Christ Our Penal Substitute

by Robert Lewis Dabney

Lectures delivered at Davidson College and Columbia Seminary by Robert Lewis Dabney, while he was old in age, and totally blind. An important work, nonetheless.

Genres: Theology, Christian

115 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1898

About the author

Robert Lewis Dabney (March 5, 1820 – January 3, 1898) was an American Christian theologian, a Southern Presbyterian pastor, and Confederate Army chaplain. He was also chief of staff and biographer to Stonewall Jackson. His biography of Jackson remains in print today.

Dabney studied at Hampden-Sydney College and the University of Virginia (M.A., 1842), and graduated from Union Theological Seminary in 1846.
He was then a missionary in Louisa County, Virginia, from 1846 to 1847 and pastor at Tinkling Spring, Virginia from 1847 to 1853, being also head master of a classical school for a portion of this time. From 1853 to 1859 he was professor of ecclesiastical history and polity and from 1859 to 1869 adjunct professor of systematic theology in Union Theological Seminary, where he later became full professor of systematics. In 1883, he was appointed professor of mental and moral philosophy in the University of Texas.
By 1894 failing health compelled him to retire from active life, although he still lectured occasionally. He was co-pastor, with his brother-in-law B. M. Smith, of the Hampden-Sydney College Church 1858 to 1874, also serving Hampden-Sydney College in a professorial capacity on occasions of vacancies in its faculty. Dabney, whose wife was a first cousin to Stonewall Jackson's wife, participated in the Civil War: during the summer of 1861 he was chaplain of the 18th Virginia regiment in the Confederate army, and in the following year was chief of staff to Jackson during the Valley Campaign and the Seven Days Battles.
After the Civil War Dabney spoke widely on Jackson and the Confederacy. He continued to hold racial views typical in the South before the Civil War, and his continued support of slavery in speeches and a book published after the war and his strong loyalty to the Confederacy until the 1890s made him a visible figure in the post-war South (Hettle, 2003).
While at the University of Texas he practically founded and maintained the Austin School of Theology (which later became Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary), and in 1870 was Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States.

Major works

Memoir of Rev. Dr. Francis S. Sampson (1855), whose commentary on Hebrews he edited (1857);
Life of General Thomas J. Jackson (1866)
A Defense of Virginia, and Through Her, of the South, in Recent and Pending Contests Against the Sectional Party (1867), an apologia for the Confederacy.
Lectures on Sacred Rhetoric (1870)
Syllabus and Notes of the Course of Systematic and Polemic Theology (1871; 2nd ed. 1878), later republished as Systematic Theology.
Systematic Theology (1878)
Sensualistic Philosophy of the Nineteenth Century Examined (1875; 2nd ed. 1887)
Practical Philosophy (1897)
Penal Character of the Atonement of Christ Discussed in the Light of Recent Popular Heresies (1898, posthumous), on the satisfaction view of the atonement.
Discussions (1890-1897), Four volumes of his shorter essays, edited by C. R. Vaughan.

Reviews

[Ethan McCarter · Rating 4 out of 5]

For the length of these lectures, this is probably the best defense of penal substitutionary atonement that I've read. Dabney was a master theologian in many places, and these lectures were no exception. He dismantles Utilitarian views of the atonement, those who hold that it's barbaric, and philosophical arguments against this vital doctrine. Without this doctrine then we have no understanding of propitiation, the ground for the atonement, and the church will succumb to Socinianism and forms of Universalism such as what happened in the churches of New England during his time period.
The only quibble I had with the book was primarily due to my own ignorance, Hodge does the same, which is where he will quote Latin phraseology without definition. This is the complaint of one who is studying Latin in the 21st century; it would have been readily understood by his students. A few things are a bit antiquated, such as the nomenclature of opposing parties, but the opposition and seed form are still apparent today. I'd recommend this book for the pastor, theologian, and the student; it may be a bit harder to follow for those unfamiliar with the nature of the doctrine or one who would like a fuller treatment. An excellent work for the price and the time it takes to read it!

[Zack · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterful defense of penal substitutionary atonement. A bit redundant because of the chosen structure: introduce terms and issue, outline objections (briefly answering/meeting them), elaborate objections and answers to them, rehearse and elaborate biblical and historical theological data, conclude with summaries. This was originally a series of lectures, so the structure is eminently appropriate!

The last couple of pages include a discussion of penal substitutionary atonement as theodicy, and this was perhaps the most interesting proposition in the entire book (though Dabney’s thorough refutations of objections was grand).

