Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-fqc5m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T22:23:34.105Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

MURDER AND THE DEATH OF CHRIST

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2010

Get access

Extract

Some people believe that God made it a condition for His forgiveness even of repentant sinners that Jesus died a sacrificial death at human hands. Often, in the New Testament, this doctrine of Objective Atonement seems to be implied, as when Jesus spoke of his blood as ‘shed for many for the remission of sins’ (Matth. 26:28), or when St Paul said that ‘Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures’ (1 Cor. 3:15). And for many centuries the doctrine was indeed accepted by most if not all Christian theologians. It seems in fact to be an essential part of Christianity, which adherents of that religion cannot reject without undermining the authority both of their scriptures and of a very long tradition. It looks then as if objections to the doctrine are objections to the Christian scheme itself. Here is one of them. As the Gospels present it Jesus was murdered, by one or more of Pilate, the Sanhedrin and the Jewish mob. Given Objective Atonement, God ordained the sacrificial death of Jesus, and so, as it seems, this murder. Murder requires freedom on the killer's part. And many have doubted that an action can be both free and ordained by God. Leave that aside. A good God would in any case not make it a condition for our forgiveness that someone acquired the guilt of murder.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)