Christ died for whose sins in accordance with the scriptures?

I assume in saying Paul is not John you are refering to scriptures like 1 John 2:2 where is says Jesus is the “propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” I can understand Paul coming from a strict Jewish narrative in his writtings and indeed using this apporach opens up many of the Scritpures. Yet, I wonder how differnt would our concept of the atonement look in light of the whole Scripture, including John, if the atonement was udnerstood as being for the Jews. In our current setting wouldn’t this then be symatics? I guess what I am getting at: with the understanding of atonement you are describing how would this change the way we “do” our faith today?

Andrew,

This is so right on.  Glad you can see it too and have the articulation to put forth the argument.

Once one sees and understands this more correct understanding of the NT narrative the easier it’s for one to see other NT truths that escape him.  For example, in that same commentary you referenced (Gordon D.  Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians) he continues to makes additional comments concerning  the rest of 1 Cor. 15 – forget the page number and I’m at work so I can’t look it up now – on Paul’s  use of the present passive throughout the chapter, which he states is very odd and doesn’t understand why.  So, verses like 1 Cor. 15:35, which most translations state as, “…How are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come in?”, should actually state, “…how are the dead being raised?  And with what kind of body are they coming in?”.

The reason Paul uses the present passive throughout is because the reference to “the dead” in 1 Cor. 15 is in reference to Israel corporately (see Max King, The Cross and the Parousia of Christ”) and not a universal application to physically dead people individually.   Same goes for the “body” being referenced.  Paul is not speaking of raising individual physical bodies (plural), but of a body (singular), which is the spiritual in contrast to the natural (which doesn’t mean physical, see 1 Cor. 2:14) that Paul contrast throughout 1 Cor. 15.  This raising was not a one-time event either but a process that lasted 40 years (AD 30 – 70), thus Paul’s “being raised” (the 1st Resurrection from Rev. 20:5).  See also Israel’s transition from the old covenant to the new covenant (Gal. 4:21-31, which is the reality of the foreshadowing of Israel’s 40 year transition from slavery in Egypt to the promise land presented in the OT.  Heck, starting is 1 Cor. 15:12 one could probably substitute Israel for “the dead” and maintain correctness of the text.

This is all connected to the fact the Jesus died for Israel’s sins so Israel could be raised (corporately) via her Messiah.  Without the raising of Israel there was nothing for the gentile (wild olive shoot) to be grafted into — see Romans 11.

I disagree with you Andrew on your reference to Adam.  While, the gentile was certain guilty of sin too, they did not reside in Adam’s sin and death.  This is why in Romans 6 Paul makes reference to “the sin” and “the death” (not just sin in general) which was due to law (note: only Young’s Translation seems to actually acknowledge the definite articles) .  Paul is dealing with Israel.  This is why in 1 Cor. 15:56 Paul could tie the resurrection to Israel’s law (the gentile was never under Israel’s law).  It was the law over Israel that condemned Israel.  Christ (Israel’s representative/federal head) died to raise Israel out from under the law thus removing her out from death, which was the last enemy (1 Cor. 15:26), which was accomplish with the destruction/removal of the OC and its law in AD70.  Also if you notice Paul once again in 1 Cor. 15 takes it back to Adam, which is all tied to the law, which ties Adam only to Israel  (I know I’ve mentioned this before in another post that you rejected, but you are wrong).

You are so correct in the need to pay attention to the “we”, the “our”, the “us” etc. throughout the NT.  The universal application of these references has completely distorted the Church’s understanding of the NT’s historical narrative beyond all recognition.

Not universal or not available universally? There’s something wrong with the invitation then.

In Psalm 106 I note the poet’s request: 

remember me יהוה, in the acceptance of your people, visit me in your salvation to see the good of your chosen, to be glad in the gladness of your nation, to praise with your inheritance - 

then immediately: 

we have sinned with our ancestors, we have been perverse

we are wicked

Who is that first person plural? 

It is a generic problem dealing with you singular and you plural, collective, selective, or corporate. It is selective parochialism to deal with the first person plural. When does it invite, when does it exclude?  And often in the psalms, the singular is a voice for the plural, for the corporate (e.g. 42-43 singular, 44 plural).

