THE CLASSIC TYPE OF THE ATONEMENT

Author: Ray Shelton

Date: 10 September 1982

Revised: 11 January 2009

The Swedish theologian, Gustaf Aulen, in his book Christus Victor attempts to delineate the type of the idea of the atonement of Christ that was dominant throughout the early church period until the Latin or objective type and its rival, the subjective type, replaced it. This type Aulen calls the classic Christian idea of the Atonement [1] because, he maintains, it was the dominant idea of the atonement in the New Testament and during the first thousand years of Christian history. [2] During the Middle Ages it was gradually replaced in the theological teaching of the church by the Latin type. In the eleventh century, Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) gave full and clear expression to the Latin type in his famous work Cur Deus Homo? [Why did God become man?]. But no sooner had Anselm completed the theological formulation of the Latin theory of the atonement than it was criticized by his younger contemporary, Peter Abelard (1079-1142). Abelard, in formulating the subjective or moral influence theory of the atonement in criticism of the objective or satisfaction theory of Anselm, began a controversy which has continued ever since. Except for Martin Luther and the devotional language and art of the church, the classic type has been completely ousted from the theological teaching of the church by the Latin type or its rival the subjective type.

Aulen attempts to make clear the nature of these three types of the idea of the atonement as they have appeared in history. In particlar, he tries to fix the actual character of the type which he calls the classical type.
Aulen points out four characteristics of the classic type:
dramatic, dualistic, cosmic, and double-sided.

1. The classic type is dramatic because "its central theme is the idea of the Atonement as a Divine conflict and victory," [3] a drama.

   "Christ - Christus Victor - fights against
   and triumphs over the evil powers of the world,
   the 'tyrants' under which mankind is in bondage and suffering,
   and in Him God reconciles the world to Himself." [4]

2. The classic type is dualistic because "God is pictured as in Christ carrying through a victorious conflict against powers of evil which are hostile to His will." [5] Aulen carefully points out that this dualism is neither metaphysical or absolute. He says,

   "It will be well to explain at this point, once and
   for all, the sense in which the word Dualism is
   used in the book. It is not used in the sense of
   a metaphysical Dualism between the Infinite and
   the finite, or between spirit and matter; nor,
   again, in the sense of the absolute Dualism
   between Good and Evil typical of the Zoroastrian
   and Manichean teaching, in which Evil is treated
   as an eternal principle opposed to Good. It is
   used in the sense in which the idea constantly
   occurs in Scripture, of the opposition between God
   and that which in His own created world resists
   His will; between the Divine Love and the
   rebellion of created wills against Him.
   This Dualism is an altogether radical opposition,
   but it is not an absolute Dualism;
   for in the scriptural view evil has not an eternal existence." [6]

3. Thirdly, the classic type is also cosmic because it involves a reconciliation between God and the world. This characteristic plays a minor role in Aulen's presentation of the classic view.
4. Lastly, the classic type is double-sided.
   By this Aulen means that the work of God in Christ not only reconciles the world to Himself but He is at the same time reconciled. God "is reconciled by the very act in which He reconciles the world to Himself." [7] Thus "the double-sidedness of the classic idea of the Atonement means that God is not only the Reconciler but also the Reconciled." [8]

In order to show that the classic type is a special type, sharply distinct from both of the other types, Aulen points out several marked differences between the classic type and the Latin type, on the one hand, and the subjective type, on the other. According to Aulen, the classic type differs from the Latin type in two ways.
(1) The most marked of these two differences is that

"the classic type shows a continuity of Divine operation,
and a discontinuity in the order of merit and of justice,
while the Latin type is opposite in both respects." [9]

"The classic type is characterised [sic]
by a whole series of contrasts of opposites,
which defy rational systematisation [sic]..." [10]
For example,
"Its essential double-sidedness, according to which
God is at once the Reconciler and the Reconciled,
constitutes an antinomy which cannot be resolved by a rational statement." [11]

The classic type also differs from the subjective type. According to the subjective type, the change that salvation brings about is in man and not in God. Aulen says concerning the classic type in comparison with the subjective type:

