What is Penal Substitution Atonement

[Squire Robertsson]

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[JonC]

Six Hour Warning
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Ha! I knew it was coming. Maybe we can get to 15 pages of rants before 7:15 PM Pacific.

What's the record?

 

[The Biblicist]

Can you not read? I said using YOUR definition. I'm trying to at least get a common definition.

Retributive justice in terms of PSA is that justice demands sins be punished and God punished Jesus to satisfy this demand.

Is this not where we disagree? Is this not where Luther fails in terms of PSA, and where you see my error?

You are not concerned with my definition at all! You are concerned about the term "retributive" a term I never have used but you consistently attempt to place me in that box as you have defined it. I have repeatedly and clearly told you my position over and over and over again.

Penal = just recompense as defined by God's own law

Substitutionary = in the place of the sinner receiving his just reward for sin as defined by God's Law

Atonement = full satisfaction of Divine justice against sin and sinners.

So don't respond that I believe in "retributive" justice because you have already defined that term in a manner I do not believe.

 

[JonC]

[ are not concerned with my definition at all! You are concerned about the term "retributive" a term I never have used but you consistently attempt to place me in that box as you have defined it. I have repeatedly and clearly told you my position over and over and over again.

Penal = just recompense as defined by God's own law

Substitutionary = in the place of the sinner receiving his just reward for sin as defined by God's Law

Atonement = full satisfaction of Divine justice against sin and sinners.

So don't respond that I believe in "retributive" justice because you have already defined that term in a manner I do not believe.

Not so, @The Biblicist.

Actually, I was very much interested in your view. That was the purpose of this thread.

I understand your view of penal and substitution (up until you rejected PSA). I was asking if you understood the retributive justice framework of PSA to be the distinction between Substitution Atonement and PSA. I was not accusing you of anything.

Quite simply, to reject retributive justice here is to reject PSA. God's justice, His Law, demanded that sin be punished. God punished Jesus with this punishment in our stead, satisfying the demands of the Law.

I was asking if this was the distinction that separated my view from yours, Luther's from PSA. You somehow took offense to the question. That is ignorance on your part, not mine. Which is your problem, not mine.

If you reject the idea that the Law demands punishment for sin and that God punished Jesus with this punishment in our place then you, IMHO, reject PSA and are confused about your own beliefs.

 

[The Biblicist]

Not so, @The Biblicist.



I understand your view of penal and substitution (up until you rejected PSA). I was asking if you understood the retributive justice framework of PSA to be the distinction between Substitution Atonement and PSA. I was not accusing you of anything.

Quite simply, to reject retributive justice here is to reject PSA. God's justice, His Law, demanded that sin be punished. God punished Jesus with this punishment in our stead, satisfying the demands of the Law.

I was asking if this was the distinction that separated my view from yours, Luther's from PSA. You somehow took offense to the question. That is ignorance on your part, not mine. Which is your problem, not mine.

If you reject the idea that the Law demands punishment for sin and that God punished Jesus with this punishment in our place then you, IMHO, reject PSA and are confused about your own beliefs.

[edited] I rejected YOUR explained definition of "retributive" penalty/justice but explained my view clearly and precisely several times. In your mind, if I reject YOUR definition of "retributive" penalty/justice then I reject Penal Substititutionary atonement. [edited]

 

[JonC]

I rejected YOUR explained definition of "retributive" penalty/justice but explained my view clearly and precisely several times. In your mind, if I reject YOUR definition of "retributive" penalty/justice then I reject Penal Substititutionary atonement. .

As far as I know there are not several definitions of "retributive justice" when it comes to the atonement.

My question was if you believed the restorative justice as a framework of PSA is what makes the difference between Substitution Atonement and PSA. I was not asking if PSA holds to retributive justice because I am not ignorant of the theory. For your edification, it does. And the Christus Victor motif holds a framework of restorative justice.

These are not terms that you can just redefine as you see fit. These terms have meaning and they have meaning in the discussion of the Atonement. It is obvious that you have no clue as to the difference between retributive and restorative justice on these grounds. Your best answer would have been simply "I don't know" instead of false accusations and insults.

 

[JonC]

Well, what I've asked I have asked honestly. Unfortunately @The Biblicist took offense at the term "retributive justice" because "retributive" is close to "retribution" therefore he assumes I am saying whatever he assumes I am saying.

What I've asked is if the framework of retributive justice within PSA is what differs when it is compared to Substitution or Satisfaction Atonement. I ask because Substitution Atonement seems to lean more towards the restorative justice of Christus Victor.

