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Slava Isusu Chrystu!
Slava Na Veeky!

I have been following and contributing to dialogs on the subject of the Protestant (specifically with Reformed types) doctrine that Jesus was a "penal substitute" for us (i.e. only the "elect" in Reformed terms)on the cross.

I find it horrifying that they believe that God killed Jesus because He (God the Father) imputed the sins of the people (the "elect" in Reformed theology) to Christ so that God could punish Christ for those sins... Then God takes Christ's personal righteousness and gives it to the people who were sinless (i.e. the elect in Reformed theology). This is how they are justified.

I ahve heard that they use 2 Corinthians 5:21 as a proof, as it says that Jesus "became sin" so that we (the elect in Reformed terms) "might become the righteousness of God." Jesus became the "bad guy" so that God's "vessels of glory" (the elect) could become "the righteousness of God."

The word used there is "hamartano," which is related to "hamartia." I don't kow Greek, but an Evangelical Protestant friend of mine (who believes that Jesus was killed "in our place") told me that "hamartano" means "one who falls short, one who misses the mark in regards with their relationship to God." I had heard, however, that the Greek word from which "hamartano" is derived (i.e. hamartia) is used to translate "sin-offering" (as opposed to the Reformed "sin") in the LXX and, therefore, does NOT have to mean that Jesus became sin, but a sin-offering. Is this true?

I also hear the Reformed types say that Jesus died "in our place," but, I have heard, that this too is incorrect, as the Greek "anti" would mean "in our stead" (i.e. Jesus dies "instead of" us, or in our place).... I have heard that the word "huper" is used which means, "on our behalf." This is differnt than Jesus dying "in our place," as it was never our place to die on a cross.

I think it better to believe that Jesus was a sin-offering in the OT sense... sin-offerings were never "imputed" (Reformed stuff again) with the sins of the people.... Jesus sacrifice expiated God's anger (as opposed to propitiated it).

How do you all feel about these things?

IC XC
Crios
<'(((><

This is how I feel...

River of Fire [geocities.com]

The Protestants are seriously flawed!

First of all, Jesus is God Himself. He is God in the Flesh. So God punishing Jesus...isn't right...it sounds like Jesus isn't God the way the context was written.

Jesus took upon the cross as a sacrifice.

If you look at the Old Law, whereas the lamb is offered as sacrifice for sins. There were strict criteria for it...the lamb must be male, under 3 years of age, must be without blemish. The four legs of the lamb must be tied to the altar, and must be slain by piercing to the heart and left on the altar for 3 hours. Then afterwards, people must eat the lamb (cooked of course) but must NOT NOT NOT ever break the bones. People even have to eat the bone marrow without breaking it.

And of course, Jesus, He didn't come to destroy the Old Law but to FULFILL IT.

He was sacrificed the same way as the lamb...all His 4 limbs nailed to the Altar of the Cross, left on there for 3 hours, He got pierced at the side, His bones were NOT broken, He is male, without blemish (NO SIN), and was 33 years old.

And we, the people, eat Him, in His Flesh and Precious Blood through Holy Eucharist.

That's why St. John the Apostles when realizing what was taking place exclaimed "THIS IS THE LAMB OF GOD!!!"

Death itself is the result of fall of mankind...SIN. The mankind have been twisted. He no longer is a perfect image of God. Men dies, suffers, bore diseases, disability, many many many more imperfections. All of these are result of sin. It is NOT natural for a man to die at all!!! It's not natural for a man to be all twisted up. God never intended that to happen. Because a man is composed of Body and Soul. When a body and soul separates, a man ceases to be fully true man.

So the reason Jesus took up the cross is to die...so that He can OVERCOME death by His resurrection. When He overcomes death...that means He overcomes SIN...He overcomes the fall of mankind. Do you know what that means??? That means He RESTORED mankind!!! Alleluia! That means man will no longer experience death, diseases, twisted being, sin, etc. All of that will take effect at the Last Day because right now we are still experiencing the "effects" of the fall even though we have been restored through His resurrection.

That is why the Christian East have been overly crazy about Pascha (Easter) to celebrate His Resurrection which is the cause of restoration of the entire mankind...to make us what God originally intended us to be. It's because we understand the process of Theosis in ways the WEST haven't comprehend which they are just now beginning to.

Only God (Jesus) has the power to overcome sin and death. That is why He took upon the cross to die. He loves us soooo much that He wants to fix our problems (sin, death, imperfections, etc.).

