Athanasius on Recapitulation and Penal Substitutionary Atonement

Theologians who deny that Jesus on His Cross effected Penal Substitutionary Atonement for sinners often argue against Penal Substitution by: 1. Claiming that a Penal Substitutionary model of the Atonement was unknown in the ancient Church, and was only conceived during the Reformation period; 2. Setting other models of the Atonement against Penal Substitution.

In the above video, it is my intention to offer some quotes from ATHANASIUS [taken from my “Doctrine of the Work of Christ” class notes, which were given by Dr. Stephen Wellum] in order to demonstrate that: 1. Penal Substitutionary Atonement WAS taught in the ancient Church; 2. Penal Substitutionary Atonement is ENTIRELY CONSISTENT with the Recapitulation model of the Atonement (one of the primary models often set as a rival against Penal Substitution by today’s scholars).

First, I read selection from Athanasius' De incarnatione Dei:

Jesus “surrendered his body to death instead of all, and offered it to the Father. This he did out of sheer love for us, so that in his death all might die, and the law of death thereby be abolished because, having fulfilled in his body that for which it was appointed, it was thereafter voided of its power for men” (2.8). In this way did he become “in dying a sufficient exchange for all” (2.9). “For the solidarity of mankind is such that, by virtue of the Word’s indwelling in a single body, the corruption which goes with death has lost its power over all” (2.9). Christ, the incarnate Word, himself offered “the sacrifice on behalf of all, surrendering his own temple [body] to death in place of all, to settle man’s account with death and free him from the primal transgression” (4.20). If then, “any honest Christian wants to know why he suffered death on the cross and not in some other way, we answer thus: in no other way was it expedient for us, indeed the Lord offered for our sakes the one death that was supremely good. He had come to bear the curse that was on us; and how could he ‘become a curse’ otherwise than by accepting the accursed death? And that death is the cross, for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree’” (4.25). [Emphases added.]

Second, I read selections from Athanasius' Orations Against the Arians:

“Christ endured death for us, inasmuch as he offered himself for the purpose to God” (1.41). He “takes our sufferings upon himself, and presents them to the Father, entreating for us that they be satisfied in him” (4.6). “Laden with guilt the world was condemned of law, but the Logos assumed the condemnation, and suffering in the flesh gave salvation to all” (1.60). [Emphases added.]

As noted in the video, the bold-faced portions above– speaking of Christ dying “instead of,” in “exchange for,” and “on behalf of” all of us– clearly employ Substitutionary language. That this is a kind of PENAL Substitution is obvious as Athanasius writes that Christ died “to settle man’s account with death,” “to bear the curse that was on us,” and that He “assumed the condemnation” that we deserved. Again, the ideas of Penal Substitution are not presented in such a systematic fashion as they occur in later church history, but they ARE there.

Recapitulation is not seen as a rival to Penal Substitution, but as the basis for Penal Substitution– Christ can die for us because He IS us; the Incarnate Word is the true and ultimate humanity, passing through the stages of human life, restoring all to communion with God by His perfect life, His obedience to the point of death on behalf of sinners, and by His resurrection.

Biographical Sketch: William Kiffin

Overview of Kiffin’s Life William Kiffin, the father of the Particular Baptists, was born in London in 1616. He lost both parents to the plague at age 9. In 1629, when he was 13, he was apprenticed to a glover. Two years later, he ran away from his master, but as he was leaving he stopped by St. Antholin’s Church, where he heard the Puritan Thomas Foxley preaching on “the duty of servants to masters.” Under conviction of this preaching, Kiffin returned to his master before his absence was even detected. He began attending sermons from Puritan ministers, and eventually came to saving faith in Christ upon hearing John Davenport preach on I John 1:7. As a new Christian, Kiffin both loved Christ and hated sin with such fervor that he came to have unrealistic expectations of entirely victorious Christian living. When Kiffin came to find that he felt himself more tempted than ever, he began to lose hope that he was a Christian at all. Finally, under the preaching of the Arminian John Goodwin, Kiffin came to have assurance of salvation (this is somewhat ironic as Arminians usually deny the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints). In 1638, when Kiffin was 22, he joined the independent congregation in London pastored by John Lathrop. He engaged in the discussions on Baptism and soon joined the congregation pastored by John Spilsbury. As Cathcart’s Baptist Encyclopedia notes:

From this community a colony went forth in 1640 which formed another church. The new organization met in Devonshire Square. It elected Mr. Kiffin pastor.

