THE PROBLEM OF THE ATONEMENT

MARTIN LUTHER

The legalistic theology misinterprets the righteousness of God as justice, that is, as that principle of God's being that requires and demands the reward of good works (comformity to the Law) because of their intrinsic merit (remunerative justice) and the punishment of every transgression of the law with a proportionate punishment because of its own intrinsic demerit (retributive justice). According to this view, for God to do otherwise He would be unrighteous and unjust. Absolute justice, which according to this legalistic point of view is the eternal being of God, is said to require and demand, of necessity, the reward of meritorious good works and the punishment of sin.

It was this legalistic misinterpretation of the righteousness of God as justice that gave Martin Luther so much trouble. The Protestant Reformation actually began, not when Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses upon the door of the Wittenburg church on 31st of October, 1517, but when Martin Luther rediscovered the meaning of the righteousness of God in Paul's letter to the Romans. This discovery was made at the end of a long and troubled search which began when at the age of 21, on July 17, 1505, Luther applied for admission to the monastery at Erfurt of the Augustinian Friars known as the Black Cloister because of their black habit. They were also known as the Augustinian Hermits. Having recently been made a Master of Arts at the University of Erfurt, Martin had gone home to Mansfeld on a vacation during the month of June, 1505. On July 2, when returning to Erfurt from Mansfeld, at a distance of about five miles from his university, close to the village of Stotternheim, he was overtaken by a thunderstorm. When one of the lightning bolts nearly struck him, he cried out in terror, "Help, St. Anne, and I'll become a monk." Later, in his DeVotis Monasticis ("Concerning Monastic Vows," 1521) Luther explains his state of mind at that time.

"I was called to this vocation by the terrors of heaven,
for neither willingly nor by my own desire did I become a monk;
but, surrounded by the terror and agony of a sudden death,
I vowed a forced and unvoidable vow." [1]
Accordingly, he sold his books, bade farewell to his friends, and entered the monastery.

Luther observed the canonical regulations as prescribed in the constitution of the Observatine section of the Augustinian Order of Mendicant Monks. He says:

"I was an earnest monk, lived strictly and chastely,
would not have taken a penny without the knowledge of the prior,
prayed diligently day and night." [2]

"I kept vigil night by night, fasted, prayed,
chastised and mortified my body,
was obedient, and lived chastely." [3]

The purpose of it all was justification, being righteous with God.
"When I was a monk, I exhausted myself by fasting,
watching, praying, and other fatiguing labors.
I seriously believed that I could secure justification through my works..." [4]

"It is true that I have been a pious monk,
and followed my rules so strictly that I may say,
if ever a monk could have gained heaven through monkery,
I should certainly have got there.
This all my fellow-monks who have known me will attest." [5]

But all these observances did not bring peace to his troubled conscience. He says:
"I was often frightened by the name of Jesus,
and when I looked at him hanging on the cross,
I fancied that he seemed to me like lightning.
When I heard his name mentioned,
I would rather have heard the name of the devil,
for I thought that I had to perform good works
until at last through them Jesus would become merciful to me.
In the monastery I did not think about money,
worldly possessions, nor women, but my heart shuddered
when I wondered when God should become merciful to me." [6]
Later in 1545 in the famous autobiographical fragment with which he prefaced the Latin edition of his complete works, Luther thus described his feelings:
"For however irreproachably I lived as a monk,
I felt myself in the presence of God to be a sinner
with a most unquiet conscience, nor could I believe
that I pleased him with my satisfactions.
I did not love, indeed I hated this just God,
if not with open blasphemy, at least with huge murmurings,
for I was indignant against him, saying,
'as if it were really not enough for God
that miserable sinners should be eternally lost through original sin,
and oppressed with all kind of calamities
through the law of the ten commandments,
but God must add sorrow on sorrow,
and even by the gospel bring his wrath to bear.'
Thus I raged with a fierce and most agitated conscience..." [7]

These inward, spiritual difficulties were intensified by a theological problem. This was the concept of the "righteousness of God" (justitia Dei). His religious background made him intensely aware of the justice of God, and he had learned the Greek concept of justice as found in book 5 of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Thus encouraged by the use of justitia in Gabriel Biel and other nominalists, he thought of God's justice as being primarily the active, punishing severity of God against sinners as he explains in his exposition of Psalm 51:14 in 1532:

"This term 'righteousness' really caused me much trouble.
They generally explained that righteousness is the truth
by which God deservedly condemns or judges those who have merited evil.
In opposition to righteousness they set mercy,
by which believers are saved.
This explanation is most dangerous, besides being vain,
because it arouses a secret hate against God and His righteousness.
Who can love Him if He wants to deal with sinners
according to righteousness?" [8]
This conception blocked his understanding of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans.
"All the while I was aglow with the desire
to understand Paul in his letter to the Romans.
But... the one expression in chapter one (v.17)
concerning the 'righteousness of God' blocked the way for me.
For I hated the expression 'righteousness of God'
since I had been instructed by the usage custom of all teachers
to understand it according to scholastic philosophy
as the 'formal or active righteousness'
in which God proves Himself righteous
by punishing sinners and the unjust..." [9]
But God used this passage to change his understanding of the righteousness of God and to solve his inward, spiritual difficulties.
"Finally, after days and nights of wrestling with the difficulty,
God had mercy on me, and then I was able to note the connection
of the words 'righteousness of God is revealed in the Gospel'
and 'just shall live by faith.'
Then I began to understand the 'righteousness of God' is that
through which the righteous lives by the gift (dono) of God,
that is, through faith, and that the meaning is this:
The Gospel reveals the righteousness of God in a passive sense,
that righteousness through which 'the just shall live by faith.'
Then I felt as if I had been completely reborn
and had entered Paradise through widely opened doors.
Instantly all Scripture looked different to me.
I passed through the Holy Scriptures,
so far as I was able to recall them from memory,
and gathered a similar sense from other expressions.
Thus the 'work of God' is that which God works in us;
the 'strength of God' is that through which He makes us strong;
the 'wisdom of God' is that through which He makes us wise;
and the 'power of God,' and 'blessing of God," and 'honor of God,'
are expressions used in the same way."

