C.C. Walker, 1929

“The Atonement”

“Atonement”: Definition and Synonyms

The English phrase, “the atonement,” is found but once in the New Testament (A.V.), namely, in Rom. 5:11. The passage with its context runs as follows:

“When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life. And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement” (verses 6–11).

In the margin here the alternative “reconciliation” is given for “atonement” in the text; and in the Revised Version “reconciliation” has been put in the text, thus harmonizing the context, and leaving that term “reconciliation” as the sole English representative of the original Greek word katallagee, the only occurrences of which in the N.T. are the following: Rom. 5:11; 11:15; 2 Cor. 5:18, 19.

It is obvious from the foregoing that “the atonement,” or “reconciliation,” has to do with the death of Christ the Son of God in reconciling men to God. But what is the radical idea underlying the original term? It is a change of status from some other position—a restoration to favour, the verb katallasso being formed from allos, another. An allophulos was a man of another race or nation, i.e., not a Jew (Acts 10:28). Such were the Ephesian Christians by nature (Eph. 2:11), but in Christ they were “no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God” (verse 19).

The synonyms of “atonement” in the New Testament are “reconciliation,” as above, “ransom,” “redemption,” “propitiation,” “justification,” in all of which it is to be understood that God, the Father, is the Prime Mover, and that His purpose, justice and mercy are always manifested and upheld in His work.

Thus, as to “ransom”: Jesus said, “The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28; Mark 10:45). “There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time” (1 Tim. 2:5, 6), (or, R.V., “the testimony to be borne in its own times”), that is by the apostles (compare 2 Tim. 2:8).

So also with regard to “redemption,” of which word “ransom” is but a much shrunken form. Believers are “justified freely by God’s grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:24). “Of him (God) are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us (apostles and brethren) wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor. 1:30). See also Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14.

So again with regard to “propitiation” and “propitiatory,” always understanding that no idea of “substitution,” or satisfaction, in the sense of “commercial transaction,” as it has been profanely expressed, underlies the divine usage of the terms: “If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the propitiation (hilasmos) for our sins” (1 John 2:1–2). “God loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). “Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth (marg. foreordained) to be a propitiation (hilasterion) through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God” (Rom. 3:24, 25). Hilasterion is the Greek term by which the Septuagint translated kapporeth, the “mercy seat” of the Old Testament scriptures. “We have such a high priest (after the order of Melchisedec) … a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man … There was (under the first, Mosaic, covenant) a tabernacle … and after the second veil the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of all; which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant, and over it the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat (hilasterion); of which we cannot now speak particularly” (Heb. 8:1–2; 9:2–5).

Atonement in the Old Testament

From these references it is obvious that we cannot rightly understand and appreciate “the atonement” unless we rightly understand and appreciate the divine ideas underlying the typical “atonement” of the Old Testament scriptures. We are expressly told that Christ died “for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first covenant” (Heb. 9:15). So that all its ritual localized in him, and was but “the shadow of good things to come” (Heb. 10:1).

First, then, as a matter of words and meanings, it must be remarked that whereas the word “atonement” occurs but once in the New Testament (A.V., and not at all in the text of the R.V.), it occurs frequently in the Old Testament, and is there the representative of the Hebrew verb kahphar (literally to cover) and its derivatives. In Gen. 6:14 God said to Noah, “Make thee an ark of gopher wood … and thou shalt pitch it within and without with pitch”. Here the verb is kahphar and the noun kopher, because pitch was the covering substance with which the ark was waterproofed. Kopher is also translated ransom, satisfaction; and in a bad sense, bribe. Kippooreem, plural, is translated atonement, atonements, and the yom hakkippurim, the great “Day of Atonement” (Lev. 16), is memorialized to this day among the Jews.

The radical idea then of “atone” in the Old Testament is to cover.

Religion

This takes us back to the first covering for sin and the institution of “religion” in “the beginning,” or “the foundation of the world,” as it is called in the New Testament scriptures (Luke 11:50, 51; 1 Pet. 1:19, 20; Rev. 13:8; 17:8). The word “religion” is said to be derived from religare, to rebind, reunite; but the derivation is apparently not primitive, but has been invented by Augustine and his followers to fit the facts of the case, which are undoubted. The facts are these: God’s law is the rule of human conduct. “Sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4, R.V.). “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin” (Rom. 5:12).