"O CHRIST...SON OF GOD...WHO IS RISEN FROM THE DEAD. AND BY DEATH HE CONQUERED DEATH AND GRANTING LIFE TO THOSE IN THE GRAVES!!!"

SPDundas
Deaf Byzantine


And by the way, if mankind have NEVER EVER sinned or fall or anything. God would still become Flesh and Blood so He can be among us. So we can be one with Him in Flesh and Spirit through communion as a way to consumate our "marriage" with Him. He loves us so much that He wants to express it physically and spiritually. It's no wonder why Jesus spoke many parables about wedding feasts (about heaven, relationship with God, etc.). He wouldn't have to die.

But only this time, it's unfortunate that He would have to in order to restore everything that we lost. But let's give thanks to the Lord for His goodness endures forever!

Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, that takes away the Sins of the World. The lamb in the O.T. is a sin offering is it not? I come from a prot background so i may be in error when i say that Jesus Christ died as our "Lamb" to atone for our sins. Christ is called the Lamb of God (John 1:26, 36), as the great sacrifice of which the former sacrifices for sin were only a type (Num. 6:12, Lev. 14:12-17)

In the O.T., the lamb offering was valid at that time. However, the reason for the lamb offering commanded by God is probably His way of forshadowing the Sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross.

Just in the same way as the Passover is the forshadowing of the Last Supper. That only the Blood of God can save us (in Holy Eucharist...like Passover for our body and soul).

Can you imagine all the Jews suffering in slavery for many many hundreds of years just so that God will set up some Jewish laws to forshadow of what is greater than the passover...The Last Supper...His offering of His Body and Blood for us to eat and drink.

"If you don't eat or drink My Flesh and Blood, you have no life in you." (John 6:50's)

Being in sin is like slavery. So when Moses freed the Jews to the promised land...it's the same way as Jesus freed us from the bondage of death and sin to the promised paradise.

Not only He atones and freed us from our sins, He OVERCAME it by destroying death by His Death and Resurrection. Not only that, He also restored mankind to it's original "condition" (before Adam and Eve fell).

His Sacrifice is GREATER than the sacrifice of lambs which is imperfect and incomplete.

SPDundas
Deaf Byzantine

To Ortho or die

I read River of Fire

Down here in the bible belt the Protestant message if 'faith alone', being 'saved'.

The Catholic message is "works" with faith.

How would you explain the subtle differences between Orthodoxy and the Protestant and Catholic
teaching.
denise

Denise writes:

>>>Down here in the bible belt the Protestant message is [by] 'faith alone' being 'saved'.

>>>The Catholic message is [by] "works" with faith.

>>>How would you explain the subtle differences between Orthodoxy and the Protestant and Catholic
teaching.

For the Orthodox, in this paradigm, we might say that if is the works of faith [ie obedience to Christ] that are salvific - But we would more accurrately perhaps say that it is the entering into communion with the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Orthodox Church, and living in obedience to Her, is what is salvific.

Christ is the only one Who 'trampled down death by death', not any of us, and it is only by becoming one with Him in His Holy Body, the Church, that we can likewise overcome sin and death...

geo

byzinroswell,

Basically what George just said is the answer.

The Latins teach that man is saved by the number and the quality of good works he shall show at the end of his life. They even declare that the good works of the saints were much more than were necessary for their own salvation and that the left-over �merits� could be disposed to the sinners if the latter could pay the appropriate price.

Rejecting this, the Protestants teach that good works have no merit, that �man is not justified by works of the Law�, and that faith alone saves man.

The debate has continued for centuries now with an uninterrupted exchange of an increasing number of arguments which convince no one, but turn around in the vicious circle of anthropocentric concepts which are so characteristic of rationalism.

What is the position of the �Orthodox� when they are confronted by this debate of the West? A feeling of inferiority and disorientation grips our theologians who stand ecstatic with admiration before the complexity of their Western colleagues� arguments. They do not know what to say. Inwardly they reproach Orthodoxy, which did not take a clear position in this problem. Some ally themselves with the Catholics with a few reservations; others try to reconcile the two views. The Apostles and Fathers do not help them at all; they seem to contradict each other and even themselves.

What darkness, truly, into which rationalism leads man! How can the rationalists understand the Apostles and Fathers, since the Apostles and Fathers, who were not rationalists, speak a language unknown to all rationalists?

