Actuality of Atonement: Chapter Four

In Chapter Four Gunton examines the Cross as God's Justice. He first points out that the cross' metaphors have some overlap. The cross as justice is no different because Satan's has a legal role in the biblical story, as the accuser--the prosecuting attorney. His defeat, Gunton notes, means that "God is not to be identified with abstract legal justice" (84).

The idea of legality in the cross is old--Tertullian and Cyprian both talk about it--but it achieves a significant status with, of course, St. Anselm. Here, the image is of a feudal lord overseeing a society whose honour is affronted. To maintain order in the society, the honour must be restored, or satisfied, or the lord is not lord and the society becomes unjust and irrational. Anselm simply draws out this analogy to a universal scale. God is universal ruler whose honour is challenged and must be restored. The death of Christ offers a worthy penalty to God to restore his honour and justice. What is often neglected in caricatures of Anselm's work is that what deteriorates is the society--in which the lord's subjects live. If his honour is not restored, their society runs amok and they suffer. The restoration of God's honour is as much in the interest of the underlings as the lord. The honour of God is restored by God's own gift of the Son.

Gunton notes that the idea that salvation is remission of penalty is a weakness here. Further, it feels as though the cross is external to us; it is removed, even cosmically, from real life.

Gunton then explores the justice of God, which he roots, not in abstract pictures, but in the covenant with Israel.

Finally, he explores two twentieth century theologies. First, P.T. Forsyth and his idea that the cross is what justifies God, is explored. Putting the cross at the center of World War 1 theology, re-immersing it in real life context, is Forsyth's aim. Second, Gunton looks at Barth's notion of Jesus as the judge judged in our place. Jesus replaces us in the seat of judgment, but we are also there, as sinners, with him. In the death of Jesus, our sin is put to death. God's justice reveals our sin, bears it in Jesus, and destroys its power.