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against nature, and made us his own disciples, the Word of God, being all-powerful and not wanting in justice, dealt justly even with the apostacy itself, buying back from it that which was His own; not violently, as he (Satan) had first gained dominion over us, by snatching greedily what did not belong to him, but by persuasion [by a method which convinced Satan his rights were at an end*] as it became God to receive what He willed by persuasion and not by force, so that neither might justice be violated, nor God's ancient creation perish. The Lord, therefore, redeemed us by His own blood, and gave His soul for (iπèp) our souls, and His flesh for (avrí) our flesh, and poured out the Spirit of the Father for the union and communion of God and man, bringing down God to men through the Spirit, raising men to God through His Incarnation, and firmly and truly giving us incorruption in His advent, through communion with God."+ For this redemption from Satan's mastery there was required a perfect obedience; compensating our disobedience through His obedience;' and hence in one passage Irenæus says, the price of our disobedience in Adam was paid by Christ's obedience in the Three Temptations; a statement which, I think, stands alone in patristic literature. This perfect obedience could only be rendered by Him who was both God and man : "For if Man had not conquered the adversary of man, he would not have been justly conquered. And, again,

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* This seems to be the obvious meaning, and not, as some understand it, 'by persuading men.'

+ Lib. v. 1.

Et tertio itaque vincens eum de reliquo repulit a semet ipso quasi legitime victum; et soluta est ea quæ fuerat in Adam præcepti prævaricatio, per præceptum legis quod servavit Filius hominis, non transgrediens præceptum Dei. Ib. 21.

if God had not given salvation, we should not have had it securely; and unless man were united with God we could not partake of incorruption."* Hence the Incarnation was necessary, that a perfect obedience might be offered, but the obedience of a man. Yet this obedience was not the means but the condition only of redemption; that had to be won by the Redeemer's death.† But how the Devil, to whom this death is ascribed, came to accomplish an act so fatal to himself; whether, as the Gnostics hold, from being deceived as to who Christ really was, or not; and again, what exactly was the connecting link between the Redeemer's conflict with Satan and His death, and how this last brought about our redemption-all this Irenæus leaves unexplained. He certainly regards Christ's death not as a punishment inflicted by God, but as the work of Satan, and temporal death itself rather as a blessing than a curse, introduced at the fall of man, to limit his opportunities of sin. On our deliverance from death, and him who has power over it, follows the restoration of our corrupted nature: “In His incarnation and manhood He recapitulated in Himself the long series of mankind...... that we might recover in Christ what we had lost in Adam, being made after the image and similitude of God."§ There is no

* Lib. iii. 18. 6. Cf. also v. 1. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἦν ἀληθῶς σαρκα καὶ αἷμα ἐσχηκὼς, δι' ὧν ἡμᾶς ἐξηγοράσατο, εἰ μὴ τὴν ἀρχαίαν πλάσιν τοῦ ̓Αδὰμ εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἀνακεφαλαιώσατο.

† Pro nobis mortuus est et sanguine Suo nos redemit. iii. 16.9.

Prohibuit autem ejus transgressionem, interponens mortem, et cessare faciens peccatum, finem inferens ei per carnis resolutionem, quæ fieret in terra. iii. 23, 6. § iii. 18. 1. Cf. v. 16, 1. There is an allusion to the distinction drawn between the image and likeness of God; the former representing the perfect type of humanity (or what the schoolmen call the 'integrity of nature'), the latter the superadded gift of grace, or 'original justice.' (See Clem. Alex. Strom. ii. 180,

need to dwell on those aspects of the author's teaching which are shared by his contemporaries.

Where Irenæus had left the question in the second century, Origen, who, notwithstanding his eccentricities, is justly styled the Father of theology,' took it up in the third; and what before had been an uncertain and fragmentary hypothesis assumes, under his creative touch, shape and consistency. With his peculiar views on the preexistence and successive metempsychoses of souls, on the final absorption of all bodily natures (including apparently our Lord's)* into the Divine essence, the extension of the efficacy of redemption to the whole creation in heaven and earth, and the ȧTокaráσTaois, or ultimate restitution of all fallen spirits, human or angelic, we need not here concern ourselves. Nor is it necessary to dwell on those parts of his teaching about redemption which do not materially differ from what has been already noticed in previous or contemporary Fathers. And in dealing with so voluminous a writer it will, of course, be impossible to point out all, or nearly all, the passages bearing on our more immediate subject; it must suffice to refer to such critical statements as supply an adequate exhibition of his manner of handling it.

