VIOLENCE IN CHRISTIAN
THEOLOGY
by J. Denny Weaver
J. DENNY WEAVER is Professor of Religion
at Bluffton (Ohio) College, where he is Chair of the History-Religion
Department and editor of The C. Henry Smith Series. his recent
publications include Anabaptist Theology in Face of Postmodernity:
A Proposal for the Third Millennium (Pandora Press U.S., 2000)
and The Nonviolent Atonement (Eerdmans, forthcoming August
2001).
The
death of Jesus is not needed to satisfy God's honor.
It is not difficult to see why discussion of the relationship of
violence and Christianity is controversial.(1)
When asked whether Christianity supports violence and is a violent
religion, does one answer "Of course -- look at the crusades, the
multiple blessings of wars, warrior popes, support for capital
punishment, corporal punishment under the guise of 'spare the rod and
spoil the child,' justifications of slavery, world-wide colonialism in
the name of conversion to Christianity, the systemic violence of women
subjected to men, and more"? Or does one respond, "Of course
not -- look at Jesus, the beginning point of Christian faith, who is
worshiped as 'Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father,
Prince of Peace' (Isa. 9:6); whose Sermon on the Mount taught
nonviolence and love of enemies; who faced his accusers nonviolently
and then died a nonviolent death; whose nonviolent teaching inspired
the first centuries of pacifist Christian history and was subsequently
preserved in the justifiable war doctrine that declares all war as sin
even when declaring it occasionally a necessary evil, and in the
prohibition of fighting by monastics and clergy as well as in a
persistent tradition of Christian pacifism"? But these answers
are apparently contradictory. Does one of them trump the other? Or
might there be yet another answer?
This essay addresses the relationship between violence and
Christianity by examining aspects of Christian theology. Specifically,
it examines violence and assumptions of violence in the classic
formulations of the central Christian doctrines of atonement and
Christology. While this analysis finds classic theology in large part
guilty of accommodating and supporting violence, the essay also points
to a specifically nonviolent Christian answer.
I am using broad definitions of the terms "violence" and
"nonviolence." "Violence" means harm or damage,
which obviously includes the direct violence of killing -- in war,
capital punishment, murder -- but also covers the range of forms of
systemic violence such as poverty, racism, and sexism.
"Nonviolence" also covers a spectrum of attitudes and
actions, from the classic Mennonite idea of passive nonresistance
through active nonviolence and nonviolent resistance that would
include various kinds of social action, confrontations and posing of
alternatives that do not do bodily harm or injury.
Atonement Motifs
The standard account of the history of doctrine lists three
families of atonement theories or images. The first round of
observations about the violent elements of these atonement images will
emerge from the description of their development and their historical
relationship to each other.
Christus Victor, the predominant image of the early
church, existed in two forms, each of which involved the three
elements of God, the devil or Satan, and sinful humankind. In the ransom
version of Christus Victor, the devil held the souls of humankind
captive. In a seemingly contractual agreement, God handed Jesus over
to Satan as a ransom payment to secure the release of captive souls.
The devil killed Jesus, in an apparent victory for the forces of evil.
The devil is deceived, however. In raising Jesus from the dead, God
triumphed over the devil, and the souls of humanity were freed from
his clutches. This victory through resurrection provides the name
Christus Victor or Christ the Victor.
A second version of Christus Victor pictured the conflict between
Satan and God as a cosmic battle. In this struggle, God's son
was killed, but the resurrection then constituted the victory of God
over the forces of evil, and definitively identified God as the ruler
of the universe. This cosmic battle imagery constitutes another
Christus Victor atonement image.
Satisfaction atonement has been the predominant atonement image of
the present time as well as for much of the past millennium. It
suffices for present purposes to sketch two versions of satisfaction
atonement. One reflects the view of Anselm of Canterbury. In 1098 he
published Cur Deus Homo, which constitutes the first full
articulation of satisfaction atonement. Anselm wrote that
Jesus' death was necessary in order to satisfy the offended honor of
God. Human sin had offended God's honor and thus had upset divine
order in the universe. The death of Jesus as the God-man was then
necessary in order to satisfy God's honor and restore the order of the
universe.
A change in this image of satisfaction occurred with the Protestant
Reformers. For them, Jesus' death satisfied the divine law's
requirement that sin be punished. Thus with his death, Jesus submitted
to and bore the punishment that was really due to us -- humankind --
as sinners. Jesus was punished in our place. Jesus substituted himself
for us, and died a penal, substitutionary death.
The third atonement image is moral influence. In this
image, the death of Jesus is a loving act of God aimed toward us. God
the Father shows love to us sinners by giving us his most precious
possession, his Son, to die for us.
Deleting the Devil from Atonement
These theories did not develop as isolated entities. Each emerged
as a response to a previous one. In the first book of Cur Deus
Homo, Anselm specifically rejected the idea that Jesus' death was
a ransom payment to the devil. Satan has no contractual rights that
would obligate God to make such a payment. And even though humankind
deserves punishment, Satan has no right to inflict that punishment.
These considerations make it unworthy of God to deal with Satan via a
ransom. Thus Anselm deleted the devil from the salvation equation.(2)
Rather than seeing human beings as captive to the devil, Anselm made
them directly responsible to God. Humans sinned against God; sin
offended the honor of God, and thus threatened order in the universe.
The death of Jesus served to restore God's honor and thus restore
order in the universe.
Abelard's school followed Anselm in rejecting the idea of Jesus'
death as a ransom payment to the devil. But Abelard also rejected the
idea of Jesus' death as a payment to God. It made God seem vengeful
and judgmental. Instead, Abelard saw the death of Jesus aimed not at
God but at sinful humankind. It was a loving act of God designed to
get the attention of sinners, and reveal the love of God for sinners
while they were yet sinners. Its impact on the psychological or moral
character of humankind identifies this view as the moral influence
theory of atonement.
Thus historical relationships exist among these atonement theories.
Anselm's satisfaction motif succeeded ransom, and was subsequently
modified by majority Protestantism. Abelard's moral theory posed an
alternative to Anselm's satisfaction theory while retaining Anselm's
critique of the ransom motif.
Each of these images attempts to explain why "Jesus died for
us." But recalling the object or "target" of the death
of Jesus makes clear that these images suggest entirely different
approaches to understanding the death of Jesus. For ransom and cosmic
battle motifs the death of Jesus has the devil as its object. For
Anselm, it is aimed at God's honor, while for penal substitution, the
object is God's law. Finally, for moral influence, the death of Jesus
targets "us," sinful humankind, as its objects.
Two More Questions
The description of the history of atonement thus far has followed
the standard account. Two questions cast additional light on these
images and bring to the fore the violent elements they contain.