Kiffin served as the pastor of Devonshire Square Church (with three other pastors assisting him at various times) for 61 years, until his death in 1701.

The First London Confession of Faith and the Nationwide Strategy

By 1644, there were seven Calvinistic Baptist churches in England, including the Devonshire Square Church pastored by Kiffin. In this year, these seven churches came together to issue the First London Confession of Faith (revised and expanded in 1646), in the drafting of which Kiffin seems to have played a major role. United in the beliefs expressed in the First London Confession, the Calvinistic Baptists engaged in a “nationwide strategy” of evangelism and church planting from 1644 to 1660. As Baptist historian Barrie R. White notes, Kiffin played “a significant and continuous part” in this “nationwide strategy.”

Support of Governing Authorities and Support of the Oppressed

Following the execution of King Charles I in 1649, England was established under a republican form of government under the administration of what came to be known as the “Rump Parliament.” Frustrated the failure of the Rump Parliament to achieve reform, Oliver Cromwell led the army to forcibly dissolve the Parliament in 1653 and Cromwell was declared Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland. As historian Michael A.G. Haykin notes,

…there were a number of Calvinistic Baptists, especially some in the army in Ireland, who were highly vocal in their criticism of Cromwell. Kiffin, John Spilsbury and a Joseph Samson wrote to their Irish Baptist brethren in January 1654, urging them to “consult with that blessed rule of truth which you profess to be your guide… for that expresseth no other thing to Christians but exhortations to be subject to all civil powers, they being of God, and to pray for all that are in authority, that under them we may live in a godly and quiet life in all godliness and honesty.”

William Kiffin even served in the second Protectorate parliament in 1656 for Middlesex. However, Kiffin did not only model his admonition “to be subject to all civil powers” under the rule of the Lord Protector (whom Kiffin supported as Cromwell was a great promoter of religious liberty), but he once again became a loyal subject to the throne when the reign of King Charles II (who persecuted independent congregations) was inaugurated in 1660. Though persecution by Charles II was the reason why the “nationwide strategy” of the Calvinistic Baptists came to an end, and though Kiffin was briefly jailed a number of times in the two or three years following the inauguration of Charles’ reign due to his refusal to compromise his Baptist beliefs, Kiffin remained a loyal subject of the king and the king eventually appointed him to public office as an alderman of London, a Lord Lieutenant and a magistrate. Though he seldom exercised these offices, Kiffin was able to use his political influence, along with the wealth he had earned as a cloth merchant, to help Baptists being persecuted in both England and in the American colonies. (Haykin notes “For instance, in 1664 he was able to rescue twelve General Baptists, who had been sentenced to death for participating in an illegal conventicle.” )

During this stormy period for England’s political history, it was sometimes hard to tell who constituted the proper governing authority, and it could be risky to become too closely involved in politics. William Kiffin’s grandsons, Benjamin and William Hewling, learned this lesson when King Charles II died in 1685 and they supported the Duke of Monmouth– a Protestant who was the illegitimate son of Charles II– thinking that he was the rightful heir to the throne, against James II, the Roman Catholic brother of King Charles II. Benjamin and William Hewling were captured, tried, and executed in 1685 by supporters of James II, when Benjamin was 22 and William was 19. This came as a great blow to Kiffin, who had raised the boys as his own sons following the death of their father.

A Sober Discourse of Right Church-Communion

Baptist historians generally consider A Sober Discourse of Right Church-Communion, published in 1681, to be Kiffin’s most important written work. This work was a response to the errors of John Bunyan, who himself held to believers’ baptism, but argued that those who held to other opinions concerning baptism should not be denied church membership or participation in the Lord’s Supper. Kiffin noted the consistent example of the apostles in baptizing those coming to faith before admitting them to the Lord’s Supper. He cited the biblical mandate from II Thess. 3:6 to withdraw from disorderly persons, and noted that those who did not submit to proper baptism were “disorderly.” Kiffin observed that Bunyan had no command or example from Scripture for letting anyone partake in the Lord’s Supper without baptism, and he asserted that Bunyan’s practice negated the importance of the command to be baptized. Kiffin considered the subject of baptism to be very serious, but this did not lessen his Christian love for those with different views, as he noted that believers' baptism was never intended by God to be "a wall of division" to exclude "other Christians from our love, charity, and Christian-communion" but only to exclude "from immediate Church-fellowship."

