T.F. Torrance: The Vicarious Humanity of Jesus Christ, pt. 4

The Unity of Revelation and Reconciliation

According to Torrance (1996b:132), the incarnation shows that revelation and reconciliation are “inseparable,” for “revelation does not achieve its end in humanity apart from reconciliation.” Though Jesus Christ was obedient throughout the whole course of his life, he had to “learn” obedience. Though conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, Jesus was born in the womb of a sinner, within the compass of sinful flesh. Torrance continues:

As the Son of Adam he was born into our alienation, our God-forsakenness and darkness, and grew within our bondage and ignorance, so that he had to beat his way forward by blows, as St. Luke puts it, growing in wisdom and growing in grace, before God as well as before men. He learned obedience by the things which he suffered, for that obedience from within our alienated humanity was a struggle with our sin and temptation . . . fought out with strong crying and tears and achieved in desperate anguish and weakness under the crushing load of the world’s sin and the divine judgment. Throughout the whole course of his life he bent the will of man in perfect submission to the will of God, bowing under the divine judgment against our unrighteousness, and offered a perfect obedience to the Father, that we might be redeemed and reconciled to him.

Finally, at Calvary, Jesus “penetrated to the utmost extremity of our self-alienating flight from God where we are trapped in death, and turned everything around so that out of the fearful depths of our darkness and dereliction we may cry with him, ‘Our Father.’” In his anguished experience at Gethsemane, where he wrestled with God over the cup he had been given to drink, Jesus cried out, “Yet not my will but thine be done.” As Torrance notes, it is “your will and my will,” that is, our Adamic self-will that Jesus appropriated in the incarnation, which is “bent back in the agony of Gethsemane in total obedience to the will of the Father . . .” Thus, we must think of “the whole life and activity of Jesus from the cradle to the grave” as constituting the vicarious human response which God has graciously and unconditionally provided for us (Torrance, 1992:79, 80; cf. 1988a:167).

In the midst of our sinful humanity, the incarnate Word of God takes the way of “vicarious” suffering and judgement. The revelation he embodies is not complete apart from reconciliation, “for only through reconciliation can revelation complete its own movement within man, bringing out of our humanity the obedient reception of revelation which is an essential part of its very substance.” As he who is both God and man, Jesus Christ penetrates to the depths of our sinful existence in order to overcome our estrangement and reconcile us to the Father. He acts from the side of God in the faithful revelation of divine truth and, at the same time, acts from the side of man “in the faithfulness of a life wholly obedient to the Father” (Torrance, 1996b:132, 133).

Comment: Note here the continued “holism” of Torrance’s theology. He does not allow a dualism (separation) between revelation and reconciliation. Both revelation and reconciliation occur “simultaneously" as the eternal Son of God assumes human flesh. Jesus both reveals the Father and reconciles us to the Father in one unitary movement of revelation and reconciliation.

Representation and Substitution

Torrance (1992:80, 81; cf. 1988a:168) asserts the “radical nature of Jesus’ mediation of our human response to God” by bringing together, and “thinking into each other,” the concepts of “representation” and “substitution.” It will not do, argues Torrance, to think of what Jesus has done for us merely in terms of “representation,” for that would imply that Jesus represents our response merely as the “leader” of humanity in its response to God. On the other hand, if Jesus is merely a “substitute” in detachment from us, who simply takes our place in an external forensic way, then his act has no ontological bearing upon us, but, rather, is “an empty transaction over our heads.” As Torrance argues, a “merely representative” or “merely substitutionary” concept of vicarious mediation is “bereft of any saving significance.” He continues:

But if representation and substitution are combined and allowed to interpenetrate each other within the incarnational union of the Son of God with us in which he has actually taken our sin and guilt upon his own being, then we may have a profounder and truer grasp of the vicarious humanity in the mediatorship of Christ, as one in which he acts in our place, in our stead, on our behalf but out of the ontological depths of our actual human being.

Here Torrance plainly reveals the necessary connection between his assertion of the incarnational assumption of fallen Adamic flesh and the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ. Against “external” concepts of representation and substitution, Jesus Christ acts on our behalf, and in our place, from “within” the ontological depths of his incarnational penetration into the fallen flesh he assumed in common with sinful humanity. Because Jesus has identified himself with us in the assumption of our diseased and sinful humanity, there is an ontological connection between us and what he does as our representative and substitute; that is, Jesus acts on our behalf and in our place, throughout the whole course of his life, from within the depths of fallen Adamic flesh. As Torrance (1976a:136) notes elsewhere:

[T]he Son of God united himself with us in our actual human condition so intimately and profoundly that through his healing and sanctifying of our human nature in himself we may be made with him sons of God. As such he acts with us and for us and on our behalf towards the Father in all our distinctive human experiences as children of God, such as confession, penitence, sorrow, chastisement, submission to the divine judgement, and faith, obedience, love, prayer, praise adoration, that we may share with him what he is in his ascension and self-presentation before the Father as the beloved son in whom he is well-pleased.

The Son of God assumes sinful human flesh, then “as man,” as son of Adam and son of Israel, acts vicariously for us, as our representative and substitute, in all our human experiences as children of God, so that we may share in his intimate experience as the Father’s beloved Son. As Torrance notes elsewhere (1986b:479):

Although atonement was certainly the Act of God himself, it was the Act of God as Man, and thus act of God translated into our human existence and made to issue out of it as a fully human act in the obedient self-offering of man in holiness and filial love to God the Father and in unbroken fellowship with him.

Because it is God who acts “as man” on our behalf and in our place, “central place” must be given to the representative and substitutionary aspects of the humanity of Jesus Christ in atoning reconciliation. As Torrance (1986b:479) argues:

Now if it was as Man as well as God that Jesus Christ took our place, he must be recognised as acting in our place in all the basic acts of man’s response to God: in faith and repentance, in obedience and prayer, in receiving God’s blessing and in thanksgiving for it.

Jesus Christ acts “as man,” “in our place,” in all aspects of humankind’s response to God. In the gospel, therefore, we do not have to do simply with the Word of God and the human response to it; rather, we have to do with the “all-significant middle term,” that is, “the divinely provided response in the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ.” Because he is the one in whom we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28), the humanity of Jesus Christ occupies a “unique place in the creative ground of our humanity” (Torrance, 1971:145). Torrance continues:

[The vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ] fulfils a representative and substitutionary role in all our relations with God, including every aspect of human response to Him: such as trusting and obeying, understanding and knowing, loving and worshipping. Jesus Christ is presented to us in the Gospels as He who in and through His humanity took our place, acting in our name and on our behalf before God, freely offering in Himself what we could not offer and offering it in our stead, the perfect response of man to God in a holy life of faith and prayer and praise, the self-offering of the Beloved Son with whom the Father is well pleased.

For Torrance, Jesus is our representative and substitute in every aspect of our response to God. “[E]ven in our believing, praying, and worshipping of God . . . he has yoked himself to us in such a profound way that he stands in for us and upholds us at every point in our human relations before God (Torrance, 1994:30, 31).

In this regard, a clear description of what Torrance means by “the vicarious humanity” of Jesus Christ is found in Torrance (2008:205 n 32), edited by R.T. Walker:

“Standing in our place” (Lat, vicarius, substitute). Christ in his humanity stands in our place and represents us, and hence the term the “vicarious humanity” of Christ in which the humanity of Christ takes our place and represents us, so that what is true of him is true of us, and what he did in his (our) humanity is ours.

