Is Christus Victor equally accepted by the Church with Anselm's teaching?

[josephback]

I’m assuming it is, on account of the Eastern Catholic rites. Just want to make sure.

 

[SonCatcher]

Anselm is losing sway in the Latin Church, though he reigns with a vengeance among Evangelicals.

Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger) even wrote against Anselm’s satisfaction theory.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

Yep. The current Latin atonement theory is something in between Christus Victor and satisfaction, I believe.

The Eastern Catholics do indeed believe Christus Victor. All of these theories are perfectly acceptable.

 

[josephback]

So there isn’t one definitive teaching on the matter? I’m doing a book on salvation, so I want to present what the Church teaches. Both Anselm and Christus Victor are acceptable?

 

[Marc_Anthony]

So there isn’t one definitive teaching on the matter? I’m doing a book on salvation, so I want to present what the Church teaches. Both Anselm and Christus Victor are acceptable?

Yes.

There are, of course, heretical theories, but as long as your theory of atonement is free of heresies it’s technically allowed.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

I’m assuming it is, on account of the Eastern Catholic rites. Just want to make sure.

St. Anselm is just another Saint as far as I’m concerned. I mean I have never gotten to know much about him. So I ask, what is " Christor Victor ? ":ehh:

 

[Marc_Anthony]

St. Anselm is just another Saint as far as I’m concerned. I mean I have never gotten to know much about him. So I ask, what is " Christor Victor ? ":ehh:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christus_Victor
**
The term Christus Victor refers to a Christian understanding of the atonement which views Christ’s death as the means by which the powers of evil, which held humankind under their dominion, were defeated.[1] It is a model of the atonement that is dated to the Church Fathers,[2] and it, or the related ransom theory, was the dominant theory of the atonement for a thousand years, until it was removed in the West by the eleventh-century Archbishop of Canterbury, Anselm, and replaced with his “satisfaction” model.[3]**

That’s pretty accurate.

And, for kicks,

Ransom Theory:

**The ransom view of the atonement,[1] is one of several doctrines in Christian theology related to the meaning and effect of the death of Jesus Christ. The first major theory of the atonement, the ransom theory of atonement originated in the early Church, particularly in the work of Origen. The theory teaches that the death of Christ was a ransom, usually said to have been paid to Satan, in satisfaction of his just claim on the souls of humanity as a result of sin. Christian philosopher Robin Collins summarized it as follows:

Essentially, this theory claimed that Adam and Eve sold humanity over to the Devil at the time of the Fall; hence, justice required that grace pay the Devil a ransom to free us from the Devil's clutches. God, however, tricked the Devil into accepting Christ's death as a ransom, for the Devil did not realize that Christ could not be held in the bonds of death. Once the Devil accepted Christ's death as a ransom, this theory concluded, justice was satisfied and God was able to free us from Satan's grip.[2]**

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ransom_theory_of_atonement

Satisfaction Theory:

Drawing primarily from the works of Anselm of Canterbury, the satisfaction theory teaches that Christ suffered as a substitute on behalf of humankind satisfying the demands of God’s honor by his infinite merit. Anselm regarded his satisfaction view of the atonement as a distinct improvement over the older ransom theory of the atonement, which he saw as inadequate. Anselm’s theory was a precursor to the refinements of Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin which introduced the idea of punishment to meet the demands of divine justice.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisfaction_theory_of_atonement

Wikipedia in this case is pretty accurate; at least, everything it says tallies up with my memory.

 

[Taestron]

Anselm is losing sway in the Latin Church, though he reigns with a vengeance among Evangelicals.

Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger) even wrote against Anselm’s satisfaction theory.

Actually, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if Christus Victor became the dominant view among evangelicals within the next generation. I, however, have difficulty accepting Cardinal Ratzinger’s arguments. He uses the language of “necessity” frequently, but the fact is, even under the satisfaction theory, Jesus did not come to save us out of necessity but out of love. He could have just let us wallow in sin, and without necessity, the love objection falls apart.