The Second London Confession of Faith

In 1688– three years after King James II took the throne and Benjamin and William Hewling were executed– James II was forced into exile and dethroned by his nephew and son-in-law, William Henry of Orange, who became King William III of England. The next year, William III urged passage of the Act of Toleration, which granted religious liberty to independent congregations, including the Baptists. Following passage of the Act of Toleration, William Kiffin and six other Calvinistic Baptist ministers sent out an invitation for Calvinistic Baptists to meet at a General Assembly in London to discuss and endorse a confession of faith that had been authored by William Collins and Nehemiah Coxe in 1677– a confession modeled on the Westminster Confession of the Presbyterians and the Savoy Declaration of the Congregationalists. This confession– the Second London Confession of Faith has been referred to by Baptist historian Thomas J. Nettles as the Baptists’ “richest confessional treasure.” This confession (or its adaptations in the Philadelphia and Charleston Confessions) was embraced by the churches or associations from which each of the 293 delegates who met in Augusta, GA in 1845 to establish the Southern Baptist Convention came. In 1689 representatives from over 100 Calvinistic Baptist churches came to the General Assembly. This number demonstrates the success of the “nationwide strategy,” which had begun when there were only 7 Calvinistic Baptist churches in existence. William Kiffin was the only Baptist minister from the group that issued the First London Confession of Faith still alive to sign the Second London Confession.

Domestic Tragedy

In addition to the loss of his grandsons mentioned above, William Kiffin had to endure the personal sadness of being preceded in death by his first wife and by all of his children. His eldest son, William, died in 1669, at age 20. His second son died in Venice, having been poisoned by a Roman Catholic priest with whom he had discussed matters of religion. His daughter Priscilla died in 1679. His final son, Harry, died in 1698 at age 44. Kiffin’s first wife, Hanna, died in 1682. Adding to the sorrow of these lost family members, Kiffin’s second wife, Sarah, was charged before Devonshire Square Church on March 2, 1698 for defrauding Kiffin of 200 pounds and for propagating false accusations against her husband. She refused to appear before the congregation and was suspended from communion on April 24, 1698.

Conclusion

Kiffin fell asleep on December 29, 1701 and was buried in Bunhill Fields. His life is an example of faithful ministry within the local church, partnership with other churches in evangelism and church planting, support for governing authorities, financial stewardship, care for the oppressed, and faithfulness to live out and proclaim convictions formed through careful study of God’s Word.

[Sources: James Leo Garrett. Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study. Macon, GA, USA: Mercer University Press, 2009.

Michael A.G. Haykin. Kiffin, Knollys, and Keach. Leeds, England: Reformation Today Trust, 1996.

Thomas J. Nettles, The Baptists, Vol. 1. Ross-shire, Scotland: Mentor, 2005. William Kiffin blog William Kiffin page on the Christian Classics Ethereal Library]

Inspiring and Challenging Quotes from the Letters and Journals of Jim Elliot

[From a handout distributed at the Sunday Bible Study of Grace Heritage Church, August 14, 2005.]

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." 

"God, I pray, light these idle sticks of my life, and may I burn up for Thee. Consume my life, my God, for it is Thine. I seek not a long life but a full one like Yours, Lord Jesus." 

"The holy life of a fearless Samuel brought trembling to the elders of Bethlehem. Lord, wilt Thou impart a holiness of this sort to me? I can make men laugh; I cannot make them tremble." [re: 1 Sam 16:4] 

"Glad to get the opportunity to preach the gospel of the matchless grace of our God to stoical, pagan Indians. I only hope that He will let me preach to those who have never heard the name of Jesus. What else is worth-while in this life? I have heard nothing better. Lord, send me." 

"'He makes His ministers a flame of fire.' [re: Psa 104:4.] Am I ignitable? God deliver me from the dread asbestos of 'other things.' Saturate me with the oil of the Spirit that I may be a flame. But flame is transient: short-lived. Canst thou bear this, my soul: short life? In me there dwells the Spirit of the Great Short-Lived, whose zeal for God's house consumed Him. 'Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.'" 

