¹ See, e.g., Fantino, Jacques, La Théologie d'Irénée: lecture des Ecritures en réponse à l'exégèse gnostique. Une approche trinitaire (Paris: Cerf, 1994), p. 180Google Scholar; Wanke's, Daniel Das Kreuz Christi Bei Irenäus von Lyon (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2000), esp. pp. 141–3Google Scholar; and Fantino's critique of Wanke's work in the Revue des Sciences Religieuses 76 (2002), pp. 103–4. For a good historically contextual study of the overall thought of Irenaeus see Behr, John, Irenaeus of Lyons: Identifying Christianity (Oxford: OUP, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

² Hereafter AH. For references to the Latin text, I have consulted Harvey, W. W., Sancti Irenaei episcopi Lugdunesis libri quinque adversus haereses, 2 vols (Cambridge: CUP, 1857Google Scholar). References to the English trans. are taken from Roberts, Alexander and Donaldson, James (eds), The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, vol. 1 of the Ante-Nicene Fathers (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1911)Google Scholar. For an overview of the scholarly discussion concerning the original Greek text, its Latin trans. and transmission see Quasten, Johannes, Patrology, 3 vols (Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1950–60)Google Scholar, vol. 1, pp. 290–2; Drobner, Hubertus R., The Fathers of the Church: A Comprehensive Introduction, trans. Schatzmann, Siegfried S. (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2007), pp. 120–1Google Scholar.

³ Hereafter Dem. The only extant manuscript is the Armenian version, found in 1904 and published by Ter-Mekerttschian, K. and Ter-Minassiantz, E., Epídeixis tou apostolikou kerúgmatos (Leipzig: Texte und Untersuchungen, 1907)Google Scholar. English citations are from On the Apostolic Preaching, trans. John Behr (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1997). References to the Latin or Greek are taken from the standard trans. of the Demonstration by Rousseau, Adelin, Irénée de Lyon: Démonstration de la Prédication Apostolique (Paris: Cerf, 1995)Google Scholar. In this translation Rousseau also gives a French translation based upon his best conjectures of what was the original Greek. Behr consults both this text and the original Armenian text for his own translation. I have also consulted MacKenzie, Iain M., Irenaeus's Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching: A Theological Commentary and Translation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002)Google Scholar. MacKenzie, however, uses the inferior translation by Armitage Robinson (originally published New York: Macmillan Co., 1920). By ‘less polemical’ I only intend that the formulations and overall exposition of the faith are not explicitly aimed at opponents. See Dem. 1–3; cf. ‘Introduction’, in Behr, On the Apostolic Preaching, p. 7.

⁴ Dem. 1.

⁵ It might also be noted that in the secondary literature on Irenaeus’ view of the atonement very little attention has been paid to the Dem. It is hoped that this essay will constitute a contribution at just this point.

⁶ Aulén, Gustaf, Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of Atonement, trans. Arthur Gabriel Hebert (London, SPCK, 1953 [1930])Google Scholar. Aulén's study was not the first analysis of this sort. It was preceded in both its analysis and some of its conclusions by the studies of Rivière, Jean, The Doctrine of the Atonement: A Historical Essay (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, 1909)Google Scholar. Compare to the alternative views of d'Alès, Adhémar, ‘La Doctrine de la Recapitulation’, Recherches de Sciences Religieuse 6 (1916), pp. 185–211Google Scholar; and Rashdall, Hastings, The Idea of Atonement in Christian Theology (London: Macmillan, 1919)Google Scholar.

⁷ von Harnack, Adolf, History of Dogma, trans. Neil. Buchanan, 7 vols (New York: Russell & Russell, 1961)Google Scholar, vol. 2, pp. 10, 236, 267–74; Ritschl, Albrecht, A Critical History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation, trans. John S. Black (Edinburgh: Edmonston & Douglas, 1872), pp. 19–21Google Scholar.

⁸ Aulén, Christus Victor, p. 16.

⁹ Ibid., p. 17.

¹⁰ See e.g. John Friesen, ‘A Study of the Influence of Confessional Bias on the Interpretations in the Modern Era of Irenaeus of Lyons’ (Ph.D. diss., Northwestern University, 1977), pp. 106–42, for a history of various interpretations of Irenaeus’ writings on atonement.