For the rationalists, Holy Scripture, the simplest book in the world, is full of contradictions. For them every word and every expression has only one pre-defined meaning. Either the Apostle Paul is correct who teaches that justification is by faith or the Apostle James, who writes: �What is the profit, brethren, if a man say he hath faith, but has not works? Can faith save him?... Even the demons believe and tremble�. That is why many Protestant theologians have characterized the Epistle of James as �chaff� and unworthy of being numbered among the books of the New Testament. But even the Apostle Paul seems to contradict himself in speaking one time about justification by faith and another about recompense �to each according to his works�. That is why some Protestants have begun speaking of �two justifications�.

The thought of the Apostles and Fathers is so clear, so simple, yet in the hands of rationalist theologians it has been filled with mist and darkness. They want Christianity to be a system. A system does not admit of antitheses. Everything must be in its place, properly classified. In their restricted thought, every antithesis is a contradiction. But reality is full of antitheses. Only when man accepts the antitheses as they are without trying to smooth them out does he approach the truth.

The Orthodox should glorify God because such a problem as this never arose in the Orthodox Church. The debate over justification which has continued for so many centuries in the West is void of any content. Salvation is not given as a reward for something good which man has accomplished, either faith or works. Salvation is not a reward, nor damnation a punishment. Such a concept, like all rationalistic concepts, is anthropocentric. It is a projection into the spiritual world of what happens in the daily life of men in society, where a good word or work is rewarded and a bad word or a bad work is punished by the laws which men have decreed.

Like the ancient Greeks, the West likewise made God according to the likeness of men. They see Him as a judge who judges and punishes on the basis of the existing laws. But the justice of God does not have a vindictive or legalistic significance. God does not punish to satisfy His own justice. Such a concept is out-and-out un-Christian. God never punishes anyone; He only chastises as a father chastises his son in order to raise him. Even Gehenna is not a place of torment but of self-exile, far from the presence of God. It is a condition of willful blindness, a place which never receives the rays of the sun. God is just, that is, good: for this reason He has no place or communion with the unjust, that is, the wicked. And this is not because God does not want to come near to the sinners, but because evil men turn away from the righteousness of God and do not want to have any communion with Him. �It is not He Who is hostile, but we; God is never hostile� (St. John Chrysostom, Homily XI on II Cor. 3).

Salvation, like knowledge, is a matter of communion with God. Works and faith, virtues and efforts are those things which open the door of our heart to the Lord. But that which gives salvation is not works, nor faith, nor virtues, nor efforts, nor all these together. A man might have all these and not enjoy the betrothal of the Spirit, not become an abode of the Holy Trinity. Salvation, like knowledge, is the vivifying of man by the grace of God and the vision of God, of which pure hearts are deemed worthy in this life according to the measure of their purity. It is not a reward forced from God by toils and labors, which might not have purified the heart at all, neither is it a reward for an intellectual faith, which might not have changed man�s life at all.

The above was from an Orthodox book.

[ 08-19-2002: Message edited by: OrthodoxyOrDeath ]

Dear George,
are you saying one must be a member of the Orthodox Church to go to heaven (salvation)?
If yes, where does everyone else go? Where are our beloved Western saints..... St Francis of
Assissi? St John of the Cross?..... etc.?

Dear Ortho-man,
In "the Soul after Death", by Fr Rose, the angels
(the good spirits) take the soul higher only if they can show the evil spirits that the person's heart was purified of passions. I suppose we could look at it as the grace of God assisted the person in being freed of passions during their life on earth, if they of their free-will they choose to turn away from their passions.

One's head spins round if we think about faith vs good works too much. Your article is correct.... scripture seems to contradict itself, at least to us in the third mellenium. St Paul often seems to contradict what Jesus said. The Fundamentalists love to quote St Paul regarding 'faith alone', yet in Matthew 25, Jesus says 'feed me, cloth me, shelter me...".

My favorite chapter of any spiritual book is
Chapter 16 from St Theophan's (the Recluse) "the
Spiritual Life and how to be attuned to it". He
writes to a young lady that all she need do is
apply the Commandments to whatever circumstances come her way each day. Forgive, ask forgiveness, pray, help others, don't be angry, etc. Very simple and un-intellectual.

****
Do the Orthodox believe only the Orthodox receive salvation (heaven)?
denise

I would like to add that sometimes I can just glimpse what the Orthodox are saying, but then too many years of hearing works vs faith covers over the bright message of purity of heart that your article explains (last paragraph).
We, in the West, unfortunately, have been subjected to Scholasticism so much we find it hard to hear or believe otherwise. And the
Puritan work-ethic of always being busy, being constructive, keeps us from being still to hear God.
denise

denise,

Your last post is very true, and there are many Orthodox, more than we like to admit including myself, that are infected with rationalism and scholasticism.

