The Surprising Reason Luke Removed Atonement from His Gospel

Comments · 464

• BI

  @bigbadthesailor5173 · 7 months ago

  Completely fascinating ... and probably one of the more consequential matters that you've discussed for anyone searching for meaning within the christian tradition.

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• VI

  @VinceWhitacre · 7 months ago

  What gets me is that Acts is basically a love letter to Paul... and <b>Paul</b> was very much an atonement guy.

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• TO

  @TomHoy-t9m · 7 months ago

  It is interesting that the parable of The Prodigal Son, a story of unrestrained, unatoned fatherly forgiveness, is found in Luke which would support Bart&apos;s position here.

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• MR

  @mrnarason · 7 months ago

  That&apos;s wild that the vast majority Christians probably don&apos;t even know this!

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• NE

  @neutral61 · 5 months ago

  &quot;Whatever you say&quot; may be best translation.

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• KD

  @KDinJP · 2 months ago

  Dr Ehrman&apos;s ideas about salvation accord with my own as a young evangelical--up to a point. &nbsp;When I was a young evangelical, the goal was to understand the New Testament church, the Pauline church. &nbsp;What shook my beliefs in the historic atonement theology was stumbling across the Sermons on the Mount and Plain--rarely studied among evangelicals. &nbsp;Here in the Lord&apos;s Prayer--again rarely prayed among many evangelicals--is the passage &quot;Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.&quot; &nbsp;Jesus&apos; concept of justification is not just about reconciliation with God; forgiveness involves reconciliation with others, with those in the world. &nbsp;Salvation is a &quot;social&quot; process. &nbsp;It is also not a single vending machine purchase of eternal salvation, what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called &quot;cheap grace.&quot; &nbsp;Being right with God involves a continuous reconciliation with God and others. &nbsp;Among early Quakers, salvation involved the disciplined submission of one&apos;s heart and conscience to the divine Light and revealed sins towards God and the world. &nbsp;The Light is God&apos;s vehicle for forgiveness with the Spirit and for discovering &quot;right relations&quot; with the world. &nbsp;Thank you for seeing the subtleties of Luke&apos;s gospel.

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• JO

  @johnfahey7587 · 7 months ago

  Why should god have to forgive you? God made an imperfect being...it&apos;s not the being&apos;s fault for God&apos;s errors.

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• TI

  @timcarbone007 · 7 months ago

  Love your discussions

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• BI

  @billheller6309 · 7 months ago

  I really appreciated the clarity of this presentation. Now I know why I&apos;ve always had a much easier time preaching Year C of the Common Lectionary! For me the allusions to atonement in Mark, Matthew, and so very much of Paul reflect that they were Jews writing for a mostly Jewish audience to make sense of a &quot;defeated&quot; messiah; how to accept as Messiah someone who suffered the humiliation of execution by the state. These authors appeal to the familiar themes linking sacrifice to atonement and the salvivic events of the Passover, along with invoking the words of the prophets as messianic foreshadowing as a way of explaining the Christ event as an inevitable fulfillment of all that had come before. &nbsp;Luke, writing mostly for an audience who wasn&apos;t culturally steeped in the imagery, ritual, and symbolism of Judaism, would not understand the significance of such references like &quot;lamb of God&quot;. &nbsp;Luke does not need all of the atonement &quot;baggage&quot; to explain to Greek speaking gentiles about God&apos;s love and grace as made incarnate in the person, words, and deeds of Jesus. If anything, I&apos;ve come to think that Luke may be picking up on themes from later prophetic oracles about the desire of God for the redemption of all nations and all peoples; and God&apos;s priority of conversion of the heart over performative sacrifices and conformity to rituals that did not lead to redemptive transformation. I continue to learn so much from you, and other scholars like Megan and Dan McClellan.

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• EL

  @eliewhelms3275 · 7 months ago

  The Centurion in Mark didn&apos;t realize the curtain was ripped either.

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• MA

  @markgoodley2450 · 7 months ago

  @20min,,, WOW, this is a game changer...WHAT are the mentioned &quot;oldest and best manuscripts&quot; that DO NOT Contain this?

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• AN

  @AnalyseThat · 7 months ago (edited)

  Totally agree with Bart. Luke&apos;s gospel is closer to Jesus&apos; teachings about a forgiving God who accepts repentance and encourages reform.

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