Lecture 34 - Doctrine of Atonement

It is fitting that "the renewal of creation has been the work of the selfsame word that made it at the beginning." (§1)

1.  Three doctrines of Creation
1. Epicureans – all things were made by chance
2. Plato – God used preexistent material
3. Sectaries (="Gnostics") – The creator God is not the same deity as the Redeemer God because creation is evil
2.  A 4th Doctrine:  Creatio ex nihilo -- The one God created the world out of nothing
1. Creation as gift;  expression of the goodness of God
2. Humans, made by the word (logos), are rational beings (logikos, cf. Gen 1:27)
3. Initially made of malleable character:  stability will come if the commandment is kept (Gen 2:17)
4. Humans made higher than the animals, but have the potential to sink far lower
3.  The story of the fall:  God made humanity for the purpose that he might be intimate with God, their Lord and Creator.  But humans violated a commandment whose penalty was death (Gen 2:17, 3:6-7).  Death now becomes our master and foe (Romans 5:12-14).
4.  We were made no different than the animals save one feature:  the imposition of language (logos) and rationality.  By rebelling humans beings made themselves even worse than the animals for now their rational faculty can lead them to evils unimagined by any in the animal kingdom  (think of genocide, wholesale destruction of the environment).  The animals act by nature, humans act against nature.
5.  God has a dilemma.
1. He gave a command with a clear consequence.  To be just, God must abide by the terms he established. "For God would not be true if, when he had said we should die, man died not." (§6)
2. Yet, it would be "unseemly" should God's gift of the word go to ruin.  Can God's goodness come to naught?  Better that humans were not made!  "For neglect reveals weakness, and not goodness on God's part – if, that is, he allows his own work to be ruined when once he had made it – more so than if he had never made man at all.  For if he had not made them, none could impute weakness." (§6)
6.  The dilemma restated:  the just claims of God cannot be ignored.  God can't become "a liar" just to preserve us.
1. Why repentance is not a solution
1.  though it befits God it does not change our nature
2.  moreover we are talking about an avalanche of sin not just a few.
2. Solution must address human corruption, i.e. our base nature.
3. Only one possible solution – the Word must start afresh.  "For his it was once more both to bring the corruptible to incorruption and to maintain intact the just claim of the Father upon all." (§7)
7.  Third statement of the dilemma:  what follows justly from human actions is unseemly to God.
1. So God prepares a body in the virgin and makes it his dwelling.
2. While in this body the Divine Word – which otherwise could not die – suffers the penalty of death on behalf of those made by the Word.  This befits God's goodness or mercy.
3. …and so all men who (justly) were bound to die would now die (justly) with him.  This befits God's justice
4. …and would in turn rise with him to a state of incorruption.
8.  There was no other way for God to save humanity from death.  "To this end he takes to himself a body capable of death…by his one body has come to dwell among them." (§9)  Read this entire section carefully!  Metaphor of a king who takes up residence in a particular home in a large city…
9.  All of this was particularly well suited to God's goodness
1. Metaphor of a king who founded a city that was later taken over by bandits…
2. "Then he also points out the reason why it was necessary for none other than God the Word himself to become incarnate, as follows: …" (§10)