Thank you Celtic1. The name of Ransom Theory sounds dubious to me - as if Satan could hold the Almighty Sovereign LORD or His creatures ransom against His will! I quite like Christus Victor as to showing up the stupidity of the Devil, however. Whatever is Patristic, let me follow that!
And Christus Victor is that. I'm not one who holds that the Fathers were always correct, but on this I certainly believe they were.
Our condemnation was not for anything we had done but for what Adam had done. Our personal sins are only symptoms of the inherited sinful nature from Adam. Adam received his spiritual death sentence prior to having any children and his condemnation spread to all succeeding generations. Even if it were possible to lead a sinless life we would still be condemned for the debt of Adam's sin. To repay that debt Jesus had to right Adam's wrong. He had to be obedient where Adam was disobedient. He had to be spiritually alive where Adam and all his descendants were spiritually dead. Where Adam used sacrifices to cover his sin; Jesus became the sacrifice that would cover all. Because all men were slaves to sin, God could find no suitable sacrifice among them, and true to his word to Abraham, God provided himself a sacrifice. And, as Irenaeus put it, in Christ God became one of us so that we may be like God. In his death and resurrection, he redeemed us and liberated us from sin and death. By putting on Christ, we are no longer the condemned children of Adam, disowned by God and owned by Satan, we become New creations: the redeemed and adopted children according to the New Adam.
Maybe, I am a great fan of Anselm. But I'm enjoying working through this Christus Victor concept as well. It all seems inadequate to describe so great a mystery as the Atonement. I doubt we'll ever fully understand it this side of heaven. Thank God we don't have to fully understand it to trust in it and the one who accomplished it.
We've been wondering about this in the other atonement thread : what is the difference between the Substitution theory and the classic Satisfaction theory?
"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all ... It was the will of the LORD to bruise him; he has put him to grief; when he makes himself an offering for sin ... By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous; and he shall bear their iniquities." (Isaiah 53:4-6 et seq.) Penal Substitution, surely.
Well, the way I understand it, Anselm argued that Christ suffered as a substitute on behalf of humankind satisfying the demands of God's honour by his infinite merit. Aquinas and Calvin developped that idea and introduced the idea of punishment to meet the demands of divine justice.
Surely not. I don't see it that way, and neither did the earliest churches who had access to the same scriptures, and neither did the church all down through the centuries, as penal substitution was unknown until Calvin.
The Ransom theory was once widely believed throughout all Christendom, a theory that made God a debtor to the devil, besides a deceiver that only pretended to pay the debt. Anselm was the first known theologian to correct this view. Simply observing what the churches in the past believed is not enough to establish the truthfulness of a doctrine. The Penal Substitution theory is a logical (and I would say necessary) development of the Satisfaction theory. The fact that you don't find comfort in the fact that Jesus died in your stead is baffling.
Penal Substitution is abhorrent and harmful. I hold to Christus Victor, the view held by the church for the first millennium, until Anselm's incorrect theory. None of the views arising in the West are adequate; most are harmful.
I have to apologize for starting two threads on the same subject -- didn't realize it until after it was done.
What is abhorrent about it? The penalty for sin is death, this is clear. Christ died for our sins, in our stead, offering Himself to the Father as the perfect oblation. God's justice was satisfied.
Divine justice could have been conceivably satisfied otherwise but yet He sovereignly chose the ultimate sacrifice of the cross. Calvary, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles, is God's own sacrifice of love for His elect, the perfect ransom for our sins, the perfect appeasement of God's wrath and the power of God unto salvation.
God needed to punish us, because we are sinful, and the punishment for sin is death. What is your answer to the fact that you deserve the death that Christ suffered? He did not deserve it, that is of course clear to anybody. But we do deserve it. What would you prefer, a Flood to cleanse the earth?
Correct me if I am wrong, but we all will still die. Or maybe you're exempt from it if you believe in Penal Substitution. Christus Victor is the obvious correct view which reflects God's character and purpose. God did not require that His wrath be appeased by inflicting divine child abuse on His Son.