Hart (2008:87, 88) is particularly helpful in his articulation of the relationship between the substitutionary and representative aspects of the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ and its connection to humanity in general. As Hart asks, if the humanity of Jesus Christ is the locus of God’s regenerative and redemptive activity, then in what sense are we actually healed and reconciled in the process? Is Torrance guilty of an “ontological fiction” that leaves humanity unhealed and unchanged? The answer is, of course, “No,” because as the material quoted above illustrates, Torrance understands that all Jesus is and does, he is and does “for us.” In assuming fallen Adamic flesh, the Son of God unites humanity to himself, thereby establishing an ontological bond by virtue of which, notes Hart, “his particular humanity was rendered inclusive in its relationship to ours.” All human beings have drawn near to God in the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ and are “included” in him, prior to, and apart from, any salvific response on our part. Because we have no existence apart from the “ontological solidarity” God has established with us in the hypostatic union of God and humanity in Jesus Christ, what takes place in the incarnation and throughout the whole course of Jesus’ life of filial obedience to the Father is no ontological fiction but, rather, impacts us in the depths of our being. As Hart notes, this is no mere philosophical notion of “concrete universals” or “primitive notions of ‘corporate personality’”; rather, this is the specifically Christian claim that Jesus Christ is the Creator Logos, the one in whom we live and move and have our being and who, in taking human flesh to himself, binds us to himself by virtue of both his humanity and his deity.

Following Torrance, Hart (2008:88) goes on to state, quite correctly, that “all” humans are united to the regenerated and sanctified humanity of Jesus Christ and are, thereby, granted access to the life of “sonship.” Yet, substitution is “not the whole story,” for substitution must be complemented by, and come to fruition in, our active participation, as we are led by the Spirit to become what we are by virtue of our ontological union with Christ. The union Christ established with us in his body and blood demands our union with him in his body and blood, as we draw near to him in worship and the sacraments. Our participation in baptism and the Eucharist (cf. below) bear witness to our appropriation, by faith, through the Spirit, of what is already ours in Jesus Christ (cf. Torrance, 1976a:111).

By bringing together and thinking into each other the concepts of “representation” and “substitution,” Torrance is in complete harmony with the New Testament (cf. Hebrews) description of Christ as both our High Priest (representative) and sacrifice (substitute), the “Offerer” and the “Offering” (cf. Torrance, 1988a:173-178). In representing our humanity before the Father, Jesus Christ is the High Priest representing the people before God. At the same time, he is also the sacrifice, “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (Rev 13:8; Jn 1:29). He is our substitute, taking our place and offering to the Father the life of perfect filial obedience we are unable to offer. As Kettler (2005:6) notes, this is the true sense of “vicarious”: doing something for another in their place, doing for them what they are unable to do for themselves. This is the heart of Torrance’s understanding of the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ.

References

see Vicarious Humanity, pt 1.

T.F. Torrance: The Vicarious Humanity of Jesus Christ, pt. 3

The Whole Course of His Obedience

In the manward-Godward movement of mediation, Jesus Christ vicariously fulfils the covenant throughout the entirety of his life, from birth through death, resurrection, and ascension. In older theology it was common to speak of the “vicarious death” of Christ. Yet, with no intent to minimize the importance of Christ’s sacrificial death, Torrance argues that the death of Christ must be seen in the wider context of his whole life. The nature of Christ’s reconciling activity is not accomplished in only the few hours he hung on the cross, but encompasses the entirety of his life, so that the entirety of our lives might be affected (Kettler, 2005:5, 6).

Following the Nicene fathers, Torrance argues that Jesus’ life, not only his death on the cross, was a priestly self-offering on our behalf.  “[T]he priestly self-consecration and self-offering of Christ throughout the whole of his earthly life are to be regarded as belonging to the innermost essence of the atoning mediation he fulfilled between God and mankind. Reconciliation through the life of Christ and reconciliation through the passion of Christ interpenetrate each other” (Torrance, 1988a:167, 168). Torrance continues:

[A]s one of us and one with us, he shared all our experiences, overcoming our disobedience through his obedience and sanctifying every stage of human life, and thereby vivified and restored our humanity to communion with God. He sanctified himself for our sakes that we might be sanctified in him.

In “an agonising union between God the Judge and man under judgment in a continuous movement of atoning reconciliation running throughout all his obedient and sinless life,” Jesus Christ sanctified every phase of human life through his filial obedience to the Father. Atonement, therefore, did not begin at the cross. To the contrary, atoning reconciliation began with the incarnation itself; that is, the assumption of sinful Adamic flesh was redemptive from the moment of Jesus’ “conception and birth when he put on the form of a servant and began to pay the price of our redemption” (Torrance, 1986b:475; cf. 1988a:167). Torrance continues:

As the one Mediator  between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus is not only God with us, but God for us, God who has crossed the chasm of alienation between us and himself, God who has taken our rebellious and corrupt human nature upon himself, God who has made our sin and guilt, our misery and death, our condemnation and godlessness, his very own, in order to intercede for us, to substitute himself in our place, bearing the just punishment of our sin, and offering and making restitution by suffering what we could not suffer and where we could make no restitution at all. That is the doctrine of Jesus Christ as Mediator who is God of God and Man of man in one Person, and who as such reconciles God to man and man to God in the hypostatic union of his divine and human natures.

Throughout his entire life, Jesus Christ is “God for us.” In taking sinful humanity to himself in the incarnation, the eternal Word began cleansing it, and continued to do so throughout what Calvin (2008:II.16.5; 327) called “the whole course of his obedience,” that is, throughout the entirety of his life, death, resurrection, and ascension (cf. Dawson, 2007:56, 62). For Torrance, therefore, atoning reconciliation is accomplished within the incarnate constitution of Jesus Christ (1986b:475), who acts on our behalf throughout the whole course of his obedient life, bending our fallen human will back to the Father and restoring communion between God and humanity. Following Greek patristic theology, Torrance (1993:238) writes:

[I]t is the whole incarnate life of Christ vicariously and triumphantly lived out from his birth to his crucifixion and resurrection in perfect obedience to the Father within the ontological depths of his oneness with us in our actual fallen existence, that redeems and saves us and converts our disobedient alienated sonship back to filial union with the Father. That is the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In regard to the “whole course” of Jesus’ atoning life, Torrance (1960:229-231) draws upon the Reformed doctrine of the “active” and “passive” obedience of Jesus Christ. The active obedience of the incarnate Son refers to the positive fulfilment in the whole life of Jesus, who, from beginning to end, lived a life of perfect filial obedience to the Father, perfectly fulfilling God’s will in our name and laying hold of the Father’s love on our behalf.  The passive obedience of Jesus Christ refers to his willing submission to the judgement of the Father upon our sin, especially as manifested in his expiation of our sins upon the cross. Christ’s passive obedience, however, cannot be limited to the cross, for his passion began at his birth, so that his entire life was a bearing of the cross. Here Torrance quotes Calvin’s (2008:II.16.5; 327) assertion that as soon as Christ put on the form of a servant (cf. Phil 2:7), he began to pay the price of liberation for our salvation. As Torrance notes, the Reformed distinction between the active and passive obedience of Christ is not intended to divide the work of Christ but to insist that atonement cannot be limited to his passive obedience at the cross; rather, the whole course of Christ’s life of filial obedience to the Father is absolutely integral to our reconciliation. Torrance (1960:230) continues:

How could it be otherwise when in the Incarnation there took place a union of God the Judge and the man judged in one Person, so that all through His life, but especially in His death, Jesus bore in himself the infliction and judgement of God upon our sinful humanity, and wrought out in His life and His death expiation and amendment for our sin?

The “mutuality” of the active and passive obedience of Jesus Christ is important in regard to justification, for it means that we have imputed to us not only the passive righteousness of Christ when he satisfied for our sins in judgement on the cross, but also the active righteousness of Christ in which he “positively” fulfilled the Father’s will in an obedient life. For Torrance, therefore, justification means not merely the “non-imputation” of our sins through the pardon of Christ but also “the positive sharing in his divine-human righteousness” (Torrance, 1960:230, 231). He continues:

We are saved, therefore, not only by the death of Christ [passive obedience] which He suffered for our sakes, but by His life [active obedience] which He lived in our flesh for our sakes and which God raised from the dead that we may share in it through the power of the Spirit. It is in that light, of His atoning and justifying Life, that we are to understand the Incarnation of the Son in the whole course of His obedience from His Birth to His Resurrection.