There is no explanation for ‘my’ story without the metaphor and the choice of Israel — so Psalm 78:2, cited in Matthew 13 about the parable that Israel is — on behalf of all. These things were written for our learning… that we all might come to the fullness of the stature of the measure of Christ (being ‘in’ the Anointed).

It’s about being governance. Psalm 107 has a curious character — it is about finding the appropriate ‘seat’ of government. Seat/a place to be this governed body, is the only Hebrew root that appears more than 6 times in the poem. Give thanks, loving-kindness get 6 mentions each but words related to ישׁב, get 7 mentions.

Our problem is both salvation and the ability to govern — without exploitation, cronyism, oligarchy, or violence. When will we come before the presence of the living God (to take Psalm 42 out of its context and apply it to our world today).

If the metaphor is exclusive, why bother? The ‘we’ section of Romans is strategically placed among other sections that emphasize other pronouns. It cannot be exclusive, but rather open and invitational, and incoprporating those obedient to its call.

I don’t want to spoil a closely and carefully argued presentation, but I do have some basic questions about it.

If Isaiah 53 referred to the salvation of Israel through the suffering servant, the wider context is never far away, eg Isaiah 52:10, and Isaiah 49:6 especially, where the same servant figure is in view. Was this “a matter of secondary effect”?

The argument from Romans 3:21-25 seems to me to say the opposite of the “exclusive” view: “The righteousness of God comes through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference.” — v.22. The argument runs without a break or qualification directly into v.25 - “God presented him as a hilasterion, through faith in his blood”. This means that the faithfulness of Jesus through which the righteousness of God comes was to all, not just to Jews, that it was based on faith, and that faith was in his blood. There is not the slightest hint that this was for Jews only, and as a secondary matter for gentiles who were convinced by what God did for the Jews.

Acts 13 is primarily addressing an audience of Jews and gentile God-fearers, but even in the passage you quote, the universal appeal of the proclamation of forgiveness of sins through Jesus is made clear:  “by him everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses” — v.39. “Everyone” in this instance means just that — Jew and Gentile, because “you”, the Jews and God-fearing Gentiles,   “could not be freed by the law of Moses”. The failure of Jews to find this freedom from the underlying problem of sin through the law of Moses highlights by contrast the success of faith in Jesus to bring the same freedom to everyone who believes.

In Galatians, a misreading of the wider argument produces a misreading of the detail. In 1:15-21, Paul is seeking to convince Gentile believers of the folly of turning to the law, since even Jews such as himself (v.15) were unable to find justification through observing the law (v.16) but only found it through faith in Christ. There was a particular need for Paul as a Jew under the law to find justification, which the law led him to — faith in Christ. The consequence of the process was the same as for anyone — v.20. The universality of this faith in Christ and its consequences, the same for Jew for Gentile, is made clear in 3:1-3. Jesus the Messiah was “clearly portrayed as crucified” to the Gentiles. It was by believing in him, not simply an argument about him, that the Spirit was given — v.2-3. Again in 3:26, the climax of the whole argument, addressing Gentiles as well as Jews, Paul says: “You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus”. There is nothing here about an exclusively Jewish argument, or that Gentiles came into a Jewish salvation by believing in an argument for and about Jews.

In Romans 4:25, since Paul has been arguing strenuously for a righteousness by faith for Gentiles as well as Jews (Abraham the Gentile and David the Jew), and since he says “He (Abraham) is the father of us all. As it is written: I have made you the father of many nations” — 4:16-17, it is regressive to then say that from v.22 to v.25, Paul suddenly changes direction and says that righteousness through believing that God raised Jesus from the dead was for Jews at that time only.

There is a particular argument about Israel and Jews under the law, and why faith in Christ freed Jews not only from the observance of the law but from the consequences of its non-obsrevance — which was more an issue about loyalty to YHWH than the particulars of observance. But the outcome of the argument is clear: from Israel’s failure arose what might be described as Israel’s greatest achievement, universal salvation which included gentiles through faith in Jesus. Paul never qualifies this salvation except when he is restricting his use of the inclusive 1st person plural, as in Galatians 1:15, where the restriction is explicit in a particular argument. The rest of the time, including 1 Corinthians 15, it is equally clear: “we” means Jews and Gentiles.