"It [the classic type] does not set forth only or
chiefly a change taking place in men;
it describes a complete change in the situation,
a change in the relation between God and the world,
and a change also in God's own attitude." [13]

"Its [the classic's] objectivity is further
emphasised [sic] by the fact that the Atonement
is not regarded as affecting men primarily as individuals,
but is set forth as a drama of a world's salvation." [14]

Although Aulen has performed an important task in calling our attention to this long neglected and often misinterpreted classic type of the idea of the atonement, there are certain aspects of his discussion that raise the question whether Aulen has clearly and correctly delineated it.
For example, does not that which Aulen calls the double-sidedness of the classic type arise from a failure to clearly distinguish the classic type from the Latin?
Does it not rather involve a concession to the Latin type?
In denying the contrast between the classic and the Latin type which describes the former as a doctrine of salvation and the latter as a doctrine of atonement, Aulen says:

"Certainly it [the classic type] describes a work of salvation,
a drama of salvation; but this salvation is at the same time
an atonement in the full sense of the word, for it is a work
wherein God reconciles the world to Himself and is at the
same time reconciled." [15]

"regards the sacrifice of Christ both as God's own act of sacrifice
and as a sacrifice offered to God.
This doulble-sidedness is always alien to the Latin type,
which develops the latter aspect, and eliminates the former." [16]

"the classic idea of the atonement defies rational systematisation [sic];
its essential double-sidedness,
according to which God is at once the Reconciler and the Reconciled,
constitutes an antimony which cannot be resolved by a rational statement." [17]

THE THEOLOGY OF ATHANASIUS

A brief examination of the doctrine of salvation of one the greatest theologians of the early church, Athanasius (296?-373 A.D.), will show that Aulen has rejected the main difference between the classic type, on the one hand, and the objective and subjective types, on the other, and this rejection is the cause of his failure to clearly and correctly delineate the classic type.

Athanasius' earliest work (316-318 A.D.), On the Incarnation of the Word, [18] contains his teaching on the doctrine of salvation. Although he does not deal directly with the question, "From what does man need to be saved?", Athanasius' answer to this question can be seen from his discussion of the reason for the incarnation. [19]

In order to determine the reason for the incarnation, Athanasius first discusses briefly the origin of man, that is, the creation and the fall of man. [20]

"For in speaking of the appearance of the Saviour amongst us,
we must needs speak also of the origin of men, that you may know
that the reason of his coming down was because of us..." [21]

"so that, if they kept the grace and remained good,
they might still keep the life in paradise without
sorrow or pain or care, besides having the promise
of incorruption in heaven; but that if they
transgressed and turned back, and became evil,
they might know that they were incurring that
corruption in death which was theirs by nature,
no longer to live in paradise, but cast out of it
from that time forth to die and to abide in death
and in corruption." [24]
"...but men, having despised and rejected the
contemplation of God, and devised and contrived
evil for themselves..., received the condemnation
of death with which they had been threatened; and
from thenceforth no longer remained as they were
made, but were being corrupted according to their
devices; and death had mastery over them as king." [25]

Athanasius apparently makes no distinction between Adam and his descendants. Because of his Platonic background, he considers all men as transgressing God's commandment in Adam. [26] Thus Athanasius speaks only of man or men.

But Athanasius does seem to make a distinction between physical and spiritual death. Physical death he calls corruption. Corruption was the natural state of man since he was created out of nothing. The

"transgression of the commandment was turning them
back to their natural state, so that just as they
have had their being out of nothing, so also,
as might be expected, they might look for corruption
into nothing in the course of time.... For man is by
nature mortal, inasmuch as he is made out of what
is not; but by reason of his likeness to Him that
is (and if he still preserved this likeness by
keeping him in his knowledge) he would stay his
natural corruption and remain incorrupt...." [27]

"Nay, why did God make them at all, as he did not
wish to be known by them? Whence, lest this
should be so, being good, he gives them a share in
his own image, our Lord Jesus Christ, and makes
them after his own image and after his own likeness:
so that by such a grace perceiving the image,
that is, the Word of the Father,
they may able through him to get an idea of the Father,
and, knowing their maker, live the happy and truly
blessed life." [28]