“...the glorious sacrifice of love does prove that no defect of divine benevolence can have had a part in this secret. Had there been in God’s Heart the least lack of infinite mercy, had there been a single fibre of indifference to the misery of his creatures, Christ would never have been given to die for the guilt of men. The Messiah is our complete theodicy!” ~ p. 114

[Daniel Kleven · Rating 2 out of 5]

Five stars for the atonement; one star for Dabney; rounding down to two because I like my PSA as a side to the main course of Christus Victor.

Historian Donald G. Mathews has written quite a lot about Dabney and his take on "the penal satisfaction theory of the atonement":

“‘We Have Left Undone Those Things Which We Ought to Have Done’: Southern Religious History in Retrospect and Prospect,” Church History 67.2 (1998): 305–25

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice,” Journal of Southern Religion (2000) (available here)

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice Part II: Religion as Punishment,” Journal of Southern Religion (2000) (available here)

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice: Part III: Sacrificing Christ/Sacrificing Black Men,” Journal of Southern Religion (2000) (available here)

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice: Article Notes,” Journal of Southern Religion (2000) (available here)

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice,” Black History Bulletin 65/66 (2002): 20–47 (on JStor)

“Crucifixion: Faith in the Christian South” inShapers of Southern History: Autobiographical Reflections (2004) (available here)

“Lynching Is Part of the Religion of Our People: Faith in the Christian South” in Religion in the American South (2004) (available here)

“The Southern Rite of Human Sacrifice: Lynching in the American South,” The Mississippi Quarterly 61.1/2 (2008): 27–70 (on JStor)

At the Altar of Lynching: Burning Sam Hose in the American South (2018)

Mathews notes that after the Civil War, Dabney "devoted himself to perfecting a theology of vengeance" and suggests that Dabney's public defense of this theory of the atonement provided a religious and theological rationale for lynching in the south: "Dabney had defended his punitive theory of atonement by appealing to the horror felt by the virtuous such as he when criminals were not punished"; "punishment was sacralized by the dominant religion of the American South."

In support of his thesis, Mathews cites three sources from Dabney:

"The Christians Duty Towards His Enemies" (1866)
"Vindicatory Justice Essential to God" (1881)
Christ Our Penal Substitute (1898)

I've written about "The Christians Duty Towards His Enemies" here: "“Love Your Enemies”? John Piper and Robert Lewis Dabney, part 2

This article is a theological expression of Dabney's bitterness and hatred for the North, and in particular his hatred for Northern Presbyterians.

"Vindicatory Justice" is the article where Dabney explicitly makes a connection between the justice of punishment and the specific situation of a lynching, for example:

"when, as too often happens, the criminal escapes his just deserts, you feel as though you had been wronged, and with a certain indignation you cry that 'the gallows has been cheated.'"

Christ Our Penal Substitute seems the least "occasional" of the three; it was originally given as a series of lectures at Davidson College and Columbia Seminary and then collected and published as this short book. I couldn't find any of the explicit racism, white-supremacy, or Confederate "sectionalism" that is all over most of his work. He seemed pretty focused on "doctrinal polemics" here. The reviewer in The Presbyterian and Reformed Review (likely B. B. Warfield) said "This useful little book will be valued not only as a legacy from Dr. Dabney, now gone to his reward, but also for its own sake as a clear, strong and incisively written defense of the central principle of the Gospel" (see "Benjamin B. Warfield on Robert Lewis Dabney: Nine Reviews (1891–1905)")

For my own part, I think Matthews is right to show how Dabney formulated the doctrine of substitutionary atonement as a justification for lynching, especially in "Vindicatory Justice." I walked away from reading Dabney on this and I didn't think "substitutionary atonement is the fundamental problem here" -- I thought "Dabney, and the system of white-supremacy that he is part of, is the problem here, which corrupts everything it touches." At the end of the day, I'm still where I was on the atonement: Christus Victor by way of Penal Substitution; I'm still where I was on lynching: a demonic abomination of injustice; and I'm still where I was on Dabney: a powerful, influential force of nature whose legacy is complicated but mostly for great evil, and who still haunts us to this day.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Puritan deep thinker presents the case for penal substitution refuting all the arguments. I give it 3 stars instead of 4 or 5 simply because I admit my own intellectual idiocy - some points here are hard to follow. Nonetheless, the subject matter is critical and - if you're up to it - worth a read.

[Anthony Lawson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this a long time ago, I liked it at the time.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read.This.Book!