First, a nuance appears when we shift from asking about the object
of the death of Jesus to inquire, Who or what needs the death of
Jesus? For the ransom theory, one might say that the devil
clearly needs the death -- it fulfills God's part of the bargain when
the devil releases the souls of humankind. For the cosmic battle
image, the question makes little sense. For the satisfaction theories,
it is God's honor or God's law that needs the death. Without it, the
debt to God's honor remains unpaid or unsatisfied, or the penalty
required by God's law remains unmet. Finally, for the moral theory,
one might say that "we" -- sinners -- need the death since
that is what enables us to perceive the Father's love shown for
and to us.
A second question shifts the nuance again and produces a much more
controversial answer. Observe what happens when one asks, Who
arranges for or is responsible for the death of Jesus? Or put
most crassly, Who ultimately killed Jesus?
With the two forms of Christus Victor, it is obvious that the devil
killed Jesus. But God the Father certainly does not look good --
handing the Son over for death as a ransom payment to purchase freedom
for God's other children, or as a debt payment to Satan, who possesses
rights in a contractual arrangement with God. One can easily sense
Anselm's distaste for this motif.
But the situation is not ameliorated when one poses the question
for satisfaction and moral theories. Satisfaction atonement pictures a
debt owed to God's honor. God's honor not only needs the death. God
also arranges for Jesus to die to pay the debt to God's honor. It
really looks as though God has Jesus killed in order to pay the debt
to God's honor. Here is where we very pointedly see the result of
Anselm's deletion of the devil from the three-cornered relationship
involving the devil, sinners, and God. With Satan deleted, remaining
in the equation are God and the sinners who have offended God. But
these sinful human beings cannot save themselves by repaying God
themselves. Thus it is merely an extension of the interior logic of
Anselm's own move that leads to the conclusion that God is the only
one left to orchestrate the death of Jesus in order to pay the debt
owed to God's honor.(3) In
penal substitution, Jesus is punished by death, in place of killing
us. Thus God's law receives the necessary death that it demands for
justice. But again, since sinners cannot pay their own debt, God is
the one who arranged to provide Jesus' death as the means to satisfy
the divine law.
One might ask, Weren't the devil or the mob or the Romans
responsible for killing Jesus? But answering "yes" to that
question within the framework of satisfaction atonement points to a
strange juxtaposition or non sequitur. Jesus, who is innocent and who
does the will of God, becomes sin, subject to punishment. And the evil
powers who oppose the reign of God by killing Jesus -- whether the
devil, the mob, or the Romans -- are the ones who are actually doing
the will of God, by killing or punishing Jesus to provide the payment
that God's honor or God's law demands. The strange implication is that
both Jesus and those who kill Jesus would be carrying out the will of
God. In fact, asserting that both claims are true is nonsense.
Avoiding the implications of such mutually contradictory claims by
cloaking it in a category such as mystery, or by claiming that the
acts of God are too big for our categories to contain, renders
meaningless any attempt to use theology to express
Christian faith.
The moral theory fares no better. Remember that while Abelard
rejected the idea that Jesus' death was a payment directed toward
God's honor, Abelard agreed with Anselm in removing the devil from the
equation. The result is an atonement motif in which the Father has one
of his children -- the Son -- killed in order to show love to the rest
of the Father's children, namely to us sinners.
These observations about the implied role for God the Father in
satisfaction and moral atonement motifs help explain why a number of
feminist and womanist writers have claimed that atonement theology
presents an image of divine child abuse.(4)
While none of the classic motifs escapes, the sharpest feminist and
womanist critique falls on satisfaction atonement. The Father arranges
the death of one of his children for the benefit of the rest of God's
children.
I cannot fault the feminists and womanists who call these atonement
motifs an image of divine child abuse. The two questions (Who needs
the death of Jesus? Who authors or arranges the death of Jesus?)
reveal some problematic dimensions of traditional atonement theology.
This observation is particularly true for satisfaction and moral
theories, which have occupied most atonement discussions until quite
recently. And one of the most important points to remember is that
those observations are not the result of feminists or pacifists just
being radical. Most fundamentally, the observations about the role of
God in satisfaction and moral atonement motifs result from drawing out
the implications of Anselm's own move to delete the devil from the
atonement equation.
The conclusion from our first round of observations about classic
atonement doctrine is that they portray an image of God as either
divine avenger or punisher and/or as a child abuser, one who arranges
the death of one child for the benefit of the others. Does it surprise
that through the centuries, folks following a God of this stripe,
where violence belongs intrinsically to the divine working, might end
up justifying violence, under a variety of divinely anchored claims
and images?
Retribution in Atonement
The first round of analysis worked on implications drawn from
Anselm's deletion of the devil from the atonement equation. This
section follows a quite different route to similar conclusions.
The various versions of satisfaction atonement function with the
assumption that doing justice or righting wrongs depends on
retribution. Sin creates imbalance. Satisfaction atonement assumes
that the imbalance is righted or balanced by the punishment
of death.
One contemporary version and one historic version of this
assumption make clear its presence in satisfaction atonement. The
criminal justice system of the United States operates on the principle
of retribution. This system operates under the assumption that doing
justice means to inflict punishment, which is understood as violence.
The assumption is that small crimes require small penalties, while a
big crime requires a big penalty. The biggest punishment, namely
death, is reserved for the most heinous crimes. The assumption that
doing justice is equated with punishment appears in the public
disapproval when what is perceived as a big misdeed receives only a
"wrist tap" as punishment. With an apparent imbalance
between deed and punishment, it seems that justice was not done. The
assumption of retributive justice -- that doing justice means meting
out punishment -- is virtually universal among North Americans and
throughout much of the world.(5)
The assumption that doing justice means to punish underlies
satisfaction atonement, and in particular the image of penal
substitutionary atonement. This image assumes the necessity of
punishment, with innocent Jesus punished in our place. As our
substitute, Jesus bore the punishment we deserve.
The motif of Jesus as the substitute object of punishment, which
assumes the principle of retribution, is the particular image that
feminists and womanists have found very offensive. It portrays God as
the chief exacter of retribution. God punishes -- abuses -- one of
God's children for the sake of the others. And the Jesus of this motif
models passive submission to innocent and unjust suffering for the
sake of others.
The contemporary assumption of retributive justice has a medieval
counterpart in the feudal system. I follow R. W. Southern's
description of the feudal system and how Anselm's image reflects his
feudal world view.(6) The
feudal world was hierarchical. A lord at the top held the hierarchy
together. Stability of the system depended on maintaining the honor of
the lord at the top of the hierarchy. An offense against the lord's
honor incurred a debt that threatened his authority and thus the
stability of the system. In order to restore honor and stability, the
debt had to be repaid. Inability to collect the debt challenged the
honor and authority of the lord.
A modern equivalent might be a teacher who is sassed by her
student. Her authority as teacher is threatened if she cannot enact
punishment on the disrespectful student. The object of dealing with
the student is not punishment per se. It is rather that some kind of
compensation for the offense is necessary in order to maintain the
integrity and stability of the teacher's authority in her classroom.
Or perhaps the perceived sense that stability of the social system
demands retribution is like a governor who refuses to pardon an inmate
on death row. In the governor's perception, pardoning a death-row
inmate would threaten the integrity of the criminal justice system. If
one who has violated the law is pardoned, it appears that the system
itself is threatened. Again here, one sees punishment as the means to
maintain the integrity and stability of the system.