Obviously therefore sin produced a breach between God and man and after the entry of sin into the world there was need of “religion” if the breach was to be healed and the reign of death abolished. But the word “religion” is rare in the New Testament, and is there used in the classical sense of worship, or religious observance. The following are the occurrences:

“After the straitest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee” (Acts 26:5). “Ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it; and profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers” (Gal. 1:13, 14). “If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is vain. Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father (R.V.) is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world” (Jas. 1:26, 27). “Many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas” (Acts 13:43).

From these texts the New Testament usage of “religion” and “religious” will be clearly perceived. The question of “the atonement” and the covering of sin remains.

Law

God’s law is the rule of human conduct, and has been in the world from “the beginning”. Christ says so, and that is enough (Matt. 19:3–5). And his reference is to the world before the entrance of sin, when there was no sin, no shame, fear and death, no religion. The contradictory evolutionary speculations of anthropologists are of no weight against Christ’s word, as will be seen when he returns to the earth. Meanwhile they have to be endured. Some talk of “man’s fall upwards,” and seem to think that law is a bad thing, and that it would have been good if man had been left to do just as he pleased. But it is difficult to suppose that such would lightly contemplate the abolition of law in the world of mankind as at present constituted. As a matter of fact law is beautiful, and affords scope for the manifestation of character, which is what God designs.

“When the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” (Gal. 4:4). The reference here is to “the law of Moses,” but there was a law of God in the world long before that, even from “the beginning”. It is recorded in Gen. 2:17, and is in the form of a simple prohibition with an attached death penalty for the breach of law: “Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die”.

Sin

“Sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4, R.V.). The definition is comprehensive, and covers thought, word and deed—sins of omission and sins of commission. “The thought of foolishness is sin” (Prov. 24:9). “By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned” (Matt. 12:37). “To him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin” (Jas. 4:17). “All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever” (1 John 2:16–17).

Read in the light of these divine maxims of the New Testament, the account of the fall in Genesis 3 is terribly intelligible, and in harmony with distressful human experience. Whereas before sin entered “they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed” (Gen. 2:25), after sin it was not so, for “the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked” (Gen. 3:7). Shame and fear were experienced, and a covering for sin, even in the estimation of the sinners, became a necessity: “they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons”. The first clothing therefore was not a climatic requirement, but was a moral and not a physical necessity.

The Divine “Clothing”

But a humanly-devised covering was not tolerated by God: “Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them” (Gen. 3:21). From the fact that Abel’s divinely-accepted offering (Gen. 4:4) is said to be “of the firstlings of his flock” we conclude that the “coats of skins” were made of lambs’ skins, and that in this brief allusion we have the first reference to “the lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” of which the Lord Jesus speaks, as has already been remarked.

Thus from “the beginning” was set forth the divine principle regarding atonement or reconciliation that “without shedding of blood there is no remission” (Heb. 9:22); and thenceforward in the divine economy clothing appointed by God represented God’s covering for sin, and consequent forgiveness, while “nakedness” represented sinful flesh given over to shame, fear, and death, by God.

In the Mosaic economy “linen garments to cover their nakedness” were appointed for Aaron and his sons; and they were to wear them in their ministrations, “that they bear not iniquity and die” (Exod. 28:42, 43).

In the divine symbolism the flesh is always regarded as unclean and defiling, and “filthy rags” (Isa. 64:6), “filthy garments” (Zech. 3:3), “garments spotted by the flesh” (Jude 23, 8–10), “defiled garments” (Rev. 3:4), are representative of “iniquity,” moral corruption, and a dead-alive state like the majority of the church at Sardis (Rev. 3:1).

Hence a change of raiment and the removal of such garments is the removal of “iniquity,” the end being eternal life. Thus to the “few” in Sardis the Lord said, “They have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy”. And the explanation of the “white raiment” is immediately added: “I will not blot out his name out of the book of life” (Rev. 3:5).

Death

“The wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). What is death? Upon a right answer to this fundamental question will depend a right understanding of “the atonement,” and the reason why Christendom is so much astray concerning the atonement is because it is so much astray concerning death and the state of man in death. To quote from a very widely-circulated definition: “In the death-state, a man instead of having ‘gone to another world,’ is simply a body deprived of life, and as utterly unconscious as if he had never existed. Corruption will destroy his dead body, and he will pass away like a dream. Hence the necessity for ‘resurrection’.” “In death there is no remembrance” (Psa. 6:5). “The dead know not anything” (Ecc. 9:5, 6). The death-state is a state of not being (Psa. 37:10). In the day of death man’s “thoughts perish” (Psa. 146:3, 4).

