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The coherence of equivocal penal substitution: modern and scholastic voices

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Abstract

In this contribution we investigate the conceptual coherence of penal substitution and its moral validity. After assessing two opposing modern contributions (Stevin Porter and Mark Murphy), we turn to Reformed and medieval scholasticism (Owen, Van Mastricht, and Duns Scotus). This scholastic manoeuvre sheds additional light on the analytic questions at issue. Following Owen and Scotus in their use of a relational analysis of guilt and its punishment, we argue that penal substitution is conceptually and morally coherent, albeit not univocally vis-à-vis ordinary punishment. Absent from the case of substitution is personal deservedness; herein we follow Murphy. However, this leaves open the conceptual possibility of representative deservedness (pace Murphy).

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Notes

  1. Oliver Crisp, ‘Original Sin and Atonement’, in: Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, Thomas Flint and Michael Rea (Ed.), (Oxford: OUP 2009), pp. 430–451.

  2. Brian Hebblethwaite, “Does the Doctrine of the Atonement Make Sense?,” in Ethics and Religion in a Pluralistic Age (Edinburgh: T&T Clark 1997), p. 79.

  3. ‘Swinburnian atonement and the doctrine of penal substitution’, Stevin Porter, Faith and Philosophy 21 (2004), pp. 228–241; ‘Not Penal Substitution But Vicarious Punishment’, Mark C. Murphy, Faith and Philosophy 26 (2009), pp. 253–273. See further Ryan W. Davis, ‘The authority of God and the meaning of the atonement.’ Religious Studies (2014) 50, pp. 405–423; and William Lane Craig, ‘Is Penal Substitution Unjust?’, International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 83.3 (2018), pp. 231–244.

  4. Responsibility and Atonement, (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 1989.

  5. There are two competing modern theories of punishment, namely utilitarian and retributive. The utilitarian theory of punishment holds that offenders are punished merely in order to discourage future wrongdoing and protect society. It is therefore essentially ‘consequentialist’ in nature; it is forward looking. Needles to say that this view suffers from all the weaknesses connected with the ‘naturalistic fallacy’ (G. E. Moore). The retributive or ‘absolutist’ theory, in contrast, states that wrongdoers morally deserve to suffer a proportionate punishment, and that this retribution contains within itself the basis of its morality. Referring to future goods does not constitute the moral quality of punishment. See https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justice-retributive/. Recently Craig has noted: ‘Fortunately, there has been over the last half-century or so a renaissance of theories of retributive justice, accompanied by a fading of consequentialist theories, so that we need not be distracted by the need to justify a retributive theory of justice.’ (Craig 2018), p. 235.

  6. Porter, p. 234.

  7. Porter, p. 237.

  8. Porter, p. 236.

  9. See note 5 above.

  10. Porter, p. 237.

  11. We will pass over Murphy’s own position of ‘vicarious punishment’, since it takes us too far away from our present topic. His view can be summarised as follows: ‘A deserves to be punished; B undergoes hard treatment, which hard treatment constitutes A’s being punished; and so A no longer deserves to be punished’ (p. 260). Note that we do not use the term ‘vicarious punishment’ in this sense, but rather as a synonym for penal substitution.

  12. Murphy, pp. 255–256; cf. a similar analysis in Veluw A. H. van, De straf die ons de vrede aanbrengt (Zoetermeer: 2001), p. 134.

  13. Murphy, p. 256.

  14. Murphy, p. 257. Murphy thus adheres to unqualified negative retributivism, see Craig (2018).

  15. Similar considerations are at stake with respect to Murphy’s critique of Lewis’s account of penal substitution as paying fines.

  16. Murphy, p. 259.

  17. Craig (2018), p. 243.

  18. G. Labooy, ‘Als een keizer die knielt’ (‘Like a Kneeling Emperor’), Kerk en Theologie, 49 (1998), pp. 209–221.

  19. G. A. van den Brink, Tot Zonde Gemaakt, De Engelse antinomiaanse controverse (1690–1700) over de toerekening van de zonden aan Christus, met bijzondere aandacht voor Herman Witsius’ Animadversiones Irenicae (1696). (Kampen: Summum Academic Publications), 2016. English translation in preparation for publication with Brill publishers.