It not difficult to see that Anselm's image of the atoning death of
Jesus reflects the feudal world view. Human sin has brought imbalance
and disharmony into the universe. The restoration of harmony, order
and balance requires a payment to satisfy the offended honor of God.
Anselm understood Jesus' death as the debt payment that satisfied the
honor of God, and thus restored balance and order in the universe. The
logic of satisfaction atonement can be understood with all the feudal
imagery removed from Anselm's argument. As was previously noted, for
example, the modern criminal justice system constitutes an arena that
assumes and models retribution. There is thus no need to dispute
Southern's conclusion that feudal society supplies the motif that
Anselm elevated to an ultimate image of the way that God maintains
order in the universe.(7)
Maintaining order in the universe depends on maintaining the honor of
God, which necessitates a debt payment -- the death of Jesus -- to
cover the offense to God's honor that was enacted by human sin.
Although Anselm's understanding of satisfaction atonement differs
significantly from penal substitutionary atonement, each assumes some
form of the idea of retribution. Whereas penal substitution pictures
retribution in terms of punishment exacted by divine law, for Anselm
it was the offended honor of God that required retribution in the form
of the payment of death.
Anselm's satisfaction atonement clearly differs from the penal
substitutionary image, in which God punishes Jesus as a substitute for
punishing sinful humankind. One recent strategy for defending
satisfaction atonement makes a great deal of this difference. The
first point of this defense is to acknowledge that feminists and
womanists are correct that the images of God and Jesus in penal
substitutionary atonement are unhealthy for persons in abusive and
oppressive conditions, namely a Father God who punishes an innocent
Son, and a Jesus who passively submits to his Father's abuse. The
second point is to claim that the image of penal substitution is not
true satisfaction atonement as articulated by Anselm. Thus, the
would-be defender of satisfaction atonement blames early Protestant
reformers for the unhealthy images, and appeals for the true
satisfaction motif to the medieval Anselm, where we do not have an
angry God who punishes, but rather an image concerned with a defense
of God's honor.(8) This God
seems not so concerned about Godself as about addressing the disorder
and disharmony in the universe produced by human sin. In this view,
the argument goes, the death of Jesus is not about having Jesus bear
punishment actually merited by human beings, but about restoring order
and harmony in the universe.
While clear differences do distinguish these two versions of
satisfaction atonement, appealing to Anselm does not absolve
satisfaction atonement of its inherent violence. To illustrate that
point, visualize atonement in terms of a debt payment to God's honor,
and consider again the questions posed earlier.
What is the object of the death of Jesus? The answer is
not God but rather the honor of God. However, can God's honor
exist apart from God? I think not. And it is clearly evident that
although this image does not picture the death of Jesus in terms of
punishment, the death of Jesus is still directed Godward, and
needs to be directed Godward. If it is not directed Godward, then
nothing salvific has happened. Then, Who orchestrates or arranges
the scenario that produces the Godward-directed death of Jesus that
pays the debt to God's honor? The devil is not allowed as an
answer since Anselm removed him from the equation. And in any case,
putting the devil in charge would align his action with the will of
God, which constitutes a logical impossibility. Further, it cannot be
sinful human beings who arrange the scenario -- if it were, they would
be saving themselves. Thus the only remaining answer is that it is God
who has arranged the scenario that produced the Godward-directed death
of Jesus in order to repay the honor of God and restore order in the
universe. The answers to these questions make clear that just as
surely as does penal substitution, the image of payment of a debt to
God's honor is a scenario in which God is left as the organizer of
Jesus' death. God is the only one who can arrange salvation, who
arranged the plan by which the Son pays the penalty of death that
results in the salvation of sinful humankind. And further, the
assumption underlying this atonement motif is that doing justice or
righting wrong depends on the violence of punishment.
Although Anselm uses different language from penal substitution,
his motif of Jesus' death as a payment to God's honor has the same
assumption of retributive violence and the same implication that God
killed Jesus as are present in the penal substitution version of
satisfaction atonement. Anselm's language merely camouflages this
violence. Claiming that Anselm's language avoids the intrinsic
violence of satisfaction atonement is like arguing that capital
punishment is not about killing people, but rather about "doing
justice" or "upholding the law." The conclusion is
inescapable that any and all versions of satisfaction atonement,
regardless of their packaging, assume the violence of retribution or
justice based on punishment, and depend on God-induced and
God-directed violence.
Ahistorical Atonement
Satisfaction atonement accommodates violence in a third way. It
structures the relationship between humankind and God in terms of an
ahistorical, abstract legal formula. Thus it concerns a relationship
that is outside of human history. Further, when visualizing the birth,
life and teaching, death, and resurrection of Jesus, quite obviously
satisfaction atonement actually needs or uses only the death of Jesus.
These elements -- positing a transaction outside of history and
involving only the death of Jesus -- make satisfaction atonement an
image that (with one exception treated below) implies little or
nothing about ethics, and contains nothing that would challenge
injustice in the social order. It is an a-ethical atonement image --
it projects an understanding of salvation that is separated from
ethics. That is, salvation in satisfaction atonement does not envision
a change of status in history or in life on earth; rather it envisions
a change in one's status outside of or beyond this life. This
a-ethical orientation makes it quite compatible with exercise of the
sword, or with accommodation of slavery and racism. And as will be
explained shortly, it actually contributes to one kind of violence in
history.
The particular significance of these observations about the
ahistorical and a-ethical dimensions of satisfaction atonement appears
when they are considered against the backdrop of the changes in the
church that are symbolized by emperor Constantine. These changes began
already in the second century and extended through several centuries
in evolutionary fashion. The end result of this evolution was that the
church ceased being perceived as a dissident minority group and came
to identify with the social order and make use of and express itself
through the institutions of the social order. Rather than posing a
contrast or a challenge to the social order, church officials could
now use imperial structures as allies if political authorities sided
with the particular officials on the issue in question. Of course they
opposed them when the political authorities disagreed with churchly
officials. There came to be a marked change in the status of the
church. No longer was it a minority, oppressed structure. With
emperors and lesser political officials now taking sides in
theological disputes and backing the decrees of church councils, the
church came to encompass the social order as a whole. A kind of
culmination was reached when Emperor Theodosius made the results of
the Council of Constantinople the official theology of the empire. It
is the situation that is anachronistically called a "Christian
society." Among other things, the exercise of the sword can
represent the change in the status of the church from a contrast to an
accommodation of the social order. Whereas before, Christians did not
wield the sword and pagans did, now Christians wielded the sword in
the name of Christ. Rather than defining what Christians did on the
basis of what Jesus said or did, the operative norm of behavior for
Christians became what was good or necessary to preserve
"Christian society." And in determining what was good for
society, the emperor rather than Jesus became the test case.(9)
I suggest that satisfaction atonement reflects the church after
Constantine that had accommodated the sword rather than the early
church, which was primarily a pacifist church. Its abstract,
ahistorical, a-ethical formula permits one to claim Jesus' saving work
while wielding the sword that Jesus had forbidden. Similarly, James
Cone, founder of the black theology movement, notes how the abstract
formulas allowed slave owners to preach a salvation to slaves that
preserved intact the master-slave relationship.(10)
In other words, stated generally, satisfaction atonement separates
salvation from ethics. In contrast, the atonement motif presented in
what follows both reflects the nonviolence of Jesus and understands
ethics as an integral dimension of salvation.
