Mike Winger Critique Episode 2: Did the Church Fathers Teach PSA?

Mike Winger claims that the Church Fathers (Christian writers living between AD 100 and 787, primarily in the East Roman or Byzantine Empire) professed penal-substitutionary atonement (PSA). Paul Vendredi refutes this claim using principles that Winger himself enforces. According to Winger, if an idea is considered central to the gospel but cannot be found in the Church Fathers' writings, then it should be rejected. Paul quotes Winger’s mentor, William Lane Craig, who found that the Church Fathers did not have a clear and thorough theory of the atonement. Applying Winger's principles, Paul concludes that PSA should be rejected as a model for Christ’s redemptive work.

Paul cites John MacArthur's book, "The Gospel According to Paul," as an example of "spin" in interpreting the Church Fathers' views on the atonement. MacArthur, a staunch defender of PSA, argues that the Church Fathers held a childlike and inadequate understanding of the atonement. However, this perspective is "chronological snobbery," a term used in Protestant apologetics to dismiss the beliefs of pre-modern peoples.

Atonement schoolers like Winger and MacArthur also depend upon the fallacy of tautological question. For example, James White mislabels a work by Athanasius as a treatment on the atonement when it is actually a treatment on the work of Christ (“atonement” and “work of Christ” are NOT synonymous). One must not confuse the historical event of the crucifixion with the modern interpretation of it as atonement.

Paul then compares the catechisms of Tim Keller, John Calvin, and Cyril of Jerusalem, challenging the expectation that PSA would be a prominent theme in ancient catechisms. However, in the Cyril’s catechetical lecture on repentance and remission of sins, one finds a lack of emphasis on PSA and instead finds language that seems to align more with the Restored-Icon model. The emphasis is on healing and recapitulation rather than infraction and penalty. If PSA is a core tenet of the Gospel, then the heart of the Gospel was lacking in these ancient Eastern catechisms.

The same holds for works of systematic theology. Paul compares two modern systematic theologies, one by Wayne Grudem and another by Walter Martin, and notes that while they dedicate around 1.75% and 8.33% of their content to PSA respectively, this is not reflective of the ancient world's approach to systematic theology. Paul opens John Damascene’s "Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith," which dates from the 8th century, and searches for any evidence of PSA. He finds references to the moral-exemplar model, the restored-icon model, and the Christus Victor model, but no mention of anything resembling PSA.

Winger’s search for PSA in the Church Fathers fails for three reasons. The first failing is the "fallacy of the Lonely Fact," where Winger assumes that finding a few components of a concept in the Church Fathers' writings proves the entire doctrine. The second failing is Winger's use of anachronistic projections, where he assigns modern meanings to words and phrases used by the Church Fathers. The third failing is Winger's inability to recognize eristic, or debating tactics designed to win arguments rather than seek truth.