Featured Dual Heresy - Torrance

You will have to quote the "Trinitarian Doctrine" you are referring to.

Would it be this?
What Is the Doctrine of the Trinity?

 

The statement:
"If Limited Atonement is correct then the Chalcedonian doctrine and the Nicene Creed is incorrect by necessity."

Again, why would this if/then be true should the two statements you provided also be true?

It's incumbent on Torrance to prove his assertion. So far, I have seen nothing that proves his assertion.

 

@taisto. I just noticed that Torrance rejected the usual Arminian or hypothetical view of atonement where Christ's death made it universally possible for everyone to be saved but actually saved no one. He rejected that because he was Calvinist enough to believe that if that were true you would have salvation depending upon human weakness. And, he accepted the Calvinist argument that such a notion could be called "self salvation". Yet he still insisted on Christ's death actually being effective for people, while at the same time not being a universalist because he clearly said that not everyone will be saved.

He did agree with Owen that if the nature of God is absolute causality, and if the atonement flows out of that divine nature, then an atoning death for all would mean the necessary salvation of all. In other words, he accepted Owen's argument against the Arminians in "The Death of Death in the Death of Christ".

What he objected to was the idea of God loving all and Christ loving all, yet not having that translating into action in the atonement. Here's a quote. " This divorce of the action of Christ from his love really means the dismemberment of Christ, the separation of his person from his work - and that is to destroy the atonement as well as the incarnation".

 

To follow up. You won't find a clear argument regarding the extent of the atonement as to what it means in a rational sense by Torrance. Here he is again, "Here we see that man's proud reason insists in pushing through it's own partial insight into the death of the cross to it's logical conclusion, and so the great mystery of atonement is subject to the rationalism of human thought. That is just as true of the universalist as it is of those who hold limited atonement for in both cases they have not yet bowed their reason before the cross of Christ."

So instead, he lists some of his objections. Which are that it doesn't fit right with his view of the whole nature of the meaning of the atonement, some parts of it being cosmic in nature, representative, and clearly universal. And that it doesn't fit well with his view of the oneness of the Father and the Son, and also that it doesn't make sense to Torrance regarding the Calvinist claims of God's love to the world when it clearly comes short in terms of action. He seems to avoid the usual rational back and forth.

In fairness to Calvinists, most theologians I read have no problem admitting the limitations of human reasoning in this area and that includes Owen, Edwards, Spurgeon, and even MacArthur. I think Torrance is right in that there is a point where we all have to just give up figuring it out but like I said, he is not new in realizing that.

 

I think a quote from GK Chesterton is fitting.

"The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits."

G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

 

I am reading his "if/then" assertion and asking how he proves his assertion. How can one know if Torrance is right or wrong in his statement? In reading your response, how can we know that Torrance presupposition of the Atonement is correct? So, ultimately, Torrance has this massive "IF" that he is begging which then, somehow, gives credence to his "then." However, the "if" is never established in this thread, which makes the "then" pointless.

I believe I will bow out of this thread as it smacks of 1 Timothy 1:4.
Don’t let them waste their time in endless discussion of myths and spiritual pedigrees. These things only lead to meaningless speculations, which don’t help people live a life of faith in God.

 

You have a point. Torrance says that if Christ "represents" all men in the incarnation then he must represent all men in his death on the cross. But he doesn't say why. And, while he states that the Calvinistic doctrine of limited atonement damages the doctrine of the Trinity and of the atonement itself - without going on with "if then" logic it is meaningless. To me, if you destroy central Christian doctrines like the trinity and the atonement then you are a heretic and probably on your way to hell. Not so with Torrance because he believes that to be lost you must consciously and actively reject the salvation accomplished by Christ. In terms we would understand as Calvinists, he was very "monergistic" with the difference being that it is possible that a person can willfully reject what Christ has actually accomplished on our behalf. Only such as do that are lost therefore being a heretic does not put you in danger as there is only one sin that does that.

What I am trying to say is that Torrance himself used "if then" statements to argue the points he wanted to make but then critiques if then logic as rationalism when the Reformers use it.

 

Is there Calvinist theological literature that rejects the Nicene creed? What is the problem a reformed theologian would have with the Nicene creed?

Also, does Reformed literature say Jesus stopped being the Son of Man on the cross?

 

Colossians 1:20, ". . . And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven. . . ."