Consequently the notion of “continuity” of life in the death-state is a “strong delusion,” sent of God upon disobedient professors of religion who in a world full of Bibles prefer to “believe a lie” (2 Thess. 2:11, 12). It is a mere “fable” (2 Tim. 4:1–4), a speculation of pagan “philosophy,” to which Paul prophesied apostate Christians should at last turn. The popular cultus of “spiritualism,” which is simply a revival of the old pagan “necromancy”, is perhaps the most challenging form of the current “strong delusion”. Under the influence of such ideas the Bible doctrine of “atonement” or “reconciliation” is absolutely unintelligible. It has nothing to do with “continuity” and alleged “immortal souls”. Nothing of the sort is to be found in the Bible, though a few passages of scripture are “wrested” to support such heresies.

Sacrifice

The law of God said to Adam, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Gen. 2:17). It may be well in passing to remark that the expression, “In the day,” does not mean in the literal day, as may be seen from a study of all the texts where b’yom, the Hebrew expression, occurs. This is also to be understood from the fact that Adam lived long after he had sinned, even “nine hundred and thirty years” (Gen. 5:5), and then “died”. Much nonsense has been written about Adam and this “day”. It would be unprofitable to discuss it here. What was involved in “dying” is sufficiently indicated in Gen. 3:19 compared with other scriptures, such as those already quoted. “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread (many days) till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return”. Obviously then, “atonement” or “reconciliation” must provide a remedy for this condition, even an anastasis or resurrection, a standing up again out of the dust on the part of those who have been “redeemed” upon God’s own principles of faith and obedience.

This was proclaimed by God from Eden onwards. “The lamb slain from the foundation of the world” foreshadowed “the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29, 36), and the “taking away of the sin of the world” involved first his own resurrection from the dead, and consequently that of his people, as he said, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25). So that the very earliest divine promise of reconciliation involved the death of Christ and his resurrection. The seed of the woman “shall bruise thy head, (O serpent), and thou shalt bruise his heel” (Gen. 3:15). “Unto Adam and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skin, and clothed them” (verse 21).

From that time forth all the sacrifices of the Antediluvian age, the Patriarchal age, and the elaborate divine ritual of the Mosaic age, pointed forward, as “shadows of good things to come,” to “our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom (says Paul) we have received the atonement,” or “reconciliation” (Rom. 5:11).

Forgiveness

“If thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared” (Psa. 130:3, 4). “To the Lord our God belong mercies and forgiveness, though we have rebelled against him” (Dan. 9:9). “Jesus … hath God exalted with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are his witnesses” (Peter in Acts 5:31, 32). “Be it known unto you, men and brethren, that through this man (Jesus) is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses” (Paul in the synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia—Acts 13:38, 39).

“The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). Paul emphasizes the difference between the wages earned and the gift of grace. But forgiveness is not unconditional, as is obvious from the passages quoted. It must be accompanied by repentance and the fear of God on the part of the one forgiven. When our first parents had sinned approach to God was not as aforetime. Their lives were indeed prolonged for a long time, but the approach was henceforth through sacrifice and a humble recognition of the righteousness of God in the death of sinners; and death at last overtook them. “Without shedding of blood there is no remission”. Eternal life, which is divinely associated with the ultimate “blotting out of sin” (Acts 3:19), was to be revealed long after Adam’s day, first in “the Seed of the Woman,” and his individual triumph over the Serpent and Death; and at last in his return from heaven in “the times of refreshing” to raise and revive his redeemed (Matt. 25:31–46; Rev. 14:1–4).

During all the long interval between Adam’s day and that still future consummation, the idea of divine forgiveness of sin has been before the world with that end in view. It may be profitably considered from two points of view, God’s and man’s. There is God’s change of mind towards the forgiven person, and the forgiven sinner’s change of status and condition in the presence of his Creator. God will not tolerate sin. “Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people; cast them out of my sight” (Jer. 15:1). “My mind was alienated from her” (Aholibah—Jerusalem) (Ezek. 23:18). This was because of prolonged and incurable apostasy.

