-inspiring matters, and I would like to emphasize that I am not trying to be flippant, or to imply something negative about Western spirituality, but only hoping to understand further.

In Christ
Byron

Anna Stickles

12-05-2009, 01:32 AM

Bryon,

I don't know anything about Catholic doctrine but I do know that St Paul said to let no debt remain outstanding except the continuing debt to love one another.

If God, in making us, gave us an infinite potential to grow in grace and in every virtue. If "the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe." has no limit, and if our part in our relationship with Him is to give back in love all that He has given us - "Thine own of thine own we offer unto You." Then it seems to me we can never pay the debt.

St Gregory of Nyssa says,
"And again: ‘May your spirit and soul and body be preserved blamelessly in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, (I Thess. 5.23.) who has furnished a pledge of immortality through Baptism to those who are worthy, in order that the talent entrusted to each may, through their use of it, produce unseen wealth. (Luke 19.13, Matt 25.14) For, brethren, holy Baptism is important, important for the things perceptible to the mind of those who receive it with fear; for the rich and ungrudging Spirit is always flowing into those accepting grace, filled with which the holy apostles reaped a full harvest for the churches of Christ. For those who have taken possession of this gift sincerely, in endures as co-worker and companion in accordance with the measure of faith, the good dwelling in each one in proportion to the eagerness of the soul in its deeds of faith, in keeping with the word of the Lord. He says that the one who accepts the coin does so on terms of interest, that is the grace of the Holy Spirit is given to everyone with the understanding that there is to be an augmenting and increase of what is received."
The more we receive the more we owe, and the more we give back to 'pay the debt off', the more we receive the 'interest' and the wonderful circle continues into all eternity.

Adam in eating of the tree of Knowledge took what was not yet his, and how can we offer to another something that does not belong to us? God is not going to accept stolen goods. Each of us can only offer to God what rightly has been given us by God.

I don't know if talking about 'repairing the sins of others' really fits the Patristic paradigm as I have come to understand it. Rather we see that each one must offer back to God what God has given him. In the parable St Gregory of Nyssa alludes to in the quote above that Christ says,

Matt 25:28 'Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. 29For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.

If we refuse to give to God whatever 'piece' of the Whole Adam that has been given to us, it will be taken away and given to one who will offer it back to God then God will be all in all. In a sense we could say that from God's perspective this is "repairing our sin", but from our perspective God is just and we are the losers.

In a sense I think that Satan, in causing Adam to try to take what God had not given him, was stealing from God. Christ took on the whole of human nature, took it away from Satan and offered it back to God - which is what Adam should have done in the first place. At least this is what it seems to me St Gregory might be saying in the quote Vasiliki gave.

Byron Jack Gaist

13-05-2009, 01:23 PM

Dear Anna,

Thank you for your feedback. I'm still confused over this business of what was given to whom and why, but what you're saying sounds deeply considered. I'd like to understand the following a little better:
If we refuse to give to God whatever 'piece' of the Whole Adam that has been given to us, it will be taken away and given to one who will offer it back to God then God will be all in all. In a sense we could say that from God's perspective this is "repairing our sin", but from our perspective God is just and we are the losers. Is the 'Whole Adam' you are referring to, the sum total of humanity? And what would giving the piece back to God entail? Did Christ 'deceive' Satan by paying him a ransom that was really a bomb which blew hell apart?

In Christ
Byron

Herman Blaydoe

13-05-2009, 01:51 PM

Did Christ 'deceive' Satan by paying him a ransom that was really a bomb which blew hell apart?

In Christ
Byron

I'm not Anna, but if I may presume to impose, the answer here, based on the hymnography of the Church appears to be a definite YES.

In the Matins service Odes, we have this wonderfully illustrative verse:

"Wrapped in the flesh like bait on a hook, Thou descended into hades O Lord..."

We also have the Paschal sermon of St. John Chrysostom:

"By descending into Hell, He made Hell captive.
He embittered it when it tasted of His flesh.
And Isaiah, foretelling this, did cry:
Hell, said he, was embittered
When it encountered Thee in the lower regions.

It was embittered, for it was abolished.
It was embittered, for it was mocked.
It was embittered, for it was slain.
It was embittered, for it was overthrown.
It was embittered, for it was fettered in chains.
It took a body, and met God face to face.
It took earth, and encountered Heaven.
It took that which was seen, and fell upon the unseen."