According to Torrance (1993:238, 239), the “cardinal issue” here is the all-important truth of the “vicarious humanity” of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. When we assign central place to the humanity of Jesus and his atoning acts throughout the whole course of his obedient life, atonement cannot be regarded merely as an “external” juridical transaction that took place at the cross, but “as something made to issue out of the depths of our actual existence through the incredible oneness which Christ forged with us in his vicarious humanity.” Torrance’s view that the entire life of Christ was lived vicariously on our behalf and in our place gives the humanity of Jesus Christ an “essential” and “integral” place (cf. Torrance, 1996b:131) in the indivisible unity of agency of the Father and Spirit and stands in stark contrast to the Latin view that the humanity of the incarnate Son played merely an instrumental role in an external, legal transaction between the Father and the Son at the cross.

As Torrance (1992:80) argues, Jesus’ filial obedience to the Father is not “an answer to God” that arises merely through an external transaction, as in the Latin view of atonement; rather, it is an obedient response that arises from the depths of the fallen humanity Jesus has made his own. Moreover, Jesus’ obedient self-sacrifice is not a mere moral example we may follow; rather, it is a “final answer” to God actualised in “the flesh and blood of our human existence and behaviour” which remains “eternally valid.” Against external forensic and exemplary theories of the atonement, Torrance asserts that “Jesus Christ is our human response to God.”

References (see previous post)

T.F. Torrance: The Vicarious Humanity of Jesus Christ, pt. 2

Torrance’s doctrine of the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ is rooted in the “covenanted way of response” God graciously provided Israel, so that a sinful people might approach God in an appropriate form of worship.

The ministry of Jesus Christ toward God on our behalf, that is, the manward-Godward movement of incarnational redemption, can be better understood by taking our “initial cue” from God’s relationship with Old Testament Israel, particularly in regard to the “reciprocity” which God patiently and lovingly worked out in covenant relationship with his chosen people. While a covenant is generally thought to involve two parties, there is an all-important “middle term” between the polarities of the covenant. This is the “covenanted way of response” God provided his people, “a divinely provided sacrifice replacing the best that the human partner may think he can offer,” as in the paradigmatic example of the offering God provided in place of Isaac, Abraham’s beloved son (cf. Gen 22:13, 14). In establishing the covenant at Sinai, God knew that Israel would not be able to fulfil its side of the covenant relationship by walking before him as a holy and obedient people, nor could sinful Israel draw near to God in appropriate worship. Hence, as an act of sheer grace, God freely provided the people a covenanted way of responding to him, a “vicarious” way in which the covenant might be fulfilled in their midst and on their behalf, so that Israel could come before God forgiven and sanctified in covenant partnership with him and fulfil their priestly mission to the world (Torrance, 1992:73, 74).

The Covenanted Way of Response

In the general pattern of the cultic liturgy, God had made it clear to the people of Israel that they were not to appear before him with offerings they had devised themselves. In contrast to pagan worship, there were to be no offerings embodying their own self-expression or representing their own natural desires: no unprescribed oblations, no “strange fire,” no rituals of their own invention were to be introduced into Israel’s worship of God. Instead, God graciously provided the people a covenanted way of response, a divinely prepared pattern of liturgy and worship, designed to testify to the fact that only God can expiate guilt, forgive sin, and bring about propitiation between himself and his people. This cultic liturgy, including the liturgical ordinances, sacrifices, offerings and oblations, and even the priesthood itself, constituted the “vicarious way of covenant response in faith, obedience and worship which God had freely provided Israel out of his steadfast love” (Torrance, 1992:74, 75).

God intended the covenanted way of response he provided for Israel to be worked into the hearts and minds of the people as a liturgical witness to God’s revealing and reconciling purpose. Over time, the covenanted way of response was worked into the flesh and blood existence of Israel, so that it might control the whole pattern of its priestly mission in history. The mediatorial and priestly roles of Moses and Aaron, as well as the notions of guilt-bearer and sacrifice, were gradually conflated, appearing in the Isaianic prophecies as the “servant of the Lord,” the “hypostatized actualisation” within the flesh and blood existence of Israel of the divinely provided covenant way of response set forth in the cultic liturgy. A messianic role was attributed to the servant of the Lord in which “mediator and sacrifice, priest and victim were combined in a form that was at once representative and substitutionary, corporate and individual, in its fulfilment.” In the Isaianic prophecies, Israel, the servant of the Lord, and the “Redeemer,” the “Holy One of Israel” were conflated and brought together, as though the prophet wanted to say that “the real servant of the Lord is the Lord himself,” the divine Redeemer who has bound himself in covenant kinship with Israel, taking upon himself Israel’s affliction in order to make it his own (Torrance, 1992:75, 76).

The Fulfilment of the Covenanted Way of Response

In the New Testament, Jesus Christ is seen as the historical incarnation of this prophetic vision (cf. Torrance, 1971:158). In him, the prophesied servant of the Lord and the promised Redeemer come together, as he bears away the iniquities, transgressions, and guilt not only of Israel, but of the whole world. Torrance regards the identity of servant and Redeemer as “the essence of the Gospel.” As the incarnate Son of the Father, Jesus Christ came to fulfil all righteousness as both priest and victim. Through his one self-offering in atonement for sin, he mediated a new covenant of universal range, wherein humanity is presented to the Father as redeemed, sanctified, and perfected forever in Jesus. As Torrance notes, “Jesus Christ constitutes in his own self-consecrated humanity the fulfilment of the vicarious way of human response to God promised under the old covenant, but now on the ground of his atoning self-sacrifice once for all offered this is a vicarious way of response which is available for all mankind (Torrance, 1992:75-77).

As Torrance (1992:77) argues, this is surely how we are to understand the twofold ministry of Jesus Christ, from God to man and from man to God. Jesus Christ himself fulfils the covenant from both sides. In regard to the Old Testament commands, “I shall be your God and you shall be my people,” “I am holy, be you holy,” and “I will be your Father and you will be my son,” Jesus Christ is both the covenant-making God and the one true Israelite, who, as the obedient and faithful servant, fulfils both polarities of the covenant. Our immediate concern in upcoming posts is the “manward-Godward” movement of the covenant, that is, the fulfilment of the covenant in the body and blood of Christ, “from the side of human beings toward God the Father as the divinely provided counterpart to God’s unconditional self-giving to mankind.”

References

Calvin, J. 2008. Institutes of the Christian Religion (translated by H. Beveridge). Peabody, MA: Hendrickson. 1,059 pp.

Dawson, G.S. 2007b. Far as the Curse is Found: The Significance of Christ’s Assuming a Fallen Human Nature in the Torrance Theology. In G. Dawson, ed. An Introduction to Torrance Theology: Discovering the Incarnate Saviour. London: T & T Clark. Ch. 3.

Kettler, C.D. 2005. The God Who Believes: Faith, Doubt, and the Vicarious Humanity of Christ. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books. 205 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1960. Justification: Its Radical Nature and Place in Reformed Doctrine and Life. Scottish Journal of Theology, vol 13, no 3. pp. 225-246. Also available in Torrance (1996b:150-168).

Torrance, T.F. 1971. God and Rationality. London: OUP. 216 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1986b. Karl Barth and the Latin Heresy. Scottish Journal of Theology, vol 39, pp. 461-482.

Torrance, T.F. 1988a. The Trinitarian Faith: The Evangelical Theology of the Ancient Catholic Church. London: T & T Clark. 345 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1992. The Mediation of Christ (rev. ed.). Colorado Springs, CO: Helmers & Howard. 126 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1993. The Atonement. The Singularity of Christ and the Finality of the Cross: The Atonement and the Moral Order. In N. Cameron, ed. Universalism and the Doctrine of Hell. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker House. Chapter 8.

Torrance, T.F. 1996b. (orig. ed. 1965). Theology in Reconstruction. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers. 288 pp.

T.F. Torrance: The Vicarious Humanity of Jesus Christ, pt. 1

With this post, we begin a detailed series on Torrance’s understanding of the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ. The importance of Christ’s vicarious work in our place, and on our behalf, cannot be overstated. When we understand what Christ has done for us, we are truly set free to love.