On the other hand, God respects “integrity”. “The Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering” (Gen. 4:4), because it was a work of faith and obedience (Heb. 11:4). But Cain was of that wicked one and slew his brother, because his own works were evil and his brother’s righteous (1 John 3:12). And his posterity was eliminated from the earth by the deluge. All this was long before the law of Moses and its “shadows” of “atonement”.

Abimelech, king of Gerar, being deceived by Abraham and Sarah, “took Sarah” (Gen. 20:2). But God warned him in a dream that she was a married woman. Abimelech pleaded his “integrity”. “And God said unto him in a dream, Yea, I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart; for I also withheld thee from sinning against me: therefore suffered I thee not to touch her. Now therefore restore the man his wife; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live; but if thou restore her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine”. Thus warned, Abimelech speedily restored to Abraham the prospective mother of Isaac and ancestress of the promised “Seed”. “And God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants, and they bare children”.

Circumcision

Just before this episode God “gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision” (Acts 7:8; Gen. 17), which was a repudiation of the flesh, and signified “the putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ” (Col. 2:11). Thus circumcision, which was afterwards divinely incorporated in the Mosaic covenant, as Jesus reminded the Jews (John 7:22, 23), was, like the rest of that economy, “a shadow of good things to come,” even “the taking away of the sin of the world”. The mere outward form, apart from the faith and works of Abraham, was “nothing,” as Paul argued (1 Cot. 7:19; Gal. 5:6; Rom. 2:25–29). The faith and works of Jesus Christ are the substance of “the atonement”. Still Jesus was circumcised (Luke 2:21). Being “made of a woman, made under the law,” it was part of his obedience. “The token of the covenant” was not lacking; but in him shadow and substance were divinely combined, and he was “cut off out of the land of the living” (Isa. 53:8). But as the context here says, it was for the transgression of God’s people that he was stricken, and he “prolonged his days” by resurrection to life eternal. In Christian baptism believers of the gospel are “circumcised with the circumcision made without hands” (Col. 2:11).

The Offering of Isaac

“The atonement” in Jesus Christ was also typically revealed to Abraham in the divinely-commanded offering of Isaac. The divine covenant of promise to Abraham before he had a son was this: “All the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever” (Gen. 13:15). Paul tells us that this ever-living seed is Christ (Gal. 3:16), of whom Isaac his progenitor was but a type. Yet when Isaac the child of promise was born, God commanded Abraham to offer him for a burnt offering on Mount Moriah (Gen. 22). Abraham obeyed, being full of faith in God’s purpose of resurrection (Heb. 11:17–19; Jas. 2:21, 22). And when the angel arrested Abraham’s hand when he was in the act of slaying Isaac, the promised Seed was figuratively given back by resurrection, a striking foreshadowing of what actually happened in after times to Jesus Christ in the same place “by the blood of the everlasting covenant” (Heb. 13:20).

The Law of Moses

“By him (Jesus) all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses” (Acts 13:39). “The law … can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect … In those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year” (Heb. 10:1–3). “Jesus our Lord … was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). “By works a man is justified, not by faith only” (James 2:24). Both Paul and James, in the places cited, are speaking of Abraham (centuries before the law of Moses), but at different times of his life.

“Justification”

This word has two senses which should be clearly distinguished: 1, vindication, declaring to be just; and 2, absolution, acquittal, forgiveness, reconciliation.

In the first sense our Lord alone is justified. The spirit of Christ in Isaiah said: “The Lord GOD will help me; therefore shall I not be confounded: therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. He is near that justifieth me; who will contend with me?” (Isa. 50:7, 8). And Jesus himself afterwards put it to the Jews: “Which of you convinceth me of sin?” (John 8:46). And though they adjudged him “a sinner” (John 9:24), and with the Romans put him to death as such, God raised him from the dead to eternal life, and thus “justified” him in the sense of vindicated him; openly declaring him before all men to be “the only begotten Son of God” in whom the Father was well pleased (Rom. 1:4; John 1:14).

In the second sense of “justification” the adopted sons and daughters of God are all absolved, acquitted, forgiven, reconciled to God by His grace through faith and repentance, and (after the sacrifice of Christ) by baptism into the name of Jesus Christ, and by “good works which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10). The spirit of Christ in Isaiah had likewise spoken of this, saying, “By his knowledge shall my Righteous Servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities” (Isa. 53:11).