To this point, we have observed three levels of exhibiting or
accommodating violence in satisfaction atonement. First, removing the
devil from the atonement equation, as did Anselm and Abelard, leaves
an image of God who saves by violence, and of an innocent Son who
passively submits to that violence. That is, its image assumes
God-orchestrated and God-directed violence. Second, satisfaction
atonement assumes the violence of retribution. Finally, its abstract,
ahistorical character does not challenge and in fact accommodates
violence and violent practices in the social order. The moral theory
and ransom theory display other dimensions of violence -- different
versions of the Father who arranges the death of the Son for the sake
of the Father's other children.
Christology
The problem of violence accommodation in Christian theology is not
ameliorated when we move from atonement to consider classic
Christology. The formulas from the councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon,
and the Cappadocian Fathers' trinitarian terminology constitute the
foundation of classic orthodoxy. These abstract formulas concern
Jesus' ontology, and compare it to the ontology of God and of
humankind. However, like the ahistorical and a-ethical formula of
satisfaction atonement, the abstract, philosophical formulas of Nicaea,
Chalcedon, and the Cappadocians say nothing about the life and
teaching of Jesus. In other words, these formulas have separated
theology from ethics. And they enable one to claim Jesus and to
profess a Christian faith that says nothing about such issues as
slavery or use of the sword. These formulas accommodate violence. Like
satisfaction atonement, they reflect the church symbolized by
Constantine that had undergone an evolutionary process of shifting the
reference point for ethics from Jesus to the emperor.(11)
It is not as though the christological and trinitarian formulas are
false in what they claim. For example, if in asking about the
relationship of the Jesus of the New Testament to the God of Israel,
one wants the answer in terms of fourth-century Greek ontological
categories and a fourth-century world view, then Nicaea is probably
the best answer. Nor do the christological formulas actively advocate
violence. They do not. But neither do these formulas challenge
violence, and their a-ethical character has long allowed the
accommodation of violence by those who understood the formulas as the
foundation of Christian faith.
Specific Applications
To this point, the argument has brought to the fore the
intrinsically violent elements of classic atonement and christological
formulas. The abstract, ahistorical formulas, whether of atonement or
christology, do not challenge violence, which means that they
accommodate it for Christians. This accommodation applies both to
overt violence (exercised in war and in capital punishment) and to
systemic violence (such as racism, sexism, and poverty). In a sense,
all other discussions of violence accommodation and modeling provide
specific instances of this claim.
The atonement formulas, and in particular the satisfaction motif,
encompass the violent imagery of retribution. And asking who authors
and who requires or receives the violence of retribution exposes the
fact that Anselm's deletion of the devil leaves God as the only one
who can direct the death of Jesus and who needs the death in
satisfaction of offended honor. Eliminating Satan from the equation
and subsequently making sinful human beings responsible directly to
God exposes the way that God both arranges the retribution and is the
recipient of Jesus' death thus produced.
If Anselm's satisfaction atonement reflected a cosmic image of
feudal assumptions, in the modern world satisfaction atonement appears
to project into the cosmic realm the assumption of the criminal
justice system that justice depends on retributive violence, with the
death penalty as the ultimate punishment. Focusing on the violence of
retribution in satisfaction atonement brings to the fore the issue of
the image or role of God. The logic of satisfaction atonement
makes God the chief avenger or the chief punisher. In its worst case,
as previously alluded to, it makes God a child abuser. This vengeful
image of God led Abelard to reject the idea that Jesus' death was a
payment to God's honor. However, the moral influence theory still
leaves God the Father offering the Son's death to sinners as the
example of Fatherly love. And classic Christus Victor has the Father
hand over the Son as a ransom payment.
Some commentators have made a virtue of the parallel assumption of
retributive violence in satisfaction atonement and in the criminal
justice system. Because God has already accomplished the ultimate
punishment in Jesus' death, it is argued, then our system of criminal
justice need not focus on punishment and can shift its efforts to
restoration and rehabilitation.(12)
While I fully support elimination of the death penalty and shifting
from retribution to restoration as the operative motif for the
criminal justice system, those changes do not depend on defending
satisfaction atonement. And as the following paragraphs indicate, that
violent image poses other, very real social problems.
A further component of the violence in classic atonement images is
the model of Jesus it presents. In satisfaction atonement, Jesus is a
model of voluntary submission to innocent suffering. If the Father
needs the death of Jesus to satisfy divine honor, Jesus as innocent
victim voluntarily agrees to submit to that violence needed by the
honor of God. Or as innocent victim Jesus voluntarily agrees to
undergo the punishment deserved by sinful humankind in order that the
demand of divine justice be met. Because Jesus' death is needed, Jesus
models being a voluntary, passive and innocent victim, who suffers for
the good of another.
Beyond the generalities, it is important to underscore for whom
these images of Jesus as an innocent and passive victim may pose a
particular concern. It is an unhealthy model for a woman abused by her
husband or a child violated by her father, and constitutes double
jeopardy when attached to hierarchical theology that asserts male
headship.(13) A model of
passive, innocent suffering poses an obstacle for people who encounter
conditions of systemic injustice, or an unjust status quo produced by
the power structure. Examples might be the legally segregated south
prior to the civil rights movement, or de facto housing segregation
that still exists in many places; military-backed occupation, under
which land is confiscated and indigenous residents crowded into
enclosed territories, called "reservations" in North America
and "bantustans" in South Africa and "autonomous
areas" in Palestine. For people in such situations of an unjust
status quo, the idea of "being like Jesus" as modeled by
satisfaction atonement means to submit passively and to endure that
systemic injustice. James Cone linked substitutionary atonement
specifically to defenses of slavery and colonial oppression.(14)
Delores Williams calls the Jesus of substitutionary atonement, the
"ultimate surrogate figure." After depicting numerous ways
in which black women were forced into a variety of surrogacy roles for
white men and women and black men, Williams says that to accept
satisfaction or substitutionary atonement and the image of Jesus that
it supplies is to validate all the unjust surrogacy to which black
women have been and still are submitted.(15)
Such examples show that atonement theology that models innocent,
passive suffering does have specific negative impact in the
contemporary context.
A victim is controlled by forces and circumstances beyond himself
or herself. A victim surrenders control to others and accepts the
injustice imposed by others. Jesus in satisfaction and substitutionary
atonement models victimization. When this atonement motif is the model
for people who have experienced abuse or exploitation, this model
underscores their status as victims. For them, being like Jesus means
to continue to submit to unjust suffering, abuse or exploitation.