"For God has not only made us out of nothing;
but he gave us freely, by the grace of the Word,
a life in correspondence with God. But men,
having rejected things eternal, and, by counsel
of the devil, turned to the things of corruption,
became the cause of their own corruption in death,
being, as I said before, by nature corruptible,
but destined, by the grace following from partaking
of the Word, to have escaped their natural state,
had they remained good." [30]

Having discussed the origin of man, Athanasius proceeds to discuss the reason for the incarnation. The reason for the incarnation arises out of man's (Adam's) transgression of the commandment of God given to him. As a consequence of that act, death had gained control of the race in such a way that it could not be evaded. But for death to have control of the race was both monstrous and unseemly.

"For it were monstrous, firstly, that God, having
spoken, should prove false - that, when once he had
ordained that man, if he transgressed the
commandment, should die the death, after the
transgression man should not die, but God's word
should be broken. For God would not be true if,
when he had said we should die, man died not.
Again, it were unseemly that creatures once made
rational, and having partaken of the Word, should
go to ruin, and turn again toward nonexistence by
the way of corruption. For it were not worthy of
God's goodness that the things he had made should
waste away, because of the deceit practiced on men
by the devil." [31]

"And thus taking from our bodies one of like nature,
because all were under penalty of the corruption of death
he gave it over to death in the stead of all,
and offered it to the Father - doing this, moreover,
of his loving-kindness, to the end that, firstly,
all being held to have died in him, the law involving
the ruin of men might be undone (inasmuch as its
power was fully spent in the Lord's body, and had
no longer holding ground against men, his peers),
and that, secondly, whereas men had turned toward
corruption, he might turn them again toward
incorruption, and quicken them from death by the
appropriation of his body and by the grace of the
resurrection, banishing death from them like straw
from the fire." [35]

It would appear from Athanasius' discussion of the reason for the incarnation that the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ saves man primarily from death and corruption and gives them life and immortality.

"For by the sacrifice of his own body, he both put
an end to the law [of death] which was against us,
and made a new beginning of life for us,
by the hope of resurrection which he has given us.
For since from man it was that death prevailed over men,
for this cause conversely, by the Word of God
being made man has come about the destruction of
death and the resurrection of life...." [36]

"Whence the Word of God came in his own person,
that as he was the image of the Father, he might
be able to create afresh the man after the image.
But, again, it could not else have taken place had
not death and corruption been done away. Whence
he took, in natural fitness, a mortal body, that
while death might in it be once for all done away,
men made after his image might once more be
renewed. None other, then, was sufficient for
this need, save the image of the Father." [37]

"But since it was necessary also that the debt
owing from all should be paid again, for, as I
have already said, it was owing that all should
die - for which especial cause, indeed, he came
among us - to this intent, after the proofs of his
Godhead from his works, he next offered up his
sacrifice also on the behalf of all, yielding his
temple to death in the stead of all, in order
firstly to make men quit and free of their old
trespass, and further to show himself more powerful
even than death, displaying his own body incorruptible
as first fruits of the resurrection of all." [38]

"And so it was that two marvels came to pass at once,
that the death of all was accomplished in Lord's body,
and that death and corruption were wholly done away
by reason of the Word that was united with it." [39]

CLARIFICATION OF THE CLASSIC TYPE

And in many other places [40] Athanasius indicates that it was from death primarily that Christ came to save men. This is quite in contrast with both the objective and subjective types. They both assume that it was from sin primarily that Christ came to save us. According to the objective type, Christ's saving work is directed toward the satisfaction of God's honor (Anselm) or justice (Calvin and orthodox Protestant theologians) which has been outraged or offended by man's sin, thus making possible man's salvation. According to the subjective type, on the other hand, the saving work of Christ is directed toward influencing man to turn away from his sin by the example of God's love for sinful man in Christ. Thus both types assume that Christ came primarily to save man from sin. Man needs to be save because he is a sinner. In contrast, Athanasius and the classic type assumes that it was primarily from death (both spiritual and physical) that Christ came to save us. Salvation from sin plays a secondary role in the classic type. An examination of other theologians of the early church such as Irenaeus will show this to be the main characteristic of the classic type which distinguishes it from the other two types. One passage from Irenaeus will show that he conceived of salvation as primarily from death.

