Jesus didn't die for your sins: God isn't violent, so violent atonement theories are wrong

God is not bloodthirsty. Too many people have been alienated from Christ by Christian theology. One of the most alienating doctrines is penal substitutionary atonement theory, the belief that Jesus died as a propitiatory sacrifice for our sins, having taken our sinfulness onto himself to save us from eternal damnation. A close relative is satisfaction theory, Anselm’s belief that, since finite humankind has sinned against an infinite God and cannot repay its infinite debt, God sent Jesus as an infinite, divine-human substitute to satisfy the divine honor and expiate our guilt for us, thereby restoring right relationship.

Despite Jesus’s own prophetic privileging of social justice over propitiatory sacrifice, these “atonement theories” came to dominance in the Western Church. According to these legalistic theologies, God is one lawgiver giving one law, promising one reward (heaven) or one punishment (hell). Because no one follows that law perfectly, all are deserving of hell. But Jesus frees us from that fate by taking our punishment onto himself, balancing the scales of infinite justice, thereby granting us entrance into heaven.

Numerous criticisms of these doctrines have been made over the centuries. Salvation is largely pushed into the afterlife, affecting this life primarily by anticipation. Since all human conduct is reprobate, selfish, and displeasing to God, ethics becomes a theoretical exercise, at least with regard to the God-human relationship. The model of divine justice is retributive, demanding an eye for an eye, a demand that Jesus rejected (Matthew 5:38-39). And it rejects any possibility of spontaneous, unconditional forgiveness—or grace.

Jesus denies that Abba is an agent of legalistic wrath. The concept of God as a vengeful autocrat who can be appeased only through death by torture does not cohere with Jesus’s revelation of Abba as a loving Parent. Loving parents are not inflexible disciplinarians, and skillful parents frequently forgo their wayward children’s punishment and offer mercy instead.

Nor do good parents resort to violence. Our horrific cruelty to one another over the millennia has pained God. One more act of horrific cruelty, the crucifixion, did not end that pain; it just exacerbated it. Jesus rejects any “underlying image of God as an angry, bloodthirsty, violent, and sadistic father, reflecting the very worst kind of male behavior,” writes Elizabeth Johnson. The God of Jesus could not be the god of any violent atonement theory, because the teachings of Jesus are incompatible with redemption through violence. Instead, the ethics of Jesus propel humankind beyond its addiction to domination through violence.

Why can’t God just forgive us outright? Any schoolchild, upon learning that God needed Jesus’s death to be appeased, will naturally ask why God didn’t just forgive us outright, without demanding the brutal death of an innocent man. Frequently, the answer will have something to do with Adam and Eve’s “original sin,” which separated humankind from God and needed reparation.

But Jesus had never heard of “original sin,” nor did his Jewish tradition interpret Adam and Eve’s story the same way Augustine would four hundred years later. Judaism did not then (and does not now) teach that all humans inherit the guilt of Adam and Eve’s disobedience and therefore need collective forgiveness. Rather than collective guilt, Judaism taught and teaches that each individual is responsible for their own actions and can resist their evil inclinations, with great difficulty, thereby choosing the good.

Anselm’s substitutionary atonement theory, aka “satisfaction theory,” in which Jesus substitutes himself for the punishment due to us, is based on the medieval feudal system in which it arose. The lord of an estate was the source of order, protection, and development for all residents, so the preservation of the lord’s honor—the source of his authority—was paramount. Any lord who had been offended by a serf had to punish that offense, for the good of all. Without that honor preserved, the social order would descend into chaos and everyone would suffer. In this way of thinking, Jesus is the lord’s son who takes the serfs’ offenses onto himself, thereby preserving the honor of the lord, the order of the estate, and the lives of the serfs.

The theory has a certain attractiveness as it renders the crucifixion an action by God for us, but it is insufficient to the life and teachings of Jesus. Jesus preaches repentance so that people will enter into loving community. He wants them to change: to forgive, reconcile, include, be generous, be kind, be humble. In Anselm’s theory, the serfs do nothing. Theoretically, they watch the exchange, feel gratitude, and are transformed by that gratitude. But they aren’t characters in the story. They’re just spectators. To Jesus, his audience were active participants in an unfolding story, and he invited them to decide what role they would play in that story.

Anselm’s theory also prioritizes justice over mercy, but Jesus teaches: “Blessed are those who show mercy to others, for they will be shown mercy” (Matthew 5 ). In the story of the prodigal son, Jesus reveals the unconditional forgiveness of God for the wayward child. For Jesus, God is mercy without reference to justice. But according to Anselm’s theory, any lord would feel compelled to demand expiation from an offending serf. Indeed, for the lord to demand expiation—to punish through violence— would make that lord like unto God.

Jesus rejects violence. Jesus did not punish through violence. He didn’t stone women. He kept them from being stoned (John 8:1-11).

Then, Jesus became the innocent victim of violence, which raises another objection to these violent atonement theories. One person should not be punished for the crime of another. Today, this is a universal principle of law that nearly every society sees as reasonable. God, being merciful, just, and rational, could not violate this principle. The use of a whipping boy could never enter the mind of God, because any such use would be abusive.

The whipping boys of legend were playmates of young princes who would be punished in the princes’ stead. This punishment conformed to Anselm’s theory of transformation through spectatorship: theoretically, the prince would feel bad that his friend was being punished and reform his behavior. In reality, the system allowed royals to act with impunity, knowing that someone else would bear the consequences of their actions. For the whipping boys (the historical existence of which is debated), there was neither mercy nor justice.

Substitutionary atonement theories are insufficiently healing. “Jesus Christ died for your sins” is the oft-repeated phrase that summarizes violent atonement theories. Alas, this declaration doesn’t stand up to the stress test of pastoral ministry. It doesn’t help pastors care for parishioners or parishioners care for each other.

For example, a couple finally gets pregnant after years of trying. Five months into the pregnancy, they discover that the fetus’s kidneys are developing outside its body. The condition is inoperable and the fetus is terminal, so they have to undergo a dilation and extraction procedure. Should the pastor reassure them, “Jesus Christ died for your sins”?

A woman was sexually abused by her father and brothers while she was growing up. Did Jesus Christ die for her sins? Did Jesus Christ die for their sins? What does that statement even do?

A child is diagnosed with schizophrenia. A spouse of sixty years develops Alzheimer's. A soldier returns with PTSD. True stories, all. To say “Jesus died for your sins” is an act of avoidance that negates Jesus’s message and ministry. It overlooks his teachings, paints Abba as cruel and vindictive, renders the incarnation naught but a means to crucifixion, makes no reference to the resurrection, and relegates humankind to mere spectatorship.

Sacrificial atonement theories render us passive. That is, I fear, the point. Jesus preaches a new social order, a universalism and egalitarianism that heartened the humble and threatened the proud. That preaching got him crucified. Then, as a new religion based on Christ arose in the Roman Empire, his teachings got crucified as well. Violent and politically mute atonement theories were substituted for the transformative life and message of the Christ. The church declared the social implications of the gospel dead and buried, laid them in the tomb, and rolled a rock in front of the entrance. But the rock wouldn’t stay, and the teachings would be resurrected. (adapted from Jon Paul Sydnor, The Great Open Dance: A Progressive Christian Theology, pages 196-199)

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For further reading, please see:

Aulén, Gustaf. Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of Atonement. Oregon: Wipf & Stock, 2003.

Foster, Jonathan. Theology of Consent: Mimetic Theory in an Open and Relational Universe. California: Verde Group, 2022.

Johnson, Elizabeth A. Creation and the Cross: The Mercy of God for a Planet in Peril. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2018.