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doctrine of the atonement has not been so fully treated as many others by Catholic writers, that it never formed the subject of any specific heresy before the Reformation, and did not even then become a prominent topic of controversy, partly from internal differences among the Reformers themselves about it, partly from the more immediate practical interest at the time of questions about Church authority and the Sacraments. We shall have occasion, however, to notice the treatment of the question by the leading Protestant divines, with the earliest of whom it acquired a new shape and significance, and became a fruitful source of misconceptions.

Thousands and tens of thousands, I know, have knelt in loving adoration before the Crucified, who never attempted to reason about the crucifixion; they felt what it meant, though they could not put their meaning into words, or were content to use such words only as those of a popular English hymn:

"I cannot understand the woe

Which Thou wast pleased to bear;

O dying Lamb, I do but know

That all my hopes are there."

Far be it from us to blame them.

Doubtless there

is more to be learnt from the crucifix than all the wisdom of all the theologians can teach us. Yet the mysteries of revelation were given to be food for the intellect, as well as for the heart; and, moreover, the questionings of heresy which have fixed the form, have troubled the unconscious simplicity of our early faith. Such scriptural statements as that "the good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep," or that "the Son of

Man came to give His life a ransom instead of many," or that "we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins," or that "God having sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh," or that "as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive;" "as by one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, by the obedience of One the many shall be made righteous:"* these and the like passages contain a depth and richness of meaning which no meditation can exhaust; but they also suggest many difficult questions which successive writers and schools, as well within as without the Church, have variously answered. Such an inquiry as the present is not, therefore, a needless one. Only let us never forget, amid the maze of theological speculations, the one grand lesson of the Passion, Amor meus crucifixus est.

John x. 11; Matt. xx. 28; Eph. i. 7; Col. i. 14;
Rom. viii. 3; 1 Cor. xv. 22; Rom. v. 19.

CHAPTER II.

THE ANTE NICENE FATHERS.

As a general rule, the rise of successive heresies is the occasion and measure of dogmatic statements of the faith. We do not, therefore, look in the AnteNicene Fathers for any elaborate discussion of questions not yet brought into controversy. Even on the central doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation, we know how halting and inadequate, to use the mildest terms, their language frequently is, before the Arian, Sabellian, Monophysite, and Nestorian heresies had forced out into bolder relief the contrary definitions of the Church, as has been conclusively shown by Petavius, and not disproved though disputed in the Defensio Fidei Nicence of Bp. Bull.* Neither, again,

*Petav. De Trin. i. 3-5. No candid critic in the present day would deny the substantial correctness of Petavius's estimate. If he errs, it is rather in exaggerating than in depreciating the accuracy of theological statement in the early Greek Fathers, especially as regards the doctrines of grace. It is no disparagement to the general merits of the Defensio to say that the learned author has sometimes allowed himself to become too much of a special pleader,-a common fault of his day among theologians. A recent Anglican writer observes: "I am bound to state candidly, that, while I sympathize with the intention of Bull, I incline practically to the judgments of Petavius. It requires a thorough-going advocate to accept Bull's expurgated edition of Ante-Nicene theology." Owen's Introd. to the Study of Dogmatic Theology. London, 1858.

can we reasonably expect to find in earlier writers that precision of theological statement which only came into vogue when theology, partly in the conflict with error, partly through the influence of Greek philosophy at Alexandria, began to be formed into a science. On the subject of the atonement, the Ante-Nicene Fathers do not, with the exception of Irenæus and Origen, propound any definite theory. The word 'Satisfaction' they never use, or use, if at all, of the satisfaction of the penitent, not of Christ;* nor was the idea, as afterwards explained, familiar to them. But they speak, in connexion with the Incarnation, and in general terms, often borrowed directly or indirectly from the language of Scripture, of the sufferings, the death, the blood, the obedience, and the sacrifice of Christ, as being offered for us, and being the means of our redemption. It is from passages of this kind that we must gather their teaching on the subject; and, to present a clear and consistent view of it, a fuller employment of detailed references and quotations will be needful than in the case of more systematic writers, whose opinions can be fairly summed up in an analysis. I will do my best, however, to avoid burdening the reader with more of lengthened quotations than is really requisite, and to select such passages only as will in each case give a fair and adequate specimen of the writer's method of handling the question. We shall afterwards be in a position to draw some inferences, as to the general drift of patristic teaching as a whole, and its relations to later theology.

* It is used in this sense by Tertullian and Cyprian. There is no word for it in the Greek.

C

First in order come the apostolic Fathers, St. Clement of Rome, Barnabas, Hermas, St. Polycarp, and St. Ignatius; but their writings will not detain us long.

We have two Epistles of Clement, to the Church at Corinth, on practical disputes which had arisen there, only dealing quite incidentally with any questions of doctrine. He is distinct in asserting, that the blood of Christ is the means of bestowing on us redemption and grace, and that by the will and through the love of God. "In love the Master received us; through the love He had for us Christ our Lord gave His blood for us, by the will of God, and His flesh for our flesh, and His soul for our souls." And again, "Let us look then to the blood of Christ, and behold how precious is His blood to God, since it was shed for our salvation, and has procured for the whole world the grace of repentance."* Clement makes the scarlet cord let down by Rahab a type of the blood of Christ; and speaks of Him as our High Priest, according to the constant usage of the Fathers. The universality of redemption, and the death of Christ as the source of grace, are here clearly laid down.

Let us turn to the General Epistle of Barnabas, which, though not by the apostle of that name, nor indeed a writing of the first century, appeared early in the second, at Alexandria. We read, in the seventh chapter, of Christ offering the vessel of His soul (i. e. His body) as a sacrifice for our sins; and of Isaac's sacrifice as a type: the writer also dwells, as do others afterwards, on the type of the two goats, one of which was sacrificed, and the other made a scape-goat, being ac

*Clem. Rom. Ep. ad Cor. 1. xlix. 7.

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