This timely and illuminating study brings welcome subtlety to an overly simplistic account of the doctrine of atonement that has gained currency in some circles in recent years. According to the history that Wheaton seeks to amend, until Anselm of Canterbury, the church regarded Christ's death as a victory over the devil, who as rightful owner of humanity needed to be overthrown by means that, though diverse, consistently placed the devil at the heart of the difficulty. With Anselm, this version of the history continues, the church broke from its previous “demonocentric” view, and endorsed a “theocentric” model of atonement, according to which Christ's death was a sacrifice that satisfied God's wrath. Further modification occurred during the Protestant Reformation, when the new claim of penal substitutionary atonement was articulated.
Although the history is not always rehearsed in quite so caricatured a fashion (a fact that Wheaton acknowledges), there is nonetheless tremendous value in unearthing figures and texts that trouble the overly tidy, three-stage development described above. Such an effort not only recognizes greater complexity of views in previous eras; in Wheaton's hands it also helpfully charts the close relationships among the different models of the atonement at a number of moments in the history of the doctrine. So, for instance, Wheaton notes that, although “the imagery of the overthrow of death and the devil was certainly popular” among any number of figures before Anselm, such overthrow was the result of—not the condition for—the reconciliation of God and human beings (4). The two ideas not only do not compete with one another; they are intimately related to one another.
Recognizing that a comprehensive examination of his topic would be beyond the scope of any one-volume treatment, Wheaton focuses his study on three “vignettes” taken from the beginning, middle, and end of the Middle Ages. He begins, somewhat unexpectedly, with the chronologically latest among these three, Dante Alighieri (d. 1321). Chapters 2 and 3 are devoted to Dante's Monarchia and Paradiso, respectively, and in those chapters Wheaton maintains that Dante is closest to the Reformers’ view of Christ's work on the cross. In fact, Dante is distinctive in relation to the other two figures on whom the study focuses in that he “adheres to a precise understanding of the atonement as an act of penal substitution, integrated into a broader framework of vicarious satisfaction” (32). In the Monarchia (2.11.5), one sees that Dante's model of the atonement “is one that has at its center Christ enduring the penalty for sin on behalf of the whole human race as its unique representative—in other words, penal substitution” (46). Although the Paradiso explores Christ's death in a subtler way than the Monarchia, in both texts “Dante places both penal substitution and vicarious satisfaction together in the same place. He clearly saw no contradiction between them” (66).
Chapters 4 and 5 focus on Caesarius of Arles (d. 542), whose sermon, “Why the Lord Jesus Christ Freed the World through Harsh Suffering, Not Power” receives close attention and appears to inspire the title for Wheaton's study. In Caesarius, one finds “a doctrine of the redemption that not only views Christ's crucifixion through the lens of a victory over the devil but also sees it as a sacrifice of propitiation and expiation made to God that enables the devil to be defeated” (96). A particularly clear anticipation of Anselmian satisfaction theory can be observed in Caesarius's Sermo XI (5, 57): “What Adam owed to God, Christ paid by undergoing death, having been made without any doubt a sacrifice” (116). Wheaton notes not only that the language of sacrifice is used, but also that “Christ was a sacrifice for sin, a sacrifice made to God himself—not to the devil or any other power but to God” (117). Therefore, although the notion of defeat of the devil is still present, it follows from the fact that the devil unjustly killed Christ—thus “God acts with iustitia, not power” (119).
Chapters 6 and 7 treat Haimo of Auxerre (d. c. 855), in whose writings can be found the notion that “Christ's death on the cross [is] a sacrifice of expiation and propitiation made to God by God” (183). For instance, in Haimo's commentary on Hebrews 9:1–10:18, one finds a clear depiction of Christ's death as a sacrifice for human sin. Therefore, to Wheaton, “Far from being a means of tricking the devil into losing his rights over his captives, the crucifixion is a sin offering . . . it is a sacrifice” (203). Chapter 7 examines two of Haimo's contemporaries, Claudius of Turin and Hrabanus Maurus, ultimately to compare their views to those of Haimo. Although Haimo's account is a more coherent synthesis and focuses to a greater extent on the sacrificial aspects of Christ's death than the other two, “all three center the understanding of the atonement on Christ's sacrificial death on the cross, a sacrifice made by God to God” (213). As such, it is not a demonocentric doctrine, but rather a thoroughly theocentric view.
A particularly valuable feature of Wheaton's study concerns the assessment of Anselm with which one emerges; he does not in fact bring about the clean break from his predecessors’ views of the atonement that he is often said to have effected. Instead, Anselm stands in significant continuity with a number of figures who come before him.
Throughout his study, Wheaton is admirably attentive to the subtleties of the texts he examines as he patiently works through viewpoint that sometimes differ only in the slightest degree from one another. The assessment that he painstakingly puts before his readers will considerably deepen their understanding of the history of the doctrine of the atonement.
