Steve Chalke, a British Baptist Minister, coined the term ‘cosmic child abuse’ in describing what some see as God getting his ‘ounce of flesh’ through the blood sacrifice of his Son, whilst telling us to forgive and then not doing the same himself. In fact this is what Chalke said in his book The Lost Message of Jesus:
“The fact is that the cross isn’t a form of cosmic child abuse – a vengeful Father, punishing his Son for an offence he has not even committed. Understandably, both people inside and outside of the Church have found this twisted version of events morally dubious and a huge barrier to faith. Deeper than that, however, such a concept stands in total contradiction to the statement ‘God is love’. If the cross is a personal act of violence perpetrated by God towards humankind but borne by his Son, then it makes a mockery of Jesus’ own teaching to love your enemies and to refuse to repay evil with evil.”
(Steve Chalke, The Lost Message of Jesus [Zondervan: Grand Rapids, MI, 2003], pp.182-183)
Categories: Bible, Christianity, Islam
Obviously, if the eternal Son of God, the eternal Word of God, voluntarily became a human and voluntarily was willing to be a sacrifice for sin, a guilt offering, then the entire argument of both Spong and Chalke are demolished. (see John 10:18 and Isaiah 53:10 and Mark 10:45 for the obvious voluntary nature of the atonement.) Also, note the wikipedia article on Spong where Raymond Brown did not think Spong was a good nor accurate scholar, in fact, not a scholar at all.
Spong is not even a Christian at all; he is not even a Theist !!!! He is a disgrace and apostate, a fake bishop.
James White debated him on homosexuality and Spong argued for homosexuality as ok and legitimate.
Spong does not believe in the Virgin Birth nor the resurrection, which adds further condemnation on him as a minister, although unbelief in basic Theism destroyed any kind of “faith” that he has.
Because he is not even a Theist nor believes in the Virgin Birth, how can you use this as somehow “close to Islam” ??
Both Spong and Chalke are heretics.
Below is from the Wikipedia article on him:
Spong’s “Twelve Points for Reform” were originally published in The Voice, the newsletter of the Diocese of Newark, in 1998.[13] Spong elaborates on them in his book A New Christianity for a New World:
Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.
Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.
The Biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.
The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ’s divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.
The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.
The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.
Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.
The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.
There is no external, objective, revealed standard written in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.
Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.
The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.
All human beings bear God’s image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one’s being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.
‘Jesus was voluntarily and willing to be a sacrifice for sin”.
Not so.
According to Matthew 26:
He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”
And according to Matthew 27:
At about three o’clock, Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
He was a victim of ‘cosmic child abuse’ it seems. And he didn’t understand why!
Matthew 26 (and Luke 22:42)
Jesus submitted to the Father’s will and so was a perfect for us to surrender to God’s will.
Shows His willingness, and submission.
Matthew 27
Is showing a fulfillment of Psalm 22 – a Psalm of David – and the real struggle of the humanity of Jesus in the face of suffering and also demonstrates that Jesus has become the sin payment – He voluntarily took on the wrath of God against sin – Galatians 3:13 – He voluntarily became the curse (judgement, paying the price for mankind’s rebellion – going all the way back to Genesis 3)
There is nothing in Matthew 26 or 27 that contradicts anything I wrote.
A little selective reading there? Let’s not forget how John recorded some additional words of Jesus just a few hours before he uttered the words that you quoted: John 14:30-31 (ESV): “I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here.”
And this one: John 15:10–11 (ESV): If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
Exactly what was it that the Father commanded him to do? Die for the sins of the world. What was it that Jesus was going to do to show the world that he loved the Father? Die for the sins of the world.
According to Psalm 91 (10-15) and John 10 (16-17) and Quran 4 (157) and 5 (110) Jesus (pbh) could not have been put on the Cross to suffer in the first place! Who killed Jesus? According to Jesus no one could! Jewish Law forbade one from comitting suicide and also Jesus’ words about following Jewish Law done to the little jot kind of put a damper on the crucifixion scenario don’t you think? So, who killed Jesus ?
Besides, Jesus (pbh) speaks reverently and loving about the cross when he mentions that word. And if we are true to him as the ‘chief guide’ we should follow his way, correct? So, is Jesus (pbh) talking about another type of cross that we should bear or is he being sadistic and cruel. You be the Judge!
Let the records be harmonized and not vilified and in order to do that we should understand them!
@Ken Temple
Hi Ken, even if I were to grant you the points you raised that would still not answer the problem. For the second person of the trinity the son had two natures. A divine nature and a human nature composed of a human mind, body, and soul. It is that human nature that gets the raw end of the deal in the this atonement plan. The divine nature gets off scot free while the human nature is suffering and sacrificed. All the while not wanting it to happen. So to me it seams apt to call this cosmic child abuse, not mention of course human sacrifice which is an abomination.