 

I don't remember taking a strong position on that which would require an all capital "YOU" but OK, I do question why one would make any assumption about the fact of the incarnation as meaning that Christ had to be a representative of anyone or everyone. Representation is not a requirement of the fact that Christ came into the world as a man and was fully God and fully man. That's not to say he wasn't, just to say that one's belief on the extent of representation does not require a deficiency in the understanding of the incarnation, unless, you also have already come with presuppositions about what this has to mean.

This also is puzzling. Torrance, while insisting penal substitution is not a stand alone total explanation of Christ's atoning work on Earth is fully on board with penal substitution as an aspect of the atonement. And rather than argue that again, I would simply point out that if that were not the case you simply could not have the level of respect for him that you have among Calvinists as for example on the Puritan Board. Because one thing Calvinists do is regard a rejection of penal substitution as a heresy.

The other thing in the above that puzzles me is the fact that Torrance seems to say two things at the same time. He says that those that believe in limited atonement do injustice to the Trinity by separating the Father and the Son, and he says that the part of the atonement involving propitiation of God's wrath is not represented properly by Calvinists because what you have in essence is really God himself taking the wrath and folding it in upon himself. This is opposed to God standing off so to speak while Jesus does this work. Well, I agree with that. But while I do think there is a danger of this in Calvinistic teaching, which can be illustrated by the famous instance where Sproul said it was almost like the Father said to the Son "God damn you" at that moment that is not standard Calvinistic doctrine. Calvinist teachers seem well aware of the connection of the Father to the Son at all times and we all admit there are difficulties in understanding the Trinity for our finite minds. Torrance himself said on one hand that God took his righteous wrath upon himself but also said this, "It is impossible to divide the deity and humanity of Christ, or Christ from the Father."

Now watch this in the very next sentence: "Now certainly we cannot speak of the Father as being crucified, the old error of so called patripassianism. At the same time we cannot but speak of God as descending to our condemned state and taking our state upon himself, so that God the judge made himself also the one judged in our place".
I don't mean to knock Torrance here but come on, you cannot make statements like that, which show the difficulty he himself is having in explaining the role of the Father and the Son in this and then turn around and say the Reformers had it wrong when they experience the same difficulty in understanding how this works.

The fact is, it is wrong if a "western" Christian makes it seem like the Father stood off to the side, angry, and the Son came forth and took the wrath on himself to try to fix things. It is also wrong, and slanderous, to make the case that this is standard Calvinist teaching. The Reformers were well aware of the unity between the Father and the Son and the Father's participation in our redemption and the unity of love by the Father to us, as well as that of the Son.

 

1 Timothy 2:5-6, ". . . one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, . . ."

John 14:6, ". . . Jesus saith . . . , I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. . . ."

 

I didn't mean to lay it at your feet. It was Torrance's argument. I was just pointing out that he was doing the same thing he thought the Calvinists were doing with rational arguments in that his argument - that if Christ represented all men in the incarnation then he had to represent all men at the cross, is not a logical necessity though he tried to make it so. I happen to agree with him that Christ did represent everyone in both places but so do a lot of Calvinists. Otherwise, Christ's sinless life and righteousness could not be imputed to us and all Calvinists say that is essential also. As far as the extent of this (whether all means all), all Christians have to deal with the fact that not everyone will be saved - we just come up with different ways of explaining it. Strict Calvinists say that the atoning work of Christ on the cross is absolutely effective so they limit it there. Low Calvinists and Arminians say it isn't applied to everyone. Torrance said that it is applied to everyone and those who consciously reject it dash themselves as it were on the atonement and it becomes their judgement.

For those on here who are not Calvinists, I was just pointing out that Torrance has a way of refuting limited atonement (and he strongly and clearly does that) which is different and was new to me at least. It is different that what the four point or "Amyraldians" did in that the cross for Torrance was just as effective as a Calvinist but it included everyone. Those lost actively reject Christ and so it's not that they didn't hear or weren't called in a special way. So he was not a universalist in the modern sense of universal salvation but he did not believe that everyone was walking around naturally an enemy of God and with a sentence of wrath on them as a default position. This I think is problematic but Torrance believes this is because of Christ's atoning work therefore the message we have is truly one of reconciliation.

Sorry to go on so long but Torrance said a lot, and he sometimes seemed to contradict himself. One reason may be that he didn't seem to be on a crusade for anything but he just loved looking into these things.