Propitiation

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PROPITIATION.—The idea of propitiation is borrowed from the sacrificial ritual of the OT, and the term is used in the EV [Note: English Version.] of the NT in three instances (Rom_3:25, 1Jn_2:2; 1Jn_4:10) of Christ as offering the sacrifice for sin which renders God propitious, or merciful, to the sinner. In the first of these passages the word is strictly ‘propitiatory’ (answering to the OT ‘mercy-seat’), and RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] renders ‘whom God set forth to be propitiatory,’ without, however, essential change of meaning. In the two Johannine passages the noun is directly applied to Christ: ‘He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world’ (1Jn_2:2); ‘Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins’ (1Jn_4:10). In one other passage. Heb_2:17, the RV [Note: Revised Version.] renders ‘to make propitiation for the sins of the people,’ instead of, as in AV [Note: Authorized Version.] , ‘to make reconciliation.’
1. In the OT.—In the OT, to which we go back for explanation, the Heb. word kipper, which corresponds with ‘to make propitiation,’ is ordinarily rendered ‘to make atonement,’ sometimes ‘to reconcile’ (e.g. Lev_6:30 AV [Note: Authorized Version.] , but in RV [Note: Revised Version.] ‘to make atonement’); the word has primarily the sense ‘to cover,’ but in actual usage has the meaning of ‘to conciliate’ an offended party, or ‘to hide or expiate’ an offence. A person may be conciliated by a gift (Gen_32:20); may be made propitious by intercession (Exo_32:30); an offence may be atoned for by an act of zeal for righteousness (Num_25:13). In ritual usage it is the priest who ‘makes atonement’ for the offender, as touching, or concerning, his sin (cf. Lev_1:4; Lev_4:35; Lev_5:13; Lev_5:18 etc.). Both ideas seem to be implied here; the offence is cancelled or annulled,—hidden from God’s sight,—and God is rendered propitious: His displeasure is turned away. The means by which this was effected under the Law was ordinarily sacrifice (burnt-offering, sin-offering, guilt-offering; the Idea was doubtless present in the peace-offering as well). The blood of an unblemished victim, obtained by slaughter, was sprinkled on the altar, or otherwise presented to Jehovah (cf. Lev_1:1-17; Lev_2:1-16; Lev_3:1-17; Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:1-19; Lev_6:1-30; Lev_7:1-38, and see Atonement). On the annual Day of Atonement expiation of the sins of the people was effected by an elaborate ceremonial, which included the carrying of the blood into the Holy of Holies, and the sprinkling of it upon the mercy-seat (Lev_16:1-34). The significance of these rites is considered in the artt. Atonement and Atonement [Day of].
2. In the NT.—These analogies throw light upon the meaning of the term in the NT in its application to Christ, and further Illustration is found in St. Paul’s words in Rom_3:25. The Apostle, having shown that no one can attain to righteousness, or be justified before God, by works of law, proceeds to exhibit the Divine method of justification, without law, by ‘a righteousness of God’ obtained through faith in Jesus Christ. ‘Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith, by his blood, to show his righteousness, because of the passing over of the sins done aforetime, in the forbearance of God.’ The ideas in this passage include the following: (1) that Christ’s death is a propitiatory sacrifice; (2) that sin cannot be righteously passed over except on the ground of such a sacrifice; (3) that Christ’s propitiatory death is the vindication of God’s righteousness in passing over sins under the older dispensation (cf. Heb_9:13); (4) that the virtue of Christ’s propitiation is appropriated by faith; (5) that everyone thus appropriating Christ’s propitiation, freely set forth, becomes possessed of ‘a righteousness of God’ which perfectly justifies him. It is seen, therefore, that Christ’s death is here regarded as having a true power to expiate guilt, redeem the sinner from condemnation, set him in righteous relations with God, and make him an object of God’s favour. It is not otherwise that Christ’s manifestation is conceived of by St. John, who in his Epistle emphasizes the cleansing power of Christ’s blood (Joh_1:7), extols Christ as the propitiation for the sins of the world (Joh_2:2), and declares that the love of God is seen in this, that He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins (Joh_4:10; cf. ‘to take away sins,’ Joh_3:5).