The “justification” under the law of Moses of which Paul speaks (Acts 13:39) was merely a foreshadowing of these things, and the law itself was not designed by God to give eternal life (Rom. 3:20; 4:13–16; Gal. 2:15, 16; 3:2, 10–11, 29) but to manifest Sin (Rom. 7:12–13). Nevertheless it was “holy and just and good,” and in all its ritual “a shadow of good things to come”. Thus the “atonement” which was elaborately specified had to do with the material altars of burnt offering and incense. In the book of Exodus the Tabernacle in the Wilderness is described—the divinely-specified offerings for its construction, the specification for the construction, the description of the manufacture according to pattern, and the ritual by which “atonement” was made for the Tabernacle and all its furniture, and through these for the High Priest and priests and people of Israel.

In Exodus 29:36, 37, God commanded that the altar of burnt offering should be “cleansed” by “atonement”. Likewise the altar of incense (Exod. 30:10; Lev. 4), the last passage describing how the “sins of ignorance” of priest, congregation, ruler and people were to be “atoned” for. The divine formula ran thus: “The priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them”. But the forgiven persons nevertheless died, though God overlooked their specific sins. And in any case there came the annual “Day of Atonement” when, as Paul emphasizes, there was “remembrance again made of sins every year” (Heb. 10:3), whereas the terms of the new covenant were, “I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (Jer. 31:34; Heb. 8:12). The angel Gabriel described this “substance,” afterwards to be revealed in “Messiah the Prince,” as God’s purpose in him “to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness” (Dan. 9:24). “For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ” (John 1:17).

Jesus Christ himself said so: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:14–16).

“The Lamb of God”

This is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” of which John the Baptist and Jesus himself speak so particularly. “Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29, 36; Acts 8:32; 1 Pet. 1:19). In the Book of Revelation the expression “the Lamb” (or an equivalent) is found about thirty times, which of itself shows the importance God in Christ attaches to the sacrifice which is the basis of all “good things to come.”

“The Lamb,” by divine paradox proclaimed in the context as “the Lion of the tribe of Judah,” opens the divinely-sealed scroll of human history, and receives the ascriptions of the praises of the “redeemed” for whom he was slain (Rev. 5). Under the “sixth seal” the whole pagan world comes to an end before “the wrath of the Lamb” (6:16), another divine paradox. Then there is the vision of the new world of “the Israel of God” (7:9, 14, 17) “before the throne and before the Lamb” in “salvation.” “By the blood of the Lamb” these “redeemed” ones overcame the world (12:11) and maintained their separation from the “wild-beast” apostasy that hunted them to death as it did him (13:8, 11; 11:8). They stand at last “on Mount Zion” with the “Lamb” (14:1, 4, 10) and “sing the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lamb” (15:3). They have been with the “Lamb” in his victory over the kings who made war upon him (17:14) and are united to him in anti-typical “marriage” (19:7–9). By another figure they are “the holy city, new Jerusalem,” “the bride, the Lamb’s wife” (21:2, 9, 14, 22, 23, 27), incorporating “wall” and “temple,” “light” and “life.” And the book ends on the theme of “the throne of God and of the Lamb” (22:1, 3), and the assurance that he “comes quickly,” to which the apostle says fervently in conclusion, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”

What are the literal things conveyed by these divine figures? What is actually involved in the expression, “taketh away the sin of the world”? What is the taking away of sin?

The Taking Away of Sin

To “take away sin” is to heal disease, and ultimately to “abolish death”—to take away the effects of sin. Obviously actions cannot be recalled, but the effects thereof can be modified or obliterated.

David sinned, and God, by Nathan’s parable, made him pass judgment upon himself: “As the LORD liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die … And Nathan said unto David, Thou art the man … And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD. And Nathan said unto David, The LORD hath also put away thy sin; thou shalt not die. Howbeit” … etc. The action was irrevocable; the law was clear (Lev. 20:10; Deut. 22:22; John 8:5). God put away David’s sin in remitting the immediate death penalty, punishing him in this life and leaving him to die in due course, before the terms of the “everlasting covenant” (2 Sam. 7:8–16; 23:1–5) could be fulfilled, consistently with the divine majesty, justice and mercy.

“Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee” (Matt. 9:2). So Jesus spoke to the palsied man, who was immediately healed and walked away. “Behold thou art made whole: sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee” (John 5:14). So Jesus spoke to the “impotent man” when he found him in the temple after he had healed him. Men “sin against their own bodies” (1 Cor. 6:18); but if they continue sinning after having been forgiven by Jesus “a worse thing” awaits them, even “the second death” (Rev. 21:8). In the cases cited it is obvious that the “taking away of sin” is the taking away of the effect in greater or less degree. The climax is the abolition of death itself, as Paul said to Timothy: “God hath saved us … according to his own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began; but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Tim. 1:8–10). And ultimately, through the purpose and grace of God in “the Lamb,” “there shall be no more death … for the former things are passed away” (Rev. 21:4). Obviously Jesus Christ has “abolished death” as yet only in himself: “For in that he died, he died unto Sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God” (Rom. 6:10).

“Sin”: Personification and Metonymy

“Sin is lawlessness”—that is the primary meaning of the word as given by the beloved disciple (1 John 3:4). But there are secondary meanings, by figures of speech such as personification and metonymy; and unless these are recognized confusion will result.

Personification is a natural, graphic and highly intelligible figure of speech, common in the scriptures. Riches are personified as “Mammon, a Master” (Matt. 6:24). Wisdom is personified as a beautiful and gracious Woman (Prov. 3:13, 15; 9:1). The Spirit of God is personified as “the Comforter” (John 16:7, 13). And Paul in Eph. 2:1–2, has a striking parallelism which of itself almost explains the personification of Sin. Speaking of the work of God in Christ in the Ephesian disciples, he says: “And you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins, wherein in time past ye walked according to

the course of this world (aion of this kosmos),

the Prince of the power of the air,

the Spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience.”

This is but the reproduction and expansion of the Lord’s own personification of Sin, as “The Prince of this World” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). “Now shall the Prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto ME. This he said, signifying what death he should die” (compare John 3:14). “Hereafter I will not talk much with you; for the Prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me. But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment (compare 10:17, 18), even so I do.” “The Comforter … will convict the world of sin … (and) of judgment, because the Prince of this world is judged” (in the sense of “cast out,” condemned—compare ch. 12:48). That expression, “The Prince … hath nothing in ME,” is, according to the best of our understanding, God’s interpretation in Christ of the word of God to Daniel by the angel Gabriel (9:26). “Messiah (‘the Prince’) shall be cut off, but not for himself” (A.V.) (R.V. text, “and shall have nothing”). The outward appearances in the death of Christ were entirely deceptive. It looked as if HE was being condemned, whereas in reality it was Sin that was being “cast out” and condemned in his “obedience unto death” (Phil. 2:8). The individuals who were the embodiment of “the Prince of this world” in his encounter with “Messiah the Prince,” “the Prince of life” (Acts 3:15), were “both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel” under Caiaphas (Acts 4:27; John 11:47–52; 18:12–27)—“crucifixurn sub Pontio Pilato” being the sad memorial of the Roman Prince that has come down to us in the contemporary Latin of the earliest Christian creeds.

The personification of Sin begins very early in the Bible (Gen. 4:7). Cain was angry because Abel’s “fuller sacrifice” (Heb. 11:4), of the “firstlings of his flock,” was accepted by God, while his own, “of the fruit of the ground,” was not. He was “very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted (marg., have the excellency, i.e., as the first-born). And if thou doest not well Sin lieth at the door (of the Tabernacle) and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.” Here is both metonymy and personification. By metonymy “sin” is put for sinoffering, and then this is personified as Sin to represent typically “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” The Hebrew verb rahvatz, “lieth” (R.V., “coucheth”), is, as Bullinger truly remarks, “specially used of animals.” And this both of lambs and lions, as in Gen. 49:9; Psa. 23:2; Isa. 17:2; Ezek. 34:15.

As to the personification of Sin, in the New Testament the epistle to the Romans abounds with examples, which must not here be particularized at length. If the interested reader will mark the following places with a capital “S” he will find the exercise enlightening: Rom. 5:21; 6:6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23; 7:7, 8, 9, 11, 13, 14, 17, 20; 8:3.

