Atonement and Forgivenss

The original meaning of the word "liberal" involved being open to a variety of ideas and ways of thinking, to be intellectually generous.  I am a liberal in this sense: I am open to and supportive of many ways of thinking and believing.  For me, when things are split into issues of black and white, I see only division and alienation.  For some, the boundaries of black and white are comforting and necessary; the gray only clouds their thinking and causes insecurity.  Unfortunately, many in the church hold black and white theology that cannot accept anything different from what they believe -- even if it is proven to be ill-based or non biblical.

I've just written this from the top of my head... no footnotes or bibliography; just a long winded exposition on a question asked of me in an interview with a Pastoral Search Committee with which the folks are caught up.

The Question:

     "John 14:6 while Jesus was comforting his disciples he said to them, 'I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.'  This speaks to the fact that one must believe, and accept that God sent his only Son to die on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins and that by believing this and by His Grace alone are we saved.  Is this belief the only way we can be assured of an eternal home with Him?"

My initial response in person was something to the effect that Jesus didn’t ever say he came to die for our sins that this is a construction of Paul’s and the later church’s.  I added that Jesus was careful to not label individuals as “sinners” when he healed them and offered them forgiveness.   I went on to say that shortly before the passage quoted is another: “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?” (John 14:2)  and that in another place Jesus says, “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice.”  I went on to say that this is good news for people who have not found hope in a particular faith. 

What some members of the committee heard me say was that Jesus never talks of sin, and that Jesus never called people sinners.  So, here is a full expository of response to this question.

In our time, we have a tendency to put the words of the whole of the New Testament into the mouth of Jesus.  “This speaks to the fact” indicates that what follows is assumed in the reading of the scripture; what follows is a theory of atonement that was developed in the Eleventh and Fifteenth Centuries and is not based upon Biblical texts.  In fact, much of the theology of this question arises from later theology, not the words or ministry of Jesus.

The challenge of the question lies in the conclusion of the second sentence.  This sentence makes a conclusion about the text of John 14:6 that is out of context with the text itself.  The question starts with the context – “while Jesus was comforting his disciples, he said to them….”  The scripture in context is part of Jesus’ response to Thomas about how they will know the way to where Jesus is going.  Jesus is instructing the disciples on what to expect after his death and resurrection.  Jesus is giving the disciples a pep talk, a comforting assurance that if they follow the way they have been taught by Jesus, they will know God; that if they are faithful to what he has been showing them, leading them, and guiding them, they will find their way to God the Father.  He says that if we know Him, we know God the Father.

In the context of John 14, Jesus is giving the assurance that they have learned well what they need to know, that they know the Father already.

•       I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father
•       If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever.
•       I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.
•        Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

Then the question deviates from that context.  Jesus is not talking about the forgiveness of sins here; he is talking about the immediate future of the disciples and their finding their way in his absence.

At this point in the Gospel of John, Jesus has not yet died; he has not yet risen.  There is not any talk of death, let alone a sacrificial death, though everyone at that last meal together knew full well that Jesus was going to die at the hands of those whose power was threatened by his teaching of truth.  Jesus is saying that if the disciples want to know God, if they want to know where he is going, they need to love one another the way that he has loved them (John 15:12).

Jesus is not the author of the theory that “one must believe, and accept that God sent his only Son to die on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins and that by believing this and by His Grace alone are we saved.”  The seeds of this theory originate in Paul and are germinated and harvested by Anselm of Canterbury, the Protestant Reformers, and, later, Twentieth Century Evangelists.  The theory that Jesus was sent to die for the forgiveness of our sins is not found in the Gospels.  Further, the idea that “the death of Jesus provides forgiveness of sins” and “His Grace alone” saves us are oppositional to one another.  Payment for forgiveness is not forgiveness; it is a transaction.  Forgiveness is indeed grace, but it cannot be bought by any means or it ceases to be grace and forgiveness.