Introduction

As a “direct correlate” of the hypostatic union (Purves, 2005:3), Torrance follows Athanasius and Barth in emphasizing the “twofold” ministry of the incarnate Son of God, wherein Jesus Christ mediates the things of God to man and the things of man to God. As Athanasius and Barth understood, unless it was God himself who was personally and directly active in Jesus Christ, nothing he did is of any saving significance; yet, in effecting reconciliation in Jesus Christ, God acted from the side of humanity “as man” and from the side of God “as God.” Like Athanasius and Barth, Torrance stresses not only the “Godward” movement but also the “manward” movement of Christ’s reconciling life and passion, for his humanity is not merely instrumental but “integral” and “essential” to the vicarious nature of his redemptive activity. This twofold movement of mediation, in both its Godward and manward directions, must be thought of as an inseparable whole arising from the unity of the person of Jesus Christ as God and man, and as continuous throughout the whole reconciling movement of his birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension (Torrance, 1986b:479; 1992:73).

Comment: Jesus Christ, the Son of God, mediates the things of God to man (↓); Jesus Christ, the son of man, mediates the things of man to God (↑) in one twofold but inseparable movement of mediation.

Previous posts on the atonement emphasized the “Godward-manward” mediation of Jesus Christ, who, in his condescension to assume fallen human flesh, embodies atonement in his incarnate constitution as God and humanity joined in reconciling union. The present series of posts will consider the “manward-Godward” mediation of the incarnate Son toward God, who, in his “vicarious humanity,” ministers the things of man to God on behalf of all humanity.

As Torrance’s younger brother David (D. Torrance, 2010:1) notes, “vicarious” is a Latin word that means “speaking and acting in place of another, on that other’s behalf.” This is exactly what Jesus Christ has done for us in his life, death, resurrection, and ascension. As Hunsinger (2001:144) notes, “vicarious humanity” means that everything Christ has done for us in his humanity was done in our place and on our behalf. According to Kettler (2005.6), “the vicarious humanity of Christ speaks of the deep interaction between Christ’s humanity and our humanity at the level of our being, the ontological level.” Against “external” forensic or exemplary theories of atonement, the atoning work of Christ is not merely a means by which we are “declared” righteous or merely an example of God’s love. “It is both,” argues Kettler, “but much more, in the sense of God desiring to recreate our humanity at the deepest levels, addressing our needs . . . from within our very being.” As Molnar (2009:119) argues, because it eliminates the idea that the humanity of Jesus played merely an “instrumental role” in atonement, the doctrine of the “vicarious humanity” of Jesus Christ plays a “pivotal role” in much of Torrance’s theology.

Epistemology (Revelation)

As noted in previous posts, in his historical dialogue with Israel, God revealed himself in such a way as to mould his chosen people into a suitable vessel for the communication of divine revelation. Throughout its tumultuous existence, the word of God came to Israel through prophets like Moses, Elijah, and Jeremiah, as well as in such disparate forms as a still small voice, a refining fire, or a hammer breaking rocks into pieces. Yet, despite the varied forms of its communication, the divine revelation imprinted itself upon the innermost being of God’s chosen people. While the presence of the divine word in the heart of Israel intensified the relationship between God and his people, sometimes favourably, sometimes unfavourably, God’s word did not return to him void; rather, it accomplished its revelatory purpose. Divine revelation laid hold of the mind and will of the people, calling forth from them “responses that were taken up, purified and assimilated to the Word of God as the means of its ever-deepening penetration into the understanding, life and service of Israel, so that it could be bearer of divine revelation for all mankind” (Torrance, 1992:77, 78).

Jesus Christ: God’s Address to Man

The movement of divine revelation in historical Israel culminated in Jesus Christ. In the incarnation, the Word of God actualised itself in time and space, in Israel and within humankind, in “the visible, tangible form of a particular human being who embodied in himself the personal address of God’s Word to man and the personal response of man to God’s Word.” Torrance (1992:78) continues:

In Jesus the Word of God was translated into the form of a human life in whom there was only truth and light and no darkness, the Word of Life to be known and grasped through communion with him, but in Jesus there was provided for mankind a way of response to God which issued out of the depths of its existence and as its very own and in which each human being was free to share through communion with Jesus. Thus in Jesus the final response of man toward God was taken up, purified through his atoning self-consecration on our behalf, and incorporated into the Word of God as his complete self-communication to mankind, but also as the covenanted way of vicarious response to God which avails for all of us and in which we all may share through the Spirit of Jesus Christ which he freely gives.

In Jesus, the Word of God is “translated” into human form. Thus, Torrance (1992:78) can assert that “the real text of New Testament revelation is the humanity of Jesus.” Torrance continues:

As we read the Old Testament and read the New Testament and listen to the Word of God, the real text is not documents of the Pentateuch, the Psalms or the Prophets or the documents of the Gospels and the Epistles, but in and through them all the Word of God struggling with rebellious human existence in Israel on the way to becoming incarnate, and then that Word translated into the flesh and blood and mind and life of a human being in Jesus, in whom we have both the Word of God become man and the perfect response of man to God offered on our behalf.

For Torrance, the written word of God communicated through the prophets is an incipient or nascent word. The voice of the prophets is the Word of God in gestation, nourished in the corporate womb of Israel and finally emerging from the womb of the faithful daughter of Israel, the Virgin Mary. At Bethlehem, the Word of God takes on flesh and blood and is laid in a manger; divine revelation takes on human form.

Jesus Christ: Man’s Perfect Response to God

In his “vicarious humanity,” Jesus Christ is not only “the real text” of God’s Word addressed to us; he is also “the real text” of our address to God. As Torrance (1992:78, 79) argues:

We have no speech or language with which to address God but the speech and language called Jesus Christ. In him our humanity, our human understanding, our human word are taken up, purified and sanctified, and addressed to God the Father for us as our very own ‒ and that is the word of man with which God is pleased.

Torrance asserts the “double fact” that, in Jesus Christ, the Word of God has assumed human form in order, as such, to be God’s language to man, while at the same time, Jesus Christ embodies man’s “true word” and “true speech” to God. “Jesus Christ is at once the complete revelation of God to man and the correspondence on man’s part to that revelation required by it for the fulfilment of its own revealing movement.” As Torrance notes, the incarnation provides for all humanity a “truly human,” yet “divinely prepared,” response to divine revelation. “The Incarnation was wholly act of God but it was no less true human life truly lived in our actual humanity. Jesus Christ is not only Word of God to man, but Believer.” Throughout the entirety of his obedient life, the incarnate Word yielded the “perfect response of man” to the divine revelation he himself embodied. “We are not concerned,” argues Torrance, “simply with a divine revelation which demands from us all a human response, but with a divine revelation which already includes a true and appropriate and fully human response as part of its achievement for us and to us and in us” (Torrance, 1996b:129, 131, 132).

The gospel includes “the all-significant middle term, the divinely provided response in the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ.” Jesus Christ himself ‘is’ the perfect human response to God. He is both the divine Word of God spoken to humanity and, at the same time, the perfect human word addressed to God. Parallel to a “theological form of Fermat’s principle,” in accordance with which the selection of one path from among many in the formulation of natural law sets aside and excludes all others as “unentertainable” and “impossible,” the incarnation of the eternal Word in our contingent existence in Jesus Christ excludes every other way to the Father and stamps the vicarious humanity of Christ as “the sole norm and law” and “the sole ground of acceptable human response to the Father” (Torrance, 1971:145, 146; 1982:88, 89).

As Torrance (1969a:50) argues, in Jesus Christ, God has not only condescended to “objectify” himself so that man may know him, but also has provided from the side of man, and from within man, “adequate and perfect reception” of the truth of divine revelation. Torrance continues:

[Jesus Christ] is in Himself not only God objectifying Himself for man but man adapted and conformed to that objectification, not only the complete revelation of God to man but the appropriate correspondence on the part of man to that revelation, not only the Word of God to man but man obediently hearing and answering that Word. In short, Jesus Christ is Himself both the Word of God as spoken by God to man and that same Word as heard and received by man, Himself both the Truth of God given to man and that very Truth understood and actualized in man. He is that divine and human Truth in His one Person.