Can one hold to PSA yet reject retributive justice (i.e., can one hold to PSA and reject that justice required a punishment for sin which Christ paid in our place as God poured out this wrath upon Him)? @The Biblicist believes so, but I do not see how this is possible (it seems to deny the very foundation of PSA). And it seems to me that this is the difference between PSA and the other theories.

My conclusion on this hijacked thread is that the primary distinction between Substitution and PSA is the contextual framework of retributive justice. Where Substitution in general views Christ as punished for our sins, it is not until viewed as retributive punishment that God punishes Christ by pouring upon Him the wrath due our sins - which is PSA.

 

[rsr]

I understand the change. To Calvin it was a more literal penal substitution while now PSA typically holds the punishment Christ received to be a satisfaction (not exactly our punishment but close enough). And that may be, I grant, closer to Luther's view than Calvin's.

I guess the question is whether or not one can believe the punishment was Christ's physical death on the cross, bearing our sins as our representative, and through the merit of His blood turning aside God's wrath towards us (instead of God punishing Jesus with our punishment) and still hold to PSA.

If the answer is "yes", then both Luther and I hold to PSA.

Well, I guess you do, then.

Pardon for barging in at this point, but this seemed to be the most appropriate place to quote.

Unfortunately, it seems to me, theologians (and armchair theologians) have taken PSA into places it does not logically need to go and, in fact, denies other orthodoxies. Some would us believe that Christ experienced "hell" or he was in fact during his passion separated from the Father, which does great injustice to the Godhead and the doctrine of impassibility, i.e, that God does not change. Having forever been in communion with the Father, he cannot have been separated from the Father.

Unfortunately, much of the development of the doctrine was in response to Socinus, whose criticism of the doctrine bore many defenses that, in the worlds of J.L. Packer, "What was happening? Just this: that in trying to beat Socinian rationalism at its own game, Reformed theologians were conceding the Socinian assumption that every aspect of God’s work of reconciliation will be exhaustively explicable in terms of a natural theology of divine government, drawn from the world of contemporary legal and political thought. Thus, in their zeal to show themselves rational, they became rationalistic."

Another unfortunate development was aided by Calvin in his defense of the "descended into hell" clause of the Apostles Creed. Calvin was intent to preserve the ecumenical creeds and was not happy with Bucer's formulation that "hell" was in fact the grave of death, i.e., Christ was actually, really, undeniably "dead" for three days. Thus Calvin interpreted "hell" as the suffering of Christ, "the travail of his soul." Thus his "descent to hell" began not with his death but in the Garden of Gethsemane and continued until he conquered death, and this was a common Reformed view. Christ, therefore, did not suffer what we would define as hell — eternal separation from God — but a hellish punishment, which he freely subscribed to because of his love.

 

[JonC]

Well, I guess you do, then.

Pardon for barging in at this point, but this seemed to be the most appropriate place to quote.

Unfortunately, it seems to me, theologians (and armchair theologians) have taken PSA into places it does not logically need to go and, in fact, denies other orthodoxies. Some would us believe that Christ experienced "hell" or he was in fact during his passion separated from the Father, which does great injustice to the Godhead and the doctrine of impassibility, i.e, that God does not change. Having forever been in communion with the Father, he cannot have been separated from the Father.

Unfortunately, much of the development of the doctrine was in response to Socinus, whose criticism of the doctrine bore many defenses that, in the worlds of J.L. Packer, "What was happening? Just this: that in trying to beat Socinian rationalism at its own game, Reformed theologians were conceding the Socinian assumption that every aspect of God’s work of reconciliation will be exhaustively explicable in terms of a natural theology of divine government, drawn from the world of contemporary legal and political thought. Thus, in their zeal to show themselves rational, they became rationalistic."

Another unfortunate development was aided by Calvin in his defense of the "descended into hell" clause of the Apostles Creed. Calvin was intent to preserve the ecumenical creeds and was not happy with Bucer's formulation that "hell" was in fact the grave of death, i.e., Christ was actually, really, undeniably "dead" for three days. Thus Calvin interpreted "hell" as the suffering of Christ, "the travail of his soul." Thus his "descent to hell" began not with his death but in the Garden of Gethsemane and continued until he conquered death, and this was a common Reformed view. Christ, therefore, did not suffer what we would define as hell — eternal separation from God — but a hellish punishment, which he freely subscribed to because of his love.

I agree (and J.I. Packer has a very interesting article on PSA).

But even with Packer (who acknowledges contributions from other theories) there is the problem of how satisfaction is actually made (what is this satisfaction). We all agree Christ bore our sins, and we all agree He died which was the punishment of sin. But there is a difference.

