The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Put thinking cap on

What is the difference between vicarious and substitutionary atonement?

I was just browsing around checking for odd theological beliefs held by our puritan church fathers. I read that Richard Baxter held to a penal and vicarious atonement, but not substitutionary atonement. There must be a slight difference, but just wondering.

Oh, what got to me to thinking about that is that I see on the Shout Box someone named McKinley asking 'Was J.C. Ryle a 4 pointer?' Since it is at the bottom of the Shout Box, there was no answer. I couldn't find one with my browsing. I did find out that Ryle would not be a puritan as he lived afterwards.

1. Richard Baxter held to a heretical view of the atonement.

2. vicarious: Suffered or done by one person as a substitute for another.

substitutionary: The act of putting one thing or person in the place of another.

3. J.C. Ryle did not hold to Definite Atonement but rather Amyraldianism or a form of it.

Now, just to add some clarification to the two terms, "vicarious" and "substitutionary". Theologically there is distinction between the two albeit the dictionary definitions look similar. Substitutionary refers to the personal aspect... He took the place of (Gk: huper), i.e., He went to the cross for those whom the Father predestined to save and as one who was personally guilty. Vicarious refers more to the actual penal judgment and penalty; God's eternal wrath was put upon Him and He had to endure physical death.

What was Richard Baxter's view of the atonement?

"Baxter’s writings are a strange theological mix. He was one of a few Puritans whose doctrines of God’s decrees, atonement, and justification were anything but Reformed. Though he generally structured his theology along Reformed lines of thought, he frequently leaned towards Arminian thinking. He developed his own notion of universal redemption, which offended Calvinists, but retained a form of personal election, which offended Arminians. He rejected reprobation. He was greatly influenced by the Amyraldians and incorporated much of their thinking, including hypothetical universalism, which teaches that Christ hypothetically died for all men, but His death only has real benefit to those who believe. For Baxter, Christ’s death was more of a legal satisfaction of the law than a personal substitutionary death on behalf of elect sinners.

Baxter’s approach to justification has been called neonomianism (that is, “new law”); he said that God has made a new law offering forgiveness to repentant breakers of the old law. Faith and repentance—the new laws that must be obeyed—become the believer’s personal, saving righteousness that is sustained by preserving grace. Baxter’s soteriology, then, is Amyraldian with the addition of Arminian “new law” teaching. Happily, these erroneous doctrines do not surface much in Baxter’s devotional writings, which are geared mainly to encourage one’s sanctification rather than to teach theology." from Joel Beeke's Meet the Puritans