This last passage raises the difficulty which will naturally be felt about ‘propitiation.’ Assuming, as can hardly be denied, that the term includes the idea of rendering God propitious, or favourable, how is this to he reconciled with the statement that the propitiation itself proceeds from, and is a demonstration of, the love of God? Can it be supposed that God, who Himself sends the Son, needs to be appeased, conciliated, or in any way made more gracious than He is, by His Son’s death? That idea, which belongs to the heathenish conception of propitiation, must certainly be excluded. Yet the paradox holds good that, while God loves the sinner, and earnestly seeks his salvation, there is a necessary reaction of the holiness of God against sin, manifesting itself in displeasure, withdrawal, judgment, wrath, which hinders the outflow of His friendship and favour to the world as He would desire it to flow forth. The sinner cannot take the initiative here; it must come from God Himself. Yet it must come in such a way as furnishes an adequate ground for the extension of His mercy. Christ’s work in our nature was one which entered into the deepest need of God’s own being, as well as into the imperatives of His just government of the world. In the Person of His own well-beloved Son a reconciliation was truly effected with humanity, which extends to all who receive the Son as Saviour and Lord. This is the reality in propitiation. See Atonement.
James Orr.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909


Rom_3:25, hilastrion, "the propitiatory" or mercy seat, the bloodsprinkled lid of the ark, the meeting place between God and His people represented by the priest (1Jn_2:2; 1Jn_4:10).HIlasmos, abstract for concrete noun. He is all that is needed for propitiation in behalf of our sins, the propitiatory sacrifice provided by the Father's love removing the estrangement, appearing God's righteous wrath against the sinner. A father may be offended with a son, yet all the while love him. It answers in Septuagint to Hebrew kaphar, kippurim to effect an atonement or reconciliation with God (Num_5:8; Heb_2:17), "to make reconciliation for ... sins," literally, to expiate the sins, eeilaskesteeai. Psa_32:1, "blessed is he whose sin is covered." (See ATONEMENT; RECONCILIATION.)
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.


To propitiate is to appease, to atone, to turn away the wrath of an offended person. In the case before us, the wrath turned away is the wrath of God; the person making the propitiation is Christ; the propitiating offering or sacrifice is his blood. All this is expressed in most explicit terms in the following passages: “And he is the propitiation for our sins,” 1Jn_2:2. “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins,” 1Jn_4:10. “Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood,” Rom_3:25. The word used in the two former passages is ιλασμος; in the last ιλαστηριον. Both are from the verb ιλασκω, so often used by Greek writers to express the action of a person who, in some appointed way, turned away the wrath of a deity; and therefore cannot bear the sense which Socinus would put upon it,—the destruction of sin. This is not supported by a single example. With all Greek authorities, whether poets, historians, or others, the word means to propitiate, and is, for the most part, construed with an accusative case, designating the person whose displeasure is averted. As this could not be denied, Crellius comes to the aid of Socinus, and contends that the sense of this word was not to be taken from its common use in the Greek tongue, but from the Hellenistic use of it in the Greek of the New Testament, the LXX, and the Apocrypha. But this will not serve him; for both by the LXX, and in the Apocrypha, it is used in the same sense as in the Greek classic writers. “He shall offer his ιλασμον, sin-offering, saith the Lord God,” Eze_44:27. “And the priest shall take the blood of the εξιλασμου, sin-offering,” Eze_45:19. Κριος του ιλασμου, “The ram of the atonement,” Num_5:8. To which may be added, out of the Apocrypha, “Now as the high priest was making ιλασμον, an atonement,” 2Ma_3:33.
