Three caricatures to kill

Gustaf Aulén, in his preface to the paperback edition of Christus Victor explains that in connection with the image of God his book has as its aim the exposure of three caricatures of God:

the God of fatalism, where even the evil proceeds from God; the God of moralism, where the spontaneity of the Love of God is being killed; and finally the shallow view of God's Love, where Love is considered self-evident, and where, therefore, every sense of the Love's hard work has been lost. Concerning gods of these types a 'god-is-dead-theology' could do us a service - especially if its death sentences were efficacious. Then it would be a work in the service of the living God of the Gospel.

The Epic Gospel Story

Gustaf Aulén says of the subjective/moral influence view of the atonement that it sets "forth a 'purified,' 'simple' conception of God, whose characteristic is an unchanging Love. But the simplicity is won at the cost of the obscuring of the hostility of the Divine Love to evil; the conception of the Divine Love has become humanised, and at the same time rather obvious and stereotyped" (p. 154, Christus Victor).

I haven't read Love Wins, so don't know if this is fair, but I did recently come across one persons view of it. He felt it was

an exceptionally bland story. There is no drama. No deep conflict requiring resolution. No compelling need for a satisfying denouement. Where is the insurmountable problem that must be overcome? Where’s the cliff we might fall off? Where’s the foreshadowed death that can be avoided only by intervention from the outside? Nothing is ever really at stake in Bell’s tale of limitless happy endings. It has even less suspense than a child’s bedtime story.

(pp. 145-206, Mike Wittmer, Christ Alone)

The real story of the Bible is never bland or obvious, but full of colour and surprises.

Last night in our home group we read the whole of Ephesians. It struck me afresh that the Gospel story is an epic. It is cosmic in scope, evil really is dark, the battle is violent, and there is a great hero.

Un-systematic ramblings on systematisation

Gustaf Aulén believes the 'classic' view of the atonement is only 'an idea, a motif, a theme' and not a 'theory'. 'It has been fully definite and unambiguous' in its expression, but 'it has never been shaped into a rational theory' (p. 157, Christus Victor).

The classic type is characterised by a whole series of contrasts of opposites, which defy rational systematisation, while the other two find rational solutions of the antinomies along theological or psychological lines.

...the oppositions of the classic type...are present wherever the classic type appears. God is at once the all-ruler, and engaged in conflict with the powers of evil. These powers are evil powers, and at the same time executants of God's judgment on sin. God is at the same time the Reconciler and the Reconciled. His is the Love and His the Wrath. The Love prevails over the Wrath, and yet Love's condemnation of sin is absolute. The Love is infinite and unfathomable, acting contra rationem et legem [contrary to reason and law], justifying men without any satisfaction of the Divine justice or any consideration of human merit; yet at the same time God's claim on men is sharpened to the uttermost.

Every attempt to force this conception into a purely rational scheme is bound to fail; it could only succeed by robbing it of its religious depth. For theology lives and has its being in these combinations of seemingly incompatible opposites.

(p. 155, Christus Victor)

In this respect he is a typical Lutheran. Frustrating to a rationalist like me and yet full of life and colour.

He calls on Luther to aid him in his cause, and even though I think Luther was less opposed to substitutionary atonement than Aulén believes, it is difficult to argue that Luther was ever systematic. He wrote scores of volumes of work and yet almost nothing that could be described as systematic.

More recently I have encountered much of this anti-systematic Lutheranism in Gerhard Forde and Oswald Bayer. Steven Paulson, a student of Forde, recalls another theologian quip about Forde that he had "lost interest in doing systematic theology".

Another student of Forde, Mark Mattes's has recently written a book analysing the theology of Jungel, Pannenberg, Moltmann, Jenson and Bayer. He argues:

Theology should not be about providing an overall system, but instead should deconstruct systems. Undoubtedly, it is desirable for the church's catechesis to seek rhetorically a structured presentation of the faith ...[but not] a "God's eye view" of all reality...The most important task in theology is not construction but discernment. All construction needs to subordinate itself to this discernment, and not vice versa.

(pp. 181-182, The Role of Justification in Contemporary Theology)

Against this background it is only really Bayer that he finds limiting theology appropriately:

For Bayer, theology is not done to integrate all knowledge, either theoretical or practical, into an abstract unity, but to limit reason to its proper fields. It is the art of discerning what God is saying to us, not peering into the divine

(p. 149)

In biblical theology I have found Seifrid also upholding this lack of systematisation.

PS In case you wondered, I feel the Lutherans have something useful to say here, but I am not totally with them.

Christus Victor

In Christus Victor, Gustaf Aulén summarises his strange but seminal account of the three atonement 'theories' as follows:

1. structure - Classic: continuity of divine action and discontinuity in the legal order; Latin: discontinuity of divine action and continuity in the legal order; Subjective: man as active party.
2. The idea of Sin - Classic: sin is an objective power and also deeply personalised; Latin: materialized view of sin; Subjective: weak view of sin.
3. Salvation - Classic: comprehensive in scope; Latin: 'series of acts standing in relatively loose connection'; Subjective: psychological change.
4. Christ and the incarnation - Classic: God himself had to do work so incarnation is necessary; Latin: less clearly necessary as God is not direct agent in atonement; Subjective: Jesus is only the 'Pattern Man' and divinity of Jesus is downplayed.
5. The conception of God - Classic: 'idea of God involves a double opposition' as he is manifested in conflict with evil, yet at the same time as the 'all-ruler' so dualism is 'not to be ultimate'; Latin: has less violent form of opposition that is compromised in a rational way; Subjective: no opposition.

He has come under much criticism for the accuracy of his historical theology. I am also thoroughly confused by what he was trying to say in some parts (e.g. on incarnation) and think he is almost wilfully blind to what a proponent of the Latin view would say in response to some of his points.

Interesting reading though, particularly because exponents of Christus Victor don't seem to see its strengths to be the same as those Aulén gets most excited about.