Okay, having said that, I’m going to give a very long explanation.

Prior to the Eleventh Century and based upon Jesus’ statement in Mark 6:45 that he offered his life as a  ransom for many,  the (Roman)  Church taught that the ransom must have been paid to those powers that hold us captive—namely the devil and the other fallen angels. Adam and Eve turned the entire human race sinful when they listened to the serpent (devil), and therefore making the devil our owner. Jesus offered himself to the devil in as the price of our freedom from this sinful state. The devil didn’t realize that he couldn’t hold the God’s son captive in death and was therefore tricked into losing both us and God’s son.  This is the ransom theory of atonement.  It’s not particularly Biblical; but it’s logical for the era from which it arises. 

In the Eleventh Century, Anselm of Canterbury debunked this theory and developed the concept of blood atonement.  This theory springs from the Old Testament concept of sacrifice.  The underlying assumption of this idea is that the moral order, God’s justice, or something about God’s nature, requires that God punish our sin – and inflict corporal punishment upon us, classically by sending us to hell—unless some substitute can be found to pay the penalty for sin.  Anselm stressed that there is no way for mere humans to satisfy God’s need for punishing us so the need is satisfied by the perfect obedience of Jesus even to the point of dying (note the words of the Apostle’s Creed).  This is the satisfaction theory of atonement.

In the Fifteenth Century, the Protestant Reformers took this a step further and asserted that Jesus chose to take the death penalty in our stead as punishment for our sins (as opposed to obedience to God). This is the punishment theory of atonement.

Either way, satisfaction or punishment, the theories assert that violence is necessary to please God’s need for justice.

There are two places in the GOSPELS that are often used to support these theories of atonement; both are problematic.  In Matthew 26:28, Jesus says “for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”  In the same vein (pun intended), Hebrews 9:22 says that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin.” The Greek word translated in these passages as “forgiveness” means release from bondage or to free from prison.  Even when understood as “release from penalty,” it merely provides an alternative means of fulfilling the same solution and life-giving role that the law and its penalties were supposed to provide.  Atonement allows God to justly release us from punishment for sin.  The idea that God requires a payment of some sort is logically in conflict with God’s forgiving our sins; true forgiveness involves relinquishing the demand that the penalty be paid.

The second is the text from Mark that I used in the discussion of ransom atonement.  The Mark text has to have a lot of speculation or preconceived understandings thrown into the picture in order to pull a theory of atonement from it.  We can read our concept or idea into the text and pull the meaning we desire from it; this is eisogesis:  reading our understanding or position into the text. If instead we begin with the text from Mark devoid of our preconceived understandings, we cannot arrive at a theory of atonement.  Solid Biblical study begins with the text and its context, not our own theology.

Jesus said he came to fulfill the law and the prophets; Jesus did not say that “by His Grace alone” we are saved.  Paul said this, and we read it into the words credited to Jesus.  Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God and what we must do to bring God’s reign to earth.  Jesus showed us the way, the truth and the life through his example, his teaching, and his willingness to die for what he believed is God’s way, truth, and light – which the religious and political powers of his day found threatening to their status and power.

What Jesus teaches is not about what is to come in the next life (again, that is Paul and American Civil Religion’s Prosperity Gospel); what Jesus teaches, preaches, and lives is God’s affinity for the “least of these,” the oppressed, the down trodden, the rejected, and the powerless.  What Jesus assures us of is that God’s realm is found when all people do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8).  What Jesus assures us is that the high will be made low, the first last, the weak strong, the hungry fed, the poor rich in spirit.

This is what I meant when I said that Jesus did not come (or die) to forgive our sins; he came to show us the way to God; the way of justice; the way of peace.  He certainly did offer forgiveness to people – freedom from that which binds them -- usually the people no one else would ever dream of unbinding, and always as a means to bring justice to the situation at hand.   But he does not assert that he's going to die for our sins.

Does this make sense, or am I rambling out of my physical exhaustion?