The propitiatory sense of the word ιμασμος being thus fixed, the modern Socinians have conceded, in their note on 1Jn_2:2, in their Improved Version, that it means the “pacifying of an offended party;” but they subjoin, that Christ is a propitiation, because by his Gospel he brings sinners to repentance, and thus averts the divine displeasure. The concession is important; and the comment cannot weaken it, because of its absurdity; for, in that interpretation of propitiation, Moses, or any of the Apostles, or any minister of the Gospel now, who succeeds in bringing sinners to repentance, is as truly a propitiation for sin as Christ himself. On Rom_3:25, however, the authors of the Improved Version continue to follow their master Socinus, and translate the passage, “whom God hath set forth a propitiation, through faith in his blood,” “whom God hath set forth as a mercy seat in his own blood,” and lay great stress upon this rendering, as removing that countenance to the doctrine of atonement by vicarious sufferings which the common translation affords. The word ιλαστηριον is used in the Septuagint version, and in the Epistle to the Hebrews, to express the mercy seat or covering of the ark. But so little is to be gained by taking it in this sense in this passage, that this rendering is adopted by several orthodox commentators as expressing, by a figure, or rather by emphatically supplying a type to the antitype,—the doctrine of our Lord's atonement. The mercy seat was so called, because, under the Old Testament, it was the place where the high priest, on the feast of expiation, sprinkled the blood of the sin-offerings, in order to make an atonement for himself and the whole congregation; and, since God accepted the offering which was then made, it was, for this reason, accounted the medium through which God showed himself propitious to the people. With reference to this, Jesus Christ may be called a mercy seat, as being the person in or through whom God shows himself propitious to mankind. And as, under the law, God was propitious to those who came to him by appearing before his mercy seat with the blood of their sin- offerings; so, under the Gospel dispensation, he is propitious to those who come unto him by Jesus Christ, through faith in that blood which is elsewhere called “the blood of sprinkling,” and which he shed for the remission of sins. Some able critics have, however, argued, from the force of the context, that the word ought to be taken actively, and not merely declaratively; not as a “propitiatory,” but as “a propitiation,” which, says Grotius, is shown by the mention which is afterward made of blood, to which the power of propitiation is ascribed. Others supply θυμα or ιερειον, and render it expiatory sacrifice. But, whichever of these renderings be adopted, the same doctrine is held forth to us. The covering of the ark was rendered a propitiatory only by the blood of the victims sprinkled before and upon it; and when the Apostle says, that God hath set forth Jesus Christ to be a propitiatory, he immediately adds, having the ceremonies of the temple in his view, “through faith in his blood.” The text, therefore, contains no exhibition of any means of obtaining mercy but through the blood of sacrifice, according to the rule laid down in the Epistle to the Hebrews, “Without shedding of blood there is no remission;” and is in strict accordance with Eph_1:7, “We have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins.” It is only by his blood that Christ reconciles us to God.
Unable as they who deny the vicarious nature of the sufferings of Christ are to evade the testimony of the above passages which speak of our Lord as “a propitiation,” their next resource often is to deny the existence of wrath in God, in the hope of proving that propitiation, in a proper sense, cannot be the doctrine of Scripture, whatever may be the force of the mere terms which the sacred writers employ. In order to give plausibility to their statement, they pervert the opinion of the orthodox, and argue as though it formed a part of the doctrine of Christ's propitiation and oblation for sin, to represent God as naturally an implacable and vengeful being, and only made placable and disposed to show mercy by satisfaction being made to his displeasure through our Lord's sufferings and death. This is as contrary to Scripture as it is to the opinions of all sober persons who hold the doctrine of Christ's atonement. God is love; but it is not necessary, in order to support this truth, to assume that he is nothing else. He has other attributes, which harmonize with this and with each other; though, assuredly, that harmony cannot be established by any who deny the propitiation for sin made by the death of Christ. It sufficiently proves that there is not only no implacability in God, but a most tender and placable affection toward the sinning human race itself, and that the Son of God, by whom the propitiation was made, was the free gift of the Father to us. This is the most eminent proof of his love, that, for our sakes, and that mercy might be extended to us, “He spared not his own Son; but delivered him up freely for us all.” Thus he is the fountain and first moving cause of that scheme of recovery and salvation which the incarnation and death of our Lord brought into full and efficient operation. The true questions are, indeed, not whether God is love, or whether he is of a placable nature; but whether God is holy and just; whether we, his creatures, are under