The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-05-19
THE FULFILLMENT OF THE LAW
BY REV. S. CRANE, d. ID.
(Norwalk, o.

In the sermon on the mount, Christ
says, II come not to destroy, but to full
fill, the law. The law to which he re-
fers is doubtless the moral law, the
Ten Commandments, which constituted
the fundamental law of the Hebrew
nation. This is evident from the fact
that he proceeds to comment on these
commandments. 1t is the moral law,
therefore, that Christ came to fulfill.
How, then, does Christ fulfill the moral
lawp How does he keep or satisfy this
law?
But this raises the previous question,
provokes the abstract question, What
is the fulfillment OF lawp What con-
stitutes the fulfllment or satisfaction
of law? How can a moral law be full
filled? This seems very simple ques-
tion and yet wrong answer to this
question has been the source Of great
errors in theology and religion. Be-
cause men have answered this ques-
tion wrongly, or because half Of their
answers have been wrong, the truth
has greatly suffered. The wrong part
of this answer has been the supposi-
tion that punishment fulfills or salts
fies law. No one has ever denied that
obedience satisfies law, all have af-
firmed this-but some have supposed
that there is another way of fulfilling
the law; that we can fulfill the law by
suffering the penalty the law prescribes
This notion has come into theology
from the use of legal phraseology in re-
ligion. We say in legal language, of
person who has suffered the penalty of
the law, that he has satisfied the law;
that the law has no more claim upon
him. The law says, for instance, that
for the crime of stealing given sum
Of money, a man shall go to prison for
so many years. This is the penalty for
this crime. Now, if the criminal suf-
fers this penalty he is said to filfill or
satisfy the law. Hence has arisen
the notion that punishment can fulfill
or satisfy the law of God. God has
attached penalty to that law. Who
ever suffers that penalty, therefore,
fulhlls or satisfies the law. The suffer
ing of the penalty is thought to be just
as much a fulfillment of the law as
obedience thereto. Hence, upon this
ground has been based, out of this no.
tion has grown, that great monstrosity
in theology, the legal atonement of
Christ. Here is the root of the legal
view of the atonement. 1t is found in
this application of legal phraseology to
religion. According to this view the
penalty Of Gods law is endless punish
ment. All mankind have incurred
that penalty by sin. Christ suffered
that penalty, or it's equivalent, on the
cross and so fulfilled or satisfied the
law and atoned for human sin. The
law now has no more claims upon man
and he can be saved.
See, now, how all this scheme is built
upon and grows out of the wrong an
swer to the question we are considering,
How can the law be fulflledp 1t is
based entirely on the notion that pun
ishment can fulfill law. Suppose we
take away this notion. Suppose we
deny that the law is satisfied with pun
ishment, what then becomes of this
egal view of the atonement ? 1t falls
to the ground, of course. II punish
ment does not satisfy law, then Christ
cannot satisfy the law of God by suf-
fering its punishment, and this whole
legal view of the atonement is without
foundation.
But it is very evident that punish
ment does not, in and of itself, satisfy