Atonement — Corporate

Mashiach’s Solidarity With Israel

vs. Universal Atonement Doctrine

To simply say that Christ (Mashiach) died for Humanity (unlimited atonement) is not to necessarily make reference to corporate atonement. The idea of atonement that makes righteousness available to the believer because it is universal and generic is not a correct idea of corporate atonement. Corporate atonement is defined first within corporate condemnation. “As in Adam all die”, is as much an essential principle of corporate atonement as is, “so in Mashiach all shall be made alive”. But in order for there to be corporate resurrection the corporate death must be somehow mitigated. If the corporate death of Adam were absolute and unmitigated through the potential of the seed of the woman it would a compromise of justice for there to be any mercy for corporate Adam, even in the form of life after death. For it is not the act of dying that satisfies a sentence of condemnation. It is only permanent death which satisfies a sentence of condemnation.

It is simply necessary that the Messiah of Israel should suffer and die so long as he has an unbreakable solidarity with Israel. This solidarity is solidarity with Israel in Adam's death. It is prescribed by the Torah.

The Torah Requires The Death of Mashiach

The Torah prescribes the death of Mashiach, for Mashiach is one of his people corporately. And it is his people who are found guilty of breaking the Torah commandments. Only Israel, as a nation, that is to say, corporately, is placed under the necessity of keeping the Torah. This defines Israel corporately as being God’s corporate claim on Adam/Humanity. This is God’s claim of the body of the woman in relation to the seed of the woman. The seed of the woman from the beginning was God’s claim upon corporate Adam, as it was a body within the body of the woman which he had prepared for a soul who did not sin with the man and the woman but who nevertheless would be destroyed with the man and the woman, unless God claimed that seed for the corporate salvation of Adam. The individual member of a corporate body does not have to be guilty of the sin in order to be condemned. The condemnation is of Adam and extends to Israel because Israel sins. This is what the Torah requires. It is the Torah, therefore that requires the death of Mashiach and prescribes that death for the corporate salvation of Israel, to provide mercy for Adam.

The Torah Requires The Resurrection of Mashiach

Yet the Torah also requires the resurrection of the dead. How is this? The Torah requires the death of Mashiach, the lamb without sin, because the Mashiach is a member of Israel – and in his death for corporate Israel the sentence of condemnation of corporate Adam is fulfilled. Justice is done; but because it is accomplished in the innocent one, the seed of the woman it is a death sentence that can be mitigated for the body of the woman as claimed by God as pertaining to the seed, which body he called Israel — and to this end Israel was set aside for blessing and promise. This is life. There must be a death of Israel with respect to Adam but then life for Israel with respect to the covenant of God with Abraham and his seed. Mashiach replaces Adam for all humanity but only in relation to Israel, who becomes to him as cHavah (Eve) unto Adam. Once this union is established life can be given to the world. Through affinity with Israel, all nations of Adam can be “grafted into Israel”. That is, Adam, the man and the woman, and every offspring of Adam can be converted from the headship of the first Adam to the headship of the last Adam. For it was for the sake of repairing the transgression of Adam that Mashiach came into the world and died for Israel and rose again.

Corporate Atonement Is Both Limited and Unlimited

Having no concept of corporate identity at all, or at least no concept of the relationship of corporate Israel to corporate Adam, the two forms of the Christian doctrine of atonement, Limited Atonement and Unlimited Atonement, both have immediate problems with time. From an eternal perspective they hold that sin for those for whom atonement is made and/or received there is no more sin. But in time, in some aspects, their sin, and sometimes their sinning, continues. This brings out the fact that not only a certain understanding of atonement but a certain understanding of what sin is, and even what the world is, are determined by whether or not there is a complete concept of corporate humanity within the given doctrine of atonement. The ongoing presence and power of sin threatens the traditional doctrines of atonement.

No theory of the atonement that says that Christ (Mashiach) paid the penalty of sin, (that is to say, death and condemnation), for us can stand simply by ignoring the fact that sin remains and that all die just as before. If the penalty is paid, what are all dying for? But we must still understand that Mashiach paid the price for Adam's sin and all sin since Adam’s sin, which understanding is comprehended in the Biblical revelation of the atonement provided by the Lamb of God.

All of these problems are solved when Limited atonement is put in the right and true context of corporate atonement and when Unlimited atonement is placed in the right and true context. It is not a limited number of individuals in Adam who are elect but the corporate body of the woman that is elect in Mashiach and all who are counted then as the seed of the woman through union with Mashiach. And when this is understood it is understood that in relation to sinners this is unlimited in its good news and its commandment to repent and believe that atonement has been made for what we all are corporately as Adam. To believe this we only need understand that it is by paying it for Israel that he pays it for all - that this seems a mystery to our natural mind becomes no mystery at all when one believes the Good News of Israel and Her Messiah.