law or not; whether this law has any penalty, and whether God, in his rectoral character, is bound to execute and uphold that law. As the justice of God is punitive, (and if it is not punitive, his laws are a dead letter,) then is there wrath in God; then is God angry with the wicked; then is man, as a sinner, obnoxious to this anger; and so a propitiation becomes necessary to turn it away from him. Nor are these terms unscriptural; they are used in the New Testament as emphatically as in the Old; though, the former is, in a special sense, a revelation of the mercy of God to man. John declares that, if any man believeth not on the Son of God, “the wrath of God abideth upon him;” and St. Paul affirms, that “the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men.” The day of judgment is, with reference to the ungodly, said to be “the day of wrath;” God is called “a consuming fire;” and, as such, is the object of “reverence and godly fear.” Nor is this his displeasure light, and the consequences of it a trifling and temporary inconvenience. When we only regard the consequences which have followed sin in society, from the earliest ages, and in every part of the world, and add to these the many direct and fearful inflictions of punishment which have proceeded from the “Judge of the whole earth,” then, to use the language of Scripture, “our flesh may well tremble because of his judgments.” But when we look at the future state of the wicked as represented in Scripture, though it is expressed generally, and surrounded with the mystery of a place, and a condition of being, unknown to us in the present state, all evils which history has crowded into the lot of man appear insignificant in comparison of banishment from God, separation from good men, public condemnation, torment, of spirit, “weeping, wailing, and gnashing, of teeth,” “everlasting destruction,” “everlasting fire.” Let men talk ever so much or eloquently of the pure benevolence of God, they cannot abolish the facts recorded in the history of human suffering in this world as the effects of transgression; nor can they discharge these fearful comminations from the pages of the book of God. These cannot be criticised away; and if it is “Jesus who saves us from this wrath to come,” that is, from those effects of the wrath of God which are to come, then, but for him, we should have been liable to them. That principle in God, from which such effects follow, the Scriptures call wrath; and they who deny the existence of wrath in God, deny, therefore, the Scriptures.
It by no means follows, however, that this wrath is a passion in God; or that, though we contend that the awful attribute of his justice requires satisfaction, in order to the forgiveness of the guilty, we afford reason to any to charge us with attributing vengeful affections to the divine Being. “Our adversaries,” says Bishop Stillingfleet, “first make opinions for us, and then show that they are unreasonable. They first suppose that anger in God is to be considered as a passion, and that passion a desire of revenge; and then tell us, that if we do not prove that this desire of revenge can be satisfied by the sufferings of Christ, then we can never prove the doctrine of satisfaction to be true; whereas, we do not mean by God's anger, any such passion, but the just declaration of God's will to punish, upon our provocation of him by our sins; we do not make the design of the satisfaction to be that God may please himself in revenging the sins of the guilty upon the most innocent person, because we make the design of punishment not to be the satisfaction of anger as a desire of revenge, but to be the vindication of the honour and rights of the offended person by such a way as he himself shall judge satisfactory to the ends of his government.”
See ATONEMENT and See EXPIATION.
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.


Very rarely does the word ‘propitiation’ appear in modern English. This is largely the reason why present-day versions of the English Bible prefer to use alternative expressions. In simple terms, to propitiate means to turn away a person’s anger by giving that person an offering.
The wrath of God
God is holy, and therefore he is always opposed to evil. The Bible describes this opposition to evil as the wrath or anger of God (Deu_11:16-17; Joh_3:36; Eph_5:6). It is not an anger such as the bad temper that sinful people often display, but an anger that contains no trace of sin. It is the attitude of one who loves goodness and hates evil to such an extent that he cannot overlook wrongdoing. He cannot treat sin as if it does not matter (2Ki_23:26; Jer_21:12; Hab_1:13; Rom_1:18; Rom_2:5; Heb_1:9; Rev_14:8-11; Rev_19:1-2).
Mean and women, through sin, have cut themselves off from God and placed themselves under the wrath of God. They are unable to have fellowship with God, unable to please God and unable to bring themselves back to God (Isa_59:2; Rom_8:7-8; Eph_2:3; Col_1:21).
God always has an attitude of wrath against sin, and there is nothing sinners can to do to propitiate God (i.e. to pacify, appease, calm the anger of or win the favour of God). Pagans used to try to escape the wrath of their gods by offering sacrifices; that is, they tried to propitiate their gods. But sinners cannot act towards God like this. None of their efforts can quiet God’s wrath against sin or win his favour. (For similar ideas of making offerings to turn away wrath see Exo_32:30-32; Pro_6:34-35; Pro_16:14; Isa_16:1-7; Isa_47:11.)