Origen regards the redeeming work of Christ, as a whole, under five aspects. It includes His teaching, as the revelation of absolute truth; His works, as cleansing the temple, and especially His miracles, to

and the Fathers passim.) There is also a reference to the idea of Christ's predestined humanity being the image on which ours was modelled. Ad imaginem Dei fecit hominem, scilicet Christi.' Tertull. adv. Prax. 12. cf. Petav. De Trin.

vi. 6.

*Orig. De Princip. iii. 6, 1.; ii. 3, 3.

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which a symbolical meaning is attached; His life as the great Example; His sufferings and death, to which is ascribed a threefold efficacy, in our redemption from the power of Satan, our reconciliation with God, and the purification of our corrupted nature; and, lastly, His continual priesthood in heaven, which is constantly and emphatically dwelt upon, and whereby He who on earth poured out His material blood for us, is said 'to offer the vital virtue of His body as a kind of spiritual sacrifice.'* Origen's views under the fourth head, as to the efficacy of Christ's death, are what contain the specialities of his theory on the atonement. He considers that death a necessity, both for our ransom from/ Satan and as a Sacrifice for sin.

Let us take each point in order. It was left unexplained by Irenæus how the Evil One came to undermine his own kingdom by procuring the death of Jesus; in Origen's system this is clear enough. It was, in fact, but part of that great conflict between good and evil, of which this world had from the first been the theatre, and which found its consummation in the death of Christ. From the Fall onwards, the dragon and his angels had fought with man, and had seemed to prevail against him. Again and again prophets and righteous men had risen up, to bear witness for truth and holiness; and again and again the world, at the instigation of Satan, had crucified its benefactors. But he had overreached himself. The fathers slew the prophets, and the children built their sepulchres; the blood of the martyrs became the seed-plot

* Ib. In Joann. i. 2: ἑαυτὸν γὰρ εὐαγγελίζεται ὁ ὑιὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ. Hom. in Matt. xvi. 20; xii. 36. Contr. Cels. i. 68. Hom. in Rom. iii, 7-21. Hom. in Levit. i. 3.

of the Church. Within and without the immediate sphere of divine revelation this contest had been carried on.* The crisis came at last, and once more the Evil One deceived himself. He had obtained rights over men: a price, an equivalent (årráðλayμa) was due to him, to free them from his power; and they had none to pay. "Man has nothing to give as an equivalent for his soul;" and therefore, "One alone was able to pay a price for our lost soul, He who bought us with His own precious blood."+ Origen sometimes speaks of this as a kind of bargain with Satan; but he does not mean, as we shall see, that the bargain was made or accepted willingly. To the question suggested by Matt. xvii. 22, By whom was the Lord given into the hands of men? he replies, "Not all gave Him up with the same design. God delivered Him out of love for the human race (Rom. viii. 32). But others delivered Him up with evil intent, each according to his own wickedness; Judas for avarice, the priests for envy, the Devil from fear, lest by His teaching the human race should be snatched out of his hands, not perceiving that the human race was to be still more delivered by His death than it had been by His teaching and miracles." Here and elsewhere Origen expressly asserts what Irenæus had left doubtful, that Satan was deceived, and thought by slaying our Lord to get pos

*See Contr. Cels. i. 31; vii. 17; viii. 44.

† Cf. Tom. in Matt. xiii. 581. Origen speaks sometimes of Christ's blood as the price paid, sometimes of His Soul, the reality of which he was the first to bring prominently forward. But he here distinguishes, in what sense is not very clear, the Soul of Christ from His Spirit, which He commended into the hands of His Father. He certainly does not mean by soul, as Thomasius thinks (Origines, p. 223), the blood or physical life, for he speaks expressly of its going down to Hades. Tom. xvi. 8.

Tom. xxxv. 75.

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