"As intensely as I had formerly hated the expression 'righteousness of God'
I now loved and praised it as the sweetest of concepts;
and so this passage of Paul was actually the portal of Paradise to me." [10]

This discovery not only brought peace to Luther's troubled conscience but it was the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Luther's protest against the errors of the Roman church stems from this discovery. But his discovery was lost by those who came after him, the Protestant scholastics. Luther's use of the scholastic distinction of active and passive righteousness tended to obscure the Biblical concept of the righteousness of God. Luther obviously rejected the active sense; but the later Lutheran protestant scholastics interpreted Luther as accepting both senses. Because their explanation of the death of Christ was still grounded in the legalistic concept of justice, that is, that Christ died to pay the penalty for man's sin which the justice of God requires to be paid before God can save man, they had to retain the active sense also. Thus Luther's discovery of the Biblical understanding of the righteousness of God was obscured and eventually lost.

THE RIGHTEOUSNESS FROM GOD

By identifying the righteousness of God with the passive sense, Luther also gave the impression that the righteousness of God is the righteousness from God, that is, the righteousness that man receives from God through faith. But the righteousness from God is not the righteousness of God. These are different though related ideas and must be carefully distinguished. Paul writes in his letter to the Philippians,

"3:8b For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things,
in order that I may gain Christ
3:9and be found in him,
not having a righteousness of my own, based on law,
but that which is through faith,
the righteousness from [ek] God that depends upon [epi] faith,..."
(Phil. 3:8b-9).
Thus the righteousness from God is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) which is that right personal relationship to God that results from faith in the true God (Rom. 4:3). Paul writes in his letter to the Romans,
"4:3 For what does the scripture say?
'Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.'
4:4Now to one who works,
his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due.
4:5And to the one who does not work
but trusts him who justifies the ungodly,
his faith is reckoned as righteousness....
4:13The promise to Abraham and his descendants,
that they should inherit the world,
did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith."
(Rom. 4:3-5, 13)
Faith in God is reckoned as righteousness (Rom. 4:5). That is, to trust in God is to be righteous. This is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) and is the righteousness from God (Phil. 3:9). The righteousness of God, on the other hand, is God acting to set man right with God Himself and, as we shall see below, it is synonymous with salvation.

THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD

The Biblical concept of the righteousness of God is the act or activity of God whereby God puts or sets right that which is wrong. [11] The righteousness of God is not the justice of God, but it is God acting to set man right with God Himself and is synonymous with salvation. In the Old Testament Scriptures, the righteousness of God is not an attribute of God whereby He must render to each what he has merited nor is it a quantity of merit which God gives, but it is the act or activity of God whereby He puts or sets right that which is wrong.

Very often in the Old Testament the righteousness of God is the action of God for the vindication and deliverance of His people; it is the activity in which God saves His people by rescuing them from their oppressors.

"In thee, O Lord, do I seek refuge;
let me never be put to shame;
in thy righteousness deliver me!" (Psa. 31:1)

"In thy righteousness deliver me and rescue me;
incline thy ear to me, and save me!" (Psa. 71:2)

"143:11 For thy name's sake, O Lord, preserve my life!
In thy righteousness bring me out of trouble!
143:12 And in thy steadfast love cut off my enemies.
and destroy all my adversaries,
for I am thy servant." (Psa. 143:11-12)

Thus the righteousness of God is often a synonym for the salvation or the deliverance of God. In the Old Testament, this is clearly shown by the literary device of parallelism which is a characteristic of Hebrew poetry. [12]. Parallelism is that Hebrew literary device in which the thought and idea in one clause is repeated and amplified in a second and following clause. This parallelism of Hebrew poetry clearly shows that Hebrew poets and prophets made the righteousness of God synonymous with divine salvation:
"The Lord hath made known His salvation:
His righteousness hath he openly showed
in the sight of the heathen." (Psa. 98:2 KJV)

"I bring near my righteousness, it shall not be far off,
and my salvation shall not tarry;
and I will place salvation in Zion
for Israel my glory." (Isa. 46:13 KJV)

"My righteousness is near,
my salvation is gone forth,
and mine arms shall judge the people;
the isles shall wait upon me,
and on mine arm shall they trust." (Isa. 51:5 KJV)

"Thus saith the Lord,
keep ye judgment and do justice [righteousness]:
for my salvation is near to come,
and my righteousness to be revealed." (Isa. 56:1 KJV;
See also Psa. 71:1-2, 15; 119:123; Isa. 45:8; 61:10; 62:1)

From these verses, it is clear that righteousness of God is a synonym for the salvation or deliverance of God.

Very often in the Old Testament the Hebrew nouns, tsedeq and tsedaqah, translated "righteousness," is derived from the Hebrew verb, tsadaq. [13] Although the Hebrew verb is usually translated "to be righteous" or "to be justified," the verb has the primary meaning "to be in the right" rather than "to be righteous." (Gen. 38:26; Job 11:2; 34:5) [14] The causative form of the verb hitsdiq generally translated "to justify" means not "to make righteous" nor "to declare righteous" but is rather "to put in the right" or "to set right." (Ezekiel 16:51-55). Thus it very often has the meaning "to vindicate" or "to give redress to" a person who has suffered wrong. Thus the Hebrew noun tsedeq usually translated "righteousness" means an act of vindication or of giving redress. When applied to God, the righteousness of God is God acting to put right the wrong, hence to vindicate and deliver the oppressed. Thus the Biblical concept of the righteousness of God is the act or activity of God whereby He puts or sets right that which is wrong.

