The Entombment of Christ

‘The Cruciality of the Cross’: P.T. Forsyth's Understanding of the Atonement

“…It goes into the tissue of the spiritual being.' 72 We can infer from this that our close identification with sin (in terms of our willing participation in its rebellion against God) would mean that any punishment meted out upon it would inevitably inflict us as well. What Christ did, then, was to somehow concentrate sin in his person and then receive its punishment with a holy confession.…”

“…As Forsyth would insist, the regenerative effect of Christ's work is created by the act on the cross rather than exemplified or modelled by it. 77 How is such effect created? To answer this, we have to return to Christ's act of confessing God's holiness on the cross.…”

“…47 The wrath of God could never fall upon his beloved Son. 48 Yet, at the same time, Forsyth affirms that Christ's suffering on the cross was penal. He took the curse and the judgement of sin, which by right did not belong to him as a sinless person.…”

“…He took the curse and the judgement of sin, which by right did not belong to him as a sinless person. 49 This attempt by Forsyth to draw such a distinction has attracted its fair share of criticism. Both Sell and Hughes, for example, point out that Forsyth has failed to explain clearly how this distinction is to be logically made.…”

“…Forsyth, in addition to all the other significance he attributes to this pivotal act, sees it as a proleptic confession by the 72 'new penitent Humanity' whom Christ both creates and represents before God. 78 Christ's confession on the cross, in his capacity as a true human being, has 'such a moral effect' that it changes us subjectively, in the course of time, from rebellious sinners to repentant persons, who will ourselves come to participate in his confession of God's holiness. 79 It is in this context that Forsyth expresses his wariness in using the term 'substitution' to express the work of Christ, preferring instead the idea of representation.…”