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The Atonement and the Modern Pulpit
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 November 2011
Extract
Interest in theology shows no signs of dying out in our time. The theology most frequently and eagerly discussed may be different from what it was a century ago; the conception of the relation between theology and the other sciences may have changed; and a number of interests have crowded in where theology was once supreme. The sermon is not now the sole or even the chief intellectual event of the week. We are for the most part much more interested in knowing a man's political or economic convictions than in discovering his views on inspiration or the Trinity. But if we may judge from the columns of reviews or the publishers' lists, theology is as much written, and presumably as much read, as ever.
This is especially true of the doctrine of the Atonement. In the last half-century no other doctrine has received more careful consideration. We have but to think of the names of Bushnell, Campbell, Dale, Simon, Lidgett, and Moberley. Those who are interested in theology as a whole, like Denney, show that they regard the Atonement as vital. It is vital for us all. If we take our theology seriously, we cannot afford to suspend our judgment here. We are bound to be partisans. Even in refusing to form a theory, we are accepting a theory. In fact, a doctrine that deals with any part of theology is bound to find itself as a doctrine of the Atonement. Every conviction about God's relation to the world runs up into a conviction about what Christ has done for man.
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- Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1915
References
page 185 note 1 Denney, J., The Atonement and the Modern Mind (London, 1903), Chap. I. “Sin has no place,” as Sir Oliver Lodge has said, “in the vocabulary of science.” In this connection we may note the words of an influential modern preacher, Dr. G. A. Johnston Ross: “Much of the religion of this generation is lacking in vivid apprehension of certain values formerly recognized in the Cross of our Lord and Saviour. In this matter there is a very deep cleavage between representative Christian experiences of this hour and those of, say, thirty years ago.” He adds, “The faith which magnifies the unmerited and sin-destroying grace of God is the only religion.”Google Scholar
page 186 note 1 Such is, roughly, the view of Eucken; and it is not difficult, bearing in mind the foregoing, to understand the fascination of Eucken for the high-minded and the intellectual today—the men and women who, in the atmosphere of a century or even a generation ago, might have made eager and enthusiastic evangelical Christians.
page 190 note 1 The attitude of the more serious people in England to the problems raised by the war suggests a further illustration. There have been appeals for penitence and humiliation for the selfishness and materialism whose presence in this as in other countries has made such a war possible. That these sins exist, few would deny. But the appeals have been timid and somewhat half-hearted. People prefer rather to concentrate on the purpose to fight the war through and then to make another such war an impossibility.
page 193 note 1 Starbuck (in The Psychology of Religion, p. 52) points out, for instance, that in one investigation fear was the main operative cause in fourteen per cent of the cases, remorse for sin in sixteen per cent, and other motives connected with some moral ideal—the influence of others, or altruistic service—in the remaining two-thirds.
page 193 note 2 Mk. 8 31; Lk. 18 33; Rom. 4 24, 25; 8 34, etc.
page 193 note 3 Rom. 5 10, 6 11; Heb. 9 14; Rev. 1 5, 6, etc.
page 198 note 1 Num. 15 30; Deut. 17 12.
page 198 note 2 Lev. 4 26, etc.; see also 12 7, 14 53.
page 199 note 1 1 Sam. 16 5.
page 199 note 2 Gen. 22 13; 1 K. 8 64.
page 199 note 3 Lev. 4 2 ff., 5 15 ff.
page 199 note 4 Ex. 12 5; Lev. 16 9 f. Of the sacrifices here enumerated, some were offered occasionally, when the “sin” of the offerer needed “atoning.” Others were periodical and at stated times and for the people as a whole; e.g., the daily sacrifices in the Temple and the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement. But these were as definitely purificatory and remedial as the others. The whole nation was regarded as having broken some of the prescriptions, either in the course of the day or in the year, and needing by one comprehensive and regular act to be brought back into communion.
page 200 note 1 The one passage in the Old Testament which seems to speak quite explicitly of substitution is Is. 53. But even there it is not stated that the sufferer bore the sins of others instead of the sinners themselves. The guilt offering is properly, in the Levitical law, the compensation for the withholding of some due (v. supra) and the end of the servant's suffering is to “make many righteous”; i.e., to put them in the right with God, make them capable henceforth of living the good life.