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Dogmatic Theology — Topic 12

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Dogmatic Theology — Topic 12

Soteriology

The Dogma of Redemption

Distortions of Orthodox teaching on the Atonement

** The Classical Legal Theory of the Atonement**

![](https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/1/st- anselm-of-canterbury-granger.jpg)Beginning in the eleventh century a coherent legal theory of the Atonement emerged in the West. The father of this theory is the Western scholastic Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109). We cannot say that he created his theory from scratch, for tendencies to interpret the mystery of the Atonement in legal categories appeared in the West as early as the second or third centuries. After all, the very naming of Christ as Redeemer has a legal sound. However, Anselm was the first to create a coherent theological theory on a purely legal perspective, rejecting other biblical and saintly images.

Its essence is as follows. Adam’s sin is a transgression of the just “legal” order established by God in paradise through the commandments, and therefore constitutes an affront to the divine majesty. The guilt for this sin is borne not only by Adam and Eve who committed it, but also by all their descendants (as heirs inherit not only property but also debts), since neither Adam, nor Eve, nor any other person, nor all together can bring satisfaction (satisfactio) for such an insult to God. For the extent of the guilt is determined according to the rank of the offended party, that is, God. In His goodness, God wants man to be saved. But God’s infinite greatness and justice also require infinite atonement for the offense committed against Him. However, the finiteness of human beings does not allow them to fulfill the conditions of an infinite atonement, even if all of humanity as a whole were sacrificed to satisfy divine justice. Man, according to God’s law, according to divine justice, is condemned to rupture with God and eternal condemnation. In God, however, justice coincides inconsistently with absolute freedom, goodness, and mercy. God is therefore compelled to make atonement through His Son, who undertakes to bring an immeasurable ransom, to restore a just order, so that both the justice of God may be satisfied and the goodness of God may be manifested. Christ was condemned to die on the cross in place of sinful humanity (His sacrifice is “vicarious satisfaction” - satisfactio vicaria) in order to make grace available to it. According to Anselm, man can receive forgiveness of sins only from a man who would be God himself and who, by his death, would reconcile sinful men to God. Only in this way are all the formal conditions of the atoning act fulfilled: satisfaction for sin is brought by the one who had to commit it, man, with the full sufficiency of satisfaction proportionate to the infinite guilt against God guaranteed by the divine dignity of the person of the God-man Jesus Christ and His total self-giving up to the death of the cross.

Anselm expressed his views in “Cur Deus homo” (Why God Became Man), De redemptione humana (On the Redemption of Man), and other works. This theory was shared by later Western scholastics. But Thomas Aquinas softened this theory. He denied the harsh necessity, the compulsion of God to accomplish salvation in this particular way. This way is the best possible way. Thomas also speaks of a change in human nature, of the deification of humanity.

In Protestantism this doctrine was further developed. Luther and Calvin spoke not only of the satisfaction of divine justice, but also of the wrath of God, which only the death of Christ on the Cross could quench.

  • The Dogma of the Atonement
    • The Positive and Negative Dimensions of Redemption
    • Soteriological Imagery
    • Distortions of Orthodox teaching on the Atonement
    • Soterichus of Antioch’s view of God the Father as the only “addressee” of the atoning sacrifice
    • Theological and Philosophical Alternatives to the Legal Theory of the Atonement

Soterichus of Antioch’s view of God the Father as the only “addressee” of

the atoning sacrifice

The legal theory of the Atonement, which arose in the West, was echoed in the Orthodox East by the controversies that unfolded at the Local Councils of Constantinople in 1156-57. The occasion for the beginning of the controversy were the words of the prayer from the order of the Divine Liturgy, addressed to Christ: “for Thou art He that offereth and is offered, that accepteth and is distributed”. These words are based on the ancient Church’s understanding of the Savior’s sacrifice on the cross, formulated, in particular, by St. John Chrysostom: “The altar of this sacrifice is unusual, because the sacrifice is unusual and unprecedented. Indeed, One and the same was both the victim and priest: He was the victim in flesh, and the priest in spirit. One and the same both offered the sacrifice and was offered in the flesh” (Sermon 1 on the Cross and the Thief).

In the controversy that broke out in the Byzantine capital in the middle of the twelfth century, one side argued that the atoning sacrifice of the Son of God was offered to the whole Holy Trinity, and that Christ, according to the words of the prayer, was both the offering and the receiving one. The other side insisted that if Christ was both the offering and the victim, then two independent hypostases were introduced. This view was voiced by Soterichus, who was named Patriarch of Antioch. Obviously, Soterichus was a weak theologian; at any rate, he did not grasp one of the most important ideas of Byzantine theology, namely, the distinction between the concepts of “nature” and “hypostasis” established by the Fourth and subsequent Ecumenical Councils.

According to the different understandings of the meaning of the Savior’s atoning sacrifice, there were also two different understandings of the meaning of the Eucharistic offering: Soterichus maintained that the Eucharist was offered to God the Father, his opponents that it was offered to the whole Holy Trinity.