Metonymy

Metonymy (meta, change, and onoma, a name, or in grammar, a noun) is “a figure by which one name or noun is used instead of another, to which it stands in a certain relation.” There is metonymy of cause, of effect, of subject, and of adjunct. Thus “sin” and its synonyms are put for the effects or punishments of sin. The angels hastened Lot and his wife and daughters out of Sodom, “lest”, said they, “thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city” (Gen. 19:15). That is in the punishment thereof, as in the margin of the A.V. See also Psa. 7:16; Jer. 14:16; Zech. 14:19: “This shall be the punishment (marg., sin) of Egypt.”

In Deut. 9:21 Moses says, “I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust; and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount.” In Exod. 32:20, where the episode is originally recorded, we read, “He strawed it upon the water, and made the children of Israel drink of it.” “The brook” flowed from the smitten rock (Exod. 17:6), which “was Christ” (1 Cor. 10:4), who said to Israel, “If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink” (John 7:37). “Let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely” (Rev. 22:17). Thus, by this remarkable figure, is the “sin” of Israel associated with Christ.

“They eat up the sin of my people” (Hos. 4:8); that is in their licentious idolatry, see context. “The high places of Aven, the sin (chattath) of Israel, shall be destroyed” (Hos. 10:8). Here there is a double figure, for the word Aven itself means “sin” (“Bethaven”—House of Sin, ch. 4:15). When Beth-el (House of God, Gen. 28:17, 19) was defiled by the idolatrous institution of the calf-worship of Jeroboam (1 Kings 12:30), “this thing became a sin,” and the name, by the spirit of God in the prophet, was changed from Bethel to Bethaven.

These things enable us to understand the like figures in the New Testament. “The body of sin” is “our mortal body” (Rom. 6:6; 8:11), mortal because of sin (Rom. 5:12). “He hath made him (Christ) to be sin for us who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (2 Cor. 5:21). That is, “God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin (R.V. as an offering for sin) condemned Sin in the flesh” (Rom. 8:3). Or, again, Christ “himself likewise took part of the same (flesh and blood) that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil” (Heb. 2:14). “Our old man was crucified with him” (Rom. 6:6). “Jesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Gal. 6:14).

The Destruction of the Devil

“By one man Sin entered into the world, and death by Sin.” “Sin hath reigned unto death.” “The wages of Sin is death.” “The Devil had the power of death.” Therefore the Devil is Sin, “The Prince of this World,” whom Jesus Christ in his “lifting up,” “cast out,” “judged,” “destroyed.” “The Devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the Devil” (1 John 3:8). “That through death he might destroy … the Devil” (Heb. 2:14). “He hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Heb. 9:26). “He died unto Sin once”; not however in the sense of having earned the “wages” of Sin, the Master, but as an act of obedience to the Father who had so commanded. Sin, the Prince, the Devil, had nothing in Jesus, that is no death claim, no real fault to find. Even Pilate said, “I find no fault in him … no, nor yet Herod” (Luke 23:14, 15). And he “washed his hands” of the case (Matt. 27:24). But “the Devil” is not dead yet, except in relation to Jesus. His final destruction remains to be accomplished by Jesus at his second advent (Rev. 20:1–3), first by the “binding” for the Millennium, and afterwards (verses 7–15) by the utter elimination of Death and Hades.

We do not read of “the Devil” in the Old Testament, though the thing signified by the phrase is there. It is all summed up in the comprehensive quadrilateral phrase of Rev. 20:2: “the Dragon, that Old Serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan.” What Jesus will “bind” is the Sin Power of the world of mankind, and enthrone the people of “the Prince of Life” (see context). “The Devil” (Gk. Diabolos) means “the Accuser,” “the Slanderer.” The Serpent in Eden was such, in effect making God a liar; but he could not bring death, until his slander was believed and received, and acted out in the sin of Adam and Eve. “Satan” simply means “adversary,” and the Serpent was such to the man, and men are such to one another. God is such to sinners; and angels to false prophets who love the wages of unrighteousness (2 Pet. 2:15, 16; Num. 22:22, 32). “The Dragon” is the symbol of Gentile hostility to Israel and the saints, from Egypt and Babylon, through Rome and onwards (Isa. 27:1; 51:9; Jer. 51:34; Ezek. 29:3; 32:2; Rev. 12, 13, 20).

