New Testament in Context
Paul’s Metaphors of Salvation in Their Ancient Contexts
In his Epistle to the Romans, the Apostle Paul used concepts familiar to the people of his time to help them understand Jesus Christ’s work of salvation.
Paul writing a letter at a desk
How does one put into words all that Jesus Christ has done for us? For Paul, the answer was to use concepts that were familiar in his time and could be likened to Jesus Christ—concepts such as justification, grace, and propitiation/atonement.
While each of these concepts may sometimes be misunderstood in the present day, in Romans 3:24–25, Paul used them as metaphors to explain salvation in terms that Christ’s followers at the time might have better understood. Therefore, knowing more about the original contexts of these words can help us better understand Paul’s teachings about our salvation in Jesus Christ.
Justification
The word justification was used in the Old Testament to teach Israel about their relationship with God.1 The idea comes from a legal context. For example, in Deuteronomy 16:18–20, Israel is commanded to appoint judges to render “just” decisions and pursue what is “altogether just” (in the original Hebrew this reads, pursue “justice justice,” repeating the word justice twice for emphasis). Just and justice derive from the same Hebrew and Greek roots as justification.
Prophets used the image of a law court, with God as judge, to poetically warn Israel and its neighboring nations (see Isaiah 3:13–14; 41:1–9, 21–24; Micah 6:1–5). In Isaiah 43:9, God summons the nations to appear before Him as if in court: “Let the people be assembled: … let them bring forth their witnesses, that they may be justified.”2 To be justified (declared just or pardoned) would be the hope of anyone brought to court.
Yet some Old Testament authors were concerned that God’s “justice,” or His “righteousness” (both translations of the same word in Hebrew and Greek), would condemn people. The psalmist acknowledges, “For in thy sight shall no man living be justified” (Psalm 143:2). Paul refers to this psalm in Romans 3:20: “By the deeds of the law [of Moses] there shall no flesh be justified in [God’s] sight.” Paul then presents the solution. God, our great divine Judge, chooses to declare us just (or righteous) because of Christ: we are “justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24).
Grace
Grace is another term that Paul adopts to explain the saving work of Jesus Christ. The word grace was not originally a religious term. In the time of Paul, grace (in Greek, charis) was commonly used to describe the relationship between a patron and a client. A patron possessed the power, authority, or financial means to grant a gift to clients they could not earn for themselves or repay in kind. Clients felt obligated to honor their patron by publicly showing their gratitude and fidelity.
For instance, in AD 90 the city of Aphrodisias sent a delegation to Ephesus to erect a statue in honor of the Roman emperors. The inscription on that statue reads: “The People of Aphrodisias, loyal to Caesar, being free and autonomous from the beginning by the grace of the Augusti, set up [this statue] by a private [act of] grace.”4 This inscription uses grace in two ways: first to describe the gift of the Augusti—that the city of Aphrodisias would be free and autonomous—and second to describe the smaller gift of a statue to profess the people’s loyalty and show their gratitude.
In Romans, Paul clarifies which of these two types of grace he is describing: “Being justified freely by his grace” (Romans 3:24; emphasis added). Paul underscored that this is the gift of God as our patron that we cannot repay and should accept with public expressions of our gratitude and faithfulness.
Propitiation/Atonement
Paul continues to explain Christ’s saving work with one final metaphor:
“God hath set forth [Christ Jesus] to be a propitiation through faith in his blood” (Romans 3:25).
The word translated as “propitiation” may also be translated as “atonement” or “mercy seat.” In the time of Paul, when most Jews heard the word atonement, they would think first of the work of priests at the temple.
For instance, Leviticus 16 describes how the high priest, on the Day of Atonement, is to sprinkle the blood of the animal sacrifice “upon the mercy seat” to “make an atonement” (Leviticus 16:15–16). Paul uses the word propitiation to compare the saving work of Jesus Christ to something his readers were familiar with: the work of priests in the temple to take away the people’s sins and reconcile them to God. Paul, however, clarifies that it is not the blood of animals that saves but rather “propitiation through faith in [Christ’s] blood” (Romans 3:25).
Within two brief verses (Romans 3:24–25), Paul invites us to imagine (1) God justifying us in a law court because of our redemption in Jesus Christ, (2) God becoming our patron because of His gift of grace, for which we should obey Him and publicly thank Him, and (3) God acting as priest, making us holy through our faith in the atoning blood of Christ.
When applied to our lives and worship as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today, each of these images can help us to see the power of our Savior’s atoning sacrifice and the love that He and our Heavenly Father have shown us by offering us such a wondrous gift.