After considering both understandings of the atoning sacrifice of Christ the Savior, the Council of Constantinople in 1157 came to the following definition:

“The Lord Christ voluntarily offered Himself as a sacrifice, offered Himself according to humanity, and Himself accepted the sacrifice as God together with the Father and the Spirit… The Word God-man first, during the Divine Passion, offered the Savior’s Sacrifice to the Father, Himself as God, and the Spirit, by whom man was called from nothingness to being, whom he also offended by transgressing a commandment, with whom also the suffering of Christ was reconciled. Likewise now bloodless sacrifices are offered to the all-perfect and perfecting Trinity, and the Trinity accepts them.

The dogmatic definitions of the Councils of Constantinople 1156-57 retain their significance as an alternative to the Western legal theory of the Atonement.

Soterichus of Antioch’s view of God the Father as the only “addressee” of

the atoning sacrifice

Soteriological Imagery

Since the doctrine of the Atonement has to do with both mortal and divine being, it was never formulated by the holy Fathers in the form of any definition or theory, for these forms of presentation presuppose, as you have seen, a clear, rational description of the subject, which in the case of the Atonement is impossible. The Fathers of the Church tried to elucidate the mystery of the Atonement through images, some of which they drew from Scripture. First of all, there is the legal image, which is only natural, since the word “atonement” itself is borrowed from legal practice.

  • the legal image is the ransom of a captive or slave at the cost of the blood of the Lamb, the Son of God (cf. Isa. 53:7; Matt. 20:28).
  • the image of the high priest offering himself as a sacrifice for man (see 1 Peter 1:19; Hebrews 5:1; Hebrews 7:20-28; Hebrews 10:12-14).
  • the image of the stout husband who overcomes the robber or enemy (i.e. the Devil) and takes away his booty (man).
  • the image of the warrior or warlord destroying the enemy’s fortress, the gates of hell, binding the foe. St. Gregory the Theologian says in his Easter Homily: “He has repelled the sting of death, he has broken the dark shutters of a dismal hell, he has given freedom to souls.
  • the image of the king who overcomes the tyrant who illegally seized power and regains his royal authority over the world (see Matthew 28:18; Luke 1:32-33).
  • the image of the prophet , the evangelist, bringing the good news of salvation. The Old Testament tells us that the Messiah will be a prophet, a preacher (Deuteronomy 18:18-19). The Lord calls Himself the Light of the world (John 12:46), the Master and Teacher, and even more, speaks of Himself as the true Master and Teacher (Matt. 23:8-10).
  • the pastoral image , the image of the Good Shepherd who seeks and finds the lost sheep (Matthew 18:12; John 10:11).
  • the medical image , the image of the Good Samaritan, the doctor who heals the wounds of His people. The meaning of this image is that Christ came into this world for the healing of the sick from the consequences of original sin, came to restore human nature to its original health. Christ Himself says: not the healthy have need of a physician, but the sick (Mt 9:12-13; cf. Mk 2:17; Lk 5:31-32), and also, quoting Is. 61:1-2: The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, for He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor, and sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, to preach sight to the blind, to set at liberty the tormented, to preach the summer of the Lord that is good (Luke 4:18).
  • the image of salvation through humiliation or the image of divine cunning. St. Gregory the Theologian: “He who has become wise in evil (i.e., the devil) hoped to be invincible, having deceived us with the hope of deification, is himself deceived by the lure of the flesh, in order to meet God by coming to Adam (i.e., Christ the man). And thus the new Adam saved the old Adam, and the condemnation of the flesh was permitted, when death was put to death by the flesh” (Homily 39).
  • the image of the second Adam , doing the work which Adam the first should have done but did not do, and leading saved humanity, as Adam became the progenitor, the leader of fallen humanity (see 1 Cor. 15:45-49).

The Dogma of the Atonement

The dogma of the atonement is one of the main dogmas of Christianity, the core of which is the redemption of fallen humanity from the power of sin, death, hell and the devil, accomplished by the feat of life, suffering, the Sacrifice of the Cross, the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus Christ. The essence of the Gospel’s idea of Christ’s redemption of fallen mankind is expressed in the Creed: “who for us men and for our salvation, came down from the heavens. And was incarnate of the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary, and became man. And was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate; and suffered, and was buried; and arose again on the third day according to the Scriptures; and ascended into the heavens, and sitteth at the right hand of the Father; and shall come again, with glory, to judge both the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end.”

Scripture speaks of salvation in two ways. Here are two quotations from the Apostle Paul: For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (Eph. 2:8). Here salvation is spoken of as something already accomplished and beyond our control. This is the kind of quote that Protestants usually cite in support of their soteriological doctrine that everything for the salvation of a particular person has already been done by Christ, that only faith in the Savior (faith that Christ is my Savior and that I am already saved by Him) guarantees one eternal life. As usual, Protestants “trim” the apostle Paul’s thought and try to squeeze divine revelation into their arbitrary schemes. But the same Apostle Paul also has another saying: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12). So, the Apostle Paul did not think that salvation was something that was already given to a person at the moment of conversion to Christ. If this were so, then how could salvation be accomplished, even with fear and trembling? Thus Scripture distinguishes between the truth of our salvation already accomplished and the truth of the necessity of salvation being accomplished by every believer in Christ, that is, the personal acquisition of the salvation revealed to us in Christ. Salvation, then, is synergistic; it involves the cooperation of God and man.

