Table of Contents | 5. What does it mean to say Jesus died for our sins?
All my life I have heard the cross interpreted to mean that Jesus died for our sins (1 Corinthians 15:3). Historically, this came to be understood as the doctrine of the atonement and it has a lengthy history. Early in the development of this doctrine the model was the sacrificial system of Hebrew religion. After all, those who helped shape the way the faith was understood (Paul in particular), as well as the early Christian community, were Jewish. Jesus, thus, was a sacrifice for the sins of human beings. Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer offers this perspective of those Hebrew religion roots in Jesus Against Christianity: Reclaiming the Missing Jesus. "Just as blood from a perfect, unblemished lamb placed on the door-posts and lintels of Jews in Egypt allowed God to 'Passover' the Israelites and kill all Egyptian firstborn so too the blood of Jesus who was born of a virgin and unblemished by sin allows God to pass over the sins of Christians who are saved by Jesus' blood sacrifice. This sacrificial interpretation of Jesus' death lies at the heart of the Christian Eucharist and, although we wrap this interpretation in the language of love, the unspoken implication is that God's wrath could only be appeased through the blood sacrifice of a divine son." The image is of a divine snit until someone, in this case Jesus, makes things right with a sacrificial gift of his life. But, as Karen King and Elaine Pagels discovered when they wrote about the Gospel of Judas in Reading Judas, this wasn't the only view that was discussed in early Christianity. In an interview in The Progressive Christian for May/June of 2007 Elaine Pagels notes, "The Gospel of Judas challenges that view and suggests that the fundamental message of Jesus is that we come from God, created in God's image; when we die and leave the visible world, we step into the infinite world of God, into the divine light, and we go into that glorious light with God." This is a way of interpreting the ministry of Jesus that doesn't set him up as an appeasement for an offended deity. John Shelby Spong observes in his book Why Christianity Must Change or Die, "Most of the content of our faith tradition has been organized in such a way as to serve this rescuer mentality." Another model for understanding what this means could be called a "ransom model." Human beings were understood to be enslaved by the darkness and sin of this world. Their salvation came about as someone would buy their freedom or redeem them. Another development was by Anselm of Canterbury and was called "satisfaction atonement." This view was developed during the days of the feudal system when "honor" and "satisfaction" were essential expressions rooted in how serfs, knights and kings related. The notion was that human sins are an offense to God. Thus, God's honor needs to be satisfied because of the offense. But human good deeds couldn't accomplish that, only Jesus could. That was the "reason" for the death of Jesus. A book by Wolfhart Pannenberg entitled Jesus: God and Man expresses it like this. Jesus "absorbs the punishment for sin due to human beings in order to satisfy the demands for justice." The idea is that this is a "fallen creation" that needs redemption. Humans have sinned (beginning with Adam in Eden) by disobeying God and, therefore, are alienated from God. Their 'sin' is an affront to God. God finds human behavior a barrier to fellowship. Thus Jesus was sent to die so sinful humans could be reconciled to an offended God who could only be appeased by some kind of unblemished sacrifice, a notion rooted in Hebrew religion. The view that Jesus died to include social outcasts and rejects in his "alternative social vision" was never voiced. Jesus rejected the view that the pious were those who lived by Torah and sinners were those whose lives weren't governed by Torah. But no word about that either. Yet, even then, it makes no sense to say Jesus' death satisfied the demand of God for reconciliation. That notion of God I repudiate. In fact, the violent death of Jesus was not part of "God's plan" at all but the result of humans taking matters into their own hands. An editorial by Daryl D. Schmidt in The Fourth R maintains that Jesus promoted complete trust in God -- even at the expense of his life. The "satisfaction theory" of atonement, he maintains, is "the popular false religion of our culture." What some call "the dilemma of offended love" is another version of the meaning of the cross. It is rooted in the convicting power of innocent suffering. To understand what is meant, you have to see the cross from the perspective of the utter contradiction between what happened to Jesus and what he deserved and from the perspective of an incredible willingness not to fight back in retaliation against those Romans who put him to death. This vision of "innocent suffering" effected those who were his followers. A pointed story John Claypool told years ago may help to explain this view. A group of boys was taking a course in woodworking. The class came at the last period of the day. One Friday afternoon the boys had finished their work and were waiting for the final bell. There was a fresh, five-gallon can of green paint on the desk and one of the boys in the class was, absent-mindedly and aimlessly, pinging on the top of the can with a hammer and nail when, accidentally, he hit too hard and punctured a hole in the can. This wasn't a serious offense; however, just as he did this the teacher walked in, the bell rang and the boy turned the can over to hide the hole. They raced out of the class to a weekend of forgetfulness. When they returned on Monday, the law of