So, yes, or so it seems to this bear of little brain

Herman the Pooh

M.C. Steenberg

14-05-2009, 01:52 PM

Dear Paul,

I'm just catching up on this thread, and noticed what you wrote here:

The idea of a ransom is a PC idea. It is saying God killed his Son to appease His rath. This view of an angry God is not correct. MAN demanded the death of Jesus. He knew this and still voluntarily allowed man to kill him in a horrible way. So if any "debt" was paid it was in love to cover our sins and especially of the one extreme sin of us killing our God.

God owed nothing to the devil. If anything Jesus allowing Himself to be killed was a subterfuge to get access to hell (not that He could not get there alone, but was now "invited" by satan) to break the gates.

I would want to echo what others have since written; namely, that the idea of 'ransom' is not a Protestant concept. It is founds in the scriptures, and talked about at length by even some of the earliest Fathers of the Church.

It is the specific idea that 'ransom' implies a debt owed by either man to God, or (even more problematically) God to the devil, that is a very late invention. This is a distortion of the very ancient, patristic teaching on ransom.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

Byron Jack Gaist

14-05-2009, 04:28 PM

Dear Fr Dcn Matthew,

I'm very glad you've decided to contribute here. I would like to hear your opinion on what
the very ancient, patristic teaching on ransom is. I'm personally quite confused about this, but it does seem important. Definitely not just a PC teaching, though - I think Fr Dcn Matthew is right there, Paul.

Dear Herman,

So, yes, or so it seems to this bear of little brain Well, that's interesting in itself. Could this 'deception' be perceived as being in any way an inappropriate means of conduct for a just God (surely not, I just wonder what we would answer to such an accusation)? Is it, too, any sort of divine assent to or acknowledgment of the 'debt' owed to Satan?

On a slightly related note, I was wondering the other day, whether Christ had ever, during his earthly sojourn, been deceived. He was betrayed, of course, but He knew He would be. So was He ever the unknowing victim of anyone's schemes? If He was 100% conscious of exactly what they would do to Him the whole time, how could it be said that He truly shared in human suffering, so much of which is caused by others' deception, against both our knowledge and will?

I'm writing in a bit of a rush, and apologise if I have said anything disrespectful about our Lord.

In Christ
Byron

Herman Blaydoe

15-05-2009, 01:25 AM

Dear Fr Dcn Matthew,

I'm very glad you've decided to contribute here. I would like to hear your opinion on what is. I'm personally quite confused about this, but it does seem important. Definitely not just a PC teaching, though - I think Fr Dcn Matthew is right there, Paul.

Dear Herman,

Well, that's interesting in itself. Could this 'deception' be perceived as being in any way an inappropriate means of conduct for a just God (surely not, I just wonder what we would answer to such an accusation)? Is it, too, any sort of divine assent to or acknowledgment of the 'debt' owed to Satan?

On a slightly related note, I was wondering the other day, whether Christ had ever, during his earthly sojourn, been deceived. He was betrayed, of course, but He knew He would be. So was He ever the unknowing victim of anyone's schemes? If He was 100% conscious of exactly what they would do to Him the whole time, how could it be said that He truly shared in human suffering, so much of which is caused by others' deception, against both our knowledge and will?

I'm writing in a bit of a rush, and apologise if I have said anything disrespectful about our Lord.

In Christ
Byron

Can He who created everything and is aware of everything be deceived? I am but a bear of little brain and not a theologian, but I don't see how that would be possible. I feel the question is up there with "can God create a rock that God cannot lift?", that is can God exceed Himself? This little brain boggles, but then again, this little brain is easily boggled. Perhaps, if you are not asking the wrong question, you are certainly asking the wrong person!

Herman the Pooh

Byron Jack Gaist

15-05-2009, 08:14 AM

Dear Herman,

Can He who created everything and is aware of everything be deceived? Well, that's my point! He could experience agony in the garden, He ate and drank, so why would it be inconceivable to imagine that, in His humanity at least, He could have been deceived? The idea that no one ever deceived Him raises a real question for me: how can we, who are deceived daily, identify with a God-man who only ever chose to suffer? What about involuntary suffering? Are we to be alone in experiencing it?

In Christ
Byron

Anna Stickles

15-05-2009, 09:54 PM

Dear Anna,

Is the 'Whole Adam' you are referring to, the sum total of humanity?
In Christ
Byron

I am just catching up here but yes.

And what would giving the piece back to God entail?

It means living a life wholly dedicated to serving God and pleasing Him. It means living a life in which we recognize His absolute authority over us, not just as a mental acknowledgement, but in the way we live. Our money, our time, our life is not our own, but ultimately comes from Him and must be given back to Him in accordance with His will for our lives. We must work toward fighting against the selfish mindset that says, "I deserve a break today." " I can do what I want with my life and my resources."