In his incarnate constitution as God and man joined in reconciling union, Jesus Christ is both the objective revelation of God and the appropriate response and conformation of man to divine revelation. He is not only the Truth (cf. Jn 14:6) spoken from the highest, he is also the perfect response to that Truth, heard and actualised from within the ontological depths of the fallen humanity he assumed in the incarnation (cf. Torrance, 1971:138).

As Torrance (1969a:50, 51) argues, Jesus Christ is the one human being in whom the truth of God and human knowledge of the truth “are fully and faithfully correlated.” Quite significantly, Torrance notes that in Jesus Christ, revelation (and reconciliation) has taken place “for all other men.” He continues:

[I]n His true and obedient humanity, the Truth of God has been given and received for all men, and as such is made openly accessible to us in the Gospel, not only as the objective Word of God to man but as the same Word subjectively realized and expressed within our human and historical existence.

In the historical actuality of Jesus Christ, knowledge of God is possible. In the incarnation, God has broken through human “inability,” “inadequacy,” and “self-will” in order to establish real knowledge of God within the limitations of our estrangement and alienation. Human knowledge of God is grounded in the divine Word’s “condescension to enter within our creaturely frailty and incompetence and so to realize knowledge of Himself from within our mode of existence, in the incarnate Son.” Hence, in Jesus Christ, “we may now freely participate in the knowledge of God as an actuality already translated and made accessible for us by his grace” (Torrance, 1969a:51).

Here the implications of Torrance’s understanding of the “vicarious humanity” of Jesus Christ begin to emerge. In regard to divine revelation, Jesus Christ ‘is’ the Word of God incarnate in a particular human being, so that the human speech of Jesus is the divine Word of God. In regard to the human response to that Word, Jesus Christ ‘is’ the “perfect response” to divine revelation. In the incarnation of Jesus Christ, God has provided a “vicarious” way of human response in place of, and on behalf of, all who partake of the nature of Adam.

References

Hunsinger, G. 2001. The Dimension of Depth: Thomas F. Torrance on the Sacraments. In E. Colyer, ed. The Promise of Trinitarian Theology: Theologians in Dialogue with T. F. Torrance. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Ch. 6.

Kettler, C.D. 2005. The God Who Believes: Faith, Doubt, and the Vicarious Humanity of Christ. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books. 205 pp.

Molnar, P.D. 2009. Thomas F. Torrance: Theologian of the Trinity. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing. 373 pp.

Torrance, D.W. 2001. Thomas Forsyth Torrance: Minister of the Gospel, Pastor, and Evangelical. In E. Colyer, ed. The Promise of Trinitarian Theology: Theologians in Dialogue with T. F. Torrance. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Ch. 1.

Torrance, T.F. 1969a. Theological Science. Oxford: OUP. 368 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1971. God and Rationality. London: OUP. 216 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1982. Reality and Evangelical Theology: The Realism of Christian Revelation.
(Forward by K.A. Richardson, 1999). Downers Grove, IL: IVP. Philadelphia, PA: Westminster. 174 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1986b. Karl Barth and the Latin Heresy. Scottish Journal of Theology, vol 39, pp. 461-482.

Torrance, T.F. 1992. The Mediation of Christ (rev. ed.). Colorado Springs, CO: Helmers & Howard. 126 pp.

Torrance, T.F. 1996b. (orig. ed. 1965). Theology in Reconstruction. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers. 288 pp.

T.F. Torrance: The Atonement, pt 9

Reprobation

Despite his rejection of a doctrine of limited atonement and his assertion of universal election in Jesus Christ, Torrance finds room for a doctrine of reprobation in his understanding of the wonderful exchange embodied in Jesus Christ.

Against a doctrine of universalism, Torrance regards the reprobate as those who, subject to the irrational and accidental nature of sin, reject God’s love as revealed in his gracious universal pardon. “Why anyone who is freely offered the unconditional love of God in the Lord Jesus should turn away from him,” writes (Torrance et. al., 1999:31), “is something quite inexplicable and baffling.” Torrance (1949:312) cites Judas Iscariot as an example of one who inexplicably rejected the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ. As Torrance (1981b:136; 1993:248) notes, why some do not believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour and go to hell cannot be explained, for here we have to do with something that happens “accidentally,” “irrationally,” and “inexplicably.” Rather than attempting to construe unbelief in terms of logico-causal connections, Torrance argues that if some do not believe and perish, that must be understood as “accidental” or “adventitious,” for Jesus Christ came to save sinners (1Tim 1:15), not to condemn them. It is the nature of the gospel to bring life, not death, just as it is the nature of light to illumine, rather than to bring darkness. Nevertheless, while God does not desire the death of sinners but, rather, that they turn and live and come to the knowledge of the truth (cf. 1Tim 2:4), argues Torrance (1996c:283), God does not impose the gospel upon people whether they believe or not. “Hence, while there is no divine decree of reprobation, God allows his will for the salvation of all for whom Christ died, to be frustrated, so that in view of the tears of the Redeemer for the lost, it may be said that God wills the salvation of those who perish.”

Comment: Note Torrance’s assertion that God allows his will to be “frustrated.” This is quite different from the Augustinian-Calvinist doctrine of absolute sovereignty. According to Augustine, if people are in hell, then God must will they be there, since God's will cannot be “thwarted.” From this unscriptural reasoning it is an easy step to assert that God “predestines” them to hell. Augustine's thought in this regard is rooted in a Greek (pagan) philosophical view of divine "immutability." Scripture plainly teaches, however, that God wishes none to perish, that he wants all to turn in repentance. God does NOT will that any be in hell. As Clark Pinnock, John Sanford, and others have shown, God is big enough to allow freedom and contingency in the creation. If any are in hell, it is because they choose hell rather than God. God is big enough and powerful enough to allow his will to be frustrated in the service of freedom. As Torrance notes, God does not “impose” the gospel on anyone.

In the face of the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ, to be reprobate is an “un-understandable mystery.” Torrance (1949:316, 317) writes:

To choose our own way in spite of God’s absolute choice of us, to listen to the voice of His infinite love and to know that we are already apprehended by that love in the death of Jesus, and by that very apprehension of love to be given the opportunity and capacity to respond in faith and love, and still to draw back in proud independence and selfish denial of God’s love, is an act of bottomless horror. . . . Can we imagine anything more appalling than that a man should use the very power that God gives him to choose to contradict God, should choose to depart from God, and yet be unable to depart, because in spite of all he is still grasped by God in an act of eternal love that will not let him go?

Even the man who wilfully rejects the love of God is held in the eternal embrace of Jesus Christ, in whom all things consist and move and have their being. Should Jesus Christ let him go even for an instant, he would vanish into nothingness. God’s eternal love will not let him go, however. “Even when a man has made his bed in hell God’s hand of love will continue to grasp him there.” And therein lies the “hell” of hell: it is to choose one’s own way and, yet, in that choice, still to be chosen by God. As Torrance notes, it is not God who makes hell, for hell is the contradiction of all that is of God (Torrance, 1949:316, 317). Hell is the place in which the sinner is forever imprisoned in his own refusal of God’s love, and that is, indeed, the “hell” of it. Against the hyper-Calvinist doctrine of double predestination, Torrance writes regarding those in hell: “[The reprobate’s] being in hell is not the result of God’s decision to damn him, but the result of his own decision to choose himself against the love of God and therefore of the negative decision of God’s love to oppose his refusal of God’s love just by being Love.” This “negative decision” of God’s love is what Torrance calls “the wrath of the Lamb” (Torrance, 1996d:cxv, cxvi).

Comment: The above-paragraph is worth reading and re-reading and re-reading!

Elsewhere, Torrance (2009:157, 158) writes more pointedly that if anyone goes to hell, it is by a “downright refusal” of the reconciliation that Christ has already provided to all in pure love. He continues:

Because of the blood of Christ there is no positive decision of God to reject anyone, but only the gracious decision to accept them, and that decision has once and for all been enacted in the cross and resurrection so that nothing in heaven and earth can change it or undo it or reverse it. To reverse it would be to bring Christ back to the cross again, and to deny the reality of what he has already done. That decision is not altered if man refuses it, but if someone goes to hell, they go because they dash themselves in judgement against an unalterable positive act of divine reconciliation that offers to them only divine love [emphasis in original].