Seeking liberation means to assert control of one's own life by
beginning to struggle against that oppression. Because one who
struggles is no longer voluntarily submitting, he or she is no longer
a victim. While liberation is not yet achieved, it has already begun
in the struggle. For oppressed peoples, satisfaction atonement
reinforces their status as victims rather than undergirding them in
the struggle for liberation from oppression. And it should be obvious
that since satisfaction poses an image of submission to oppression, it
consequently poses no challenge to the acts of those who oppress and
exploit.
Some writers have appealed to the Trinity to defend satisfaction
atonement against the claims that it poses a harmful model for abused
or oppressed people. According to this argument, the unity of the
persons of the Trinity means that the Father suffers with the Son.
Thus rather than having the Father cause Jesus to suffer, one has God
the Father both identifying with the suffering of Jesus and also
suffering for sinful humankind rather than exercising judgment.(16)
In my view, this appeal camouflages but does not deal fundamentally
with the abusive imagery of satisfaction atonement. Returning to the
questions used earlier about the object of Jesus' death and who needs
and arranges the death shows that the death of Jesus is still aimed
Godward. This appeal does change the image, however, from the Father
abusing the Son to the Father engaging in abuse of himself. Perhaps it
is akin to what once was called patripassianism.
Narrative Christus Victor
What I call narrative Christus Victor(17)
identifies the victory of Christ in terms of the narratives of the
Gospels and Revelation and also distinguishes my formulation from
classic Christus Victor. The final section of this essay outlines
narrative Christus Victor as an approach to atonement and Christology
that expresses the nonviolence of Jesus, that does not presume that
justice depends on punishment, that does not put God in the role of
chief avenger, that does not make Jesus a model of passive, innocent,
voluntary submission to abuse, and that frees oppressors from their
oppression. Narrative Christus Victor features an understanding of
salvation that includes ethics, and that begins in but is certainly
not limited to the historical arena in which we live. In other words,
narrative Christus Victor avoids all the problems of violence
identified for classic atonement and christological imagery.
Consider again the original survey of atonement images. In
particular, note the "cosmic battle" version of Christus
Victor, which has received little attention in this essay. Recall that
this image featured the forces of God involved in a cosmic battle with
the forces of Satan (or of evil) for control of the universe. When
Jesus died, Satan won an apparent and momentary victory. But with the
resurrection of Jesus, the reign of God emerged victorious, and the
perceived authority of the reign of God was definitively and
ultimately established. For present purposes, the important issue with
classic Christus Victor is to recognize and understand what that
"cosmic" battle consists of and where and when it
took place.
The book of Revelation is replete with images of this cosmic
battle, of images of the confrontation between the reign of God and
the forces of Satan. While many vignettes in Revelation portray this
confrontation, chapter 12 contains the specific image of a
heavenly battle between the forces of Satan, represented by the
dragon, and the forces of God led by the angel Michael.
But one of the most important points is to see that this
confrontation between Michael and the dragon was not an actual battle
waged in the cosmos. The imagery and symbols of Revelation, both in
chapter 12 and throughout the book, refer to people and events in
the historical world of the first century. In other words,
Revelation's symbols refer not to the distant future nor to cosmic
events outside of history but to events of the first century in the
world that we live in.
In the case of the seven-headed dragon in chapter 12, most
scholars recognize that the dragon refers to imperial Rome, whose
eponymous city by legend was founded on seven hills, with the horns
and crowns referring to a sequence of emperors. The "battle"
depicted between forces of God and forces of Satan was really the
confrontation in history between the church, the earthly
institution that represented the rule of God, and the Roman empire,
the earthly structure used to symbolize the rule of Satan. The
so-called cosmic battle was really imagery that gave the cosmic
significance of the confrontation between the Roman empire and Jesus
and his church. Revelation uses cosmic imagery and symbols to depict
the significance of the struggle of Jesus and the early church against
the Roman empire.
The same kind of interpretation applies to the seven seals in
chapters 6-7. One very plausible set of historical antecedents for the
seven seals is the following. I suggest that the seals correspond to
the sequence of Roman emperors from Tiberius (14-37 C.E.,
seal 1), under whose rule Jesus was crucified, through Caligula
(37-40 C.E., seal 2), Claudius (41-54 C.E., seal 3), Nero
(54-68 C.E., seal 4), and Vespasian (69-79 C.E., seal 6), to
the short reign of Titus (79-81 C.E.) or more likely Domitian (81-96
C.E., seal 7). Seal 5 coincides with the gap between Nero
and Vespasian when three pretenders (Galbo, Otho, and Vitellius)
carried the title but failed to consolidate imperial power.
Each seal contains a symbolic reference to elements from the reign
of the corresponding emperor. The unsuccessful effort to conquer by
the rider on the white horse -- he came out "conquering and to
conquer" -- makes an oblique reference to the death and
resurrection of Jesus that occurred during the reign of Tiberius.
Since Jesus did not stay dead, the imagery implies, the rider --
Tiberius -- had a temporary victory, or a victory that consisted of
appearance only. Following symbols are more obvious. The blood-red
horse, the sword, and taking peace from the earth in seal two refer to
the threats posed by Caligula. In addition to Caligula's provocations
against the Jews, in 40 C.E. he sent an army to install a statue of
himself arrayed as a Roman god on the altar of the temple of
Jerusalem. This army posed a major threat to the city, but Caligula
died before the threat was carried out. The symbols of famine in
seal 3 refer to the famine during the reign of Claudius that is
mentioned in Acts 11:28, while the double-ugly riders and multiple
means of destruction in seal 4 portray Nero, whose infamy still
lives. Changing the point of view from earth to heaven in seal 5
corresponds to the eighteen-month interlude between Nero and Vespasian,
when the three pretenders each obtained the title but did not succeed
in consolidating power as emperor. The multiple symbols in the first
scene of seal six portray the breakdown of order and the overwhelming
sense of despair and tragedy felt by the heirs of David when his city
-- Jerusalem -- was sacked and destroyed in 70 C.E. by an army
commanded by emperor Vespasian's son Titus.(18)
The entirety of chapter 7 also belongs to seal 6, which
pointedly depicts the celebration of the two throngs as the
counterpoint to the devastation of the first scene of seal 6,
which I interpret as the destruction of Jerusalem. Twelve is the
number of Israel's tribes, and 144,000 is the product of 12 times 12
times 1000. It is a large number that symbolizes the people of God as
continuous with God's people Israel. In the first century, this number
would have seemed much larger than it does for us in the computer age
on the cusp of the third millennium. Its size should be read as a
parallel to the "countless multitude," which includes people
of every ethnic and national group in the people of God. These two
throngs, which show that the people of God includes both Israelites
and gentiles around the world, celebrate the victory of the reign of
God over the forces of evil. For those who perceive the resurrection
of Jesus, the celebration loudly proclaims, the rule of God has
already triumphed over the accumulation of evil experienced under the
rule of Rome. In the midst of the worst imaginable tragedy from an
earthly perspective -- even the destruction of the holy city -- the
two multitudes are depicted in celebration. For the reader of
Revelation, the message of the cheering throngs is that for those who
live in the reality of the resurrection of Jesus, the rule of God has
already triumphed. And the people of God do not face ultimate despair,
even when confronted by the accumulation of evil experienced under the
rule of Rome, even when that rule culminates with the destruction of
the temple and the sacred city of Jerusalem.