“He Bare the Sin of Many”

“He hath poured out his soul unto death; and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors” (Isa. 53:12). What is meant by Christ’s “bearing sin”? The true answer is bear the consequences or effects of sin even unto death, and put them away by righteousness in resurrection to life eternal. This is obvious in the context: “and made intercession”. “He ever liveth to make intercession” (Heb. 7:25); so by reason of his bearing of sin he is himself “saved out of death” (Heb. 5:7, R.V. marg.) “through death” (Heb. 2:14), “through the blood of the everlasting covenant” (13:20).

In the cases of actual transgressors, the bearing of sin means only death (Exod. 28:43; Lev. 22:9; Num. 14:33; Ezek. 18:20). In the case of Christ, who “knew no sin,” “did no sin” (1 Pet. 2:24), but was “obedient unto death,” it means the “taking away of sin” in resurrection to eternal life, because God would not suffer the “Holy One to see corruption” (Psa. 16:10).

No Substitution

It is true that “Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8; 1 Thess. 5:10); “for the ungodly” (Rom. 5:6); “for all” (2 Cor. 5:14); but “for” here means “on account of,” “on behalf of,” just as in the case of “making intercession for us” (Heb. 7:25). Substitution would be unjust. Why should the innocent be put to death and the guilty allowed to live? In the death of Christ God is “just” (Rom. 3:26), for that death of obedience was at once followed by the gift of life, even “length of days for ever and ever” (John 5:26; Psa. 21:4).

When Israel made the golden calf Moses interceded for them, saying to God, “If thou wilt, forgive their sin; and if not, blot me I pray thee out of the book which thou hast written. And the LORD said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book” (Exod. 32:31, 32). Substitution was not tolerated. Besides this, if Christ died instead of us, why do we die? And why did Christ rise? And how can it be said that God forgives sins for Christ’s sake?

No, it is not substitution but representation and association. Christ’s own references and those of the apostles to his sacrifice and the taking away of sin include allusions to:

“Flesh,” “Blood,” “Body,” “Life,” and “Death”.

Flesh—“I am the bread of life … the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world” (John 6:35, 51). “You hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death” (Col. 1:22).

Blood—“This is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Matt. 26:28). “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you” (John 6:53). “A propitiation through faith in his blood” (Rom. 3:25). “Justified by his blood” (Rom. 5:9). “Made nigh by the blood of Christ” (Eph. 2:13). “Redemption through his blood” (Col. 1:14, 20).

Body—“This is my body which is given for you” (Luke 22:19). “He said, Take, eat: this is my body which is broken for you” (1 Cor. 11:24). “A body hast thou prepared me”. “Sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Heb. 10:5, 10). “He bare the sin of many” (Isa. 53:12). “Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree” (1 Pet. 2:24).

Life—“The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life (psuchee) a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28). “My soul (psuchee) is exceeding sorrowful unto death” (Matt. 26:38). “The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep”. “I lay down my life for the sheep”. “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power (exousia, authority; R.V., marg., right) to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:11, 15, 17, 18).

Death—“Sorrowful unto death” (Matt. 26:38). “Signifying what death he should die” (John 12:33; 18:32). “If when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life” (Rom. 5:10). “In that he died, he died unto Sin once; but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God” (Rom. 6:9, 10). “Jesus, made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man”. “That through death he might destroy … the Devil” (Heb. 2:9, 14). God “was able to save him from (or out of, R.V. marg.) death” (Heb. 5:7). “Where a testament (covenant) is, there must also of necessity be brought in the death of the testator (R.V. text, “of him that made it”)” (Heb. 9:16). But this would be the death of God! See the “I will make” of ch. 8:8, 10. Christ is the appointed “Mediator” in the case (ch. 9:15) who by God’s gift has “by his own blood entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption” (verse 12).

“What Shall We Do?”

“Men and brethren, what shall we do?” (Acts 2:37). So spoke the convicted crucifiers of Jesus. Peter answered, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins”. Repentance is change of mind and disposition, a confession of, and a forsaking of sin. Baptism is a symbolic participation of the sacrifice of Christ, and by no means to be connected with any idea of substitution. “Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we should walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:3, 4).

“Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19, 20). Such was the Lord’s parting commission to his disciples. Let those who “hunger and thirst after righteousness” learn from the scriptures what God has taught concerning Jesus Christ and “the Atonement,” and what Jesus himself taught and preached. And then let them “turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven” (1 Thess. 1:9, 10). This was the attitude of the “exemplary” in the apostle Paul’s day, and the conditions have not changed.