The Cross in Context: Reconsidering Biblical Metaphors for Atonement

The concept of atonement, addressed through Jesus Christ and how the essential relationship between God and humans is restored, is a central element in Christian theology. Yet atonement is a complex concept, expressed through a variety of biblical images and approached by theologians in a variety of different ways. Theologians have developed six primary theories for understanding atonement, including recapitulation, Christus victor, ransom, moral influence, satisfaction, and penal substitution. Each of these models provides some helpful insights, but disagreement about them have caused much conflict and divisiveness among Christians. What the pseudonymous Southeastern Baptist author W. (Reading Romans with Eastern Eyes) is particularly concerned about is how evangelical Christians often evaluate others by whether they hold to the penal substitution theory. His approach is to move back from theories and examine how the concept of atonement is presented in various places in the Bible. From this analysis, he finds three key metaphors: impurity, debt, and burden. He uses those analogies to evaluate the atonement theories.