In loving humanity even to the point of death on the cross, “God risked the happening of the incredible,” that man would choose to reject the love revealed at the cross. Thus, the cross unmasks “the bottomless dimension of sin in the human heart.” To be sure, the witness of scripture stands aghast at the mystery of iniquity; therefore, it refuses to betray the love of God and the agony of Jesus by a doctrine of universalism. On the other hand, scripture refuses to teach that God’s love is split in two by a doctrine of double predestination. To the contrary, God’s action towards humanity remains forever the one, indivisible act of love, and even the “dark whirlpool” of human sin, particularly as revealed at Calvary, cannot alter that fact (Torrance, 1949:317).

Halleluiah!

This is the last of my Lenten series on Torrance’s doctrine of the atonement. Thanks to all of you who have taken the time to read this wonderful material. If you have found these posts helpful, I would love to hear from you. See you again around May 15, when we begin an in-depth look at Torrance's doctrine of the vicarious humanity of Jesus Christ. You're gonna love it!

References: See previous posts.

T.F. Torrance: The Atonement, pt. 8

Universalism and Limited Atonement

Comment: Barth and Torrance are often wrongly "accused" of being universalists. They are not. Apparently critics don't take the time to differentiate between universal atonement and universalism.

Torrance’s assertion that God has chosen all humanity in Jesus Christ, coupled with his insistence on the universal range of atoning reconciliation, may lead to the erroneous conclusion that he is a “universalist,” that is, one who believes in the salvation of all mankind (Bloesch, 2004:14, 39, 40). In this regard, an examination is needed of his rejection of both “universalism” and the doctrine of “limited atonement.” As will become plain, Torrance’s argument against a doctrine of limited atonement is directly related to his rejection of the “Latin heresy” described in a previous post (March 9, 2011), particularly in regard to his repudiation of atonement as an “external” rather than ontological reality.

As Torrance notes, the argument for either universal salvation or limited atonement is commonly cast as follows: If Christ died for all, then all must be saved, whether they believe or not; but if all are not saved, then Christ did not die for all; therefore, atonement is limited. Behind both these alternatives, however, Torrance (1986b:481; 1993:245, 246) finds two “very serious heresies.”

First, in regard to the Calvinist doctrine of limited atonement, there is a “disjunction” or dualism that bifurcates the divine and human natures of Christ, divides his being and his acts, and consequently separates the incarnation from the atonement. As Torrance (1986b:481) notes:

On this view the humanity of Christ is not regarded as having any inner ontological connection with those for whom he died, but is regarded only as an external instrument used by God as he wills, in effecting salvation for all those whom God chooses and/or for those who choose to accept Christ as their personal Saviour. Thus a separation can be made between the universal range of the Kingdom of Christ and the limited range of his atoning sacrifice.

Because it fails to appreciate the ontological connection between Jesus Christ and all humanity, a doctrine of limited atonement minimizes the significance of the incarnation for atonement by treating the humanity of Jesus Christ in an “external” and “instrumental” way. By reducing the atonement to a forensic transaction or the fulfilment of a legal contract between God and mankind, this view makes the Son’s humanity merely a tool used by God for a temporary repair job and then returned to the cosmic tool box in heaven (Torrance, 2009:182; cf. Kruger, 2003:36, Jesus and Undoing of Adam).

In addition to its merely external or instrumental nature, a doctrine of limited atonement implies a “restricted and partial” view of the incarnate Son’s assumption of fallen Adamic flesh and a consequent notion of partial rather than total substitution in the atonement. According to Torrance, hyper-Calvinist views of the atonement create a Nestorian dualism, or split, in the incarnate reality of Jesus Christ by asserting that the deity of Christ was in “repose” at the cross, so that the incarnate Son suffered in his humanity only (Torrance, 2009:184). Against this view, Torrance (1993:246; cf. 2009:184, 185; Torrance, et. al., 1999:29) argues:

If we really hold that it is God himself who bears our sins in Jesus Christ, God himself who in becoming man takes man’s place and stands with man under his own divine judgement, God himself the Judge becoming the man judged, then we cannot allow any divorce between the action of Christ on the cross and the action of God. How is it at all possible to think of the divine judgement in the cross as only a partial judgment upon sin, or a judgement only upon some sinners, for that is finally what it amounts to if only some sinners are died for, and only some are efficiently implicated in atonement? The concept of a limited atonement thus rests upon a limitation of the very being of God as love, and a schizoid notion of the incarnation, i.e., upon a basic Nestorian heresy.

For Torrance, a doctrine of limited atonement rests on a Nestorian dualism that breaks apart the hypostatic union with its implication that God is not intimately and personally involved in the suffering of Calvary; rather, only the humanity of Jesus Christ suffers on the cross. Since God is not involved at the cross, except by consent, the atonement can be construed in a restricted and partial, as well as external and instrumentalist way, wherein Jesus offers his humanity on behalf of the elect few only. On the other hand, against a Nestorian dualism between the deity and humanity of Jesus Christ implied in a doctrine of limited atonement (cf. Torrance, 1996c:19, 133), Torrance rightly asserts, along with the New Testament writers, that the one who died on the cross is the eternal Word made flesh, the very one by and through whom all things are created and have their being, and in whom hold together. Because all humanity is ontologically bound to the incarnate Creator Word, there can be no restriction to the atoning work of Jesus Christ.

In addition to a Nestorian dualism underlying the partial judgement implied in the doctrine of limited atonement is the second of the serious heresies Torrance finds in common arguments regarding both limited atonement and universalism: that is, a controlling framework of thought based upon “logico-causal connections.” As Torrance argues, the insertion of a logico-causal relation between the death of Christ and the salvation of men and women has led to a view that the atonement of Jesus Christ is “sufficient” for all but “efficient” only for some. According to the logic of this argument, if the atoning death of Christ applies to all men, then logically and causally all men must of necessity be saved; on the other hand, if some perish in hell, then logically and causally the efficacy of the atonement does not reach them. According to Torrance, this view was introduced into post-Augustinian high medieval theology, later rejected by Calvin, then reintroduced into Calvinist orthodoxy by Theodore Beza (1519-1605). The place of “logico-causalism” within Protestantism was considerably reinforced by the Newtonian view of “causal connections” between external entities such as atoms or particles, a view that gave rise to the hard determinism of hyper-Calvinistic notions of predestination and limited atonement. As Torrance notes, the ongoing problem of universalism versus limited atonement attests to the deep entrenchment of the Latin heresy in Protestant and Evangelical thought, wherein atonement continues to be reduced to a logical framework of cause and effect (Torrance, 1986b:481, 482; 1993:245, 246).

At the heart of the “logico-causal” (i.e., “if . . . then”) assertions regarding universalism and limited atonement, Torrance (1993:246-249) finds “two fatal interconnected errors” that completely “shatter” the argument. First, to posit a logico-causal connection between the atonement and the forgiveness of sins is “falsely to project into the atonement a kind of connection which obtains between finite events and statements about them in our fallen world, and to substitute it for the transcendent kind of connection that is revealed in the creative and redeeming activity of God himself.” As Torrance argues elsewhere (1981b:135, 136), a logico-causal approach to the atonement, as particularly evident in Calvinist Scholasticism, attempts to read back into God the temporal, causal, and logical relations characteristic of human experience in the world. This forced Calvinist Scholasticism to connect “the relative apparent distinctions” between believers and unbelievers to the absolute decree of God, thereby forcing the construal of predestination into the double form of election and reprobation. The doctrine of double predestination, however, entailed a dualism in the heart of God, “an ultimate ‘Yes’ and an ultimate ‘No,’” that could not be explained away by regarding the “No” of reprobation as only the “passing over” of some rather than their deliberate damnation. Calvinism was trapped in its own logic, notes Torrance. While there is a “logic of grace” exhibited in the pattern of God’s grace in the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Christ, wherein “he acted under the freely accepted constraint of his unreserved self-giving for our salvation,” to construe the logic of grace in terms of necessary, logical connections is to convert grace into something other than itself, for such a construal implies that there is not a “free, contingent relation” between the self-giving of Christ in the cross and human salvation but, rather, a “logico-causal” relation.

