False teachers claim the Early Church taught PSA. Misrepresenting Orthodox Saints, they cherry-pick isolated quotes, in a desperate attempt to give PSA an appearance of historicity and respectability.
I'm not arguing, just trying to understand. In the OT the Hebrew word kphr is translated as "atone" but a more literal translation is "made propitiary shelter". The question is shelter from what? It seems to refer to shelter from the wrath of God for sin. On Mount Moriah God required Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, but then provided a ram in his stead. It is hard for me to see any other meaning for that. The Orthodox teaching that Christ lived a complete life on behalf of His people is unquestionably true. But the atonement thing is a major component of the revealed Scripture that seems to teach that blood sacrifice is required to shelter sinners from the wrath of God. And the description of Christ as the Pascal Lamb links Him to the blood sacrifice as the sacrifice itself. If blood sacrifice was not to make atonement to protect sinners from God's wrath, what was it for?
God has never had a divine bloodlust, demaning blood as "payment" for sin. Even in the Old Testament, bloodshed is generally not necessary for atonement and the forgiveness of sins. Paul Vendredi thoroughly demonstrates this fact in parts 20 - 34 in his lecture series on the atonement: https://paulvendredi.com/
The Father did not forsake the Son on the cross. If that happened, then there would be a temporary schism within the Trinity itself, which is impossible. PSA contradicts basic Trinitarian doctrine.
When Jesus said, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?", He was quoting Psalm 22. And later in the same Psalm, it is made clear that He was never actually forsaken by the Father. Verse 24 says: "Nor has He hidden His face from Him; But when He cried to Him, He heard."
Thus, God the Father never hid His Face from His Son.
He became Sin for us. The Father's wrath was directed at that sin. Christ could not have been sin and God's Son at the same time. I'm trying to get my head around where PSA fails to embrace the completeness of the Trinity. Thank you for your writing about this. It is really of supreme importance.
Christ is always the Son of God, including when He is on the cross. If anyone were to deny that, they would be denying the Incarnation itself, and the Hypostatic Union. There is never a time when Christ "becomes" the Son of God, or "ceases to be" the Son of God. It is not possible for Him to temporarily "stop" being the Son of God.
According to the doctrine of the Trinity, the Father, Son, & Holy Spirit are eternally, unchangeably in perfect peace, love, and harmony with one another. If a change took place within the Trinity, so that for a certain amount of time the relationship between the Father and Son was broken, while the Father was "turning His back on His Son" and "pouring out wrath on His Son", then the doctrine of the Trinity would be destroyed.
Peter, just so I understand, are you Orthodox? or Catholic? or Protestant? I don't judge you, in any case. I just need to know, so I can better discern how to communicate in a way that will be most understandable.
Jesus did not literally "become sin". And the Father did not pour out any "wrath" upon His beloved Son. To properly understand 2 Corinthians 5:21, it is helpful to see how the Early Church understood this passage of Scripture.
When St. Gregory of Nyssa interprets 2 Corinthians 5:21, he uses the word "sin" as a figure of speech, basically synonymous with the human body or the damaged human condition:
"By these words it is established that, while the Man tasted death, the immortal Nature did not admit the suffering of death; and again; 'He made Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin,' giving once more the name of 'sin' to the flesh."
— Gregory of Nyssa, Against Eunomius (Book 6, section 1)
When St. Ambrose of Milan interprets Second Corinthians 5:21, he tells us that the terms "sin", "curse", and "infirmity" merely indicate the human condition that Christ assumed. In other words, these words are simply a reference to the Incarnation:
"It is profitable to me to know that for my sake Christ bore my infirmities, submitted to the affections of my body... that is to say, for every man, He was made sin, and a curse."
— Ambrose of Milan, Exposition of the Christian Faith
(Book 2, chapter 11, section 93)
St. Gregory of Nazianzus is in agreement with St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Ambrose. He says that the Scripture quote "He was made sin" is simply a reference to the Incarnation:
"And so the passage, 'The Word was made Flesh' (John 1:14), seems to me to be equivalent to that in which it is said that 'He was made sin' (2 Corinthians 5:21), or a 'curse' (Galatians 3:13) for us; not that the Lord was transformed into either of these, how could He be? But because by taking them upon Him He took away our sins and bore our iniquities."