¹¹ The discussion of a non-violent atonement is broader, of course, than Irenaeus studies. For a few more recent examples of non-violent atonement theories that do not rely on, or interact much with, Irenaeus, see Cone, James H., God of the Oppressed (New York: Seabury Press, 1975)Google Scholar; Wink, Walter, Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992)Google Scholar; Williams, James G., The Bible, Violence, and the Sacred: Liberation from the Myth of Sanctioned Violence (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1992)Google Scholar; Williams, Delores S., Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993)Google Scholar; Schwager, Raymund, Jesus in the Drama of Salvation: Toward a Biblical Doctrine of Redemption (New York: Crossroad, 1999)Google Scholar.

¹² This is by no means an uncontroversial claim, even among proponents of non-violent atonement. J. Denney Weaver e.g. has argued that all three models of atonement in Christian history are guilty of perpetuating a view of a violent God. See Weaver, J. Denney, ‘Christus Victor, Ecclesiology, and Christology’, Mennonite Quarterly Review 68 (July 1994), pp. 277–90Google Scholar; Some Theological Implications of Christus Victor’, Mennonite Quarterly Review 70/3 (Oct. 1994), pp. 483–99; ‘Response to Martens, Peter, “The Quest for an Anabaptist Atonement”’, Mennonite Quarterly Review 82 (April 2008), pp. 313–20Google Scholar; ‘The Nonviolent Atonement : Human Violence, Discipleship, and God’, in Brad Jersak and Michael Hardin (eds), Stricken by God?: Nonviolent Identification and the Victory of Christ (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 2007), pp. 316–355. Some scholars have argued even further that not only is there divine consent and action in the passion of Christ, but also an element of substitution. See Rashdall, Hastings, The Idea of Atonement in Christian Theology (London: Macmillan, 1919), p. 233Google Scholar; Aloisi, John, ‘“His Flesh for Our Flesh”: The Doctrine of Atonement in the Second Century’, Detroit Baptist Seminary Journal 14 (1 Jan. 2009), pp. 23–44Google Scholar.

¹³ Andrew Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming the Divine: Identification and the Recapitulation of Peace in St. Irenaeus of Lyons’ Atonement Narrative’, in Stricken by God?, pp. 422–80; Finger, Thomas, ‘Christus Victor as Nonviolent Atonement', in Sanders, John (ed.), Atonement and Violence: A Theological Conversation (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2006), pp. 87–111Google Scholar; Sesboüe, Bernard, Tout récapituler dans le Christ: Christologie et sotériologie d'Irénée de Lyon (Paris: Desclée, 2000)Google Scholar.

¹⁴ Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, p. 425; Finger, ‘Christus Victor as Nonviolent Atonement’, p. 93.

¹⁵ Klager e.g. says, ‘this unique concept of Irenaeus’ anthropogony alters significantly the purpose of God's wrath, the definition of human freedom and the affirmation of human culpability in the rest of his thought’ (‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, p. 428). For Irenaeus’ view see, e.g. AH 3.25.3 and Dem. 14. For studies on this aspect of Irenaeus’ thought see Steenberg, M. C., ‘Children in Paradise: Adam and Eve as “Infants” in Irenaeus of Lyons’, Journal of Early Christian Studies 12/1 (Spring 2004), pp. 1–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Behr, John, Asceticism and Anthropology in Irenaeus and Clement (Oxford: OUP, 2000), pp. 43CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 110, 135–6; Iain M. MacKenzie, Irenaeus's Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching, pp. 116–17; de Andia, Ysabel, Homo vivens: Incorruptibilité et divinisation de l'homme selon Irénée de Lyon (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1986), pp. 127–45Google Scholar.

¹⁶ Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, p. 436; cf. Finger, ‘Christus Victor as Nonviolent Atonement’, p. 95.

¹⁷ Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, pp. 436–7.

¹⁸ Finger, ‘Christus Victor as Nonviolent Atonement’, p. 93.

¹⁹ Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, p. 442; cf. Thomas Finger, ‘Christus Victor and the Creeds: Some Historical Considerations’, Mennonite Quarterly Review 72/1 (1 Jan. 1998), pp. 31–51, esp. 47–8. For similar conclusions of older scholarship see Johannes Werner, Der Paulinismus des Irenaeus (Leipzig, 1889), p. 177; Beuzart, Paul, Essai sur la théologie d'Irénée (Paris: E. Leroux, 1908), pp. 93Google Scholar, 102, 104, 148; Tschipke, Theophil, Die Menschheit Christi als Heilsorgan der Gottheit (Freiburg: Herder & Co., 1940), p. 25Google Scholar.