Finally, this celebration leads to the seventh seal, which does not
advance the chronology, but rather begins a new cycle of seven.
Ceasing the count at seven and beginning a new series of seven places
the time of the seventh seal in the author's present. According to my
sequence, that would be perhaps during the short reign of Titus (79-81
C.E.) or more likely during the reign of Domitian (81-96 C.E.).(19)
Putting the declarations of cosmic victory together with the
historical antecedents of the symbols shows that Revelation delivers a
cosmic and eschatological perspective on events in the history of the
first century. The image in Revelation 12 depicts the same history in
another way. Rome, the seven-headed dragon, whose 10 horns and 7
crowns encompass the emperors and pretenders just mentioned, confronts
the beautiful woman with a crown of twelve stars. She is Israel, who
produced Jesus the Messiah, and is also the church, who is pursued by
Rome. In this set of symbols as well, the resurrection of Jesus gives
the victory to the earthly representatives of the reign of God over
the forces of evil symbolized by Rome.
Identifying these symbols with Rome does not empty Revelation of
contemporary meaning. On the contrary. The message of Revelation is
just as true for the church today as it confronts structures and
institutions not loyal to or shaped by the reign of God. It goes
without saying that these evil powers would include Nazi Germany but
also include any contemporary political state to the extent that it
claims to speak and act in the name of God and thus puts itself in the
place of the church as the earthly structure that witnesses to the
reign of God.
The Gospels present the same story as that told in Revelation, but
from a different standpoint. Revelation tells the story of Jesus from
the perspective of the heavenly throne room and the future culmination
of the reign of God. The Gospels narrate that same story from the
earthly vantage point of the folks who got dust on their sandals as
they walked along the roads of Palestine with Jesus. Both accounts
locate the victory of the reign of God on earth and in history --
narrative Christus Victor -- and make quite clear that the triumph
occurred not through the sword and military might but nonviolently,
through death and resurrection. The intrinsically nonviolent character
of the victory eliminates what is usually called triumphalism of the
church. As intrinsically nonviolent, its stance to the other or toward
those who differ and are different can only be nonviolent. To be
otherwise is to cease to be a witness to the reign of God and to join
the forces of evil who oppose the reign of God.
At the same time, reading that story in the Gospels shows that
Jesus was not a passive victim, whose purpose was to get himself
killed in order to satisfy a big cosmic legal requirement. Rather,
Jesus was an activist, whose mission was to make the rule of God
visible. And his acts demonstrated what the reign of God looked like
-- defending poor people, raising the status of women, raising the
status of Samaritans, performing healings and exorcisms, preaching the
reign of God, and more. His mission was to make the reign of God
present in the world in his person and in his teaching, and to invite
people to experience the liberation it presented.
And when Jesus made the reign of God visible and present in that
way, it was so threatening that the assembled array of evil forces
killed him. These forces include imperial Rome, which carried ultimate
legal authority for his death, with some assistance from the religious
authorities in Jerusalem, as well as Judas, Peter, and other
disciples, who could not even watch with him, and the mob that howled
for his death. Resurrection is the reign of God made victorious over
all these forces of evil that killed Jesus.
As sinners, in one way or another, we are all part of those sinful
forces that killed Jesus. Jesus died making the reign of God present
for us while we were still sinners. To acknowledge our human
sinfulness is to become aware of our participation in the forces of
evil that killed Jesus, including their present manifestations in such
powers as militarism, nationalism, racism, sexism, heterosexism and
poverty that still bind and oppress.
And because God is a loving God, God invites us to join the rule of
God in spite of the fact that we participated with and are captive to
the powers that killed Jesus. God invites us to join the struggle of
those seeking liberation from the forces that bind and oppress. This
invitation envisions both those who are oppressed and their
oppressors. When the oppressed accept God's invitation, they cease
collaborating with the powers that oppressed and join the forces who
represent the reign of God in making a visible witness against
oppression. And when the oppressors accept God's invitation, they
cease their collaboration with the powers of oppression, and join the
forces who represent the reign of God in witnessing against
oppression. Thus under the reign of God, former oppressed and former
oppressors join together in witnessing to the reign of God.(20)
One dimension of the image of narrative Christus Victor is that it
is the undoing of Anselm's deletion. Anselm removed the devil
from the salvation equation. Narrative Christus Victor restores the
devil to the equation, but with a difference. In narrative Christus
Victor, the image of the devil is not that of an individual,
personified being. Rather "the devil" is the Roman empire,
which symbolizes all the institutes and structures and powers of the
world that do not recognize the rule of God. Thus "devil"
includes ourselves. Following Walter Wink's understanding of the
powers, this devil is the symbol for the accumulation of all that does
not recognize the authority of the reign of God.(21)
In his contemporary construction of Christus Victor, James Cone wrote
that the powers of evil confronted by the reign of God include
"the American system," symbolized by government officials
who "oppress the poor, humiliate the weak, and make heroes out of
rich capitalists;" "the Pentagon, which bombed and killed
helpless people in Vietnam and Cambodia and attributed such obscene
atrocities to the accidents of war;" the system symbolized in
"the police departments and prison officials, which shoots and
kills defenseless blacks for being black and for demanding
their right to exist."(22)
What the victorious Christ has done is to rescue us from the forces of
evil and allow us to be invited into and to be transformed by the rule
of God. While that transformation is never complete, our participation
in evil has now become involuntary and our lives take on the character
of opposition to rather than cooperation with the forces of evil.
Earlier it was shown how Anselmian atonement correlates with the
ecclesiology of Christendom. It is now also possible to show that
narrative Christus Victor belonged to, and in fact only makes sense
when perceived within, the ecclesiological status of the early church
in relation to the Roman empire and the social order. As is clear from
the symbolism of Revelation, the church in that setting perceived
itself to be different from the empire, to maintain itself as distinct
from the prevailing social order. This sense of being distinct is true
whether one argues that the church endured direct persecution, or more
likely as has been recently argued, that the church perceived itself
in crisis but did not actually face widespread, ongoing persecution.