The righteous acts of the Lord, or more literally, the righteousnesses of the Lord, referred to in Judges 5:11; I Sam. 12:7-11; Micah 6:3-5; Psa. 103:6-8; Dan. 9:15-16, means the acts of vindication or deliverance which the Lord has done for His people, giving them victory over their enemies. It is in this sense that God is called "a righteous God and a Savior" (Isa. 45:21 RSV, NAS, NIV) and "the Lord our righteousness" (Jer. 23:5-6; 33:15-16).

There is a difference between the righteousness of God in the Old Testament and that in the New Testament. In the Old Testament the righteousness of God is the vindication of the righteous who are suffering wrong (Ex. 23:7). God vindicates the righteous who are wrongfully oppressed. In the Old Testament, the righteousness of God requires a real righteousness of the people on whose part it is done. In Isa. 51:7 the promise of deliverance is addressed to those "who know righteousness, the people in whose hearts is my law." Similarly, in order to share in the promised vindication, the wicked must forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and return unto the Lord (Isa. 55:7). In the New Testament, the righteousness of God is not only a vindication of a righteous people who are being wrongfully oppressed (this view is in Jesus' teaching in Matt. 5:6; 6:33; Luke 18:7), but is also a deliverance of the people from their own sins; it is also the salvation of the ungodly who are delivered from their ungodliness (trust in a false god) and unrighteousness. The righteousness of God saves the unrighteous by setting them right with God Himself through faith ( Rom. 1:17a).

The righteousness of God is not opposed to the love of God nor does it condition it. On the contrary, it is a part of and the proper expression of God's love. It is the activity of God's love to set right the wrong. In the Old Testament, this is shown by the parallelism between love and righteousness.

"But the steadfast love of the Lord is
from everlasting to everlasting upon those who fear him,
and His righteousness to children's children." (Psa. 103:17).
(See also Psa. 33:5; 36:5-6; 40:10; 89:14.)
God expresses His love as righteousness in the activity by which He saves His people from their sins. In His wrath, God opposes the sin that would destroy man whom He loves. In His grace, God removes the sin.
What is the grace of God?
The grace of God is God's love in action.
God's grace is more than His favor;
it is His love acting to do something good for us.
And because He loves us, God has acted to save us.
The grace of God is the love of God in action to bring salvation.
"2:4 But God who is rich in mercy,
out of the great love with which he loved us,
2:5 even when we were dead in our failures,
made us alive together with Christ
(by grace you have been saved)" (Eph. 2:4-5 ERS).

"2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith;
and that [salvation] is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God,
2:9 not as a result of works, that no one should boast."
(Eph. 2:8-9 ERS; see also Titus 2:11)

Thus the grace of God may properly be called the righteousness of God. For in His righteousness, God acts to deliver His people from their sins, setting them right with Himself. And since the grace of God is God's love in action, then the righteousness of God is God acting in love for the salvation or deliverance of man. This righteousness of God has been manifested, that is, publicly displayed, in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
"3:21 But now apart from the Law
the righteousness of God has been manifested,
being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets;
3:22 even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ
for all those who believe; for there is no distinction;"
(Rom. 3:21-22 NAS).
The righteousness of God, as we have just seen, is God acting in love to set man right with God Himself and is synonymous with salvation (Ps. 98:2; 71:1-2, 15; 119:123; Isa. 45:8; 46:13; 51:5; 56:1; 61:10; 62:1). Now this righteousness of God has been manifested (phaneroo), that is, publicly displayed, in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. God was active in Jesus Christ, particularly in His death and resurrection, for our salvation (Acts 4:12; I Thess. 5:9; I Tim. 2:10; 3:15; Heb. 5:9). And because He is this act of God for our salvation, Jesus Christ is the righteousness of God (I Cor. 1:30). Now the gospel tells us about God's act of salvation in the person and work of Jesus Christ; the gospel is the gospel of our salvation (Eph. 1:13). And since the gospel or good news is about Jesus Christ, who He is and what He did (Rom. 1:3-4; I Cor. 15:3-4), the gospel is about this manifestation of the righteousness of God.

But the gospel is not only about the righteousness of God manifested in the past on our behalf, but in the preaching of the gospel the righteousness of God is being continually revealed (apokalupto) in the present.

"For in it [the gospel] the righteousness of God
is being revealed from faith unto faith" (Rom. 1:17a ERS).
The revelation that is spoken of in this verse is not just a disclosure of truth to be understood by the mind, but it is a working that makes effective and actual that which is revealed. Hence, the revelation of the righteousness of God is that working of God that makes effective and actual that which is revealed, that is, the righteousness of God. [15] In other words, the revelation of the righteousness of God is the actualization of God's salvation. And the righteousness of God is revealed when the salvation of God is made actual and real, that is, when salvation or deliverance takes place. Thus in the preaching of the gospel there is taking place continually an actualization of the righteousness of God. In other words, salvation or deliverance is taking place as the gospel is preached. This is the reason that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation
"1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel,
for it is the power of God unto salvation
to everyone who believes,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek."
"1:17 For in it [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed
from faith unto faith; as it is written,
'Now the righteous from faith shall live.'"
(Rom. 1:16-17 ERS)
(Compare Rom. 1:16-17 with Isa. 56:1 which is, no doubt,
the source of Paul's concepts and words in these verses.)