²⁰ Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, p. 442.

²¹ Ibid., p. 449.

²² Ibid. Finger also thinks in this passage Irenaeus clearly abdicates any violence on the part of God in the atonement. ‘Christus Victor and the Creeds’, pp. 46–7.

²³ Sesboüe, Tout récapituler dans le Christ, p. 120. Translations of this work are my own.

²⁴ Ibid., pp. 120–1.

²⁵ See e.g. Hochban, John I., ‘St. Irenaeus on the Atonement’, Theological Studies 7/4 (1 Dec. 1946), pp. 525–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hans Boersma, ‘Violence, the Cross, and Divine Intentionality: A Modified Reformed View’, in Sanders, Atonement and Violence, pp. 47–69; Wanke, Daniel, Das Kreuz Christi Bei Irenäus von Lyon (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2000)Google Scholar, esp. pp. 141–3, 281, 328.

²⁶ Dem. 98, 3 respectively.

²⁷ Dem. 1.

²⁸ Dem. 3. Irenaeus says that this is what Christian baptism reminds its participants of. The question of how Irenaeus understands the relation of baptism to the remission of sins remains outside the scope of this essay. For a collection of Irenaeus’ writings on baptism see Power, David N., Irenaeus of Lyons on Baptism and Eucharist: Selected Texts with Introduction, Translation and Annotation (Bramcote: Grove Books, 1991)Google Scholar.

²⁹ Dem. 15.

³⁰ Dem. 15; cf. AH 5.27.1.

³¹ Dem. 16,17; cf. AH 5.23.1–2.

³² Irenaeus did not see any inconsistency in maintaining both that God punishes and that humans freely and responsibly incur their own punishment. In AH 5.27.2 he says, ‘on as many, according to their own choice, depart from God He inflicts that separation from himself which they have chosen of their own accord . . . God, however, does not immediately punish them of Himself, but that punishment falls on them because they are destitute of all that is good.’

³³ AH 3.25.5, referencing Plato's De legibus 4.715–16 (in which it is stated that the δίκη which follows God is that by which God is a τιμωρός θεός).

³⁴ See also Dem. 8, 17, 18; AH 4.37.1; 4.40.2; 5.27.1.

³⁵ AH 4.36.6.

³⁶ See e.g. Dem. 12. See Klager, ‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, pp. 450–1. Ian MacKenzie adds to the infancy notion that according to Irenaeus the curse of God is primarily directed at the serpent and the ground, citing passages like Dem. 16. Cf. AH 3.23.3; 4.40.3. MacKenzie, Irenaeus's Demonstration, pp. 118, 123, 127.

³⁷ AH 4.40.3 (emphasis added).

³⁸ Dem. 16. Commenting on this passage MacKenzie glosses it by saying that God ‘expels humanity from paradise’, but he fails to mention that, for Irenaeus, this was an expulsion from God's very presence. MacKenzie, Irenaeus's Demonstration, pp. 126–7.

³⁹ Dem. 11, 15. Cf. AH 5.1.3 where Irenaeus makes the association of the ‘breath of God’ and God's Spirit even more explicit. Though beyond the scope of this essay, this interpretation of Irenaeus is consistent with passages such as AH 5.9.1 which suggest a tripartite understanding of the human person. The consistency, in short, can be seen from a basic division of human persons into material and immaterial followed by further divisions of both the material and immaterial parts, in this case the immaterial part being sub-divided into ‘spirit’ and ‘soul’.

⁴⁰ AH 5.17.1.

⁴¹ Dem. 15; cf. AH 5.9.3.

⁴² AH 5.27.2.

⁴³ See AH 4.38.1–4.

⁴⁴ Hochban, St. Irenaeus on the Atonement, p. 531.

⁴⁵ Dem. 31. Rousseau has omnes implicati-adligati-sumus morti per inobaudientiam. Cf. AH 5.27.2; Hochban, St. Irenaeus on the Atonement, p. 532.

⁴⁶ Dem. 72, 78, and 88.

⁴⁷ See e.g. AH, 3.5.3, 3.10.2, 3.12.7, 3.16.9, 4.20.2, 4.27.2, 5.1.1, 5.1.2, 5.2.1. This list does not include Irenaeus’ numerous scriptural citations containing the phrase ‘redemption by his blood’ or ‘death’.

