Okay, Jason. But why confuse people by using the word “propitiate” as a translation rather than the expression “be merciful”? When the average person encounters “propitiate”, he does not think “be merciful”, and to the best of my knowledge, no dictionary so renders the word either. For example, in the oxford dictionary, oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/propitiate
the definition of "propitiate is :
And the following sample sentences are given:
The pagans thought it was important to propitiate the gods with sacrifices.
The Samhitas are hymns addressed to gods representing the forces of nature, followed by rites and sacrifices to propitiate those gods.
The death of Christ propitiates God, and the word ‘propitiation’ contains the thought of averting the wrath of God.
Plotinus and Porphyry felt reserve towards participation in sacrifices to propitiate the spirits.
So the usual understanding of “propitiate” is indeed “appease”.
Mainly because I like to watch people’s minds go boom when I use the term they’re familiar with in the actual direction of the Greek grammar.
Everyone already knows pretty well that God is merciful to us.
The idea that God “propitiates” us or our sins on the other hand is super-unexpected. So putting it that way lets me directly challenge the common notion that the Son propitiates (MAKES PEACE WITH?!? HAS MERCY ON?!?) the Father, or the Father’s wrath, or whatever.
It’s one of those things that most people think they already know and can confidently deploy whenever they want, when actually it’s false both to the grammar and to the theology: they aren’t getting it ‘from the Bible’, much less from a coherent theology, but they think they are. So I think it’s important to call attention sharply to it, when given an opportunity.
In other words: most people are already confused about the proper usage of the term in Christian theology, but don’t realize they’ve got it completely backward. (Same confusion with atoning or reconciling.) Psychologically they don’t feel confused, of course, partly by habitual usage and partly because the natural religious expectation is that the deity has to be convinced to lean toward or to smile upon the creature (or to make peace with or to have mercy on, etc.)
Calvinists, in their disputes with Arminians, really should have been the ones to dig out this point and promote the correction: it fits well with the emphases they specially protect.
Does anyone have any particular passages in mind that we could start another thread on in regards to this subject? I’ve got a few in mind that I think would be really cool if we discussed.
That would be a good one to do. I’m also interested in discussing some other things that PSA believers use to support their theory, like the idea of passover - many of them would use that to say that Jesus is our passover lamb so that we ourselves are saved from the God’s wrath and destruction
When Jesus was in anguish in the garden He pleaded with God:
This cup of suffering that Jesus would drink from was the wine of God’s wrath. Anytime in the Bible it speaks of a cup of suffering it’s ALWAYS referring to God’s wrath.
The cup of suffering and punishment always refers to the cup of wine of God’s wrath. Show me in the Bible where it doesn’t.
So if we believe this literally—that Jesus became sin (or “a sin sacrifice” as Steve7150 believes), then do we also believe that in Christ we literally become the righteousness of God?
So in other words, “Our sins didn’t really become Christ’s; they are only imputed (counted) as His, and so He got punished for them . Likewise we don’t actually become righteous like God. It’s only that His righteousness is imputed to us (counted) as if it were ours, while we continue in sin.” — all a kind of pretending game.
No they really do become Christ’s just not intrinsically. It’s like how we are valuable creatures because we have been created in God’s image. This value isn’t intrinsic though - It’s extrinsic.
Oh, so you mean that our sins become Christ’s but they did not originate with Him. In that case, how about our “becoming the righteousness of God”?
Is this not a real righteousness which is actually intrinsic to ourselves? Not that we are the source of that righteousness through self-effort, but that the enabling grace of God, made available by Christ’s sacrifice, makes it possible for us to possess a real righteousness in ourselves.
Imputation just makes no sense to me at all. I keep hearing this from Christians “when God looks at you, He doesn’t see the terrible rotten and evil person you are, but he sees His son Jesus instead” I know that is supposed to make me feel better, but that actually makes me feel far worse. Like God had to come up with some plan because he cannot stand the thought of me, yet at the same time loves me? Err, what? That makes no sense. Imputation makes no sense. What makes even less sense about imputed righteousness is that it leaves the individual unchanged… He is still rotten to the core and always will be without that ‘covering’… Furthermore, if God is willing to both hate and love humanity at the same time, then he might as well just not limit his ‘imputation’, he might as well impute everyone, since we are all terrible rotten people. What difference does it make if one has a intellectual belief that Jesus died for his sins? Seems like a really petty and minor thing to rest someone’s eternal salvation on.