The gospel not only tells us about this manifestation of the righteousness of God, but also in the gospel the righteousness of God is being continually revealed or made effective and actual ( Rom. 1:17a). When the gospel is preached, God is acting to set man right with Himself. The result of God's activity of righteousness is the righteousness of faith, the righteousness from God, since it has been received from God by faith. God in His righteousness sets man right with Himself and through faith man is set right with God; faith rightly relates man to God. The righteousness of God is what God does and the righteousness of faith is what man does in response to God's activity. The righteousness of faith is the righteousness from God because faith, which is man's response to the word of God, comes from God (Rom. 10:6-8, 17); that is, in a sense, faith is "caused" by the word of God, even though it is man who does the believing and trusting.

SALVATION THROUGH FAITH

Faith is the actualization of the righteousness of God or the salvation of God. This is expressed by Paul in Romans 1:17a in a twofold way: "from faith unto faith". These prepositional phrases modify the verb "being revealed", not the words "the righteousness of God." The revelation is "from faith unto faith."

  1. Faith is the source of the revelation of the righteousness of God: "from faith". The revelation of the righteousness of God arises out of or comes out of faith. That is, the actualization of the deliverance of God is the faith which the righteousness of God produces. The righteousness of God is revealed only when the one to whom the revelation comes has faith. Without faith there is no revelation, and only when there is faith is there a revelation, an actualization, of the righteousness of God. In this sense, faith is the source of the revelation of the righteousness of God.
  2. Faith is goal of the revelation of the righteousness of God: "unto faith". The revelation of the righteousness of God moves toward and is accomplished in faith. When a man has faith, the deliverance of God has reached its goal. Faith then is the goal of the revelation of the righteousness of God.

Faith is not the means nor the condition of salvation but faith is the actualization of salvation. Salvation is not a thing which is received by faith but is God's activity of deliverance which produces faith and is accomplished in that faith. In salvation, God does not give us something but gives us Himself, and faith is not receiving of something but is the receiving of Him. In salvation, God does not just reveal something about Himself but reveals Himself. Apart from this personal revelation, faith in God is impossible, but when this revelation take place, faith is possible. Since "faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of Christ" (Rom. 10:17), faith is the product of God's activity of the revelation of Himself. And this revelation takes place in the preaching of the gospel.

THE MISUNDERSTANDING OF THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD

The Biblical concept of the righteousness of God must be carefully distinguished from the Greek-Roman concept of justice. The righteousness of God in the Scriptures is not an attribute of God whereby God must render to each what he has merited nor is it a quantity of merit which God gives, but it is God acting to set right man with God Himself. Luther's apparent identification of the righteousness of God with the righteousness from God lead eventually to the equating of the righteousness from God with Christ's righteousness, that is, the merits of Christ, which Christ earned by His active obedience before He died on the cross and is imputed to the believer's account when he believes. Scripture is often misinterpreted in terms of this identification. For example, Paul's statement that
"in him we might become the righteousness of God" ( II Cor. 5:21b)
is interpreted to mean that the righteousness of God is the righteousness from God. Therefore, the believer is righteous by the "righteousness of God in Christ" which is interpreted as the merits of Christ that was earned by Christ's active obedience before He died on the cross. Thus righteousness is misunderstood as merits and the righteousness of God as the justice of God. But the righteousness from God is not the righteousness of God. These are different though related ideas and must be carefully distinguished. Paul writes in his letter to the Philippians,

"3:8b For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things,
in order that I may gain Christ
3:9and be found in him,
not having a righteousness of my own, based on law,
but that which is through faith,
the righteousness from [ek] God that depends upon [epi] faith,..."
(Phil. 3:8b-9).
Thus the righteousness from God is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) which is that right personal relationship to God that results from faith in the true God (Rom. 4:3). According to Rom. 4:5, faith in God is reckoned as righteousness. That is, to trust in God is to be righteous. This is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) and is the righteousness from God (Phil. 3:9). The righteousness of God, on the other hand, is God acting to set man right with God Himself and, as we have seen above, it is synonymous with salvation.

THE MISUNDERSTANDING OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

Legalism understands righteousness to be a keeping of the rules, a conformity to the law in thought, word and deed, a living up to the divine standard; righteousness is moral perfection. Since man is created, according to legalism, under the law and for the law, man's highest good and final goal is this moral perfection, this legal righteousness. To stand spotless and without blame before the law is thought to be man's ultimate hope. This righteousness is often conceived in terms of merit; each good deed has a certain quantity of righteousness or merit associated with it. During the course of his life, a man acquires merit by his good works or demerit by his sins, transgressions of the law. At the final judgment, these will be weighed in the double-pan balance of justice (dike). And justice will render to each impartially that which is due to him (he has earned it). If the merits outweigh the demerits, the man is legally declared righteous and legally entitled (he has earned it) to eternal life and blessedness. On the other hand, if the demerits predominate, he justly deserves and receives eternal death, punishment, pain and suffering.

As we saw above, this legalistic concept of righteousness is a misunderstanding of the Biblical concept of righteousness. The Biblical concept of righteousness is revealed in the story of Abraham. After God revealed His promises to Abraham, the Scripture says, "then he believed in the Lord; and He reckoned it [his faith] to him as righteousness" (Gen. 15:6; see also Rom. 4:3; Gal. 3:6). Abraham believed the promises of God and his faith was reckoned to him as righteousness (Rom. 4:5, 9). And Abraham's faith was reckoned to him as righteousness because faith in God is righteousness, the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:16-22). Righteousness is not a quality that we possess, neither is it merit that we have earned or have imputed to our account, but a right relationship to God. Faith in God relates us rightly to God. A man is righteous when he is in right relationship to God. And faith in God, believing the promises of God, trusting in God is being in right relationship to God. The righteousness of faith is the opposite of sin; sin is trusting in a false god and righteousness is trusting in the true God. Just as man's basic sin is idolatry, so man's basic righteousness is allegiance to and worship of the true God from the heart. It has nothing to do with merit just as sin has nothing to do with demerit.