"For if man, who had been created by God that he
might live, after losing life, through being
injured by the serpent that had corrupted him,
should not any more return to life, but should be
utterly [an forever] abondoned to death, God would
[in that case] have been conquered, and the
wickedness of the serpent would have prevailed
over the will of God... and by means of the
second man did He bind the strong man, and spoiled
his goods, and abolished death, vivifying that man
who had been in a state of death." [41]

Gustaf Aulen in his book Christus Victor rejects this interpretation of the classic Christian type of the idea of the atonement. [42] In regard to Irenaeus, he says:

"We have already noted the assertion that he
[Irenaeus], in common with other Eastern
theologians, places relatively little emphasis on
sin, because he regards salvation as a bestowal of
life rather than of forgiveness, and as a victory
over mortality rather than over sin. I shall hope
to show that this assertion is quite misleading." [43]

"Athanasius does, in fact, regard sin as not merely
the cause of corruption from which men need to be
saved, but as being identical with it. That is to
say, Christ's work has a direct relation to sin;
He came in order that He might break the power of
sin over human life.... The work of Christ is the
overcoming of death and sin; strictly, it is
a victory over death because it is a victory over sin." [46]

"He came 'that He might set all free from sin and
the curse of sin, and that all might evermore live
in truth, free from death, and be clothed in
incorruption and immortality.'" [48]

"He becomes Son of Man, by taking created flesh;
that, since all were under sentence of death, He,
being other than them all, might Himself for all
offer to death His own body; and that henceforth,
as if all had died through Him, the word of that
sentence might be accomplished (for 'all died'
[II Cor. 5:14] in Christ), and all through Him
might thereupon become free from sin and the curse
which came upon it, and might truly abide forever,
risen from the dead and clothed in immortality and
incorruption." [49]

Aulen's difficulty with this interpretation of the classical type that salvation is primarily from death stems from the fact that he takes death to mean only physical death. Aulen writes:

"It may, indeed, be said that the forgiveness of
sin is not proclaimed with same power as by the
Reformers; that the Greek theologian does not
sound the depths like Luther. But this does not
justify the allegation that the idea of sin takes
only a subordinate place, and that his conception
of salvation is purely 'physical' and 'natural,'
the bestowal of immortality on human nature
through the Divine nature of Christ. If the
thought of the triumph of life and the overcoming
of mortality takes the central place it is
intimately connected with the breaking of sin's power." [50]

Athanasius does not make clear the connection between our sin and death. In regard to Adam's sin as the sin of mankind, he very clearly says it resulted in death for all mankind. [53] But because of his Platonism and the resulting failure to distinguish clearly between Adam and his descendants, Athanasius is not clear as to the connection between our sin and the death (both spiritual and physical) received from Adam. He seems to hold that all men die (spiritually and physically) not because of their own personal sin but because of Adam's transgression who acted for all. And because of this spiritual death (loss of the image or knowledge of God), all men are going into idolatry and other sins.

"But men once more in their perversity having set
at nought, in spite of all this, the grace given
them, so wholly rejected God, and so darkened
their soul, as not merely to forget their idea of
God, but also to fashion for themselves, instead
of the truth, and honor things that were not
before the living God, 'and serve the creature
rather than the Creator' [Rom. 1:25] but worst of
all, they transferred the honor of God even to
stocks and stones and to every material object and
to men.... And, in a word, everything was full of
irreligion and lawlessness, and God alone, and his
Word, was unknown...." [54]

Since reconciliation is salvation from death to life, only man or the world need to be reconciled, not God. This removes the double-sidedness and the resulting antinomy from the classic type, now it is possible to construct a rationally consisent theory of the atonement of the classic type. The classic type is not double-sided but single-sided. God is the Reconciler and not the Reconciled. Aulen not only fails to correctly characterize the classic type, but he also fails to recognize other charactertistics of the classic type that are basically non-legalistic. The classic type shows not just a discontinuity in the order of merit and justice but a complete absence of the order of merit and justice. This is why God does not need to be reconciled; God's righteousness is not justice and there is no order of justice in God that has to be satisfied by the death of Christ. Aulen retains these elements of legalism in his delineation of the classic type and creates the antinomy that prevents the construction of a rational theory of the classic type; that is, a non-legalistic theory of the atonement.

CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY OF CLASSIC TYPE

In conclusion, let us summarize the characteristics of the classic type.

1. The classic type is dynamic. The death of Christ and his resurrection is a divine conflict and victory. Christ in his death and resurrection fights against and triumphs over the evil powers of the world, primarily death, and thus reconciles the world to Himself.
2. The clssic type is dualistic. This is not a metaphysical or absolute dualism between the infinite and the finite, nor between spirit and matter, nor between the one and the many, nor between the rational and the irrational. nor "in the sense of the absolute Dualism between Good and Evil typical of the Zoroastrian and Manichean teaching, in which Evil is treated as an eternal principle opposed to Good." [6] It is a conflict between God and the powers of evil who have rebelled against His authority and who are defeated in the death and resurrection of Christ. Satan, who has the power of death (Heb. 2:14), has been defeated through Christ's death and resurrection. It is a dualism of salvation from death to life, and then from sin to righteousness and from wrath to peace with God.
3. The classic type is cosmic. The problem that was solved by the death and resurrection of Christ is in the world and in man, and not in God. The evil powers that Christ fights against and triumphs over are in the world. This world is not just the physical world, but the human world, the world of man. It is man who is dead, both spiritually and physically, and who needs to be saved from death to life.
4. The classic type is single-sided. God is the Reconciler, not the Reconciled. It is man who must be reconciled to God, saved from death to life, from sin to righteousness (redemption), and from wrath to peace with God (propitiation). God is the redeemer Who saves man from sin to righteousness through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Rom. 3:24-25), thus turning away God's wrath, Christ being a propitiation for the sins of the whole world (I John 2:2).
5. The classic type is non-legalistic. It makes no legalistic assumptions about the need for salvation or the nature of salvation. There is not only no discontinuity in the order of merit and justice, but there is a complete absence of the order of merit and justice.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Gustaf Aulen, Christus Victor
(New York: The Macmillan Company, 1951), pp. 6-7.

[2] Ibid., p. 6.

[3] Ibid., p. 4.

[4] Ibid., p. 4.

[5] Ibid., pp. 4-5.

[6] Ibid., pp. 4-5.

[7] Ibid., p. 5.

[8] Ibid., p. 59.

[9] Ibid., p. 145; see also pp. 91, 95.

[10] Ibid., p. 155.

[11] Ibid., p. 91.

[12] Ibid., p. 59.

[13] Ibid., p. 6.

[14] Ibid., p. 6.

[15] Ibid., p. 4.

[16] Ibid., p. 77.

[17] Ibid., p. 91.

[18] All quotations of Athanasius' On the Incarnation of the Word are taken from the English edition translated by Archibald Robertson appearing in
Christology of the Later Fathers, Vol. III,
The Library of Christian Classics
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1954),
edited by Edward Rochie Hardy.

[19] Ibid., Chs. 2-20, pp. 56-75.

[20] Ibid., Chs. 2-5, pp. 56-60.

[21] Ibid., Ch. 4, pp. 58-59.

[22] Ibid., Ch. 3, pp. 57-58.

[23] Ibid., Ch. 3, p. 58.

[24] Ibid., Ch. 3, p. 58.

[25] Ibid., Ch. 4, p. 59, cf. Rom. 5:14, 17.

[26] "As we might expect, the account he gives is a blend of Platonizing metaphysics and the Genesis story."
J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrine
(London: Adam & Clarles Black, 1958), p. 346.
"Athanasius' language often suggests that he conceives of the human nature, after the manner of Platonic realism, as a concrete idea or universal in which all individual men participate."
Kelly, p. 378.
"His argument presupposes the unity, or solidarity, of the race with the first man....
But Athanasius never hints that we participate in Adam's actual guilt, i.e., his moral culpability, nor does he exclude the possibility of man living entirely without sin. In one passage [footnote: C.Ar. 3, 33.], for example, he claims that Jeremiah and John the Baptist actually did so."
Kelly, pp. 347-8. Compare the development of this Platonism in the Cappadocian fathers, particularly Gregory of Nyssa.