  20. ‘… poenaeque vocabulo utor largius, non quatenus timoorian signat, sed quatenus paradeigma.’ Van den Brink, pp. 304–313.

  21. Owen, ‘On Justification’, Works 5, Cap. vii, p. 168.

  22. Van den Brink, pp. 159–165. It should be noted that Van den Brink actually weaves the positions of (primarily) Van Mastricht and Owen together, and, by calling that section ‘the position of Owen’ (4.2.1.), ascribes it primarily to Owen. However, as the following will make clear, this is misguided. What Van den Brink describes in that section is actually Van Mastricht’s view.

  23. Ille reatus potentialis, à peccato inseparabilis; hic actualis, qui per gratiosam Dei dispensationem, si non à peccato, saltem à peccatore seperari potest. Est ergo reatus medium quid, inter culpam & poenam: ex culpa enim oritur, & ad poenam ducit, adeo ut unus sit reatus culpae & poenae, qui inter istos terminos quasi medius incedit, & ab utroque ex aequo denominatur. Van Mastricht, Theoretico-practica Theologia, Amsterdam 1724. Lib. IV caput secundum; par. 7. p. 444 (translation ours).

  24. Davenant’s analysis is quite similar, although he shows less signs of uneasiness. He contrasts ‘intrinseco ejus poenae merito’ and ‘extrinseca ordinatione ad poenam, proveniente à voluntate Dei statuentis & volentis illud punire’. See Disputatio de justitia, Disputatio posterior; Praelectiones de justitia habituali et actuali; Cambridge 1631; Cap VIII, p. 241.

  25. Owen, ‘On Justification’, Works 5, Cap. viii, p. 199.

  26. Idem, p. 199.

  27. Idem, p. 201.

  28. Idem, p. 202.

  29. Idem, p. 199. This definition seems to contain a quotation (the Latin), but we were unable to trace its origin.

  30. Idem, p. 178.

  31. Ord. IV, D 14, n17.

  32. Ord. IV, D 14, n29. This whole passage uses n28–34.

  33. Ord. IV, D 14, n30.

  34. Ord. IV, D 14, n22–23.

  35. Refutation (opinionis improbatio) see Ord. IV, D 14, n21–27.

  36. Ord. IV, D 14, n34. Even the stain is seen as part of God’s verdict; however, this is an intricate subject that we cannot delve into here.

  37. Lectura III, D 18–20. He even mentions infinite punishment of Christ in D 19: n34.

  38. Lectura III, D 18–20.

  39. Ord. IV, D 14, n61–62.

  40. See Lombardus, Sententiarum libri IV, D 16: ‘In perfectione autem poenitentiae tria observanda sunt, scilicet compunctio cordis, confessio oris, satisfactio operis.’ See also Scotus’s critical analysis in Ord. IV, D 16, Q1: satisfaction (along with the other two, contrition and confession) is only a part of perfect ‘poenitentia’ if we take ‘poenitentia’ in the sense of ‘virtue-penance’ (and then still in a certain restricted sense, only n18–19, not n16–17), not if taken in its sacramental sense. Taken in its sense of ‘sacramental-penance’, then satisfaction is a necessary consequence of penance if penance is to be efficient (n26).

  41. Davenant, Idem, p. 241. Gabriel Vazquez, Commentariorum ac Disputationum in (partes) S. Thomae, Tom. Secundus, Antwerp 1621; Disp. CCVI, caput 1, pp. 645–646.

  42. Van den Brink, p. 464.

  43. See e.g. Richard Cross, Duns Scotus, series Great Medieval Thinkers, (Oxford: OUP) 1999, pp. 89–95.

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Labooy, G.H., Wisse, P.M. The coherence of equivocal penal substitution: modern and scholastic voices. Int J Philos Relig 86, 227–241 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11153-019-09709-y

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