By the way for future reference I’d avoid quoting Wikipedia as a source and rather you instead use the sources they list if any instead.
I can use Wikipedia is I want to. So there. It is up to you to refute the accuracy of the article, since I know it is true by watching Spong for the past 30 years and his garbage.
I use wikipedia for convenience and summary – from what I know about Spong, it is accurate – these things are well known about him – he is not a Christian, not even a Theist; and he thinks homosexuality is ok – see his debate with James White.
Spong is a disgrace and an evil person for all the false doctrines he has spread in the past 30 + years – he was a darling of the mainstream media – being on many shows that atheists and secularists and LGBT people use to make their case against Christianity.
He has caused the enemies of God to blaspheme. (Just as he does here by Muslims and Paul as some kind of “free Monotheist”)
2 Samuel 12:14; Romans 2:24; Isaiah 52:5; Ezekiel 36:17-21
@Ken Temple
I only mentioned avoiding using Wikipedia because doing will allow people to take you more seriously. If don’t care about that then fine. So no comments on how the divine nature gets off scot free while the human nature is suffering and sacrificed?
I already answered that.
The Divine Nature, by nature and logic cannot be damaged by death, since God cannot be affected by physical suffering.
But Jesus as the eternal Son (John 17:5) and eternal Word (John 1:1-5) became voluntarily a human (John 1:14; Philippians 2:5-8), adding to Himself a human nature and becoming the sin payment for His people from all nations (Revelation 5:9; 7:9).
Since it was voluntary and not abuse, but love for sinners, love for God the Father, a model for us in suffering, the cross and atonement and the proof in the resurrection defeats any argument you have.
The resurrection of Jesus from the dead vindicated Jesus and demonstrated God the Father’s love for Him.
So, it was not “cosmic child abuse”.
Both Spong and Chaulke are heretics. Spong is not even a believer in God.
@Ken Temple
I understand that but the created human nature, which has it’s own mind body and soul didn’t get to agree to that and is clearly not wanting to be apart of the plan.
struggle of pain and suffering does not mean that He did not submit as one unified person. He fully agreed as one unified person with 2 natures.
@Ken Temple
Are you saying that the mind and soul of the human nature fully knew what the plan was? And if so when?
He probably knew early on – as He kept saying, ” I have come to do My Father’s Will”, etc. Even as a 12-13 year old – “Did you not know that I had to be about My Father’s business?” Luke 2:49
This is made clearer when He submitted to it as one unified person in Luke 22:42 – “Not My will, but Thy Will be done.” Matthew 26 also.
@Ken Temple
Then why did he ask for the cup to pass from him?
“voluntarily”
I don’t think the matter is about doing that (voluntarily) here, Ken.
The whole picture is that God wanted blood because he (cannot) forgive without blood. Therefore, that God used His son for that. Whether the son was willing or not is irrelevant.
Moreover, as Paul mentioned the gospels show that Jesus was not that willing to do that job. He wished if it could be by something else. In fact, according to you Jesus quoted a passage about a man who was skeptical about God! (my God ..my God, why have you forsaken me).
And to build your view about this world and why we are here based on that picture is really sad. The world needs Islam. Islam the only way.
That make a valid argument that The God can not forgive human sins without sacrifice his son.
The only thing correct about what Spong wrote is that the doctrine of substitutionary atonement is based on the Jewish OT background in Leviticus 16-17 (and Exodus 12 and Genesis 22 and Isaiah 52-53). Proves the Unity of both OT and NT together as one revelation from God.
the Genesis 22 connection is important because of the Qur’an’s statement, it shows that the Qur’an unwittingly and unknowingly affirms the truth of substitutionary atonement.
Qur’an 37:107
“We have ransomed him with a mighty sacrifice.”
https://apologeticsandagape.wordpress.com/2016/10/21/so-why-did-allah-substitute-an-innocent-animal-in-the-place-of-abrahams-son/
Temple: the Genesis 22 connection is important because of the Qur’an’s statement, it shows that the Qur’an unwittingly and unknowingly affirms the truth of substitutionary atonement.
The Quranic account of Abraham’s sacrifice has nothing to do with the atonement of sins.
Yes it does, ransom فدیه / فدا and sacrifice by slaughter ذبح (cognate of the Hebrew, זבח of rams, goats, sheep, lambs demonstrates the connections back to the OT sacrificial system.