JUSTIFICATION THROUGH FAITH

The Gospel tells us about this manifestation of the righteousness of God. But also in the preaching of the Gospel the righteousness of God is being continually revealed or made effective and actual.

"For in it [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed
from faith unto faith; as it is written,
'Now the righteous from faith shall live.'"
(Rom. 1:17 ERS)
This revelation of the righteousness of God in the preaching of the Gospel is justification. That is, the revelation of the righteousness of God (Rom. 1:17) is justification (Rom. 3:24). As we have seen, the righteousness of God is the act or activity of God whereby God sets man right with God Himself. Hence, the revelation of the righteousness of God is this act of setting right, and this act of setting right is called justification. Justification is not just a pronouncement about something but is an act that brings about something; it is not just a declaration that a man is righteous before God but it is a setting of a man right with God: a bringing him into a right personal relationship with God. Justification is then essentially salvation: to justify is to save (Isa. 45:25; 53:11; see Rom. 6:7 where dikaioo is translated "freed" in RSV). This close relationship between these two concepts is more obvious in the Greek because the words translated "justification" and "righteousness" have the same roots, not two different roots as do the two English words.

In the English language, the use of "justify" to translate the Greek verb dikaioo and the use of "justification" to translate the Greek verbal noun dikaiosis seems to imply that the righteousness of God is the Greek-Roman concept of justice. The English language has no verbal noun or verb of the same root as the English word "righteousness" to translate the Greek verbal noun or verb. This deficiency of the English language does not mean that the righteousness of God is the Greek-Roman concept of justice.

The Greek noun dikaiosis, translated "justification" occurs in the New Testament twice only at Romans 4:25 and 5:19. The majority of occurences of the Greek verb dikaioun usually translated "justify" is in Paul's letters to the Romans (fifteen times) and Galations (eight times). Outside the Pauline letters, the Greek verb is found in the New Testament eleven times in all, and most of these occurences are not relevant to the theological issue. James is the only New Testament writer besides Paul who explicitly discusses justification, and he clearly does not mean what Paul meant by it. Thus, the doctrine of justification is peculiar to Paul, although the basic idea which Paul expounded by means of it is fundamental to the whole New Testament and was taught by Jesus Himself. Instead of a doctrine of salvation by one's own merits and works, Jesus Himself taught a doctrine of justification of sinners by the righteousness of God. It is the theme of such parables as the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32;
note that the Pharisaic doctrine of merit upheld by the elder son, vv. 25-39),
the Pharisee and the Publican (Luke 18:9-14;
note the Greek verb dedikaomenos in verse 14),
the Laborers in the Vineyard (Mat. 20:1-16), and the Great Supper (Luke 14:16-24).
Paul alone of the New Testament writers picked up and developed the Isaianic concept of divine righteousness (Isa. 53:11), which works salvation. Paul conceived of the righteousness of God, after the manner of Isaiah, as an energizing power of God ( Rom. 1:16-17) that sets a man right with God, saving him by faith.

What is justification?
Justification is that act of God whereby He sets or puts man right with God Himself. It is not just a legal pronouncement declaring that man righteous before God but justification is the action of God setting or putting man right with God: a bringing him into right personal relationship with God. Thus justification is essentially salvation; to justify is to save. Hence Paul can say that God is He "who justifies the ungodly" (Rom. 4:5), that is, who saves the ungodly.

"But to him who works not,
but trusts him who justifies the ungodly,
his faith is reckoned as righteousness."
(Rom. 4:5 ERS)
God justifies the ungodly by bringing them into the righteousness of faith which relates man rightly to God; to have faith in God is to be right with God. Thus justification is by or through faith (Rom. 3:22, 28) and out of or from faith (Rom. 3:26, 30). Justification by faith takes place when the Gospel is preached. God acts to set man right with Himself as the Gospel is preached by bringing man to faith in God Himself.
"So faith comes from what is heard,
and what is heard comes by preaching of Christ."
(Rom. 10:17 RSV)

There are three aspects of justification:

  1. Justification by faith is salvation from sin to righteousness.
    "For the one who died has been justified from sin." (ERS)
    [ho yar apothanon dedikaiotai apo hamartias] (Rom. 6:7).
    Justification as God's act of setting man right with Himself brings man into faith, which is to be set right with God. Thus justification is through faith (dia pisteos, Rom. 3:30; Gal. 2:16) and out of or from faith (ek pisteos, Rom. 3:26, 30; Gal. 2:16; 3:8, 24). Thus justification is salvation from sin to righteousness.

  2. Justification by faith is salvation from wrath to peace with God.
    "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God
    through our Lord Jesus Christ." (Rom. 5:1 KJV)

    "Since, therefore, we are now justified by his blood,
    much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God." (Rom. 5:9)

    But justification as salvation is not only the deliverance from sin to righteousness but also the deliverance from wrath to peace and from death to life. Justification as deliverance from wrath to peace is set forth by the Apostle Paul in Romans 3:24-25:
    "3:24Being justified by His grace as a gift,
    through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus,
    3:25whom God set forth to be a propitiation,
    through faith in His blood."
    (Rom. 3:24-25 ERS; see also Isa. 32:17)
    Here in these verses, Paul connects justification with redemption, the liberation aspect of salvation, and with propitiation, the sacrifical aspect of salvation. Redemption is the deliverance from sin by the payment of a price called a ransom which is the death of Jesus Christ. And propitiation is the deliverance from the wrath by the sacrifical death of Jesus ("His blood") which turns away or averts the wrath of God through faith in that sacrifice ("through faith in His blood"). Christ's death as a propitiation turns away God's wrath from the one who has faith in that sacrifice. The wrath is turned away because the sin has been taken away by the death of Christ as a ransom, by which a man is redeemed or set free, delivered from sin. When sin has been removed there is no cause for God's wrath. No sin, no wrath. Man is saved from wrath because he is saved from sin.