The love and mercy of God
God’s opposition to sin is connected with his concern for people’s good. God is a God of love, and he reacts in holy and just anger against all that is wrong in his rebellious creatures. Sinful people justly deserve the punishment that God’s holy wrath requires, but God is patient with them and has no pleasure in punishing them (Psa_78:38; Rom_2:2-4; 2Pe_3:9). In fact, he provides a way whereby they need not suffer the punishment themselves.
This was demonstrated in the sacrificial system that God gave to Israel. Sinners were in a hopeless position where there was nothing they could do to escape God’s wrath. Yet God in his love provided a way of dealing with sin, so that the punishment on sin could be carried out, while at the same time sinners could be forgiven.
God allowed repentant sinners to kill an animal, so that the animal suffered the penalty that they, because of their sin, should have suffered. Pardon was not something that sinners had to squeeze from an unwilling God, but was the merciful gift of a God who wanted to forgive. God’s anger was turned away (i.e. God was propitiated) not by the efforts of people to please him but solely by his own gracious gift. God provided the propitiation (Lev_17:11; see BLOOD; SACRIFICE).
The sacrifice was not the sinner’s gift (in the sense of a bribe) to win God’s favour, but God’s provision to bear the divine judgment on sin. God’s act of forgiveness, being based on love, involved his dealing with sin. God’s wrath and God’s love, far from being in conflict with each other, operated in harmony (Isa_53:4-5; Isa_53:10-11; Isa_54:8; Mic_7:18; Joh_3:16-21; Joh_3:36; Rom_6:23).
The sacrifice of Christ
Sacrifices belonging to the Old Testament system had real meaning for genuinely repentant sinners. The sacrifices enables people to see that God was acting justly in dealing with their sins, and gave them a way of expressing their faith in God’s forgiving love (Heb_9:22). But the blood of animals could not take away sins (Heb_10:4). Only the blood of Jesus Christ – his death on the cross – can do that. In view of Christ’s death, God was able to ‘pass over’, temporarily, the sins of Old Testament believers. God forgave them on credit, so to speak, for their sin was not actually removed till Christ died (Rom_3:25-26).
It becomes clear, now that the climax of God’s plan of salvation has been reached through Christ, that the only thing that propitiates God is the death of Christ. Again, God provides the way. He himself becomes the sacrifice that secures the propitiation. A loving God willingly pays the penalty on behalf of those under his judgment (2Co_5:19; 1Jn_4:10). God’s holy wrath against sin has been satisfied by Christ’s death, and therefore he can show mercy on the believing sinner. He can forgive the sinner, yet still be just in doing so (Rom_3:25-26; Heb_2:17; 1Jn_2:2).
Bridgeway Bible Dictionary by Don Fleming
PRINTER 1990.


pro-pish-i-ā?shun:

1. Terms and Meaning:
The word is Latin and brings into its English use the atmosphere of heathen rites for winning the favor, or averting the anger, of the gods. In the Old Testament it represents a number of Hebrew words - ten, including derivatives - which are sufficiently discussed under ATONEMENT (which see), of which propitiation is one aspect. It represents in Septuagint the Greek stems ἰλασκ-, hilask- (ἱλε-, hile-), and καταλλαγ-, katallag-, with derivatives; in the New Testament only the latter, and is rarely used. Propitiation needs to be studied in connection with reconciliation, which is used frequently in some of the most strategic sentences of the New Testament, especially in the newer versions In Heb_2:17, the English Revised Version and the American Standard Revised Version have both changed ?reconciliation? of the King James Version to ?propitiation,? to make it correspond with the Old Testament use in connection with the sacrifice on the DAY OF ATONEMENT (which see). Luk_18:13 (?God, be thou merciful (margin ?be propitiated?) to me the sinner? (the American Standard Revised Version margin)); Heb_8:12 (quoted from the Septuagint); and Mat_16:22 (an idiomatic asseveration like English ?mercy on us?) will help in getting at the usage in the New Testament. In Septuagint hilastḗrion is the term for the ?mercy-seat? or ?lid of the ark? of the covenant which was sprinkled with blood on the Day of Atonement. It is employed in exactly this sense in Heb_9:5, where later versions have in the margin ?the propitiatory.?