gravity had done its work and you can imagine the mess that was found. Five gallons of green paint had seeped out all over the desk, the tools and onto the floor. To say that the teacher was upset is too much of an understatement to be truthful. He was beside himself and ranted for 30 minutes or more about the kind of mentality that would do such a thing. When he finally delivered himself of his rage, his eyes narrowed and he said, "All right, who did it? There is forty-five dollars worth of damage done here. It's got to be paid for. Who knocked a hole in the can?" A wave of amnesia engulfed the boys. Not one of them could remember what happened. This reaction added to the teacher's anger and he said, "I'm going to find out who did this if it's the last thing I do in this class!" That signalled the beginning of gestapo tactics. The boys were grilled in every way known short of torture. The teacher had each boy come up to the desk to be questioned individually. The principal came in and threatened the whole class with suspension. But nothing worked. No one cracked under the barrage and, afer two days, the teacher had had enough. He called the class together and said, "I'm going to give you one last chance to tell me who did it." There was utter silence. Then he said, "I've decided what I'm going to do," and everything got deathly still. He went on, "You don't deserve this for all of you have acted just like babies but the damage has to be paid for. I've decided to pay for it myself." With that he reached into his battered old billfold and took out forty-five dollars and laid the bills on the desk. This action took everyone by surprise. Though they hadn't demonstrated it, the class had real respect for the teacher. They knew he had five children. They saw the faded clothes he wore and the ancient car he drove. They knew he didn't have forty-five dollars to spend this way. In the silence that followed, a boy's voice was heard saying, "Wait a minute. I can't let you pay for this. I did it and I'll pay for it." When every form of pressure failed, the spectacle of innocent suffering got inside that boy and behind his defenses and moved him to confess. And this is the effect the cross can have when viewed from this perspective. It is rooted in a relational understanding. An interpretation that moves beyond the "popular false religion" mentioned earlier and does make sense to me is described by Robert W. Funk in a chapter entitled The Cross as Symbol of Integrity in his book called A Credible Jesus: Fragments of a Vision. He points out how Constantine's vision in 312 c.e. became a symbol for Christian triumphalism. His vision consisted of a spear and a bar joined to form a cross. An inscription read, "In this sign conquer." Constantine proceeded to do no less! Christianity would become the recognized religion of the "holy Roman empire." And the development of a particular understanding of the cross was underway, an interpretation expressed by Christian triumphalism. That which began as manifestation of God's weakness in the salvific process, according to Paul, moved on to claim that true faith is measured by the conquering power of the cross. And it moved on to become the culmination of the Christian story that was finally codified in the Apostles' Creed as sacrificial atonement. That which had been an embarrassment for the early centuries was now a potent symbol of the faith. For me, the cross says that Jesus became the victim of his own vision of "Empire of God" or "realm of God" or "alternative social vision." He believed in the utter availability of God's gracious purpose for all and claimed it for himself. He died with his trust in this gracious God inviolate. The cross became the symbol of that trust and, as Socrates chose to drink the hemlock rather than deny the law its due, so the cross expressed Jesus' surrender to his vision. Unwilling to compromise his vision for the sake of survival, his commitment stamped an eternal no on the brow of a domination system that was determined to maintain its power. The church came to understand that the cross "was a function of his fidelity to his mission," says Roger Haight in Jesus: Symbol of God. So, the cross is a symbol for the way of life he lived, for which he died and to which he invites us. In his provocative book Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews, James Carroll interprets the symbol of the cross as "signifying the absense rather than the presence of God." Marcus Borg, in The Heart of Christianity, asserts, "I do have faith in the cross as a trustworthy disclosure of the evil of domination systems, as the exposure of the defeat of the powers, as the revelation of the 'way' or 'path' of transformation, as the revelation of the depth of God's love for us and as the proclamation of radical grace. I have faith in the cross as all of those things." By the cross, I understand that we are all pilgrims embarked on an exodus from the captivity of dominating powers to the utter joy of life rooted and lived only in trust of a gracious God. That's gospel -- for me and for anyone who wishes to claim it. Both Marcus Borg and Roger Haight understand the metaphorical and symbolic significance of Jesus. In fact, in The Heart of Christianity, Borg claims that Jesus is "the" metaphor of God. Of course, he was also a real person. As a metaphor of God, Jesus discloses what God is like. We see God through Jesus....And because we see Jesus as the revelation of God, we see in his life and death the passion of God. He discloses both the character and passion of God." The words of John Shelby Spong in Jesus for the Non-Religious: Recovering the Divine at the Heart of the Human express a parallel perspective by asserting that Jesus