"My preaching [all] last month was service for service's sake. Oh, how I thank Thee, Father, for my earthly father [Jim's Dad, Fred Elliot] who has seen the truth as to [my] motives for service. It is not the winning of souls nor the spreading of missions that should inflame me. Paul said, 'I count all loss that I may win (not souls) but Christ.'" [re: Phil 3:8] 

"I dare not stay at home while Quechuas perish. What if the well-filled church in my homeland needs stirring? They have the Scriptures, Moses, and the prophets, and a whole lot more. Their condemnation is written on their bank books and in the dust on their Bible covers."

Biographical Sketch: James P. Boyce

James P. Boyce: Early Life (1827-1855)

James P. Boyce, the first president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, was born on January 11, 1827 at Charleston, South Carolina. Boyce matriculated at Brown University in 1845. He quickly became a respected student and popular peer. Soon after entering Brown, Boyce professed his faith in Christ. Soon after his conversion, he fell in love at a friend’s wedding. Just two days after meeting Lizzie Ficklen, Boyce asked her to marry him. Taken aback, Lizzie rebuffed her suitor, but only for a time. The two wed in December 1848 and together raised two daughters.

Boyce served as editor of the Southern Baptist after graduation. In 1849 he entered Princeton Theological Seminary, where he completed the three-year course in just two years. He then served as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Columbia, South Carolina until 1855, when he received an offer from South Carolina’s Furman University to join its faculty. He accepted and became a professor of theology in 1855.[1]

James P. Boyce and the Founding of Southern Seminary (1856-1888)

In 1859 James Petigru Boyce along with Basil Manly Jr., John Broadus, and William Williams opened the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Born as the son of the wealthiest man in the South in his day, J.P. Boyce would eventually drain his fortune in order to keep Southern Seminary opened.[2] The following is a summary presentation of Boyce’s vision for Southern Seminary, the theological foundation of Southern Seminary established under Boyce’s leadership, and Boyce’s defense of Southern Seminary when those beliefs were challenged.

The Vision for Southern Seminary: "Three Changes in Theological Institutions"

The history of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary begins a full two years before the first class was ever conducted at the institution. In 1856, James Boyce was hired as a professor at Furman University. In his inaugural address at Furman, Boyce delivered a lecture titled, “Three Changes in Theological Institutions.” This address set forth a vision for theological education that would eventually take shape as the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. The ‘three changes’ Boyce proposed were:[3]

1. Availability of theological education to all called by God to be ministers in His church, despite possible lack of previous formal education. (Most theological institutions in Boyce’s day assumed students would have had ten to twelve years of Latin and six to nine years of Greek.[4])

2. Excellence in theological education, including programs of study at the research level equal to or surpassing those available in secular universities. (This conviction would later lead Southern Seminary to become the first non-university based institution in the United States to offer a Ph.D.)

3. A confessional basis for theological education in which specific beliefs about what the Bible says are declared.

This last point would later lead to the framing of the Abstract of Principles.

The Theological Foundation of Southern Seminary: The Abstract of Principles

In 1858, one year before Southern Seminary opened for classes, a committee comprised of James P. Boyce, Basil Manly Sr., Basil Manly Jr., and John Broadus completed the Abstract of Principles. This confessional statement– the first crafted by a group that was specifically Southern Baptist– would serve as the theological foundation for all faculty members of Southern Seminary. The chief architect of the Abstract of Principles was Basil Manly Jr., who drew heavily upon the 1689 London Baptist Confession in crafting this document.[5] The construction of the Abstract of Principles was guided by three mandates agreed upon by the drafting committee:

1. The abstract of principles must be a complete exhibition of the fundamental doctrines of grace, so that in no essential particular should they speak dubiously.
2. They should speak out clearly and distinctly as to the practices universally prevalent among us [those in the Southern Baptist Convention].
3. Upon no point, upon which the denomination is divided, should the Convention, and through it, the Seminary, take any position.[6]

The result was a simple twenty-point confession of faith that “remains a powerful testimony to a Baptist theological heritage that is genuinely evangelical, Reformed, and orthodox.”[7]

The Defense of Southern Seminary: The Toy Controversy

During Boyce’s administration of Southern Seminary, the first major challenge arose as to the Seminary’s confessional convictions. This challenge was not raised by an individual who denied any specific point of the Abstract of Principles, but who rather denied the very presuppositions from which the Abstract originated.