@Ken
That make more stronger argument that The God of Christianity can not forgive human sins without sacrifice his son, otherwise He could substitute Jesus with a lamb or an animal, even worst God of Christianity didn’t response to Jesus’s pray.
And like Kmak says : The Quranic account of Abraham’s sacrifice has nothing to do with the atonement of sins.
Read the whole book of Hebrews in the New Testament. read slowly and from beginning to end.
@Ken Temple
https://quranandbibleblog.com/2016/05/05/does-islam-teach-substitutionary-atonement-a-response-to-a-christian-apologist/
https://quranandbibleblog.com/2020/03/18/not-one-of-his-bones-will-be-broken-how-the-gospel-of-john-misappropriated-the-passover-sacrifice/
Failures
Already refuted many times
@Ken Temple
No they haven’t.
Temple: Yes it does, ransom فدیه / فدا and sacrifice by slaughter ذبح (cognate of the Hebrew, זבח of rams, goats, sheep, lambs demonstrates the connections back to the OT sacrificial system.
Your stupidity never ceases to amaze me. The Quranic account of Abraham’s sacrifice is about the atonement of sins because of the mere presence of the words ‘ransom’ and ‘sacrifice’? By your logic, since the word ‘sin’ or related terms never appear in the story, it follows the Quranic account of Abraham’s sacrifice is not about the atonement of sins.
It is the opposite and you display your stupidity to understand the old testament sacrificial system for sin
@Ken Temple
“you display your stupidity to understand the old testament sacrificial system for sin”
Ironically the Jews would say the same thing to you Ken.
I don’t think so because after the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. and then the scattering of most of the Jews out of the land of Israel the rabbis had to come up with a way to explain why God allowed the destruction of the temple. They have no way for forgiveness without the temple and the sacrifices so they had to come up with an explanation.
@Ken Temple
If you truly believe that then you must not have looked into their views and explanations.
Here ya go Ken. To help get you started.
https://www.chabad.org/asktherabbi/default_cdo/jewish/Ask-the-Rabbi.htm
Paul Williams has linked to several Jewish sites for years and I have looked into their views pretty thoroughly, and listened to Tovia Singer and several other Jewish Rabbis – they have to re-interpret the important and necessity of the OT sacrifices because the temple was destroyed in 70 AD.
Also, no passage that the modern Jews (Rabbinic Judaism, post 70 AD Judaism) – the passages that they use for the Messiah are all about the future Messianic Age and the word “Messiah” is NOT used in ANY of them that they use for their understanding for the Messiah, and at the same time rejects Jesus of Nazareth, virgin born Son of God – born of the virgin Mary (which Islam affirms). You cannot have it both ways – Islam rejects blood sacrifice substitutionary atonement, yet affirms the virgin birth; but true OT Judaism affirms the blood sacrifice substitutionary atonement, and the virgin birth prophesy (Isaiah 7:14; 9:1-7 – fulfilled in Matthew 1:18-25 and Luke chapters 1-2), and because the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, the Jewish people who rejected Jesus as Messiah were forced to downplay the necessity of blood sacrifice for the forgiveness of sins.
see more here, where I interact with some of Paul Williams material and his use of bible scholars, and links to Jewish websites.
https://apologeticsandagape.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/passages-in-the-old-testament-that-modern-jewish-people-say-is-about-the-messiah/
@Ken Temple
But have you ever brought you’re points and arguments to them personally?
I have listened to their’s (and other Rabbis) debates with Michael Brown, and afterward, they do not seem willingly to answer Dr. Brown, after, from the proper Jewish Messianic position, they could not refute him. I have Dr. Brown’s 5 volume set, “Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus” and it is the most comprehensive answers to the Rabbic view of rejection of Jesus and inability to account for the destruction of the temple in 70 AD. Jesus pointed them to Him as the fulfillment – Matthew 24:15 – “when you see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by the prophet Daniel, let the reader understand” (pointing to Daniel 9:24-27) (Matthew 23:36-39 to -24:1-3 – Jesus is predicting the destruction of the temple, and Daniel 9:24-27 shows the Messiah is the final sacrifice for sin.
@Ken Temple
So no, you haven’t given your points and arguments to rabbi or Jewish person personally. In which I still think the link I sent will be good for you.
Here is another one, where I pointed out Rabbi Michael Skobac admits that the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur = יום כפר ) of Leviticus 16 is the closest parallel to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ! He tried to argue that Jesus did not fulfill the Passover the Sacrifice, yet the New Testament teaches just that. (John 1:29; 1 Corinthians 5:7) . . .