  3. Justification by faith is salvation from death to life.
    "4:24It [righteousness] will be reckoned to us
    who believe in Him that raised from the dead Jesus our Lord,
    4:25who was put to death for our offenses
    and raised for our justification." (Rom. 4:24-25).

    "So therefore as through the offense of one
    to all men unto condemnation,
    so also through the righteous act of one
    to all men unto justification of life." (Rom. 5:18).

    Justification is also deliverance from death to life. Man is delivered from sin to the righteousness of faith because he is delivered from death to life. As sinners, we were enemies of God, but through the death of God's Son we have been reconciled to God and are now no longer enemies. To be reconciled to God means we have passed from death to life and we are saved in His resurrected life ("having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Rom. 5:10; see also II Cor. 5:17-21). We are delivered from death by being "made alive together with Him" in His resurrection.
    "2:4But God, being rich in mercy,
    because of His great love with which He loved us,
    2:5even when we were dead in our trespasses,
    made us alive together with Christ
    (by grace are you saved)." (Eph. 2:4-5 NAS)
    He was "raised for our justification" (Rom. 4:25). Thus justification is "justification of life" (Rom. 5:18). To be set right with God is to enter into fellowship with God. And this right relationship to God is life. Justification puts us into right relationship to God and hence is a justification of life. Fellowship with God is established when God reveals Himself to man and man responds to that revelation in faith. Life is a personal relationship between God and man that results from this revelation and the faith-response to it. Apart from this revelation the response of faith is not possible, and this revelation is the offer of life and the possibility of faith. But life is not actual unless man responds in faith to the revelation of God Himself. Life is received in the act of faith. Since God's act of revelation is first, and man's response in faith is second and depends upon God's revelation, life results in the righteousness of faith and man becomes righteous because of life. Justification as the revelation of the righteousness of God brings about life and thus the righteousness of faith.

Justification is the free act of God's grace.

"3:24 Being justified freely by his grace
through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
3:25 whom God set forth as a propitiation
through faith in his blood...." (Rom. 3:24-25; ERS).

"3:4But when the kindness of God our Savior
and His love for man appeared,
3:5He saved us, not on the basis of works
which we have done in righteousness,
but according to His mercy,
by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit,
3:6whom He poured out upon us through Jesus Christ our Savior,
3:7that being justified by His grace
we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life."
(Titus 3:4-7 ERS).

The source of justification is the love of God. And the love of God in action to bring man salvation is the grace of God.
"2:4But God, being rich in mercy,
because of His great love with which He loved us,
2:5even when we were dead in our trespasses,
made us alive together with Christ
(by grace are you saved)." (Eph. 2:4-5 NAS)
Hence, justification is the true expression of the grace of God, the act of the love of God. Because justification is a gift ( Rom. 3:24; 5:15-17), justification is free and is not something that can be earned.
"4:4 Now to the one who works his wages is not reckoned according to grace [as a gift]
but according to debt [something owed since it was earned]
4:5 But to the one who does not work,
but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly,
his faith is reckoned for righteousness." (Rom. 4:4-5 ERS).
Being a free act of God's grace, justification has nothing to do with the works of the law (Rom. 3:20, 28; 4:6; Gal. 2:16; 3:11; see also the following verses.
"2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith;
and that [salvation] is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;
2:9 not as the result of works, that no one should boast."
(Eph. 2:8-9 ERS)

"But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works;
otherwise grace would no longer be grace." (Rom. 11:6)

"3:8b For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things,
in order that I may gain Christ
3:9and be found in him,
not having a righteousness of my own, based on law,
but that which is through faith,
the righteousness from [ek] God that depends upon [epi] faith,..."
(Phil. 3:8b-9);

Titus 3:5).

SUMMARY

The penal satisfaction theory is clearly legalistic. It assumes that the order of law and justice is absolute; free forgiveness would be a violation of this absolute order; God's love must be carefully limited lest it infringe on the demands of justice. Sin is a crime against God and the penalty must be paid before forgiveness can become available. According to this view, God's love is conditioned and limited by his justice; that is, God cannot exercise His love to save man until His righteousness (justice) is satisfied. Since God's justice requires that sin be punished, God's love cannot save man until the penalty of sin has been paid, satisfying His justice. God's love is set in opposition to His righteousness, creating a tension and problem in God. How can God in His love save man from sin when His righteousness demands the punishment of sin? This is the problem that the death of Christ is supposed to solve. And according to this legalistic theology, this is why Christ needed to die; he died to pay the penalty of man's sin and to satisfy the justice of God. Accordingly, the necessity of the atonement is the necessity of satisfying the justice of God; this necessity is in God rather than in man. And since this necessity is in God, it is an absolute necessity. If God is to save man, God must satisfy His justice before He can in love save man.

It is not surprising that in the popular mind this abstract problem of the seeming contradiction between love and justice in God is reduced to a concrete opposition between God the Father who wants to punish sin and God the Son who wants to forgive sin. That this is not true is clear from Scripture: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son" (John 3:16). But this is the way the popular mind has seen this abstract problem in God of His love and justice.