⁴⁸ AH 4.27.2: curatio et remissio peccatorum mors Domini fuit.

⁴⁹ Hochban, St. Irenaeus on the Atonement, p. 545.

⁵⁰ AH 5.1.1.

⁵¹ AH 5.1.2.

⁵² AH 5.14.1.

⁵³ See Wanke, Das Kreuz Christi Bei Irenäus von Lyon, pp. 198–9.

⁵⁴ Hochban, St. Irenaeus on the Atonement, p. 542.

⁵⁵ Dem. 31.

⁵⁶ Dem. 34.

⁵⁷ Dem. 34.

⁵⁸ AH 5.23.2.

⁵⁹ Dem. 69. Irenaeus cites Isa 50:6, 52:13–53:5, 5–6, 7, Ps 72:14; and Lam 3:30. Dem. 68–9.

⁶⁰ AH 5.1.1; 5.23.2.

⁶¹ . . . ut neque quod est justum confringeretur neque antiqua plasmatio Dei deperiret. This formula, along with his discussion of God's remaining true to his word in AH 5.23.2, comes very close to the later discussion of the same by Athanasius in his De incarnatione verbi 6. On account of this, it is astonishing that Klager can maintain that Irenaeus ‘does not introduce a problem’ to which an atonement theory is the solution. Rather, he says, Irenaeus simply provides the ‘solution concerning the origin of sin. Apostasy is not something for which humanity must receive its due punishment, but an opportunity for restoration and reconciliation back to God’ (‘Retaining and Reclaiming’, pp. 436–7). In this passage Irenaeus clearly presents a dilemma to which the plan of redemption is a solution. The dilemma, of course, is taken from the narrative of scripture as Irenaeus reads it. We are not meant to read the dilemma back into his doctrine of God, as if God really were in a quandary and had to devise some clever plan in order to get out of it. Rather, by introducing the dilemma, Irenaeus is able to emphasise the wisdom of God in his one, eternal plan for the world.

⁶² In contrast to what those who would claim Irenaeus as an early proponent of a non-violent atonement theory have argued, Irenaeus insisted that even the suffering and death of Jesus is according to the will of the Father. Indeed, Daniel Wanke has shown that it was actually Irenaeus’ Gnostic opponents who argued that the true God had nothing to do with Jesus’ passion. In contrast, claims Wanke, Irenaeus contended that ‘the cross is to be interpreted both as the event of salvation and simultaneously as the expression of the consistent will of the one creator God’ (Wanke, Das Kreuz Christi Bei Irenäus von Lyon, pp. 143; my translation).

⁶³ It is evident, then, that this passage cannot bear the weight of the edifice built upon it by those claiming Irenaeus as an early proponent of a non-violent atonement theory. Their argument rests largely upon the English translation of the Latin vis as ‘violence’. When read in context, however, it is clear that Irenaeus does not intend by vis what they mean by ‘violence’ (see n. 22 above). It should also be noted that this passage provides only one element of justice in Irenaeus’ conception of the work of Christ. His whole doctrine of recapitulation is meant to convey a sense of the justice, or equality, and thus ‘fittingness’, of God's work of redemption.

⁶⁴ AH 5.23.1.

⁶⁵ AH 5.23.2.

⁶⁶ See Dem. 69 for Irenaeus’ comments on these words from the prophet Isaiah.

⁶⁷ See n. 61 above.

⁶⁸ See AH 4.38.3, where Irenaeus argues that God has worked out his salvation in the created order such that all the parts of the ‘plan’ are harmonious, that humanity is thereby matured and perfected, and that ‘in all things God has the pre-eminence’.

⁶⁹ AH 4.5.1; 4.37.7; Dem. 43. For a discussion of Irenaeus’ christological protology see Holsinger-Freisen, Thomas, Irenaeus and Genesis: A Study of Competition in Early Christian Hermeneutics (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2009)Google Scholar, p. 36. Stephen O. Presley also gives a detailed discussion of the relation of Christ to creation and humanity in the thought of Irenaeus in his The Intertextual Reception of Genesis 1–3 in Irenaeus of Lyons (Leiden: Brill, 2015), pp. 96–106.

⁷⁰ Dem. 98.