Elsewhere in the New Testament this form is found only in Rom_3:25, and it is here that difficulty and difference are found extensively in interpreting. Greek fathers generally and prominent modern scholars understand Paul here to say that God appointed Christ Jesus to be the ?mercy-seat? for sinners. The reference, while primarily to the Jewish ceremonial in tabernacle and temple, would not depend upon this reference for its comprehension, for the idea was general in religious thought, that some place and means had to be provided for securing friendly meeting with the Deity, offended by man's sin. In Hebrews particularly, as elsewhere generally, Jesus Christ is presented as priest and sacrifice. Many modern writers (compare Sanday and Headlam), therefore, object that to make Him the ?mercy-seat? here complicates the figure still further, and so would understand hilastērion as ?expiatory sacrifice.? While this is not impossible, it is better to take the word in the usual sense of ?mercy-seat.? It is not necessary to complicate the illustration by bringing in the idea of priest at all here, since Paul does not do so; mercy-seat and sacrifice are both in Christ. ἱλασμός, hilasmós, is found in the New Testament only in 1Jo_2:2; 1Jo_4:10. Here the idea is active grace, or mercy, or friendliness. The teaching corresponds exactly with that in Romans. ?Jesus Christ the righteous? is our ?Advocate (margin ?Helper?) with the Father,? because He is active mercy concerning (περί, perı́) our sins and those of the whole world. Or (Rom_4:10), God ?loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for (active mercy concerning) our sins.? This last passage is parallel with Rom_3:25, the one dealing with the abstract theory, and so Christ is set forward as a ?mercy-seat,? the other dealing with experience of grace, and so Christ is the mercy of God in concrete expression.

2. Theological Implication:
The basal idea in Hebrew terms is that of covering what is offensive, so restoring friendship, or causing to be kindly disposed. The Greek terms lack the physical reference to covering but introduce the idea of friendliness where antagonism would be natural; hence, graciousness. Naturally, therefore, the idea of expiation entered into the concept. It is especially to be noted that all provisions for this friendly relation as between God and offending man find their initiation and provision in God and are under His direction, but involve the active response of man. All heathen and unworthy conceptions are removed from the Christian notion of propitiation by the fact that God Himself proposed, or ?set forth,? Christ as the ?mercy-seat,? and that this is the supreme expression of ultimate love. God had all the while been merciful, friendly, ?passing over? man's sins with no apparently adequate, or just, ground for doing so. Now in the blood of Christ sin is condemned and expiated, and God is able to establish and maintain His character for righteousness, while He continues and extends His dealing in gracious love with sinners who exercise faith in Jesus. The propitiation originates with God, not to appease Himself, but to justify Himself in His uniform kindness to men deserving harshness. Compare also as to reconciliation, as in Rom_5:1-11; 2Co_5:18 ff. See also JOHANNINE THEOLOGY, V., 2.

Literature.
Besides the comms., the literature is the same as for ATONEMENT, to recent works on which add Stalker, The Atonement; Workman, At Onement, or Reconciliation with God; Moberly, in Foundations, Christian Belief in Terms of Modern Thought.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.


Propitiation
The Greek word ἱλαστήριον (or ἱλασμός), rendered propitiation (Rom_3:25; 1Jn_2:2; 1Jn_4:10) and mercy seat (Heb_9:5), is used in the Septuagint as the translation of the Hebrew word כִּפֹּרַת, i.e. covering, properly the lid or cover of the ark of the covenant in the most holy place, which was overlaid with pure gold, over which the cherubim stretched out their wings, and where Jehovah communed with the representatives of his people (Exo_25:17-22; Exodus 37; in the Sept. Exo_38:6-9). Into the holy place the high-priest entered but once a year, when he sprinkled upon the mercy seat or covering of the ark the blood of an expiatory victim, in order to make propitiation for the sins of the people (Lev_16:11-15). In the common Greek idiom, ἱλαστήριον properly designates an expiatory or propitiatory victim, SEE PROPITIATORY SACRIFICES; and in Rom_3:25; 1Jn_2:2; 1Jn_4:10, Christ is represented as the propitiatory sacrifice for the sin of the world. His blood alone atones for and covers our guilt. When faith is exercised in the blood of this sacrifice, its propitiatory effect is produced. In other words, Christ makes expiation which is effectual for such, and only such, as trust or put confidence in his atoning blood.