The church distinct from the social order constitutes the context in
which Jesus' actions pose contrasts to prevailing practices and in
which it makes sense to speak of confrontation between church and
empire or church and social order. In fact, since the empire and the
social order are considered pagan, it makes no sense not to speak of
Jesus and the disciples and the early church as posing a contrast or a
witness to the social order. And it seems almost self-evident that for
those who call themselves Christians, Jesus is the orientation point
for that witness. My reconstruction of narrative Christus Victor that
makes visible the church in Revelation and the life of Jesus in the
Gospels simply reflects the status of the church in the first century
and beyond. I note without elaboration that this church is a pacifist
church, whether that stance is because Christians did not wield the
sword and shed blood or because of the idolatrous nature of the army's
religious commitments.(23)
We noted previously the series of changes in the church beginning
in the second century and extending through several centuries. The end
result of these changes, for which Constantine is a symbol of the way
things were moving rather than a cause, was that the church came to
identify with the social order. Rather than a witness against it, the
church came to support and to work through the institutions of the
social order. This is the general context in which Anselm's
satisfaction atonement emerged.
Christus Victor eventually faded away, although instances of it can
be found well into the middle ages and beyond, and Anselm clearly
sensed a need to refute its ransom version. The standard reasons given
for the demise of Christus Victor are several: objection to the idea
that God would recognize certain rights of the devil, or that God
would overcome the devil through trickery; objection to its dualistic
world view; little evidence of the victory of the reign of God in the
historical realm in which we live; incompatibility of the imagery of
cosmic battle with our modern world view; distaste for the battle
imagery.
However, I suggest a quite different reason for the demise of
Christus Victor. This image makes sense only if the church, as a
representative of the reign of God, confronts the world(24)
or poses an alternative to the world. According to my hypothesis,
Christus Victor dropped out of the picture when the church came to
support the world's social order, to accept the intervention of
political authorities in churchly affairs, and to look to political
authorities for support and protection. With the historical
antecedents of Revelation soon forgotten, all that seemed to remain
was cosmic imagery of confrontation that did not match the political
reality. Thus eventually the motif I have called narrative Christus
Victor could fade away without a sense of loss, to be replaced by
Anselm's satisfaction motif, which reflected the medieval social and
ecclesiological conditions. That there are mixed atonement metaphors
in someone like Gregory of Nyssa or that one can still find the motif
after Anselm's became the predominant one are not evidence against my
hypothesis. Rather, these data merely show the evolutionary nature of
the fall and rise of atonement motifs.
The image of narrative Christus Victor avoids all the problematic
elements in classic atonement images, particularly those of
satisfaction atonement. It reflects the ecclesiological world view of
the early rather than the medieval church. It is grounded in
assumptions of nonviolence -- the nonviolence of Jesus -- rather than
violence. In particular, it does not assume retribution, or the
assumption that injustice is balanced by the violence of punishment.
It does not put God in the role of chief avenger, nor picture God as a
child abuser. And it is abundantly obvious that God did not kill Jesus
nor need the death of Jesus in any way. Jesus does suffer, but it is
not as an act of passive submission to undeserved suffering. Jesus
carries out a mission to make the rule of God present and visible, a
mission to bring and to give life. To depict the reign of God as made
visible by Jesus, it is necessary to make use of the entire life and
teaching of Jesus, rather than focus only on his death. When this
mission threatens the forces of evil, they retaliate with violence,
killing Jesus. This suffering is not something willed by nor needed by
God and it is not directed Godward. To the contrary, the killing of
Jesus is the ultimate contrast between the nonviolent reign of God and
the rule of evil.
Narrative Christus Victor understands Jesus as the one whose person
and mission make the reign of God present in our history. It pictures
Jesus as a model of liberation. Those who accept the invitation of God
join the movement that witnesses to the nature of the reign of God in
contrast to the forces of evil that bind. This motif thus features
salvation that begins in history to the extent that the reign of God
is present in history.
Earlier, one of the questions used to analyze the various atonement
motifs was "Who needs the death of Jesus?" Bringing that
question to narrative Christus Victor brings to the forefront the
profound difference between it and satisfaction atonement. The
question has a non-answer in narrative Christus Victor. God does not
need the death because this motif does not make use of the idea of
retribution. In narrative Christus Victor, the death pays God nothing
and is not Godward directed. If anything or anyone "needs"
the death, it is the forces of evil who kill Jesus. They
"need" the death as the futile effort to annihilate the
reign of God. The death of Jesus is thus very pointedly not something
needed by God or God's honor. It is rather what the forces of evil --
the devil -- do to Jesus. Rather than a divine requirement, the death
of Jesus is the ultimate indication of the difference between the
reign of God and the reign of evil.
Rather than the death of Jesus, what sinners need, what the reign
of God needs is the resurrection of Jesus. That is where the victory
of the reign of God is. And this discussion shows one of the most
profound differences between satisfaction atonement and narrative
Christus Victor. Satisfaction atonement focuses on the death of Jesus,
and uses and needs that death. And satisfaction atonement has God
arrange things so that the death happens in order to satisfy the
divine requirement. And it does not even talk about resurrection.
Whereas for narrative Christus Victor, death has an entirely different
meaning. The death of Jesus is not a divine requirement. Rather, the
death is that which clearly distinguishes the rule of the devil from
the rule of God. The rule of the devil attempts to rule by violence
and death, whereas the rule of God rules and ultimately conquers by
nonviolence.
The analysis of this essay has demonstrated the extent to which
presuppositions of violence and overt violence are inherently a part
of classic Christian theology. We have also observed that the abstract
and ahistorical character of the classic formulas of atonement and
Christology mean that they do not challenge injustice in the social
order. This combination of intrinsically violent elements and lack of
challenge to injustice in the social order mean that it has been
possible throughout much of Christian history for Christians to
profess allegiance to Jesus and to claim salvation as depicted in
classic Christology and atonement, while simultaneously pursuing the
violence prohibited by Jesus' teaching and life.
If Christians are uncomfortable with Christianity as a violent
religion, the first step is to recognize the extent to which formulas
of classic theology have contributed to violence both overt and
systemic. This essay provided data for that acknowledgement. The
second step away from Christianity as a violent religion would be to
construct theology that specifically reflects the nonviolence of its
namesake, Jesus Christ. As a suggestion in that direction, I offer
narrative Christus Victor as both nonviolent atonement and narrative
Christology. Finally, step three would be to live out the theology of
its nonviolent namesake. That commitment is a call to every Christian.
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Notes
1. [Back to text] This
essay draws on elements of my book The Nonviolent Atonement
(Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2001).
2. [Back to text]
Anselm, "Why God Became Man," in A Scholastic
Miscellany: Anselm to Ockham, ed. and trans. Eugene R.
Fairweather, The Library of Christian Classics (Philadelphia:
Westminster, 1956), 107-10.
3. [Back to text]
Anselm himself did not deal with the specific question of whether God
was responsible for the death of Jesus, although he does discuss
whether the Father willed the death of the son. Anselm wanted to
portray the necessity of the incarnation and of Jesus' death as a
payment to God's honor, but without appearing to place limits or
obligation on God. To deal with this dilemma and to absolve God of
responsibility for seeming unjust acts, Anselm developed the category
of "fitting" or fittingness" to describe what was
necessary for God but without placing necessity or obligation on God.
R. W. Southern, Saint Anselm: A Portrait in a Landscape
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 201-2, 206 For Anselm's
use of "fitting" and "unfitting," see Anselm,
"Why?" 115-21.