This Biblical concept of the righteousness of God must be carefully distinguished from the Greek-Roman concept of justice. The righteousness of God in the Scriptures is not an attribute of God whereby He must render to each what he has merited nor a quantity of merit which God gives, but God acting to set right man with God Himself. Righteousness is misunderstood as merits and the righteousness of God as the justice of God. The idea that the righteousness of God is the justice of God, that is, that attribute of God which requires that God punish all sin and reward all meritorious works, is a legalistic misunderstanding of the Biblical concept of the righteousness of God. This legalistic misunderstanding reduces and equates the righteousness of God to justice, that is, the giving to each that which is his due to them with a strict and impartial regard to merit (as in Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics). It is this concept of righteousness that gave Luther so much trouble.

Luther's apparent identification of the righteousness of God with the righteousness from God lead eventually to the equating of the righteousness from God with Christ's righteousness, that is, the merits of Christ, which Christ earned by His active obedience before He died on the cross and is imputed to the believer's account when he believes. Scripture is often misinterpreted in terms of this identification. For example, Paul's statement that
"in him we might become the righteousness of God" ( II Cor. 5:21b)
is interpreted to mean that the righteousness of God is the righteousness from God. Thus the believer is righteous by the "righteousness of God in Christ" which is interpreted as the merits of Christ that was earned by Christ's active obedience before He died on the cross. Thus righteousness is misunderstood as merits and the righteousness of God as the justice of God.

But the righteousness from God is not the righteousness of God. These are different though related ideas and must be carefully distinguished. Now since the righteousness of God, as we saw above, is God setting right the wrong, then the righteousness of God here is the deliverance or saving of us from our sins in Him, in Christ's death and resurrection. But the righteousness from God is the righteousness of faith. Paul writes in his letter to the Philippians,

"3:8b For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things,
in order that I may gain Christ
3:9and be found in him,
not having a righteousness of my own, based on law,
but that which is through faith,
the righteousness from [ek] God that depends upon [epi] faith,..."
(Phil. 3:8b-9).
Thus the righteousness from God is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) which is that right personal relationship to God that results from faith in the true God (Rom. 4:3). Paul writes in his letter to the Romans:
"4:3 For what does the scripture say?
'Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.'
4:4Now to one who works,
his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due.
4:5And to the one who does not work
but trusts him who justifies the ungodly,
his faith is reckoned as righteousness....
4:13The promise to Abraham and his descendants,
that they should inherit the world,
did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith."
(Rom. 4:3-5, 13)
Faith in God is reckoned as righteousness (Rom. 4:5). That is, to trust in God is to be righteous. This is the righteousness of faith (Rom. 4:13) and the righteousness from God (Phil. 3:9). That is, the righteousness of faith is not merit placed to the account of the believer, but it is the right relationship of the believer to God by faith. The righteousness of faith is the act or choice of a man to trust God and the righteousness of God is the act or activity of God to set a man right with God Himself by faith. The righteousness of God is what God does and the righteousness of faith is what man does in response to God's activity. Thus the righteousness of faith is not the righteousness of God.
Now the righteousness of faith is the righteousness from God. Since this act of faith by a man is possible only when God acts to set a man right with God Himself by the righteousness of God, then the righteousness of faith is the righteousness from God.
But as we just saw, this righteousness of faith is not the righteousness of God. Thus the righteousness from God is not the righteousness of God. Luther's apparent identification of the righteousness from God with the righteousness of God was wrong and unscriptural.

Many modified Calvinist saw that the penal satisfaction theory of atonement is Biblically inadequate because it does not include the Biblical doctrine of the believer as being in Christ. They saw that the Apostle Paul, after setting forth the truth of justification through faith in Christ's death for us in chapters 3 through 5 of Romans, went on to set forth in chapter 6 of Romans the believer's identification with Christ's death. In chapters 3 to 5, they believed that Paul presented Christ's death as for us; but in chapter 6 they believe that Paul presented our death with Christ. According to their interpretation, in chapter 6 of Romans our justification is no mere formal or legal transaction (although it is essentially a legal matter), but that it is an union with Christ. In justification, God declares the ungodly just (righteous) by the imputation of the righteousness earned by Christ's active obedience during His life before the cross where in His passive obedience Christ paid the penalty of our sins. This legal declaration and imputation is made apart from a real and deep life-union of the believer with Christ. In chapter 6 of Romans, Paul sets forth our identification and our union with Christ in His death which our baptism pictures as the likeness of Christ's death and burial. Since we have been united to Christ crucified, our position must be one of death "in Him". The death of Christ for all involves the death of all. We therefore died in Christ to sin. Paul asks, in Rom. 6:1:
"Shall we therefore continue in sin?" Perish the thought.
"In Christ" and "in sin"? What an ethical contradiction!
Christ dying for my sin involves inevitably my death with Christ to sin. Christ in His incarnation being identified with us as a man, having taken upon Himself the penalty of our sin, He also took us unto Himself, making us one with Himself. Thus we believers are legally and ethically involved in Christ. We have been sentenced to death in Christ for our sins, and at the same time we have automatically died to sin with Christ. As an old theologian put it, I am "born crucificed" (that is, when I was born again) [16].

As we shall see below, this view of the atonement is a legalistic misinterpretation of Christ's death. The penal substitutionary theory is a legalistic misunderstanding of the sacrifical aspect of the death of Christ. This view of Romans attempts to combine the Biblical doctrine of our death and resurrection with and in Christ with the legalistic penal substitutionary theory. But it leaves the believer under law and it is unable to deliever the believer from the slavery of sin.

