The Synoptic Gospels and Atonement (1)

Brace yourselves for a pair of lengthy but necessary posts. The error they address has been around for ages, but people are still circulating it online. Others have certainly pushed back against it, but we’ve never addressed it here at any length, and I think it’s worth some careful analysis.

Critics of Christianity often try to set the teaching of the gospels, in particular the synoptics, against the teaching of the apostle Paul in his epistles. They allege that the gospel preached by Paul contradicts and even “destroys” the teaching of Jesus. That’s a claim that cries out for rebuttal from the pages of scripture. If true, it presents a major difficulty for the Christian faith.

One of the areas in which Paul and Jesus allegedly differ is the subject of atonement.

Through the Lens of Systematic Theology

Jack Heppner, for example, makes the case that the synoptic gospels do not in any substantive way support the various theories of atonement developed throughout centuries of Christian history. In that, he is probably technically correct.

I have often used this space to complain that when you come to the Bible looking through the lens of systematic theology, you tend to see what you want to see whether it’s there or not. Come to the synoptics with an existing theory of atonement — moral influence, ransom, satisfaction, penal substitution, scapegoat … you name it — you will always find something you think validates your theory. That does not mean it’s there. It just means you’re approaching things backwards.

Heppner says there’s no “there” there, at least insofar as the systematic theologians are concerned. Happily, he stops short where many commentators do not. He’s challenging specific theories advanced by the Church Fathers, not the words of New Testament scripture. Others go much further, right off into fantasyland.

Did Paul Invent Atonement?

For example, at Medium.com, The Sincere Seeker identifies atonement as one of the subjects he says the apostle Paul “invented”:

“Almost all the concepts of the modern-day teachings of Christianity, including the concept of Jesus Christ being the son of God and Atonement, are from Paul — and not from the teachings of Jesus Christ. As such, the teachings of Paul contradict the teachings of Jesus.”

Seeker claims Paul “destroyed the teachings of Jesus Christ”. The version of Christianity that has survived, he insists, is not the version that Jesus preached.

Two Clarifications

Okay then. Let’s clarify a few things here:

First, the gospels, John included, are not treatises in systematic theology. That is not their purpose. They are histories that begin with either the birth of Jesus or his ministry, and end at some point after his resurrection, depending on the gospel. That’s the story they are telling, with limited commentary from the authors. The gospels are biographies that give us glimpses of the Lord’s kingdom teaching and miraculous works to attest to its truth. They are manifestly nowhere near comprehensive in setting out the life and teaching of Christ. They do not pretend to be.

Second, Paul’s epistles indeed include all kinds of material the gospels do not. I would argue that in no way do they contradict the teachings of Jesus, though Paul definitely says much more about what was actually happening in the background at the cross than Jesus ever cared to. This is entirely to be expected. The Lord had yet to go to the cross throughout most of the gospels, and his very own disciples did not believe he would die until it actually occurred. At that point, why would he trouble them with the reasons it must be so? They were thoroughly incapable of processing them. That was fine. The Lord had ways to get them that information when they were ready for it.

Third, I have no interest in defending the various theories of atonement the church has come up with over the centuries since except to say that I agree with them where they agree with Paul. All are based on something of substance, and some are more persuasive than others, but I’m not remotely interested in embracing any system of thought about scripture in its totality solely on the basis of what the Church Fathers and later theologians wrote about it.

Where Did the Gospel Come From?

It may come as a surprise to younger believers that, according to the best historical scholarship can tell us, all four gospels came into the hands of first century believers well down the road from a significant portion of Paul’s writings. Most believe the circulation of Galatians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Corinthians and Romans — Paul’s major theological works — all preceded the circulation of the three synoptic gospels, and that the synoptics were more or less contemporary with Paul’s shorter (and later) prison epistles.

In assessing any modern criticism of Paul, it’s important to grasp that the first century Christian community was reading and accepting his theology long before it ever encountered the histories of Matthew, Mark or Luke, let alone John. From the pronouns Luke uses in Acts (“we” instead of “they”, commencing in chapter 20), it’s evident he joined Paul in his travels four to five years prior to completing his own gospel and releasing it, right around the time Paul was writing Romans. This being the case, he was most certainly familiar with the Pauline theology of atonement. It’s highly probable Matthew and Mark had read Romans as well when they wrote their gospels, but even if they had not, they were surely familiar with things Paul had been teaching in every church he planted for more than a decade.

It’s no exaggeration to say that Paul and his group of co-workers either planted, wrote to or visited the vast majority of local churches birthed in the first century throughout the Roman Empire. What the early church believed about the atonement didn’t come from the gospels, it came from Paul’s teaching. He was discussing the theological consequences of Christ’s death and resurrection from the very beginning.

Paul’s own testimony, Luke’s history and the words of the apostle Peter validate and vindicate Paul’s gospel and the implications that follow from it. The last is especially significant considering we know that Peter and Paul had at least one major disagreement. Apparently, it did not affect Peter’s objectivity about his co-worker in the gospel.

Paul and Jesus

That makes setting Paul’s “version of Christianity” against that of Jesus something of a category error. Christianity grew and spread with Paul as one of its earliest and most authoritative voices. Jesus said very little about Christianity or the Church, as one might expect: he came to bring the message of the kingdom to Jews. The gospels later written were bricks built up on an existing foundation, not the foundation itself. They are not contradictory but complementary.

Here’s an even bigger problem for the critics: Luke, who wrote one of the gospels alleged to contradict Paul, also wrote Paul’s history in Acts, traveled with and supported him for years. What sense does that make if the two men held and promoted conflicting versions of Christianity? If any of Matthew, Mark or Luke had intended with his history of the Lord’s life and ministry to “correct” the theology of Paul, he would surely have tackled it openly and explicitly. That they all did it passive aggressively — which Seeker’s version of events requires — seems a truly bizarre and utterly improbable assertion.

Moreover, had two distinct versions of the Christian faith competed with each other during the first century in the presence of endless numbers of eyewitnesses and chroniclers who could point to the reality, it might have been logical or at least prudent for the victorious churches to erase or minimize the influence of the losers. After all, they would have viewed their opponents as teaching error. If they were really at odds, either the synoptic gospels or Paul would have to go. Is that what we find? In my Bible at least, Matthew, Mark and Luke sit companiably alongside the works of Paul, as they have throughout church history. The critics of this arrangement are not numerous or, for the most part, Christian. They find the synoptics and Paul incompatible only because they are so far downstream from both that they understand neither.

What We Should Expect from the Synoptics

What then should we expect to find in the synoptic gospels concerning atonement? To look for a fully articulated theory of atonement in any gospel is somewhere between unreasonable and a fool’s errand. However, if indeed the synoptic writers and Paul are not at odds, we should hardly expect to find nothing at all.

As in any instance of progressive revelation, I expect we should find hints, premonitions and suggestions that our Lord was doing something grander and far more significant in dying than simply paying the traditional price exacted from prophets for telling the truth. Lo and behold, that is exactly what we find.

Naturally, I don’t expect you to just take my word for it. This coming Sunday I’d like to follow that bold assertion with a plethora of supporting evidence from the synoptics.