Anselm of Canterbury

But so another theologian that you talk about from that early period is Irenaeus.

And I want to talk about him a bit because, you know, coming out of Augustine and his understanding of original sin, but really through the medieval period, we tend to have in the West, in Western theology, a sense of salvation through a kind of, you know, legal and penal framework, right? Going back to Anselm and all of that.

that the Reformation was trying to solve for in a very different way than kind of the medieval practices were and medieval theology was.

But that sense of sin and salvation as sort of somehow getting ourselves legally in right relationship with God who's punishing us, I think can often fall flat in modern culture.

Thus in spite of the discontent of his people and the frequent petitions to him, one of which is peculiar, that the king would allow it to be enjoined that the people should pray that the king's heart might be changed, he continued obstinate until a dangerous illness brought on a temporary fit of remorse as violent as is usual in ill-balanced minds.

Then at last, giving way to a long-expressed desire of his country, he appointed Anselm Archbishop of Canterbury in 1093.

This great man was a Lombard like Lanfranc and of noble birth.

He had been attracted to Beck by the fame of Lanfranc, and there in spite of their very different characters had become one of his dearest friends.

To his predecessor he formed a complete contrast.

Lanfranc was a man of the world, gifted with a practical, vigorous turn of mind.

Anselm, on the contrary, deficient in worldly qualities, far surpassed his friend in originality of thought and subtlety of mind.

He was the first great philosopher of Christian Europe, and in his works at once laid the basis of the future scholastic philosophy and went beyond it.

And this is not a Protestant thing.

This is St. Anselm.

St. Anselm writing in what, the 12-1300s.

He says that the debt that humanity has to God is so great that no human man could ever pay it back.

So purgatory is just not possible.

Why do Christians adorn their churches, homes, and necks with a symbol of abasement, terror, and torture? The Feast of the Exaltation or Triumph of the Holy Cross provides the answer.

St. Anselm in the twelfth century explained it this way.

Our first parents' sin was all about pride, disobedience, and self-love.

Deceived by the serpent, Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit in defiance of God because they wanted to exalt themselves as His equal.

uh a few different things i don't think that you can kind of pin them down exactly i think this is i think first of all i think atonement theory is probably one of the most complex topics in the bible and there's probably a good reason why no one in church history really expected everybody to have an atonement theory it's never a part of any of these creeds or anything jesus died for our sins was good enough for most of them and it should be good enough for us today but wrath satisfaction started really in the middle ages.

A guy named Anselm really made the big shift.

I didn't say what the early church believed.

I should say that real quick.

And then the modern church, if you ask them, why did Jesus need to die for our sins? They would say, well, God can't forgive sins, and not unless he punishes somebody.

So our problem is God.

And that's what Anselm did.

So Anselm, right in the middle between the two worlds, He actually says it explicitly.