To answer your question, the uncontested answer is that yes, the Orthodox believe they are the only ones with the Mysteries and therefore salvation.

We do not believe however that the heterodox are simply condemned, perhaps they are placed in a place of light, but in no way can they recieve the full glory of God.

Orthodoxy or Death,


WHOA! You be very careful there! Saying that the Orthodox Church is the only salvation! You may very well be wrong!

Besides that, thank God that most Orthodox churches do not hold that strong of a view as you do. They realize that only God is the judge of who is saved and who is not.

Faith WITH works is necessary! Jesus Christ Himself said that...(not in these exact words...but He was clear):

It goes something like this:

"If you feed the hungry...then you fed Me,

If you give drink to the thirsty, then you gave me a drink,

If you clothe the naked, then you gave me clothes to wear,

etc...."

Then He said something like this:

"If you did not feed the hungry, give drink to thirsty, clothe the naked, etc.... then I DO NOT KNOW YOU!!!!!"

WOW! What a powerful statement! When He said, "I DO NOT KNOW YOU!!!" That means this person is not going to heaven for not doing these kind of things.

So...therefore...faith WITH works is necessary for salvation.


You have a good day "Mr. Orthodoxy or Death."

Hi,

I just quickly scanned the posts. But my 2cents worth is what we sing in one of the troparions....
"It pleased Him to be elevated upon the Holy Cross."

Fron George Maloney's book "That Your Joy Might be Complete" page 35:

"The Spirit in Jesus allowed him to grow "in wisdom and age and favor before God and man" (Lk 2:52). All anxiety was removed from his openness to meet his loving Father in each fresh moment. The situation was not objectivized as either holy or profane for Jesus. But from the inner presence of the Spirit he moved freely and joyfully through life's event and circumstances to respond fully according to the Father's will. His life, made up of each moment and his free choices within that moment, brought him into a growing experience that in all things he was the enternal child, only begotten, of the heavenly Father. Free from sin and self-seeking, Jesus was free to be loved infinately by his Father and to strive to respond joyfully in a return of that love.

Jesus found joy in becoming more fully human in all moments of his earthly life, even in suffering and death, as he surrendered to his Father's working in his life."

Dear Friends,

The fact is that when the Church was still undivided, there existed more than one understanding on Christ's Death on the Cross.

The Roman Church, still one with the Eastern Orthodox, understood Christ's atoning death more in terms of making amends to the Father for the offense of the Sin of Adam and those of humanity.

Christ's atoning sacrifice to the Father could only be "achieved" if the humanity of Christ was One with His Divinity, since the Father Himself is Divine and the "satisfaction" made to a Divine Person had to be made by One Who is also Divine.

In fact, when a lot of the Eastern Church was under the spell of Arius who denied Christ's Divinity, Rome was prominent in defending it, along with Athanasius of Alexandria, precisely because Arius' view directly challenged the Soteriology of the West. The same was true of the error of Eutychianism. This is discussed at length by Meyendorff, in case anyone doesn't believe me.

The later Protestant view of the "substitutionary" Death of Christ is extreme Augustinianism at worst.

Both the Eastern Orthodox and the Roman theologies of the Death of Christ on the Cross and the Salvation wrought by it are perfectly legitimate, even though they are different in approach. Both existed side by side in the undivided Church, and they could again in a future undivided Church.

Indeed, Rome's Soteriology has more than once come to the aid of a Church beseiged by heresy, especially in the East.

Alex

To byzinroswell:

To address the faith vs works issue, one must look at Paul and James' writings with consideration given to what the problems and circumstances were that needed addressing.

Paul wrote we are justified by faith to a group of professing believers who were "bragging" of their own merits and/or works. Paul wanted their attention, praise, and thanks to be focused on the Lord, NOT THEM.

James was addressing a group of professing believers who showed no change of lifestyle(s). They were continuing in their old behaviors; and when confronted, they responded they were justified by their faith. So James proceeds to teach them that faith unaccompanied by good works, a changed lifestyle, etc., is a dead faith. Good works give evidence to a sincere faith.

Let me see if I can sum the 2 of them up without error:

We are justified before God by our faith in Jesus Christ, and our works give evidence to the sincerity of that faith.

How's that?

Peace,
Walt M