We should spend our lives working up to whatever level of commitment we can. It starts with a couple of hours, and a couple of dollars every week attending services and putting something in the offering plate, and can continue all the way up to selling everything and living a life in total dedication such as the monastics do. We are each somewhere on this spectrum. The ideal is to be growing such that eventually in our lives God becomes all in all.

The difference between victorious Christians and defeated ones is not that some have the Spirit while others have not, but that some know His indwelling and others do not, and that consequently some recognize the divine ownership of their lives while others are still their own masters.

Revelation is the first step to holiness, and consecration is the second. A day must come in our lives, as definite as the day of our conversion, when we give up all right to ourselves and submit to the absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ. There may be a practical issue raised by God to test the reality of our consecration, but whether that be so or not, there must be a day when, without reservation, we surrender everything to Him - ourselves, our families, our possessions, our business and our time. All we are and have becomes His, to be held henceforth entirely at His disposal. From that day we are no longer our own masters, but only stewards.

Not until the Lordship of Christ in our hearts is a settled thing can the Spirit really operate effectively in us. He cannot direct our lives until all control of them is committed to Him. If we do not give Him absolute authority there, He can be present, but He cannot be powerful. The power of the Spirit is stayed.

Is there anything God is asking of you that you are withholding from Him? Is there any point of contention between you and Him? Not till every controversy is settled and the Holy Spirit is given His full place can He reproduce the life of Christ in any believer. Watchman Nee

Anna Stickles

15-05-2009, 10:03 PM

Dear Herman,

Well, that's my point! He could experience agony in the garden, He ate and drank, so why would it be inconceivable to imagine that, in His humanity at least, He could have been deceived? The idea that no one ever deceived Him raises a real question for me: how can we, who are deceived daily, identify with a God-man who only ever chose to suffer? What about involuntary suffering? Are we to be alone in experiencing it?

In Christ
Byron

We cannot identify with Him at this point in our lives because we are sinners and He is sinless. It is only as we submit to God and allow Him to purify us that we start to take on the image of Christ, and only as we start to take on His image can we start to identify with Him. We live in delusion because we are resistant to God's will, Christ was perfectly in submission to God's will and therefore never suffered from delusion.

I guess we must get out of thinking that voluntary suffering means I cause myself to suffer, and involuntary suffering means circumstances cause me to suffer (and thus ignoring the fact that all circumstances are part of God's providence)

It seems to me that all suffering that is truly in Christ is voluntary, not in the sense of self-chosen, but in the sense that the one undergoing the suffering is submitted to the will of God in faith and love and chooses to freely accept that suffering.

On involuntary suffering, I think that if we believe that God is just then our involuntary suffering is due to our sin, it is God's chastizement meant to bring us to repentance. If God allows me to suffer, and I reject it, (not volunatrily accepting it) and am not willing to suffer, then maybe I am rejecting God's will and thus living in sin? This is really the only truly involuntary suffering there is.

Christopher Dombrowski

15-05-2009, 11:00 PM

Jesus had to die so that He could fully participate in the human nature that He had assumed at the Incarnation so it would be deified so that we could later participate in that deification.

I hope I'm not being overly simplistic...

Byron Jack Gaist

02-06-2009, 11:26 AM

Dear all,

I found this description of the Synod at Blachernae:
Synod of Blachernae, in Constantinople local Synod, 1157 AD
Convened regarding Basilakes and Soterichus. Condemned those who say Christ offered His sacrifice to the Father alone, and not to himself and to the Holy Spirit; those who say the sacrifice of the Divine Liturgy is only figuratively the sacrifice of Christ's body and blood; those who deny that the sacrifice in the Liturgy is one and the same as that of Christ on the cross; those who say men were reconciled to the Son through the incarnation and to the Father through the passion; those who think the deification of Christ's humanity destroyed his human nature; those who deny that his deified human nature is worthy of worship; those who say that, since the human nature of Christ was swallowed up into Divinity, his passion was an illusion; those who say that characteristics of Christ's human nature (creaturehood, circumscription, mortality, and blameless passions) exist only hypothetically, when one considers Christ's human nature in abstraction, and not really and truly. What I'm wondering is, concerning the point in bold, are we saying Christ did offer His sacrifice to the Father, but also to Himself and the Holy Spirit? And if we are, then in what way was this sacrifice accepted by the Holy Trinity?

Related to this perhaps, is the further question: in the Divine Liturgy (St John Chr.), it also says "Thou art the Receiver and the Received" - can someone explain a little further what Christ is receiving, when He is being the Receiver?

In Christ
Byron