[27] Athanasius, op. cit., Ch. 4, p. 59. See also Ch. 5, pp. 59-60.

[28] Ibid., Ch. 11, p. 65.

[29] "The restoration of the image means first of all, that men recover the true knowledge of God which is life eternal. Adam enjoyed this in Paradise, but when he lost the image through sin his descendants were reduced to ignorance and idolatry.
Secondly, they become partakers of the divine nature (cf. II Pet. 1, 4), since fellowship with Christ is fellowship with God...
Thirdly, the Word being the principle of life, the principle of death is reversed in us and the precious gift of incorruptibility (aphtharsia) lost at the Fall is restored. Hence the redemption can be described as a recreation carried out by the Word, the original author of creation." Kelly, p. 378.

[30] Athanasius, op. cit., Ch. 5, pp. 59-60. Cf. Ch. 11, p. 65.

[31] Ibid., Ch. 6, pp. 60-61.

[32] Ibid., Ch. 6, p. 61.

[33] "For he would still be none the more true, if men did not remain in the grasp of death." Athanasius, Ch. 7, p. 61.

[34] "...nor, secondly, does repentance call men back from what is their nature - it merely stays them from acts of sin." Athanasius, Ch. 7, p. 61.

[35] Ibid., Ch. 8, p. 63.

[36] Ibid., Ch.10, pp. 64-65.

[37] Ibid., Ch. 13, pp. 67-68.

[38] Ibid., Ch. 20, p. 74.

[39] Ibid., Ch. 20, p. 74.

[40] Ibid., Ch. 22, p. 76; Ch. 34, p. 88; Ch. 44, p. 99.

[41] Irenaeus, Against Heresies, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers,
edited by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson,
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1925), Vol. I, pp. 455-6.

[42] Aulen, op. cit., p. 7.

[43] Ibid., p. 22. Aulen is here referring to the interpretation of the early church fathers by the theologians of the liberal Protestant school. See further footnote 51 below.

[44] Ibid., pp. 24-25.

[45] Ibid., pp. 43-44.

[46] Ibid., p. 44.

[47] Ibid., p. 43. Aulen discusses only one such passage:
On the Incarnation of the Word, Ch. 7. Aulen says:
"From such passages it might appear that the need for Christ's coming and His redemptive work had arisen exclusively out of the consequence of sin [death] and not out of sin itself;
and so, that the work of Christ had only an indirect relation to sin. But such an interpretation would not be just either to Athanasius or to the other Greek Fathers."
Ibid., p. 43.

[48] Ibid., p. 44.

[49] Four Discourses Against the Arians, II, 69, p. 386 in
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. IV,
Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, editors
(Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1957).

[50] Aulen, op. cit., p. 44. See also p. 149.

[51] Ibid., p. 18. See Adolph Harnack, History of Dogma
(London: Williams & Norgate, 1896), pp. 274-5.

[52] For a discussion of the distinction between spiritual death and physical death and the problem connected therewith, see
Leon Morris, The Wages of Sin
(London: The Tyndale Press, 1954).
See also the section in Chapter 1 of my book,
From Death to Life, titled " Death".

[53] Athanasius, On the Incarnation of the Word, Chs. 3-4, pp. 57-9.
Athanasius is scriptural in this regard.
See Romans 5:12 and I Cor. 15:21, 22.

[54] Ibid., Ch. 11, pp. 65-6. Cf. also Ch. 5, p. 60.
As we saw in the section titled " Death and Sin" of Chapter 1 in my book From Death to Life, the last phrase of Romans 5:12, "because of which [death] all sinned," indicates that spiritual death is the cause of this personal sin of Adam's descendants. See also I Cor. 15:16; Gal. 4:8; Eph. 4:18-19.

[55] Aulen, like most theologians, does not distinguish between reconciliation and propitiation. Propitiation is not the reconcilation of God.
See the Section " Why Christ Died " later.