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Theme 2 Part C - Coggle Diagram
Theme 2 Part C
Importance of Sacrifice
In the Old Testament, sacrifice was a common practice aimed at restoring broken relationships between people and God. In Leviticus, there is a passage which shows a priest symbolically lays the sins of the community upon a goat, which is then cast out into the wilderness.
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Lambs were also traditionally sacrificed as part of Jewish culture and tradition, and John the Baptist refers to Jesus as the ‘Lamb of God’ who would ‘take away the sin of the world’.
This theory is also based on a section in the New Testament called ‘The Epistle to the Hebrews’ which writes extensively about Jesus’ death as a sacrifice not dissimilar to those sacrifices written about in the Old Testament. ‘The Epistle to the Hebrews’ means ‘Letter to the Hebrews’ and it’s purpose was to convince Jews of Jesus’ legitimacy as the Son of God, hence the likening to Old Testament sacrifices that Jews would make. It states that through the perfect sacrifice of Jesus, human sin is taken away ‘once and for all’ (Hebrews 7:27).
Moral Example
repopularised since Augustine first wrote about it, and is now favoured by most modern liberal theologians.
Jesus died, not to appease God/pay off an insurmountable debt on behalf of
mankind/reinstate justice as these models are too problematic.
the purpose of Jesus’ crucifixion was to show human beings the depth of God’s
love for them and through this loving act, lead humans to repentance.
This model isn’t focused on appeasement, paying a ransom to the devil or other more abstract notions of sin or God’s honour/justice. It is focused on the moral improvement of mankind. God loves us so much, he was willing to die through the Son, and we should repent due to this and commit to being better human beings.
criticisms
This model still does not really explain the need for a grotesque crucifixion. Jesus didn’t need to die in order to show God loves us and provide us with a renewed sense of morality, surely Jesus could have done this through his life and teachings?
It potentially shows God as a soft touch, wasn’t God angry at all by the amount of human sin mankind accumulated?
Ransom Model
a variant of the sacrificial model which tries to deal with the issues that the original model
faces.
Rather than a sacrifice, Jesus’ death could be seen as ‘ransom payment’ to redeem men and women who have sinned
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‘The Son of Man came to give his life, a ransom for many.’ – Matthew 20:28
Origen believed that Jesus death was a ransom which was paid to Satan to free mankind from sin, rather than a sacrifice to appease God
many people have rejected this original model as it gives Satan a lot of power, the power to make God
indebted to him
Christus Victor
In 1931, Swedish theologian Gustaf Aulen repopularised the ransom model by altering it slightly in his book ‘CristusVictor’. Rather than Jesus’ death and atonement being a ransom payment paid directly to the devil, it should be seen as a more general ransom payment to ‘the powers that hold mankind in bondage’ - notably human sin.
This lessens the direct influence of the devil on the atonement, as it is human factors that contribute to said ‘powers’ that enslave mankind. The ransom narrative is one of ‘liberation’ from ourselves, rather than a direct payment to a powerful ruler of the underworld who has held us captive.
Criticisms
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too ‘triumphalist’ as there are still plenty of people, Christian or otherwise, who are not good people, therefore this ’victory’ and ‘liberation’ of humans from sin is not sustained.
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Penal Substitution
Humans owed a huge, unjust amount of ‘debt’ of sin to God and deserved to be punished. However, the amount of debt accrued meant that no punishment to humans would every truly delivery justice. Due to this, Jesus set human beings free from being punished for their sins by taking that punishment on himself on the cross, thus satisfying the Justice of.
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Criticisms
the model bases itself, more than anything, on the criminal justice system as opposed to biblical revelation
no good criminal justice system would punish the innocent
instead of the guilty! Is this truly justice?!
rooted in violence, with his own Son suffering in a horrific way in order to ‘rebalance the scales’.
Satisfaction Model
Anselm, the then Archbishop of Canterbury suggested that the combined sin of mankind was so great that it had offended God’s honour. Humans are responsbile for this and owe a huge debt, however the debt was so big that the only way this honour could be restored/satisfied is by the death of the ‘God-Man’ Jesus.
The accumulation of debt created by human sin was so huge there was nothing on this world that could pay the ‘bill’/restore God’s honour. Therefore, God had to pay the debt himself. He had to make himself into a human in the form of Jesus as the payment would not redeem mankind unless the payment was made by a human. Due to this, the God’s honour has now been infinitely restored.
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