The idea of the legal reconciliation of God and all sinners who cordially receive the Gospel plan of salvation is presented under two aspects. 1. Expiation: this denotes the doing of something which shall furnish a just ground or reason in a judicial administration for pardoning a convicted offender. 2. Propitiation: anything which shall have the property of disposing, inclining, or causing the judicial authority to admit the expiation — i.e. to assent to it as a valid reason for pardoning the offender. Expiation, therefore, regards the condition of the offender; propitiation, that of the judge or sovereign. “We can conceive cases,” says Dr. J. Pye Smith, “in which an expiation, good and reasonable in its kind, might be offered, and yet a wise and good government might not be willing to accept it — i.e. might not be propitious to the offender and to the proposal for his being forgiven. We call also conceive of a wise and good government being cordially disposed and greatly desirous to pardon an offender, but unable to gratify this gracious disposition because it can find no just grounds for such an act, and it is aware that a pardon arbitrary and destitute of unexceptionable reason would relax the obligations of law, bring dishonor upon public justice, and prove of pernicious example. It is also obvious that the same thing may be, and is most naturally fit and likely to be, both an expiation and a propitiation i.e. both a valid reason for pardoning, and a determining motive to the will of the competent authority to admit and act upon that reason.” SEE ATONEMENT.
Now, in applying these terms to the great and awful case of ourselves, the whole world of justly condemned sinners, and our judge, the infinitely perfect God, there are some cautions of great importance to be observed. Nothing can be admitted that would contradict incontrovertible first principles. But there are two such principles which are often violated by inconsiderate advocates of the doctrine of salvation by the mediation of Christ; and the violation of them has afforded the advantage of all the plausible arguments urged against that doctrine by its adversaries. The first is the immutability of God. His moral principles — that is, his rectitude, wisdom, and goodness, as expressed by his blessed and holy will — can undergo no alteration; for to admit such a supposition would be destructive of the absolute perfection of the divine nature, as it would imply either an improvement or a deterioration in the subject of the supposed change. We cannot, therefore, hear or read without unspeakable disapprobation and regret representations of the Deity as first actuated by the passions of wrath and fury towards sinful men, and as afterwards turned, by the presentation of the Saviour's sacrifice, into a different temper-a disposition of calmness, kindness, and grace. The second foundation principle is that the adorable God is, from eternity and in all the glorious constancy of his nature, gracious and merciful. He wants no extraneous motive to induce him to pity and relieve our miserable world. No change in God is necessary or desirable, even if it were possible. This is abundantly evident from many parts of the divine Word (Exo_34:6-7; Joh_3:16; Joh_6:39; Joh_10:17; Eph_1:3-10; 2Co_5:18-19).
The question whether sinners shall be pardoned is not one that can be referred to arbitrary will or absolute power. It is a question of law and government, and it is to be solved by the dictates of wisdom, goodness, justice, and consistency. God's disposition to show mercy is original and unchangeable: in this sense nothing is needed to render him propitious. But the way and manner in which it will be suitable to all the other considerations proper to be taken into the account that he should show mercy, none but himself is qualified to determine. “God is the righteous judge, and God is angry [with the wicked] every day.” But this anger is not a commotion or a mutable passion: it is the calm, dignified, unchangeable, and eternal majesty of the judge; it is his necessary love of righteousness and hatred of iniquity. Pardon, when on any consideration it takes place, brings the true and just idea of a change; but that change, in the great case before us, is not in the mind or character of the Supreme Ruler, but it is in the administration of his government, and in those outward acts by which that administration is indicated. This change is, in the order of moral right, the effect of an adequate cause. This cause lies in the whole mediatorial work of Christ, but most particularly and essentially in his sufferings and death, and these have constituted the expiation. SEE ATONEMENT, DAY OF MEDIATION.
The Romish Church believes the mass (q.v.) to be a sacrifice of propitiation for the living and dead; while the Reformed churches, justified by the express declarations of Scripture, allow of no propitiation but that one offered by Jesus on the cross, whereby divine justice is appeased and our sins atoned for (Rom_3:20; 1Jn_2:2). SEE SACRIFICE.

CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.





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