Historical Background
The early church spoke of the cross as victory over the powers and as ransom; Irenaeus taught recapitulation, and the ransom picture held the field for a millennium. Anselm's Cur Deus Homo (1098) reframed the cross as satisfaction offered to God's honor. Abelard's emphasis on the cross as the supreme display of love shaped the moral influence account. The Reformers developed penal substitution: Christ bears the penalty of sin in the sinner's place. The extent question divided the Reformed world at the Synod of Dort (1618-19), which confessed the death of Christ as of infinite worth and intended effectually for the elect, against the Remonstrant position that Christ died for all and benefits are applied to believers.
Scripture References
- Isaiah 53
- Romans 3:21-26
- 2 Corinthians 5:18-21
- Hebrews 2:14-18
- 1 Timothy 2:3-6
- 1 John 2:1-2
The Questions
- What does the cross change: God's disposition, the sinner's standing, the powers' hold, or the believer's heart? Work on this question in the Workshop
- Did Christ die for all people or for the elect alone? Work on this question in the Workshop
- Is punishment of the innocent substitute just? Work on this question in the Workshop
- How do the several models of the atonement relate: rivals, or aspects of one work? Work on this question in the Workshop
The Positions on This Subject
Classical Calvinism
The death of Christ is of infinite worth and sufficiency, and was intended effectually to redeem the elect, whose salvation it actually secures rather than merely makes possible.
Classical Arminianism
Christ died for all people without exception, and his death made salvation possible for every hearer; it becomes effectual in those who believe.
Eastern Orthodox
Christ saves by uniting human nature to himself, trampling down death by death, healing what he assumed; the cross is first a victory and a medicine, and its juridical aspects are retained inside this larger frame.
Wesleyan-Arminian
Christ died for all, and God wills all to be saved: the atonement is as wide as the ruin, and no one perishes for want of a ransom paid on his behalf.
Anabaptist
The cross is both Christ's saving work and the pattern of the saved life: the church follows the suffering Christ, and its own suffering under persecution belongs to its witness, not to its merit.
Charismatic and Pentecostal
Salvation in Christ is whole: Jesus saves, sanctifies, heals, baptizes in the Spirit, and is coming as King; divine healing is provided in the atonement and belongs to the gospel's present gift.
Progressive
The cross reveals God's solidarity with the suffering and God's judgment on violence and empire; its saving power works as the unveiling of divine love that reorders human life, rather than as a transaction that satisfies a legal requirement.
Methods Brought to This Subject
The methods of theological discovery demonstrably worked on this subject, each with the reason it belongs here and the evidence of its use.
Typological Interpretation
The claim that Christ's death fulfils the sacrifices rests on reading the tabernacle, the Passover, and the Day of Atonement as patterns that point forward. Typological reading is how the New Testament's own writers make the connection, and every position on this subject has to reckon with those patterns.
Evidence of use: The letter to the Hebrews reads the Levitical priesthood and sacrifices as shadow and copy of Christ's offering, and Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, questions 46 to 49, takes up the Passion under the same pattern of figure and fulfilment.
Objections
Penal substitution is objected to as dividing the Trinity and as morally incoherent punishment of the innocent. Limited atonement is objected to on the universal texts (1 Timothy 2, 1 John 2) and on the sincerity of the universal gospel offer. Unlimited accounts are objected to for making the cross's efficacy depend finally on the human response, and satisfaction accounts are objected to for subjecting God to a necessity outside himself.
Sources
Primary: Anselm of Canterbury, Cur Deus Homo (1098); John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book II, chs. 15-17 (1559); Canons of Dort, Second Head of Doctrine (1619); Gustaf Aulen, Christus Victor (Swedish original 1930; English 1931).
Secondary: David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson, eds., From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, and Pastoral Perspective (Crossway, 2013); Michael J. Gorman, The Death of the Messiah and the Birth of the New Covenant (Cascade, 2014).