Ukrzyżowanie Syna Bożego uśmierzające gniew Boga Ojca. Szkic z historii myśli teologicznej

Abstract

The salvific meaning of the death of Christ and the problem of God’s wrath, understood as God’s hatred of sin, have long been intertwined in the history of theology. In some soteriological formulations, we can observe attempts to directly link the death of Christ with God’s wrath, that is, that the chief meaning of Christ’s passion lies in providing appeasement. The article outlines the main historical phases of this kind of theological synthesis. It seeks to trace the relationship between the salvific dimension of the cross of Jesus and theological interpretations of God’s wrath. The article has been divided into three parts. The first presents the development of the interpretation of the death of Christ in Patristic and Scholastic theology. The second part discusses the culmination stage of the theological link between the death of Christ and God’s wrath, beginning with the Reformation concept of “penal substitution” and then following this idea's contestation over time. The article's third part explores contemporary attempts at understanding this relationship, i.e. the death of Christ viewed within the context of God’s wrath.