 

[SonCatcher]

Actually, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if Christus Victor became the dominant view among evangelicals within the next generation. I, however, have difficulty accepting Cardinal Ratzinger’s arguments. He uses the language of “necessity” frequently, but the fact is, even under the satisfaction theory, Jesus did not come to save us out of necessity but out of love. He could have just let us wallow in sin, and without necessity, the love objection falls apart.

Unfortunately, the only reason I find that statement acceptable is due to the apparently fickle nature of (acephalic) Evangelicalism. What is popular one generation is replaced in the next as old congregations die out and new ones are formed. There is no lasting foundation since their interpreting basis of scripture is individualistic.

Personally, I have mostly heard Satisfaction theory espoused by Evangelicals and the way it is presented almost invariably a forced, even robotic, series of rules and conclusions that deprives God of the freedom to choose any way of atonement He likes.

It may just be that Evangelicals make lousy apologists for Anselm’s theory. However, then-Cardinal Ratzinger would have been addressing the source (Anselm, himself) rather than the messenger.

 

[Orthodox_T]

Actually, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if Christus Victor became the dominant view among evangelicals within the next generation. I, however, have difficulty accepting Cardinal Ratzinger’s arguments. He uses the language of “necessity” frequently, but the fact is, even under the satisfaction theory, Jesus did not come to save us out of necessity but out of love. He could have just let us wallow in sin, and without necessity, the love objection falls apart.

I heard it put once by an Orthodox priest that God’s love moved Him out of necessity to send Christ; that, because He loved us, He had to. Of course, this doesn’t mean that some external force required God to act, but because He is love, it sprang from His very Being…meaning it was impossible for Him not to act because of Himself…if that makes sense?

 

[Eleve]

Yes, if God is a necessarily good being, then presumably the things he does out of goodness or love are also things that he does by necessity. That doesn’t mean that he does them dragging his feet, “because he has no choice.” To the contrary, it’s precisely because he chooses, and because his will is essentially good, that he does the right thing.

 

[newenglandsun]

Are there any early Christian commentaries covering the subject of atonement and how to make it out in Galatians 3?

 

[1AugustSon7]

This sounds convincing (from the above link to (then) Cardinal Ratzinger’s work):

The Problem with St Anselm’s Satisfaction Theory

With the Cross it is not a matter of an accumulation of physical pain, as if its redemptive value consisted in its involving the largest possible amount of physical torture. Why should God take pleasure in the suffering of his own Son, or even see it as the currency by which reconciliation has to be purchased from him? The Bible and right Christian belief are far removed from such ideas. It is not pain that counts. Love alone gives the pain an aim and a meaning. Were it otherwise, the executioners around the Cross would have been the priests offering the sacrifice. But the priest was Jesus, who reunited the two separated ends of the world in his love.

We know that our Lord was both the priest and the victim on the Cross offering himself to the Father. I would agree that - with points made in a later work (Jesus of Nazareth) from the same theologian - on the Cross we see the Lord fulfulling His word to “love to the end”: I.e., love was both the motivational force driving the Lord and also the end (goal) it was desiring to reach or, in other words, it was both the efficient and the final cause (or terminus) of the action, which seems to have an overall unity from the beginning to the end: The same love that preached to the poor and miraculously healed the sick and sought to restore justice at one time later would suffer the shame and humilitation of the Cross.

 

[newenglandsun]

Found one.

“So sin means both a bad action deserving punishment, and death the consequence of sin. Christ has no sin in the sense of deserving death, but He bore for our sakes sin in the sense of death as brought on human nature by sin. This is what hung on the tree; this is what was cursed by Moses. Thus was death condemned that its reign might cease, and cursed that it might be destroyed. By Christ’s taking our sin in this sense, its condemnation is our deliverance, while to remain in subjection to sin is to be condemned.” (Augustine Against Faustus 14.3)