Faiz or Stewjo (I cannot remember which one) tried to refute that, but they failed.
https://apologeticsandagape.wordpress.com/2013/07/07/rabbi-admits-that-the-day-of-atonement-is-parallel-to-jesus-christ/
@Ken Temple
Quite the contrary QB refuted you and this notion.
https://quranandbibleblog.com/2020/01/10/rabbi-admits-that-the-day-of-atonement-is-parallel-to-jesus-christ-ken-temple-caught-lying-again/
https://quranandbibleblog.com/2020/03/18/not-one-of-his-bones-will-be-broken-how-the-gospel-of-john-misappropriated-the-passover-sacrifice/
Let me ask you Ken, if Yom Kippur is the true parallel to the sacrifice then why do the NT writings never mention it? Instead they misappropriate the Passover sacrifice to fit Yom Kippur’s function.
No, he did not refute at all.
@Ken Temple
Yes he did. Let me ask you Ken, if Yom Kippur is the true parallel to the sacrifice then why do the NT writings never mention it? Instead they misappropriate the Passover sacrifice to fit Yom Kippur’s function.
QB accused me of lying. I did not. You have to read my entire argument.
But I do appreciate that QB typed out what the Rabbi said.
Here is the transcript of Rabbi Skobac’s speech (1:30:26 mark; emphasis mine):
“This is one of the strangest things about Christianity is they’re using the Passover sacrifice as the paradigm for Jesus, meaning if I wanted to find something in the Bible for Jesus to correspond to, right, if I wanted to find an analog, a Biblical analog for Jesus, what should I have chosen? What would have made sense? I want to find an analog for someone that is going to die for general sacrifice for everyone’s sins. Yom Kippur! We have a day of atonement…right, we have the scapegoat that was sent out and on the back of this animal were carried all the sins of the Jewish people, all the sins! A general sacrifice for everything! That would have been a good parallel for Jesus. The Passover sacrifice? The Passover sacrifice had nothing to do with sins at all!” (from QB / Faiz’s article)
If you read the book of Hebrews, especially chapters 8, 9, and 10, the references back to the Day of Atonement of Lev. 16-17 are very clear.
Also, he falsely claims that the Passover has nothing to do with sin.
The death angel was God’s wrath against the idolatry of Egypt, which is sin!
Idolatry is not sin?
Israel was protected by the bloody subsitutionary sacrifice of the passover lamb. Without the blood sacrifice, they also would have struck down by God’s wrath, because idolatry is one of the root sins of the heart. (see Colossians 3:5 – our passions, evil desires, greed, amount to idolatry, which is what the OT was getting at – Ezekiel 14:3-6)
Ezekiel 14:3-6 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
3 “Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts and have put in front of their faces the stumbling block of their wrongdoing. Should I let Myself be consulted by them at all? 4 Therefore speak to them and tell them, ‘This is what the Lord God says: “Anyone of the house of Israel who sets up his idols in his heart, puts in front of his face the stumbling block of his wrongdoing, and then comes to the prophet, I the Lord will let Myself answer him in the matter in view of the multitude of his idols, 5 in order to take hold of the hearts of the house of Israel who have turned away from Me due to all their idols.”’
6 “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘This is what the Lord God says: “Repent and turn away from your idols, and turn your faces away from all your abominations.
The NT writers are constantly appealing to ALL the sacrificial passages.
Hebrews chapters 9 and 10 is a constant mention of the Day of atonement and 9:22 quotes from it.
Isaiah 53 is combining the 2 goats of sacrifice – the slaughtered one and the scapegoat that carries the sins away. You need to read the details of all my articles.
Almost every line of Isaiah 52:13-15 to 52:1-12 is quoted or alluded to in the NT.
Jesus fulfilled the substitutionary sacrifice atonement of ALL the OT:
Genesis 22
Exodus 12
Leviticus chapters 1-6; 16-17
1 Kings chapter 8
Isaiah 52-53
And the Qur’an unknowingly affirmed Genesis 22
https://apologeticsandagape.wordpress.com/2016/10/21/so-why-did-allah-substitute-an-innocent-animal-in-the-place-of-abrahams-son/
@Ken Temple
You’ve already been responded to on this multiple times Ken. You ignoring our responses a good argument does not make.
Your responses have never been adequate or right at all.
@Ken Temple
Most of what you wrote is just your interpretation. The NT writings mention the Passover explicitly (and misapply it) what I’m looking for is a passage in the NT that does the same explicit mention but with Yom Kippur.
NO !! Hebrews 8, 9, and 10 specifically does mention the Day of Atonement, and that Christ fulfilled it.
And Isaiah 53 does also, it combines both goats. 1. slaughtered goat and 2. the scapegoat that carries sin away.