G. C. Jeffers

As we approach passion week and the end of the Lenten season, I wanted to write about a topic that has long been important to me but which I have never systematically addressed: the doctrine of the atonement. The atonement is the doctrine that says that since Christ was crucified, died, was buried, descended to the dead, and then was raised to new life then we are rescued from sin and death and get to be with God forever. An atonement theory is a theological explanation of how Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection saved us. The Church has never had a single atonement theory (and different branches of the Church privilege one or another), but probably the most common view (and maybe the only view) in the evangelical circles in which I grew up is called Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA). The framing is usually something like this:

a) Humans sin.
b) Sin separates us from God because the punishment for sin is eternal death.
c) Because God loves us, he has chosen not to carry out the punishment on those humans who put their trust in him. Rather, God the Father carries out the punishment against God the Son. 
d) Justice having been vindicated, humans who have faith in God are forgiven and enabled to live with God forever. 

I fundamentally deny that PSA is a legitimate atonement theory. Though not heresy, it is a grave theological error with serious pastoral implications. Here is my blurb about atonement from my “personal theology” blog post: “I reject penal substitution as a sub-biblical distortion of the atonement (though I happily affirm substitution), an innovation of the Western Church at the hands of Anselm (and, much later, substantially expanded by Luther and Calvin). Rather, Christ fulfilled the Law on our behalf thus overcoming our sin (satisfaction theory), gave his life to purchase our freedom from the Powers thus overcoming Satan (ransom theory), and stormed the barred gates of Hades thus overcoming death (christus victor theory). Those who have gathered to his banner pledge their allegiance to him and pass into his family via an identification, in baptism, with his death, burial, and resurrection. His Spirit is sent to call all people to his cause, to indwell those who come, and to equip them for service in his kingdom.”

So, as we head to Good Friday, I want to equip you to think about the cross in a manner other than Jesus being punished instead of you. Because that view is dangerous nonsense. 

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As for my rejection of Penal Substitution, I have a myriad of interlocking reasons. In sum, I think it is a) a theological innovation of the Western Church (specifically a Protestant innovation when fleshed out by Calvin and Luther), b) is deeply unbiblical, and c) is incoherent. 

First, PSA is an innovation of the Western Church. The first glimpse of Penal Substitution in Christian theology is in Anselm’s work, but even he subordinated the idea to the larger notion of Christ obeying the law in our place as opposed to Christ suffering our punishment in our place. As a (anglo) catholic Christian, I firmly hold to the Vincentian canon:

“Now in the Catholic Church itself we take the greatest care to hold that which has been believed everywhere, always and by all. That is truly and properly ‘Catholic,’ as is shown by the very force and meaning of the word, which comprehends everything almost universally. We shall hold to this rule if we follow universality [i.e. oecumenicity], antiquity, and consent. We shall follow universality if we acknowledge that one Faith to be true which the whole Church throughout the world confesses; antiquity if we in no wise depart from those interpretations which it is clear that our ancestors and fathers proclaimed; consent, if in antiquity itself we keep following the definitions and opinions of all, or certainly nearly all, bishops and doctors alike.” And I just find it impossible to hold to a theory of the atonement unknown to the patristics. Seriously. Find me anything in any patristic writer that even smells like penal substitution and I will gladly change my tune. 

Second, I think that penal substitution is deeply unbiblical. All of the verses (Romans 3:23-26, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Galatians 3:10, 13, Colossians 2:13-15, 1 Peter 2:24, 1 Peter 3:18, etc) appealed to support PSA all have better interpretations. The wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23), but death is not a punishment (a wage is something earned by work; the work of sin earns death). It is slavery. It is the natural outcome of a life of sin. The bible sometimes depicts God as punishing sin temporally (i.e., David and Bathsheba, Annanias and Sapphira), but he only eternally punishes by saying “let thy will be done” (Rom 1:24) and thus people who reject God become less and less until they cease to exist at all (eternal death). Using The Lord of the Rings as an analogy, Smeagol’s transformation into Gollum wasn’t his punishment for murder; it is what happens when you murder and continue down that dark path. Even further down the path are the ringwraiths and the barrow wights.

Additionally, the OT sacrificial system was not about animals being punished in place of the Israelites so that the Israelites could enter into God’s presence, but this is exactly the story told by PSA supporters today–Jesus was punished in our place. Rather, the OT sacrificial system was about blood (which contains life in the Israelite imaginary) being thrown against the altar to a) remind God of the Covenant in Genesis 15 (he will fulfill both sides of the Covenant) and b) to remind people of the weight and cost of a life lived separated from God. As a merely human father I am capable of absorbing the rebellion of my own children without hurting them or, less bad but still bad, taking it out on the dog. Similarly, God, in Christ, became sin (2 Cor 5:21) for us. He absorbed it and then expiated it via his death and resurrection. In the PSA model, God can’t help how wrathful sin makes him and he has to punish someone. In his mercy, he takes it out on Jesus instead of us. While I appreciate the sentiment, it isn’t clear why God would be less emotionally or spiritually developed than I am. As God’s therapist in the PSA system, I would reassure God that there are more positive ways of handling his anger. So while it is clear that God’s wrath is revealed against all ungodliness (Rom 1:18), the only times in scripture when the consequences of sin are judicial are for temporal punishments, not for eternal ones. At most, Romans 1:24 supports a kind of judicial hardening of the hearts of the unrepentant. St. Paul couldn’t be clearer: the wages of sin is death. His wrath thus results in giving us over to our sinful desires (Rom 1:24) which contain within them the due punishment for our sins (Rom 1:27), the ultimate expression of which is death (Rom 6:23), or our total annihilation from reality (in contrast to eternal life in the same passage). As C.S. Lewis famously said, so one goes to hell against their will. It is locked from the inside. If interested, I have a document here outlining my acceptance of annihilationism. 

Third, I think the doctrine is just incoherent. In PSA, God doesn’t save us from sin or from death. Rather, God saves us from himself. And he does this by punishing himself! It doesn’t make sense! By analogy, the anger I feel when I am cut off in traffic doesn’t have to be expressed either as punishing the other driver or punishing myself. Instead, I can push through the feelings toward love and empathy. Dare we be more compassionate than God himself? 

Additionally, if Jesus’s death is the punishment we deserved, then Hell is a silly idea. How is it possible that, as agonizing as it was, six hours on the cross and three days in the grave is able to satisfy the punishment I deserve (which, according to most proponents of PSA, is eternal conscious torment in Hell)? Wouldn’t Jesus have to suffer in Hell for eternity in order to bear my punishment on my behalf. 

Further, suffering the punishment of someone else makes a mockery of justice. It is one thing for Jesus to discharge my debt on my behalf (such is what a generous person does), but it is another for him to suffer my punishment for sin for which I am culpable. The analogy I heard when I was a kid in youth group was that Jesus’s PSA is like a judge in a murder trial who, at sentencing, stands up and removes his robes and offers himself to be killed in my stead. But this is gross injustice. Killing an innocent person in order to save a guilty one makes a mockery of justice in a judicial setting. In other settings, someone dying to save another is noble–taking a bullet for someone, for example, or Mufasa jumping into the gorge to save Simba from the stampede. Or even a prisoner exchange. 

Finally, PSA subordinates God to an abstract principle of justice that operates outside of God. In PSA, God MUST satisfy the balance of justice by making sure someone is punished for sin. In order to spare us, he elects himself because he has no choice. But this reduces God’s sovereignty and control.