The Interpenetration of the Atonement
The Atonement seems to have involved a complete communion between Christ and every moment of every human experience. Thus he experienced and bore all our sins and their punishments (the sin is usually itself the punishment), all of our failings, illnesses, weaknesses, the whole lot.
The Holy Ghost interpenetrates. It seems logical that the Holy Ghost would be the means whereby Christ would have so communed. But the scriptures say nothing about the Holy Ghost being present at the atonement.
Warning: speculation ahead.
There is a strengthening angel mentioned. Does that represent the Holy Ghost? Maybe, but an angel would be an odd symbol for the Holy Ghost. Besides, I have my own theory about who or what the angel represents (Adam, but not just Adam).
Could total interpenetration have meant that there was nothing to “spare” of the Holy Ghost to be a separate, mentionable presence at the Atonement?
OK, here’s my wildest thought. The Holy Ghost does not abide sin, we are told. Can He really then bring Christ into ‘communion,’ as it were, with sin? The devil is also a spirit and also interpenetrates to the degree we allow him, which means to the degree we sin. We know he had access to Christ during the Atonement and that the Atonement was in some sense Christ confronting Satan at Satan’s most powerful and still overcoming. What if Satan used his temporary power over Christ to drag him in to experiencing every last bit of of sin and defilement that Satan had wrought? This would be simultaneously the most powerful attack Satan could have and would also fit his vindictive and boastful character. See what I have done!
Don
May 11, 2021
This post made me sick to my stomach. I have no idea of the scriptural truth, but the visceral imagery really drives home the idea of what it meant for Christ to die for our sins. Thanks.
Don
May 11, 2021
(I meant that as a huge compliment for the record 🙂 )
Zen
May 11, 2021
The scripture that we are in Christ, and he in us, says to me, that while we feel of his power and grace and peace, he feels our struggles, our disquiet, our weakness.
And so, I see no need for the Holy Spirit to do that for the Savior. I think he does it himself.
JimD
May 11, 2021
Does the “wildest thought” suggest that Christ’s Atonement would never have “worked” if there hadn’t been a satan-figure who rebelled against God and, at the opportune moment, launched the kind of attack of which you speak?
E.C.
May 11, 2021
Two thoughts, both from my favorite Institute teacher:
1) His speculation is that the strengthening angel might have been either Mighty Michael (Adam) or our Heavenly Mother. I think either option would have been a comfort to the suffering Savior.
2) Satan attacked Christ as he would attack all of us. That means Christ experienced deeper depths of depression, mental illness, physical pain, and spiritual woundedness than we ever will. But in the end, as President Packer said, “How the Atonement was wrought, we do not know. No mortal watched as evil turned away and hid in shame before the light of that pure being.
“All wickedness could not quench that light. When what was done was done, the ransom had been paid. Both death and hell forsook their claim on all who would repent. Men at last were free.”
Which my teacher interpreted to mean that Satan himself felt ashamed by Christ’s pure goodness in the face of everything he could throw down.
Wm Jas Tychonievich
May 14, 2021
“What if Satan used his temporary power over Christ to drag him in to experiencing every last bit of of sin and defilement that Satan had wrought?”
He could not have experienced the guilt — the horrifying knowledge one has as a sinner that *I myself* have done this horrible thing — unless he were temporarily delusional. Experiencing someone else’s guilt vicariously, no matter how vividly, can never be the same, because the most important element — the *reality* of it — is missing.
(For the record, I do not believe that Christ suffered, or had to suffer, “all our pain” in this literal sense.)
Zen
May 14, 2021
21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be cone in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:
23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.
John 17:21-23
Other verses available as well
I think he does feel our pain and struggles, temporal and spiritual, at least to the degree we also feel of his peace and grace.
G.
May 19, 2021
Wm J, I think I disagree. Highly empathetic people already have this kind of experience without any interpenetration at all. The concept of interpenetration is that you are literally experiencing someone else’s experience.
Your belief in the parentheses is quite respectable and probably what the vast majority of good Saints believe. I just happen to believe otherwise.
@Zen, ” I see no need for the Holy Spirit to do that for the Savior. I think he does it himself.” This is another good choice. What I am going off of are the scriptures in D&C that say that the Holy Ghost has to be fleshless so it can be inside us, and the ones talking about how at least for mortals the Holy Ghost does allow something like interpenetration.