p;iid to Satan, but as a conqueror. As Satan conqucM'ed mankind and made them his slaves ; so Christ became a man, and, in our nature, conquered Satan ; and thus acquired the right to dehver us from our bondage and to consign Satan himself to chains and darkness.
The third form of the theory is, that as the right and power of Satan over man is founded on sin, he exceeded his authority when he brouglit about the death of Chi'ist, who was free from all sin ; and thus justly forfeited his authority over men altogether. This general theory that Christ's great work, as a Redeemer, was to deliver man from bondage to Satan, and that the ransom was paid to Him and not to God ; or that the difficulty in the way of our salvation was the riglit which Satan had acquired to us as slaves, which right Christ in some way cancelled, was very prevalent for a long time in the Cliurch. It is found in Irenaeus, Origen, The- odoret, Basil, Cyril of Jerusalem, Augustine, Jerome, Hilary, Leo the Great, and others.^ The Scriptural foundation for this view of the work of Christ is very slight. It is true that men are the cap- tives of Satan, and under his dominion. It is true that Christ gave Himself as a ransom ; and that by the payment of that ransom we are freed from bondage to the prince of darkness. But it does not fi)!low that the ransom was paid to Satan, or that he had any just claim to his authority over the children of men. What the Scrip- tures teach on this subject is, —
1. That man by sin became subject to the penalty of the divine law.
2. That Satan has the office of infficting that penalty in so far as he is allowed to torment and degrade the children of men.
3. That Christ by his death having satisfied the penalty of the law, of course has delivered us from the power of Satan, See especially Hebrews ii. 14. But this gives no ground for the doc- trine that Satan had any claim in justice to hold mankind as his slaves ; or that Christ offered Himself as a ransom to the prince of this world. This doctrine was strenuously opposed in the early Church by Gregory of Nyssa, and has long since passed into obliv- ion. The only interest which it now has is as a matter of history. It is of course not to be supposed that the great lights of the Church above mentioned believed that the whole work of Christ as the Saviour of men consisted in his delivering us from the power of
1 The proof passages are given more or less at length in all the modem histories of doc- trine as in Ilagenbach's Dogmenrjeschichte, translated by Dr. B. H. Smith; Miinscher'a, and Neander's Dofjmetiijeschichle, and especially in the elaborate work of Baur of Tiibingen, Die Lelire v&ii der Versohnunq.
666 PART in. Ch. IX. — theories of the atonement.
Satan ; that they ignored his office as a high priest unto God, or denied the effect of his death as an expiation for sin, or forgot that He is to us the source of spiritual Hfe. These doctrines are as clearly asserted by them from time to time as are their peculiar views as to our deliverance from the bondage of Satan. Even Origen, so unrestrained in his thinking, and so disposed to explain Christian truths philosophically, teaches the catholic doctrine with perfect distinctness. In his comment on Romans iii. 25, 26, he says,^ " Cum dixisset, quod pro omni genere humano redemptionem semetipsum dedisset, .... nunc addit aliquid sublimius et dicit, quia ' proposuit eum Deus propitiationem per fidem in sanguine ipsius : ' quo scilicet per hostiam sui corporis propitium hominibus
faceret Deum, et per hoc ostenderet justitiam suam Deus
enim Justus est, et Justus justificare non poterat injustos, ideo inter- ventum voluit esse propitiatoris, ut per ejus fidem justificarentur qui per opera propria justificari non poterant." No one of the Reformers gives a clearer utterance to the truth than is contained in these words. So also he says,'"^ " Posuit ergo et manum suam super caput vituli : hoc est peccata generis humani imposuit super caput suum. Ipse est enim caput corporis ecclesiae suge." In all ages of the Church, by the early fathers as well as in subsequent periods, the language of the New Testament in reference to Christ and his work is retained. He is familiarly called priest, and high priest, and held up as a sacrifice for sin, as a redeemer, as a ran- som, and as one who cancelled our debts. As the early fathers were conversant with sacrifices, and knew the light in whicli they were regarded by the ancient world, that both heathen and Jewish sacrifices were expiatory, there is little doubt that the fathers, in calling Christ a sacrifice, meant to recognize Him as an expiation for our sins, although it is admitted that great vagueness, variety, and inconsistency prevail in tlieir utterances on this subject. The whole activity of the cultivated minds was in the early ages directed first to the doctrines of the Trinity and of the person of Christ, and subsequently to those concerning sin and grace.
§ 3. The Moral Theory.
A third general theory concerning the work of Christ is that which rejects all idea of expiation, or of the satisfaction of justice by vicarious punishment, and attributes all the efficacy of his work to the moral effect produced on the hearts of men by his
1 Works, edit. Benedictines, Paris, 1759, vol. iv. p. 513, B, a, b, c.
* In Levilicum Homilia, i. 3; Works, edit. Paris, 1733, vol. ii. p. 186, d.