— St. Gregory of Nazianzus, To Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius. (Ep. CI.)
So... what is atonement, and why does Scripture use that word a few dozen times? Was Christ's death and resurrection done on behalf of others at all? If not, what was the point? Is the Orthodox rejection of PSA purely because PSA contradicts the Orthodox notion of justification by personal obedience? I'm just trying to understand.
The word "atonement" is a recently coined English word, which has barely been around for 500 years. Both the word and the concept are relatively new. Paul Vendredi deals with this question extensively in this series. No, Orthodox Christians do not believe in "justification by personal obedience".
Yes, we believe that Christ died for us, that He shed His blood on our behalf, and that He suffered for our sakes. We believe every word of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Isaiah 53. None of these passages of Scripture teaches anything about Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA). Jesus did suffer and die on our behalf, but when He did so, God the Father was not "punishing" the Son or "pouring out His wrath" upon Him. There was never a time when the Father "turned His back on the Son" and poured out damnation on Him in retribution for our sins.
It is possible — indeed, it is normal — to understand Christ's sacrifice in a way which doesn't involve Penal Substitutionary Atonement. The reason many modern Christians don't know that, is because most of them haven't learned anything except PSA. So when they see phrases like "Christ died for the ungodly" or "He was bruised for our transgressions", they don't know how to interpret such phrases, except in the one way that PSA has trained them to interpret. The Early Church didn't have this problem when reading the Scriptures, because when they were first taught the Faith, they weren't drowned in a sea of PSA propaganda.
The cure for this problem, is simply to become educated on other ways that respected Christian saints throughout history have interpreted these same passages of Scripture. In time, we come to see that PSA presents a modern, distorted understanding of Christ's work on our behalf.
The Restored Icon model presents a much more reasonable understanding of our salvation in Christ, in a way that is compatible with the teachings of Scripture and the historic understanding of the Orthodox Church.
I'm not arguing, just trying to understand. In the OT the Hebrew word kphr is translated as "atone" but a more literal translation is "made propitiary shelter". The question is shelter from what? It seems to refer to shelter from the wrath of God for sin. On Mount Moriah God required Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, but then provided a ram in his stead. It is hard for me to see any other meaning for that. The Orthodox teaching that Christ lived a complete life on behalf of His people is unquestionably true. But the atonement thing is a major component of the revealed Scripture that seems to teach that blood sacrifice is required to shelter sinners from the wrath of God. And the description of Christ as the Pascal Lamb links Him to the blood sacrifice as the sacrifice itself. If blood sacrifice was not to make atonement to protect sinners from God's wrath, what was it for?
God has never had a divine bloodlust, demaning blood as "payment" for sin. Even in the Old Testament, bloodshed is generally not necessary for atonement and the forgiveness of sins. Paul Vendredi thoroughly demonstrates this fact in parts 20 - 34 in his lecture series on the atonement: https://paulvendredi.com/
For a brief overview of how to better understand the Old Testament blood sacrifices, consider this 30 minute presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7b2orgHGb6I
Father why hast Thou forsaken Me? How does that eliminate God's wrath?
The Father did not forsake the Son on the cross. If that happened, then there would be a temporary schism within the Trinity itself, which is impossible. PSA contradicts basic Trinitarian doctrine.
When Jesus said, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?", He was quoting Psalm 22. And later in the same Psalm, it is made clear that He was never actually forsaken by the Father. Verse 24 says: "Nor has He hidden His face from Him; But when He cried to Him, He heard."
Thus, God the Father never hid His Face from His Son.
He became Sin for us. The Father's wrath was directed at that sin. Christ could not have been sin and God's Son at the same time. I'm trying to get my head around where PSA fails to embrace the completeness of the Trinity. Thank you for your writing about this. It is really of supreme importance.
Christ is always the Son of God, including when He is on the cross. If anyone were to deny that, they would be denying the Incarnation itself, and the Hypostatic Union. There is never a time when Christ "becomes" the Son of God, or "ceases to be" the Son of God. It is not possible for Him to temporarily "stop" being the Son of God.