Thus, based on Scripture, we can conclude that the very concept of salvation has two sides: objective and subjective. The objective side is all that is done for the sake of our salvation by God and does not depend on our will, is a gift to us because we could not do it ourselves if we wanted to. This part is the content of soteriology (the doctrine of salvation or the dogma of the Atonement). When we speak of the Atonement, we are referring to the objective side of salvation - the things that God has done for our salvation: the Incarnation, Christ’s life, the preaching, the miracles, death, the descent into hell, the Resurrection, the Ascension.

The subjective side of salvation is the effort we have to make in order to make use of this gift, to receive it. The combination of this effort and divine grace is the subject of the doctrine of grace, ecclesiology, and the doctrine of the Sacraments.

The Positive and Negative Dimensions of Redemption

The Atonement has as it were two dimensions: positive and negative (from the word “negare” to deny, i.e., to reject).

The positive dimension of Atonement basically coincides with the purpose of creation and the Incarnation, which is the deification of man and through him of the whole world. We spoke in detail about the purpose of the Incarnation, according to the Holy Fathers, at the beginning of the school year.

The negative dimension of the Redemption is the removal of those barriers which, at a certain point, separate man from God. There are four such barriers:

a) Sin.

Sin in its essence is disobedience, that is, a disagreement between the will of man and the will of God, a rebellion of man against God, and therefore a rebellion against his own nature, created by God. Sin leads to the destruction of the original unity that existed between God and man and the destruction of the inner unity of all forces in man.

b) Curse

St. Philaret of Moscow gives the following definition of damnation: “Damnation is the condemnation of sin by the righteous judgment of God” (Extended Christian Catechism). The Fall is followed by the expulsion of the first people from paradise and the deprivation of man’s ability to communicate directly with God. God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5), so nothing dark, sinful, evil can be in the presence of God, be in communion with Him. For this reason God removes man from Himself. Thus, the curse is expressed, first of all, in man’s alienation from God as the Source of life.

c) The Devil

Having fallen away from God, man is at the mercy of fallen angels. The devil, through his power over man, becomes the “prince of this world.”

d) Death

Being in a state of alienation from God and in the power of the devil, man has no means of getting out of this state on his own, and thus he finds himself condemned to spiritual death.

As a consequence of the Atonement, there has been a change in the relationship between God and man. The apostle Paul puts it this way: God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself (2 Cor. 5:19). After the Fall people became enemies of God, and by nature the children of wrath (Eph. 2:3), so a change in the relationship between God and man was necessary. And this change is defined by the apostle as reconciliation.

Atonement

The reaction to the extremity of the legal theory in the West was the so-called moral theory of the Atonement. This theory, which emerged as an opposition to Anselm’s theory, was pioneered by Pierre Abelard (twelfth century). According to his theory, Christ’s death had a purely moral significance because it tangibly expressed the love of God for men, and through it also in them the saving love of God. The focus here is on the ethical side of Christ the Savior’s redemptive deed - through overcoming all temptations, through obedience to the Father, Christ shows the highest example to be emulated.

The moral theory of the Atonement was widespread in the West, whence it was introduced to Russia and developed in the writings of Archpriest P. Smirnov, M. M. Tareyev, V. I. Nesmelov, and Archpriest Hilarion of Vereya.

Regarding the shortcomings of the moral theory of the Atonement, it must be said that, like any theory which opposes another, it is strong in its criticism of legal theory, in its emphasis of its failings, but weak in its positive content. The sacrificial deed of the Savior of the world is more exemplary, an illustration of the life Christ commanded us, than the Calvary sacrifice which is saving and essential to our salvation. The salvific significance of the Resurrection of Christ for us is also completely incomprehensible. It is inevitably diminished, as is the significance of Christ’s death on the cross - they are ascribed significance for the psychology of the saved, not essential for salvation. But according to the teaching, for example, of St. Athanasius the Great, Christ died so that by His resurrection He might overcome decay.

The moral theory of redemption dogmatizes not the legal relationship between man and God, as in the legal theory of redemption, but rather the law of mental interaction, the moral example of Christ. But the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ and the example of His personal life alone are not sufficient for salvation. The sight of a healthy person and the example of a healthy life cannot by itself heal the sick; other means are needed for that.

Thus, as Fr. Florovsky aptly notes, “it is impossible to reveal precisely and completely the meaning of the Sacrament of the Cross in ethical categories alone. The moral and, even more so, the legal concepts here always remain only pale anthropomorphisms.

Atonement

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