The more I reflect on it, the more I realize that this version the atonement (PS) seems to go hand in hand with eternal hell. It seems they are married… For example, it allows one to base someone’s final destiny on what they ‘profess’, whereas, if true salvation manifests itself not in our words, but in our conduct, then it becomes a bit more difficult to ‘control’ the masses, so to speak. It is easy to group people into a category of ‘saved’ or ‘not saved’ by asking a simple question “Do you believe Jesus died in place of you for your sins?” but without that rigid guidelines, you cannot be so quick to judge someone, you must judge them based on their conduct, probably something not a lot of immoral leaders would support, since the people who see how corrupt they were…
The righteousness is a foreign righteousness as the Bible says. It is ours even though it is extrinsic. The change begins in our hearts at initial salvation - is carried through by sanctification - and complete in glorification. At every stage of our salvation we wear the robes of righteousness.
Thanks Gabe. I see it much the same way. I don’t think God is interested in counting particular people righteous when they are not, and condemning all the others who have not “accepted that Christ has died in their place” (which is the vast majority of the human population).
Rather God is interested in REAL righteousness and avoidance of wrongdoing—those actions which harm others as well as oneself. For God knows that people can have rich and fulfilling lives if everyone treats everyone else with love and respect, and is ready to help them in a time of need.
Indeed, this is the very reason for Christ’s death—to deliver us from sin—indeed to do away with it altogether!
I Peter 2:24 He himself endured our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.
II Corinthians 5:15 And he died for all, that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.
Romans 14:9 For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.
Titus 2:14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity and to purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds .
Heb 9:26 …he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.
Here’s the Jonathan Mitchel translation, which I find interesting:
The first thing I see here is the “He constructed a sin”. Does this imply that the whole thing is a “construct,” or a manner of thinking, for our benefit? The Jews used to place their hands on the head of the scapegoat and “impute” the sins of the nation onto the goat’s head, then drive it out of the camp. Does anyone here think that sins literally went into the goat, or that the goat turned into sin somehow? WE needed the same thing needed by the ancient Hebrew people – to feel that our sins had been taken away somehow – maybe because we couldn’t conceive of God as simply forgiving them – because WE would never do such a thing for a person who had so grievously betrayed US. We humans needed to see that God “properly” disposed of the sin by punishing SOMEONE at least. How could He possibly just let it go? Especially in the society of Moses’ time? Such things definitely weren’t DONE, and weren’t even seen as a good way to do things. THAT was weakness and simpering fear – NOT the sort of stuff a primitive tribal people in constant danger from enemies all 'round wants their god to be made of.
Of course God turned the tables on that one by HIMSELF becoming the scapegoat. What shame for us that our God should carry in His own body on the cross, OUR sins, and by His death on our behalf, put to death the body of this flesh (our own bodies) so that we can follow Him into resurrection and live by the life of God.
So no, I do not believe that this verse means to tell us that Jesus Christ literally BECAME sin. I also don’t believe in transubstantiation – but I don’t see that it usually does a lot of harm for a person to believe in transubstantiation. I’m kind of ambiguous about penal substitution (which kind of depends on Jesus becoming sin (or at least on Him literally becoming guilty of sin). On the one hand, it makes no sense, even for ECT believers – except as a legal fiction – and I don’t believe that our God would stoop to that sort of silliness. He’s all about what’s real, not about constructing loopholes to let us off becoming righteous. On the other hand, PS seems to work for at least some universalists, and I really don’t care what sort of constructs they use, so long as it doesn’t interfere with their relationships with God and with themselves and in showing love to others. For me though, it stopped making sense, so I dumped it. Scripture doesn’t really support it – not when taken as a whole – so why would I feel the need to hang on to what is essentially nothing more than a tradition of the church? I’m interested in truth.
Jesus tells us the true story though, when he spins the parable of the Prodigal Son (or perhaps more aptly, of the Good Father). The father in the story receives back his son who HAS sinned against heaven and against him, and doesn’t even give Him the chance to blurt out his planned confession and self-debasement. God, our heavenly Father, wants us back. If we need a scapegoat, He offers Himself in the form of His begotten Son who always goes forth from the Father. He “says,” in effect, “Okay, so you need to blame someone? Someone to take your rap? I’ll do it then.” But in the process of appeasing (propitiating) US, He also does the needful thing. He saves us from our sins. He is interested in REAL righteousness and NOT in a make-believe legal fiction kind of “righteousness” that doesn’t translate into a change in behavior (including our thought lives). He wants us set FREE from sin.
Just a little aside. It seems so common these days for people to define sin as “missing the mark”, which indeed was the original meaning of “αμαρτια” (hamartia). However, the word came to be ANY wrongdoing, not merely getting just a little bit off the mark of what ought to be. This seems to be a trivialization of sin.
Therefore do not let hamartia reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its desires (Rom 6:12)
Surely “hamartia” in contexts such as the above, means a lot more than a slight error in judgment, a “missing of the mark.”
And Cindy, I truly appeciated your comments. Here are some with which I could closely identify:
on the other hand is super-unexpected. So putting it that way lets me directly challenge the common notion that the Son propitiates (MAKES PEACE WITH?!? HAS MERCY ON?!?) the Father, or the Father’s wrath, or whatever.