In a similar vein, Torrance argues that a doctrine of universalism commits the “logical fallacy” of “transmuting movement into necessity.” That is, universalism destroys the free decision of faith by making salvation necessary rather than possible. For Torrance, universalism can, at best, only be expressed in terms of “hope” or “possibility,” but never in terms of dogmatic necessity (Torrance, 1949:313; 1996c:277). It is the construal of a logico-causal relation between grace and human salvation that gives rise to the “twin errors” of both limited atonement and universal salvation (Torrance, 1981b:136).

As Torrance (1993:246, 247) wisely notes, the miraculous acts of God cannot be construed in the ordinary categories of human thought, for they operate from a “transcendent presence in which his being and act and Person are integrated in the power of his triune being.” Torrance finds this transcendent connection in the virgin birth, the resurrection, the miracles of divine healing, and the multiplication of a few loaves and fish. As Torrance argues:

Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life, and that cannot be construed within a system of this-worldly logico-causal relations. The kind of connection that obtains in the atoning death of Christ was demonstrated in the resurrection of Jesus. The connection between the atoning death of the Lord Jesus and the forgiveness of our sins is of an altogether ineffable kind which we may not and cannot reduce to a chain of this-worldly logico-causal relations. To do that comes very near to sinning against the Holy Spirit.

As Torrance rightly argues, there is no “logical-causal” connection between the death of Jesus Christ and the forgiveness of sins. Rather, the connection between the cross and human salvation is an ineffable mystery hidden in the heart of the Triune Godhead, one that cannot be captured within the bounds of ordinary categories of human thought. As Torrance (1981b:136) cogently notes, if human salvation is dependent on a logical connection between the death of Jesus Christ and the forgiveness of sins, “we would all be unforgiven whether we believe or not.”

The second fatal error in logico-causal arguments for universalism or limited atonement, wherein attempts are made to explain why some are finally saved and others are not, involves a “rationalisation of evil.” For Torrance, a doctrine of universalism fails to take into account the irrational nature of the “mystery of iniquity” and the “abysmal irrationality of evil,” realities that cannot be explained away rationally, for to do so would mean that God need not have taken the way of the cross in order to save humanity. Evil involves a “radical discontinuity” that cannot be explained in terms of logico-causal relations (i.e., “continuity”) without explaining it away. Evil is so “bottomless,” or “abysmal,” that to overcome it requires nothing less than the direct presence and power of the eternal, infinite God (Torrance, 1949:313; 1996c:277; 1993:247). Torrance (1993:247, 248) argues:

In order to redeem us from the enormity of evil God “had to” become incarnate in our mortal existence and penetrate into the chasm of our sinful and guilty separation from himself, which he freely did on the cross out of his unlimited and unstinting love. Conversely, the fact that God himself, God incarnate, penetrated into our damned existence and death in order to save us, reveals the bottomless chasm and the irrational, inexplicable nature of evil by which we are separated from him. If then anyone thinks he can explain why the atoning death of Christ avails efficaciously only for some people but not for all through offering a logico-causal explanation, he is really putting forward an argument which is tantamount to doing despite to the infinite agony of God Almighty at Calvary, for he does not consider the fearful nature of sin and evil which cost God the sacrifice of his own beloved Son.

For Torrance (1993:248), both universalism and the doctrine of limited atonement are “twin heresies which rest on a deeper heresy,” that is, the recourse to a logico-causal explanation of why the atoning death of Christ avails or does not avail for all humanity. As Torrance pointedly argues, “Any such an attempt at logico-causal explanation of the efficacy and range of the atonement is surely a form of blasphemy against the blood of Christ.”

References: See previous posts.

T.F. Torrance: The Atonement, pt. 7

Atoning Reconciliation and Election

Comment: For those of us rightly revulsed by the Calvinist doctrine of election, the following is cause for cheers and shouts of joy!

The boundless nature of the wonderful exchange and the unlimited range of atoning reconciliation bear directly on Torrance’s understanding of election or predestination. In keeping with the Reformed tradition of unconditional election, one which reflects a strictly “theonomous” way of thinking centred in God, Torrance’s doctrine of election rejects any idea that humanity can establish contact with God or induce God to act in accordance with human will and desires, for all human relations with God derive from God’s grace, whereby he freely establishes reciprocity between himself and his creatures. Torrance notes that post-Reformation Reformed theology stressed the priority or prevenience of God’s grace, often preferring the term “predestination” to the term “election.” He argues that the “pre” in “predestination” emphasised the “sheer,” “unqualified” objectivity of God’s love and grace toward all, as expressed in the biblical teaching that God has chosen humanity in Christ “before” the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4). Torrance links this eternal decree with the truth that Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, was slain before the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8). Thus, Torrance distinguishes between predestination and election by locating the former in the timeless, eternal purpose of God’s love for humanity and the latter in the fulfilment of that purpose in space and time in the history of Israel and the mediation of Jesus Christ. For Torrance, election is more than a static decree located in the timeless past; rather, it is a living reality that enters time and space and confronts us face to face in Jesus Christ (Torrance, 1981b:132-134; cf. 1996c:14; Habets, 2008:335, 336).

In one of his earliest papers, Torrance (1941:108, 109) identifies two strands of thought in Reformed teaching on predestination. The first is the more familiar tendency to treat the doctrine of predestination along with, even in between, the doctrines of the divine decrees and subsequent doctrines. In this line of thought, predestination is raised to the position of a separate article in Christian theology, one that, to a certain extent, “stands on its own legs” and “governs” the doctrines of creation, providence, the fall, and sin and punishment (cf. Torrance, 1996c:135). The second characteristic of Reformed teaching on predestination, one that is often overlooked by its critics, and the one that reflects Torrance’s own understanding of election, is the recurring insistence that election is closely connected with Christ; that is, election is in Christo or propter Christum. Torrance writes:

[T[he relation between God and man in predestination is to be thought of in terms of the person of Christ. How does God elect men? Through Christ. Why does He elect them? Because of Christ. Just because Christ is, therefore, the author and the instrument of election, we may not think of it in any deterministic sense, but in terms of the way our Lord treated men when He Himself was on earth. Unless this aspect of the Reformed doctrine of predestination is understood along with the other, it is not really understood at all.

There are “two sides,” therefore, to the Christian doctrine of predestination: “that the salvation of the believer goes back to an eternal decree of God, and yet that the act of election is in and through Christ.” The connection between election and Christ is essential to a full understanding of the Reformed teaching on election, for it acts as a “powerful antidote” to the philosophical determinism that arose with the systematisation of Reformed theology (Torrance, 1941:108, 109).

As Torrance argues, however, a division occurred between these two aspects of predestination; that is, election was detached from the historical, incarnate reality of Jesus Christ and hidden in the secret, inscrutable counsel of God. In post-Reformation Calvinist Scholasticism, under the influence of Augustine’s doctrine of “irresistible grace,” combined with an Aristotelian doctrine of final cause and imbued with the determinism of Newton’s “cause-effect” cosmology, a strongly deterministic slant was read into the doctrine of predestination. Among the problems associated with the hard determinism of Calvinist Scholasticism was the tracing of predestination back to an eternal, irresistible decree in God, wherein election was detached from the incarnation and the cross and grounded in an “arcane dark patch” in God behind the back of Jesus. In this bifurcation of christology and election, Christ was regarded as the “instrument” of election, but not the “ground” of election. The ultimate ground of election was found in the secret counsel (arcanum consilium) of God. This detachment of election from Jesus Christ, that is, the separation of the eternal will of God from the existence of the incarnate Son, drove a deep wedge between Jesus and God and, thereby, introduced not only a “suspicion of Deism” in the Calvinist predilection to detach election from Christ, but also an element of Nestorianism into Calvinist christology, a dualism which called into question any essential relation between Jesus and the Father and provided ground for “a dangerous form of Arian and Socinian heresy in which the atoning work of Christ regarded as an organ of God’s activity was separated from the intrinsic nature and character of God as Love.” Torrance notes that this dualism between election and the incarnation was far removed from Calvin himself, who insisted that Christ is the “mirror of election” (Torrance, 1941:109, 110; 1981b:134, 135; 1996c:133).