4. [Back to text]
Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker, "For God So Loved the
World?" in Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse: A Feminist
Critique, ed. Joanne Carlson Brown and Carole R. Bohn (New
York: Pilgrim Press, 1989), 1-30; Julie M. Hopkins, Towards a
Feminist Christology: Jesus of Nazareth, European Women, and the
Christological Crisis (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1995),
50-52; Rita Nakashima Brock, Journeys by Heart: A Christology of
Erotic Power (New York: Crossroad, 1988), 55-57; Carter Heyward, Saving
Jesus: From Those Who Are Right: Rethinking What It Means to Be
Christian (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1999), 151;
Delores S. Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge
of Womanist God-Talk (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1993),
161-67.
5. [Back to text] For
an analysis of retributive justice, with restorative justice as the
suggested alternative, see Howard Zehr, Changing Lenses: A New
Focus for Crime and Justice, A Christian Peace Shelf Selection (Scottdale,
Pa.: Herald Press, 1990).
6. [Back to text]
Southern, Saint Anselm, 221-27.
7. [Back to text]
Ibid.
8. [Back to text]
Catherine Pickstock pushes this argument the farthest, but it is also
used by Margo Houts and Nancy Duff. See Catherine Pickstock, After
Writing: On the Liturgical Consummation of Philosophy (Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers, 1998), 155-57; Margo G. Houts,
"Atonement and Abuse: An Alternative View," Daughters of
Sarah 18, no. 3 (1992 Summer 1992): 30; Nancy J. Duff,
"Atonement and the Christian Life: Reformed Doctrine from a
Feminist Perspective," Interpretation 53, no. 1
(January 1999): 24.
9. [Back to text] The
seminal treatment of the changes in the church symbolized by
Constantine is John Howard Yoder, "The Constantinian Sources of
Western Social Ethics," in The Priestly Kingdom: Social
Ethics as Gospel (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame,
1984), 135-47, as well as John H. Yoder, "The Disavowal of
Constantine: An Alternative Perspective on Interfaith Dialogue,"
in The Royal Priesthood: Essays Ecclesiological and Ecumenical,
ed. and introd. Michael G. Cartwright, foreword Richard J.
Mouw (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1994), 242-61, and John H.
Yoder, "The Otherness of the Church," in The Royal
Priesthood: Essays Ecclesiological and Ecumenical, ed. and introd.
Michael G. Cartwright, foreword Richard J. Mouw (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1994), 53-64. H. A. Drake has shown that
Constantine himself pursued a policy of tolerance, and that the
changes he symbolizes and the move toward enforcing one prescribed
faith actually occurred in the decades following Constantine.
H. A. Drake, Constantine and the Bishops: The Politics of
Intolerance (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 2000).
10. [Back to text]
James H. Cone, God of the Oppressed, rev. ed. (Maryknoll,
N.Y.: Orbis books, 1997), 42-49, 211-12.
11. [Back to text]
See references in note 9.
12. [Back to text]
Argument made by William Placher. William C. Placher,
"Christ Takes Our Place: Rethinking Atonement," Interpretation
53, no. 1 (January 1999): 15. Applying the assertion in the book
of Hebrews that the death of Christ is the end of all sacrifice,
John H. Yoder makes the same application of satisfaction
atonement as does Placher. H. Wayne House and John Howard Yoder, The
Death Penalty Debate: Two Opposing Views of Capital Punishment
(Dallas: Word Publishing, 1991), 158-60. However, Yoder does not
thereby validate satisfaction atonement. In fact, he stated that he
shared discomfort with the retributive assumptions of satisfaction
atonement. But Yoder then argued that the psychic desire for
punishment is so pervasive that in seeking to reduce the violence that
comes with exercise of the death penalty, we would do better to accept
the assumption of retribution and then argue that the death of Jesus
ended the need for retribution rather than to challenge the assumption
with alternative theology. John Howard Yoder, The Case for
Punishment (John Howard Yoder's Home Page, 1995), ch. 5, 9,
Accessed July 1, 2000, www.nd.edu/*theo/jhy/writings/home/welcome.htm.
Regarding atonement, Yoder's purpose was to reduce the violence of
capital punishment and his comment is neither a defense of
satisfaction atonement nor a clear statement opposing development of a
theological alternative to it.
13. [Back to text]
Brown and Parker, "For God So Loved the World?"; Hopkins, Towards
a Feminist Christology, 50-52; Brock, Journeys by Heart,
55-57; Heyward, Saving Jesus, 151.
14. [Back to text]
Cone, God of the Oppressed, 211-12.
15. [Back to text]
Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness, 60-83, 161-67, 178-99.
16. [Back to text]
For versions of this argument, see Placher, "Christ Takes Our
Place," 16-17; Thelma Megill-Cobbler, "A Feminist Rethinking
of Punishment Imagery in Atonement," Dialog 35,
no. 1 (Winter 1996): 19-20; Leanne Van Dyk, "Do Theories of
Atonement Foster Abuse?" Dialog 35, no. 1 (Winter
1996): 24; Houts, "Atonement and Abuse," 29.
17. [Back to text]
Thanks to Leanne Van Dyk, who suggested this particular name for the
motif that I was developing.
18. [Back to text]
No scholarly consensus exists on the correlation of seals with
emperors. While my particular suggestion here is quite plausible, the
argument for narrative Christus Victor does not depend on accepting
this particular interpretation. The vitally important point is to
recognize that the antecedents of Revelation's symbols are located in
the first century (however identified) and not in the distant future
or our present age.
19. [Back to text]
Without developing the historical analysis here, I suggest that the
sequences of seven trumpets and seven bowls use different symbols and
kinds of destruction, much of it drawn from the Old Testament, to
cover the same seven imperial eras from Tiberius to Domitian.
20. [Back to text]
This is an image of narrative Christus Victor, using the book of
Revelation and the Gospels. For a much fuller development, as well as
for discussion of how it fits with Paul and other literature of the
New Testament, see my The Nonviolent Atonement (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: Eerdmans, forthcoming).
21. [Back to text]
For the full description of the powers, see the first volume of Walter
Wink's trilogy on the powers, Naming the Powers: The Language of
Power in the New Testament, The Powers, vol. 1
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984).
22. [Back to text]
Cone, God of the Oppressed, 212-13.
23. [Back to text]
David G. Hunter, "The Christian Church and the Roman Army in
the First Three Centuries," in The Church's Peace Witness,
edited by Marlin E. Miller and Barbara Nelson Gingerich (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1994), 161-81; David G. Hunter, "A
Decade of Research on Early Christians and Military Service," Religious
Studies Review 18, no. 2 (April 1992): 87-94; David M.
Scholer, "Early Christian Attitudes to War and Military Service:
A Selective Bibliography," TSF Bulletin 8, no. 1
(September-October 1984): 23-24.
24. [Back to text] I
am using the term "world" as a theological term that stands
for all that is not oriented by the rule of God.