C.H. Toy, who had been among the first class of students at Southern Seminary, studied theology and Semitic languages in Germany following the Civil War. Toy returned to the United States in 1868 and one year later he was elected as professor of Old Testament interpretation for Southern Seminary.[8] At his hiring, the trustees and faculty of Southern Seminary were apparently unaware of the extent to which Dr. Toy had been influenced by German higher critical methods. In his classroom, Toy began to undermine the biblical account of creation, teaching Darwinism and higher criticism. Boyce realized the danger of this teaching and insisted that Toy teach the Old Testament history as it is written in Scripture, which Toy agreed to do. Nevertheless, convinced of the validity and usefulness of his position, Toy submitted a defense of his beliefs, along with his resignation, to the trustees of Southern Seminary at the 1879 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Atlanta. The trustees accepted his resignation. Boyce did not oppose Toy’s resignation, but suffered great personal grief at being distanced from a treasured friend that had seemed so intellectually promising. John Broadus reported that when Toy left Louisville, Boyce accompanied him to the railway station and embracing him with his left arm, raised his right arm before him, saying, “Oh Toy, I would freely give that arm to be cut off if you could be where you were five years ago, and stay there.”[9]

James P. Boyce: Death (1888)

Boyce labored long in Louisville until illness drove him to seek recovery in Europe in 1888. Though his heart lifted in a visit to Charles Spurgeon, his health did not improve. Southern Seminary’s first president passed away on December 28, 1888.[10] The legacy he left behind was immense. He understood, as his contemporary Charles Spurgeon in England did the danger of a people of God not having the proper theological moorings. Like Spurgeon, Boyce often lamented the inroads that Arminianism was making on Baptist life. He saw the fate that awaits the Church when it trades the sovereignty of God for the sovereignty of man. Boyce also warned against the dangers of hyper-Calvinism that had taken root among Baptists in the south in the form of Primitive or Hard-Shell Baptists. He was a Calvinist who was so committed to evangelism that he offered the Seminary grounds to D.L. Moody when he brought his tent to Louisville.[11]

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[1] “James P. Boyce” [on-line], accessed 15 July 2007; available from http://archives.sbts.edu/partner/Article_Display_Page/0,,PTID325566|CHID717900|CIID1978880,00.html; Internet.

[2] R. Albert Mohler, Jr., “James Petigru Boyce and Renewal in Theological Education” (The Southern Baptist Founders Conference, 1995), audiocassette.

[3] R. Albert Mohler, Jr., “To Train the Minister Whom God Has Called: James Petigru Boyce and Southern Baptist Theological Education,” The Founders Journal 19/20 (1995) [journal on-line], accessed 25 June 2007; available from http://www.founders.org/FJ19/article4.html; Internet.

[4] Mohler, “James Petigru Boyce and Renewal in Theological Education.”

[5] R. Albert Mohler, Jr., “Don’t Just Do Something, Stand There! Southern Seminary and the Abstract of Principles,” Southern Seminary Magazine, November 2000 (class reader, 42710–– The Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting, Summer 2007, photocopy), 3.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Billy Grey Hurt, “Crawford Howell Toy: Interpreter of the Old Testament” (Th.D. diss., The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1966) [on-line], accessed 25 June 2007; available from http://archives.sbts.edu/partner/Article_Display_Page/0,,PTID325566|CHID717902|CIID1992648,00.html; Internet.

[9] L. Russ Bush and Tom J. Nettles, Baptists and the Bible (Nashville: Broadman and Holman Publishers, 1999), 216.

[10] “James P. Boyce” [on-line], accessed 15 July 2007; available from http://archives.sbts.edu/partner/Article_Display_Page/0,,PTID325566|CHID717900|CIID1978880,00.html; Internet.

[11] “J.P. Boyce” The Baptist Page [on-line], accessed 15 July 2007; available from http://www.siteone.com/religion/baptist/baptistpage/Portraits/boyce.htm; Internet.