Is it as Luther believed, that sin and death were "engulfed and swallowed up" by virtue of Christ's own nature which satisfied the demands against us by outweighing sin and wrath? This assumes a view of justice that would be associated with the Christus Victor view (a restoration, Christ by virtue conquered sin and death...i.e., sin and God's wrath against us). Or is it more along the lines of traditional PSA - that justice demanded sin be punished, Jesus bore our sins, God poured out His wrath on Jesus as this punishment due our sins?

They are similar but they also go into different directions.

I sincerely wish we had the temperament to discuss this topic.

 

[rsr]

Again, Jon, you don't ever want to take "yes" for an answer. Please pay attention to Packer on the mystery of the atonement.

"‘Mystery’ in the sense (traditional in theology) means a reality distinct from us which in our very apprehending of it remains unfathomable to us: a reality which we acknowledge as actual without knowing how it is possible, and which we therefore describe as incomprehensible ...

"Now the atonement is a mystery in the defined sense, one aspect of the total mystery of God. But it does not stand alone in this. Every aspect of God’s reality and work, without exception, is mystery. The eternal Trinity; God’s sovereignty in creation, providence, and grace; the incarnation, exaltation, present reign and approaching return of Jesus Christ; the inspiring of the Holy Scriptures; and the ministry of the Spirit in the Christian and the Church — each of these (to look no further) is a reality beyond our full fathoming, just as the cross is. And theories about any of these things which used human analogies to dispel the dimension of mystery would deserve our distrust, just as rationalistic theories about the cross do.

... The passion to pack God into a conceptual box of our own making is always strong, but must be resisted. If we bear in mind that all the knowledge we can have of the atonement is of a mystery about which we can only think and speak by means of models, and which remain a mystery when all is said and done, it will keep us from rationalistic pitfalls and thus help our progress considerably."

 

[JonC]

Again, Jon, you don't ever want to take "yes" for an answer. Please pay attention to Packer on the mystery of the atonement.

"‘Mystery’ in the sense (traditional in theology) means a reality distinct from us which in our very apprehending of it remains unfathomable to us: a reality which we acknowledge as actual without knowing how it is possible, and which we therefore describe as incomprehensible ...

"Now the atonement is a mystery in the defined sense, one aspect of the total mystery of God. But it does not stand alone in this. Every aspect of God’s reality and work, without exception, is mystery. The eternal Trinity; God’s sovereignty in creation, providence, and grace; the incarnation, exaltation, present reign and approaching return of Jesus Christ; the inspiring of the Holy Scriptures; and the ministry of the Spirit in the Christian and the Church — each of these (to look no further) is a reality beyond our full fathoming, just as the cross is. And theories about any of these things which used human analogies to dispel the dimension of mystery would deserve our distrust, just as rationalistic theories about the cross do.

... The passion to pack God into a conceptual box of our own making is always strong, but must be resisted. If we bear in mind that all the knowledge we can have of the atonement is of a mystery about which we can only think and speak by means of models, and which remain a mystery when all is said and done, it will keep us from rationalistic pitfalls and thus help our progress considerably."

Actually, I don't mind taking "yes" as an answer here. I just don't want one understanding confused for the other.

At one time (when I first studied theories of the atonement seriously) we had names for these doctrines. Origen fell under the Ransom Theory (a specific view of the Ransom Theory), Martyr -Christus Victor, Anselem - Satisfaction, Luther - Substitution, and Calvin - PSA. Now they are blended a bit more than I would like. All of them are now considered by some to have held Penal Substitution Theory (except perhaps Origen).

I'm not complaining, I just find myself in a "new world" where terms have lost their meaning.

How do you speak of the Atonement clearly if such a broad range falls under PSA? If we don't distinguish between things like retributive justice and restorative justice, then are we not talking past each other?

What is even more interesting, though, is how these distinctions we no longer make affect how we view even doctrines we would assume we have in common (like positions on election, for example).

 

[Squire Robertsson]

This thread is closed.

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[Yeshua1]

I'm not accusing anyone here of believing that.

I disagree with your view, brother. But this entire thread has been a failed attempt (mostly my own fault) at narrowing down what is and is not PSA. I wanted to see the distinction and I believe it to be the framework that is retributive justice. It is just a different context in terms of divine justice.

Thank you for explaining your position clearly and honestly.

There also seems to be differing views on how much latitude to allow in holding to PST or other options on the atonement, as I hold to the Pt being the best and most biblical stance, but others allowed, while others seem to see it as just PST or their own view is allowed to be held!