According to the doctrine of the Trinity, the Father, Son, & Holy Spirit are eternally, unchangeably in perfect peace, love, and harmony with one another. If a change took place within the Trinity, so that for a certain amount of time the relationship between the Father and Son was broken, while the Father was "turning His back on His Son" and "pouring out wrath on His Son", then the doctrine of the Trinity would be destroyed.
Peter, just so I understand, are you Orthodox? or Catholic? or Protestant? I don't judge you, in any case. I just need to know, so I can better discern how to communicate in a way that will be most understandable.
Jesus did not literally "become sin". And the Father did not pour out any "wrath" upon His beloved Son. To properly understand 2 Corinthians 5:21, it is helpful to see how the Early Church understood this passage of Scripture.
When St. Gregory of Nyssa interprets 2 Corinthians 5:21, he uses the word "sin" as a figure of speech, basically synonymous with the human body or the damaged human condition:
"By these words it is established that, while the Man tasted death, the immortal Nature did not admit the suffering of death; and again; 'He made Him to be sin for us, Who knew no sin,' giving once more the name of 'sin' to the flesh."
— Gregory of Nyssa, Against Eunomius (Book 6, section 1)
When St. Ambrose of Milan interprets Second Corinthians 5:21, he tells us that the terms "sin", "curse", and "infirmity" merely indicate the human condition that Christ assumed. In other words, these words are simply a reference to the Incarnation:
"It is profitable to me to know that for my sake Christ bore my infirmities, submitted to the affections of my body... that is to say, for every man, He was made sin, and a curse."
— Ambrose of Milan, Exposition of the Christian Faith
(Book 2, chapter 11, section 93)
St. Gregory of Nazianzus is in agreement with St. Gregory of Nyssa and St. Ambrose. He says that the Scripture quote "He was made sin" is simply a reference to the Incarnation:
"And so the passage, 'The Word was made Flesh' (John 1:14), seems to me to be equivalent to that in which it is said that 'He was made sin' (2 Corinthians 5:21), or a 'curse' (Galatians 3:13) for us; not that the Lord was transformed into either of these, how could He be? But because by taking them upon Him He took away our sins and bore our iniquities."
— St. Gregory of Nazianzus, To Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius. (Ep. CI.)
So... what is atonement, and why does Scripture use that word a few dozen times? Was Christ's death and resurrection done on behalf of others at all? If not, what was the point? Is the Orthodox rejection of PSA purely because PSA contradicts the Orthodox notion of justification by personal obedience? I'm just trying to understand.
The word "atonement" is a recently coined English word, which has barely been around for 500 years. Both the word and the concept are relatively new. Paul Vendredi deals with this question extensively in this series. No, Orthodox Christians do not believe in "justification by personal obedience".
Yes, we believe that Christ died for us, that He shed His blood on our behalf, and that He suffered for our sakes. We believe every word of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Isaiah 53. None of these passages of Scripture teaches anything about Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA). Jesus did suffer and die on our behalf, but when He did so, God the Father was not "punishing" the Son or "pouring out His wrath" upon Him. There was never a time when the Father "turned His back on the Son" and poured out damnation on Him in retribution for our sins.
It is possible — indeed, it is normal — to understand Christ's sacrifice in a way which doesn't involve Penal Substitutionary Atonement. The reason many modern Christians don't know that, is because most of them haven't learned anything except PSA. So when they see phrases like "Christ died for the ungodly" or "He was bruised for our transgressions", they don't know how to interpret such phrases, except in the one way that PSA has trained them to interpret. The Early Church didn't have this problem when reading the Scriptures, because when they were first taught the Faith, they weren't drowned in a sea of PSA propaganda.
The cure for this problem, is simply to become educated on other ways that respected Christian saints throughout history have interpreted these same passages of Scripture. In time, we come to see that PSA presents a modern, distorted understanding of Christ's work on our behalf.
The Restored Icon model presents a much more reasonable understanding of our salvation in Christ, in a way that is compatible with the teachings of Scripture and the historic understanding of the Orthodox Church.