As Torrance argues, when the doctrine of election is interpreted within a dualistic framework that separates the incarnate Son from election, coupled with the cause-effect determinism of Newtonian cosmology, the doctrine of predestination is “turned on its head.” Instead of being regarded as the dynamic movement of God’s love into human existence in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, it is twisted and distorted into a “mythological projection into the realm of God’s Being and Activity of cultured-conditioned concepts and creaturely distinctions” (Torrance, 1981b:137). “We cannot let go the truth,” Torrance argues, “that God has come in person in Jesus Christ, and that in Him we have a full and final revelation of the Father.” Election “in Christ,” therefore, means that Christ is the “ground” of election. To detach election from Christ makes election precede grace; that is, it implies that “there is a higher fact than Grace, and that therefore Christ does not fully go bail for God” (Torrance, 1941:109, 110). Torrance continues:

Christ is himself identical with the action of God toward men; He is the full and complete Word of God. There is therefore no higher will than Grace or Christ. There are no dark spots in the character of God which are not covered by the Person of Christ; as the express image of God He covers the whole Face and Heart of the Father. And while election must be grounded in the eternal decree of God, Christian faith cannot allow that to be separated in the very least from the Word. Christ is in His own Person the eternal decree of God ‒ and it is a false distinction to make Him only the causa et medium and not also the full ground of predestination.

Comment: Be sure to get that: Jesus Christ, the eternal Word of God, is the eternal decree of God. There is no inscrutable decree of election located in eternity past that is separate from the incarnate Son.

In his assertion that election cannot be detached from Christ, Torrance will not allow the subordination of the love of God revealed in Christ to a “higher and more comprehensive decree of Providence.” For Torrance (1941:110), a doctrine of predestination must start in Christo, for “[t]here is no higher will in God than Grace.”

In another early paper, Torrance (1949:314, 315) describes election as “nothing more and nothing less than the complete action of God’s eternal love” for the whole world, as expressed in John 3:16. He further describes election as “the eternal decision of God who will not be without us entering time as grace, choosing us and appropriating us for Himself, and who will not let us go.” For Torrance, election is the love of God “enacted and inserted into history” in Jesus Christ, “so that in the strictest sense Jesus Christ is the election of God.” Decades later, he writes (1981b:131, 132):

Properly regarded, divine election is the free sovereign decision and utterly contingent act of God’s Love in pure liberality or unconditional Grace whether in creation or in redemption. As such it is neither arbitrary nor necessary, for it flows freely from an ultimate reason or purpose in the invariant Love of God and is entirely unconditioned by any necessity . . . in God and entirely unconstrained and unmotivated by anything beyond himself. . . . [Moreover] election refers to the eternal decision which is nothing less than the Love of God himself is, in action . . . [flowing] freely and equably to all irrespective of any claim or worth or reaction on their part.

Simply stated, election is the concrete expression of the love that God is by nature (cf. Habets, 2008:346).

Torrance (1981b:133) describes the doctrine of election as the “counterpart to the doctrine of the incarnation.” As “the exact antithesis of all mythology,” that is, in contradistinction to all mythological projections of the human psyche onto God, the incarnation is the “projection of God’s eternal purpose of Love into our creaturely existence and its embodiment in a unique and exclusive way in Jesus Christ,” in whom authentic relationship between God and man is established. Torrance continues:

The incarnation, therefore, may be regarded as the eternal decision or election of God in his Love not to be confined, as it were, within himself alone, but to pour himself out in unrestricted Love upon the world which he has made and to actualise that Love in Jesus Christ in such a way within the conditions of our spatio-temporal existence that he constitutes the one Mediator between God and man through whom we may all freely participate in the unconditional Love and Grace of God.

Torrance (2009:183) captures the relation between election and the incarnation by insisting that election or predestination does not occur “behind the back of Jesus Christ”; that is, there can be no dualistic divide between election and grace, wherein election is detached from Jesus Christ and located in inscrutable divine decrees from eternity past (cf. Torrance, 1949:315; 1996c:133). To go behind the back of Jesus and speak about election apart from Christ is to fail to fully appreciate the soteriological significance of the consubstantial Father-Son relation. The creedal assertion that the incarnate Son is homoousios to Patri means there is no inscrutable will or hidden nature of God other than the will and nature of God revealed in Jesus Christ. Hence, God’s eternal purpose of election (cf. Eph 1:4, 5) cannot be separated from the divine love revealed by God in sending his Son to be the Saviour of the whole world (cf. J. Torrance, 1983:87, 88).

Comment: Just as epistemology (knowledge of God) must begin with God’s definitive self-revelation in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, so, too, our understanding of election and predestination must begin with Jesus!

In keeping with his unitary, holistic approach to the mediation of Christ, Torrance (2009:183) argues against any dualism between election and Christ’s atoning work on the cross. He writes:

God’s eternal election is nothing else than God’s eternal love incarnate in his beloved Son, so that in him we have election incarnate. God’s eternal decree is nothing other than God’s eternal word so that in Christ we have the eternal decree or Word of God made flesh. Election is identical with the life and existence and work of Jesus Christ, and what he does is election going into action.

In Jesus Christ, the eternal decision of God has entered time and space and become “acutely personalised.” Election is not, therefore, some “dead predestination” hidden in the past or “some still point in timeless eternity,” but is a living act that enters time and confronts us in the Word of God incarnate (Torrance, 1949:315; cf. 1941:112). Torrance continues:

The great fact of the Gospel then is this: that God has actually chosen us in Jesus Christ in spite of our sin, and that in the death of Christ that election has become a fait accompli. It means too that God has chosen all men, in as much as Christ died for all men, and because that is once and for all no one can ever elude the election of His love. In as much as no one exists except by the Word of God by whom all things were made and in whom all things consist, and in as much as this is the Word that has once and for all enacted the eternal election of grace to embrace all men, the existence of every man whether he will or no is bound up inextricably with that election ‒ with the Cross of Jesus Christ.

Torrance’s assertion that “God has chosen all men” reflects the biblical principle governing salvation history: that is, God elects the one for the many, just as Israel was elected to serve as a light to the nations (cf. Torrance, 1996c:134, 135). It is this corporate covenant-election that is brought to fulfilment in Jesus Christ, the Mediator of the new covenant, in whom election and substitution “combine in the most unique, most intense and personal concentration of the one and the many.” Jesus Christ is the “actualisation” of the eternal purpose of God to give himself to humanity in pure love and grace. Every human being is loved by Jesus Christ, so that his atoning work is the “pouring out of the pure love of God upon all humanity” (Torrance, 1981b:132, 133; 2009:109, 183, 184).

For Torrance (1996c:14), therefore, election is “christologically conditioned.” While election proceeds from the timeless, eternal decree of God, this eternal decree, or word of election, enters historical time and space in the incarnate reality of the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ. The “heart of the mystery of election” is found in the hypostatic union, where God and man are reconciled in the one person of Jesus Christ. As Torrance argues, “Christ is himself the Elect One ‒ in him election becomes and operates as atoning mediation.” If there is a paradox in the grounding of election in both the eternal decree of God and the space-time reality of Jesus Christ, Torrance (1941:111) argues, “it is nothing else than the central paradox of the Christian faith, the Incarnation of the Son of God.”

References: see previous posts

Comment: I agree with Dr. Baxter Kruger in his assertion that it is time we take back the doctrine of election from the Calvinists, wherein predestination is reduced to a dark, inscrutable, and usually terrifying decretum horribilis. To paraphrase Barth, “Election is the best news we can hear.” The doctrine of predestination/election should cause us to rejoice, for it means that God has loved all humanity from the foundation of the world, and has determined that he will not be without us. As Torrance (1949:316) argues, because the whole universe revolves around the love of God in Jesus Christ, preaching should make election “the very centre of the Kerygma.” Amen!!