part0006

However, men seem to always want to add some conditions, methods, steps and processes as prerequisites to God’s goodness. One such condition, has been the doctrine of repentance.

In this booklet we will look at how various doctrines of repentance were developed, including some of the most popular and current mindsets. Then we’ll look at how the greek word metanoia was used, in both classical Greek and also in the context of the New Testament.

The purpose is to show that faith and repentance are not separate processes or events, but different descriptions of the same event. We’ll also see that neither faith nor repentance persuades God to forgive, but rather, they are the natural responses to the revelation of what God has done already.

Paul was constantly plagued by people who wanted to introduce at least a few of the old ways, a few reasonable conditions, to the good news he proclaimed. In Gal 4 & 5, Paul gives this conclusion: if you mix any law, any conditions, to the message of Jesus, He will be of NO benefit to you! [1]

It did not take long for distortions to take root. In fact the first generation after the Apostles started making some additions. Instead of acknowledging that all sin was dealt with in the once-and-for-all sacrifice of Christ, the emphasis was placed on something man had to do.

On the theology of the early church fathers, Torrance notes:

Salvation is wrought, they thought, certainly by divine pardon but on the ground of repentance [self-amendment before God], not apparently on the ground of the death of Christ alone. There is no doubt about the fact that the early Church felt it was willing to go all the way to martyrdom, but it felt that it was in that way that the Christian made saving appropriation of the Cross, rather than by faith … It was not seen that the whole of salvation is centered in the person and the death of Christ .... Failure to apprehend the meaning of the Cross and to make it a saving article of faith is surely the clearest indication that a genuine doctrine of grace is absent. [2]

Following are the views that were held prior to the Reformation.

Only sins prior to baptism were forgiven:

This view basically placed the emphasis on the event of baptism. At this point a new believer began with a clean slate. The view was that all sins prior to this event were forgiven, but certainly not any new sins. [3] The thinking behind this was: if the consequences of sin are as grave as possible, then the likelihood of people sinning would be less. However, such an approach has never worked!

The expected, but problematic response was that people put off baptism for as long as possible, thereby ensuring that more sin would be forgiven.

These early Christian leaders dealt with this problem by developing the concept of ‘doing penance’ or repentance, as a way to solve the problem of sin after conversion. It was meant to make forgiveness possible, but difficult, so that people would not take advantage of it. But this got complicated very quickly . Which sins qualified? How many times could you be forgiven? Some suggested that there could only be one additional opportunity to repent! However, most felt that there could be multiple opportunities to repent. But how many times could a person ‘do penance’? How exactly could repentance be implemented in a way that would discouraged people to sin again?

This lead to a very complicated system of categorising sin and an equally complicated process of repentance, involving the depth and sincerity of a person’s feelings of regret, together with various ‘acts of penance’, as prescribed by a priest. These acts of penance in effect became one’s own atonement for one’s sins.

By the time the scriptures were translated into Latin, these doctrines, rather than the actual text, influenced the translation more. And so metanoia was translated as ‘acts of penance’ and later as repentance. Penance implies a payment ... and many cathedrals were financed by this concept of paying for your sins. Many religious organisations are still financed by the same concepts of guilt and payment.

This translation of metanoia has caused so much misunderstanding. In fact, the common understanding of the word repentance does not even occur in the original text!

The word repentance still carries the same flavour as penance. Re-penance ... a repetition of penance. Augustine, who had an enormous influence on the western christian mindset, used the vulgate as his preferred translation and built his doctrine of repentance upon this erroneous translation.

The vulgate has been reviewed often and many errors have been corrected. Often it was pointed out that the concepts of repentance and penance are not present in the Greek word metanous. Lorenzo Valla, a theologian, again pointed out this error in translation in 1430. However, because these concepts were so ingrained within the religious mindset, the corrections were overruled and the error of penance was retained.

From this understanding of penance, came the doctrines of indulgences, whereby people literally used money to buy forgiveness. Now many of you might scoff at this idea as pre-reformation ludicracy ... not realising how much of it has been retained in protestant theology.

Although the idea of monetary payment was rejected by protestants, the idea of repentance being a type of payment, remained. The currency simply changed to ‘sorrow’ and ‘confession’. In other words, repentance was measured by the depth of sorrow a person felt for what they did and who they were. Further weight was added by the sincerity of their sin confession. This idea says that what Jesus did is only potentially yours; that the payment of repentance - the weight of your sorrow and the sincerity of your confession - is what actually pays for your forgiveness!

Such an understanding of repentance gave birth to so much preaching, aimed at evoking regret and sorrow through making people conscious of their sin and undeserving nature. This is not the gospel! As we’ll see later, true repentance might include regret, but it is not synonymous with regret.

[ 3 ]Justin Martyr, The First Apology, 15-16; Ambrose, Concerning Repentance, 2.11; Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, 1.17-18; and Anselm, De Concordia III: Grace and Free Choice, 8