offers us a "doorway into the realm of transcendent otherness." Across the centuries the church struggled to understand "the alternative social vision" of Jesus called "kingdom" or "realm of God." Jesus was more committed to the validity of this vision than he was to life. The early church could only affirm the power of his vision over them, a power they were yet to understand. Indeed, however, they understood enough of that vision to perceive it's radicality. The Empire of God to which Jesus pointed was a challenge to the Empire of Rome. Thus, Jesus' confrontation with the domination systems of the culture of Rome as well as the power of Rome led to his death. The end result was that they described that death with the phrase "the scandal of the cross." And, with the passing of the years, the crucified Christ has become the central image of Western Christianity and is, to use the words of Karen Armstrong, in her essay entitled Suggestions for a Second Axial Age in The Once and Future Faith, "a terrifying depiction of the difficulty and pain involved when we try to implement a divine imperative in the flawed and tragic conditions of human life." For many this wasn't enough. They soon came to believe that death wasn't the end and that resurrection held the clue to understanding this "alternative social vision." The life Jesus lived, the death he died and the life to which he invites us is God's gracious gift of life and God keeps on giving it. N. T. Wright asserts that "belief in resurrection was a refusal to relinquish the world to the principalities and powers...." Resurrection is a reaffirmation of the essential goodness of creation and of life lived as a disciple of Jesus. Therefore, cross and resurrection became expressions of the life he lived, for which he died and to which he invites us. However, none of these theories is persuasive to me because they seem to be aimed at pleasing or appeasing God or how humans can satisfy God's needs, not how human estrangement can be repaired. Much of religion can be faulted at this point. It is aimed at behavior that God approves, not at human beings. I am more likely to put these views to one side, with gratitude, and continue on my way to some other understanding. I like what Karen Armstrong wrote about the Buddha in The Battle for God. It's the story he told of a traveler who came to a great expanse of water and desperately needed to get across. There was no bridge and no ferry. He decided to build a raft and row himself across. But what should he do with his raft? Because it had been useful, should he load it on his back and lug it around with him wherever he went? Or should he moor it and continue on his way? The best of the historic interpretations of the death of Jesus don't satisfy me and I don't see any reason to keep "lugging them around on my back!" For me, the cross is the disclosure of the depth of God's love and the proclamation of radical grace. Yes, Jesus' death on the cross was the utter fulfillment of the way he lived. His death is a symbol of his determination that his "alternative social vision" will live on. It is a challenge of the powers that seek only to destroy. Paradoxically, it is a sign by which a gracious God yearns to embrace us! Resurrection is a symbol for God's refusal to give up on this created order and allow it to return to the chaos from which creative grace called it. One of the most helpful expositions of the notion of atonement is found in Doubts and Love: What Is Left of Christianity by Richard Holloway. He uses Paul's words from Romans 8:1-5 to note how they "easily lend themselves to the development of what is called satisfaction theory, which holds that human sinfulness has built up a colossal debt towards God that we are incapable of paying. Christ can be thought of as offering God satisfaction, with the idea swinging between his being punished instead of us and his offering God, finally, a perfect human life. Sometimes Paul switches from the law court to the slave market, from the forensic metaphor of acquittal or justification to the metaphor of redemption. Slaves could be freed in a number of ways, including being paid for or bought out by a redeemer, the way that, on Friday night when the pay packet came in, the poor redeemed items they had pawned on Wednesday, when there was no money in the house....Paul associataed his liberation with the death and resurrection of Jesus rather than, explicitly, with his teaching." Holloway continues the imagery with these words. "Standing in the dock, guilty as charged, waiting to hear the sentence of death, he is staggered to hear the words of acquittal from the judge that let him out of jail free with no penalty. Another has paid the fine, served the sentence, changed the heart of the judge...." Then he moves on to root the atonement in the human experience. Like Martin Luther in the monastery privy, meditating on Paul's letter to the Romans, and, like Paul Tillich, struggling with his own inner life of compulsive sexual relationships, human beings are caught up in alienation and we experience sin as something that tears us away from our best sense of ourselves, from those we love and from God. As Nietzsche observed in his Genealogy of Morals, we "instinctively see a cause for our suffering; more exactly, an agent; still more specifically, a guilty agent who is susceptible to suffering -- in short, some living thing upon which he can, on some pretext or other, vent his affects, actually or in effigy; for the venting of his affects represents the greatest attempt on the part of the suffering to win relief...." Thus the death of Jesus becomes the mythic vehicle which bears, for Christians, the universal human experience of justifying grace. |