"For sin shall not have dominion over you:
for you are not under the law, but under grace."
(Rom. 6:14).
And this legalistic interpretation of Christ's death is based on a misinterpretation of Paul's letter to the Romans.

Thus, according to this interpretation of Romans, there are two aspects of salvation that are presented in first eight chapters of Romans. First, the forgiveness of our sins, and second, our deliverance from sin. In the first part of Roman, chapters 1 to 5, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for salvation (Rom. 3:26); in the second part, chapters 6 to the end of chapter 8, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that we have been "crucified" with Christ. Thus an aspect of Christ's representative work involves our union with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. In the first part of Romans, the Blood deals with what has been done for us, and in the second part the Cross deals with what we are [17].

But according to the correct intrepretation of Romans, in the first part of Romans, from chapters 1:18 to 3:31, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for our salvation from God's wrath (Rom. 3:25 "propitiation by his blood");
in the second part of Romans, from chapter 4:1 to 5:11, we are presented with our salvation as from sin to righteousness (Rom. 4:5 "faith is reckoned as righteousness");
and in the third part of Romans, from chapters 5:12 to end of chapter 8, we are presented with our salvation as from death to life in Christ's death and resurrection. In this third section, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that our old man have been "crucified" with Christ and in 6:11 we are to consider ourselves "dead to sin and alive to God in Christ" risen from the dead.

Because God loves us, He has acted in the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ for the salvation of man from death, sin and wrath. Since wrath is caused by sin (Rom. 1:18) and sin by death (Rom. 5:12d ERS), salvation is basically from death to life and then from sin to righteousness and then from wrath to peace with God. Thus there are three aspects of salvation.
(1) propitiation is salvation from wrath to peace;
(2) redemption, is salvation from sin to righteousness; and
(3) Reconciliation is salvation from death to life.
These three aspects of salvation are accomplished in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Christ's death is a propitiation because it is a redemption; and it is a propitiation and a redemption because it is a reconciliation to God. 


                 THREE ASPECTS OF SALVATION
In Adam                                            In Christ

From--------------------SALVATION--------------------->To

WRATH------------------PROPITIATION-----------------> PEACE
                                                       
because of                                          because of
                                                       
SIN---------------------REDEMPTION---------------> RIGHTEOUSNESS
                                                       
because of                                          because of
                                                       
DEATH-----------------RECONCILIATION-----------------> LIFE

These three aspects of salvation were accomplished in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Propitiation is the sacrificial aspect of His work,
redemption is the liberation aspect of His work, and
reconciliation is the representative aspect of His work of salvation.
The Gospel tells us about this act of God for our salvation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (I Cor. 15:3-4). And in the preaching of the Gospel, God exerts His power for the salvation of men by bringing them to faith in Jesus Christ ( Rom. 1:16).

To continue, click here

END NOTES

[1] Quoted in Albert Hyma, New Light on Martin Luther
(Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1958), p. 16.

[2] Luther, Commentary on the Gospel of John
Weimer ed., XXXIII, 561. Dated 21, 1531, quoted in Hyma, p. 28.

[3] Luther, op. cit., dated October 28, 1531, p. 574,
quoted in Hyma, p. 28.

[4] Luther, Exposition on Psa. XLV, p. 29.

[5] Luther, Answer to Duke George's Latest Book
quoted in Hyma, pp. 28-29.

[6] Luther, Sermon on Matthew XVIII-XXIV, pp. 29-30.

[7] Library of Christian Classics, Vol. XV,
Luther: Lectures on Romans
(Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1961), pp. xxxvi-xxxvii.

[8] What Luther Says, Vol. III,
Complied by Ewald M. Plass
(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1959), p. 1225.

[9] What Luther Says, Vol. III, p. 1225-1225.

[10] Ibid., p. 1226.

[11] Alan Richardson,
An Introduction to the Theology of the New Testament,
(New York: Harper & Brothers, 1958), pp. 79-83, 232-233.

[12] Edward J. Young, An Introduction to the Old Testament
(Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1950), pp. 281-282.
See also Gleason L. Archer, Jr.,
A Survey of Old Testament Introduction,
(Chicago: Moody Press, 1964), pp. 418-420.

[13] C. H. Dodd, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans
(London and Glasgow: Fontana Books, 1959), p. 38.

[14] C. H. Dodd, The Bible and the Greeks
(London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1964), p. 46.

[15] Burton on Galations in the ICC in contrasting phaneroo and apokalupto points out that
"for some reason apokalupto has evidently come to be used especially of a subjective revelation, which either takes place wholly within the mind of the individual receiving it, or is subjective in the sense that it is accompanied by actual perception and results in knowledge on his part:
Rom. 8:18; I Cor. 2:10; 14:30; Eph. 3:5."
Ernest deWitt Burton,
A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Galations, in
The International Critical Commentary
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1896), p. 433.
He goes on to say that
"phaneroo throws emphasis on the fact that that
which is manifested is objectively clear, open to perception.
It is thus suitably used of an open and public announcement, disclosure or exhibition:
I Cor. 4:5; II Cor. 2:14; 4:10-11; Eph. 5:13." Ibid.
The use of the word apokalupto (translated "revelation") by Paul in Rom. 1:17 thus seems to place an emphasis on something happening to the individual receiving the revelation. The word "subjective" is probably not the right word to use to describe this event because it suggests that the source of revelation is from within the individual, the subject. Clearly the revelation that Paul is speaking of is from without the individual, and from God. But it does make a difference, a change; a response does take place in the person receiving the revelation. It does bring about that which is revealed, salvation.

[16] L. E. Maxwell, Born Crucified
(Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1945), pp. 16-17.

[17] Watchman Nee, The Normal Christian Life
(Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1957, 1979), pp. 14-15.