Jesus’ death, an act of extreme violence, was a necessary act of service to his people — taking the form of ‘a ransom’ (Greek lytron; Matt 20:28; Mark 10:45).¹See Jonathan T. Pennington, ‘Matthew and Mark,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 631-68.

Paul draws on the same field of language when he says Christians have been redeemed from slavery to sin, and have instead become slaves to righteousness and to God (Rom 6:15-23).

In Romans 1:1 he calls himself a ‘slave’ (doulos) of Christ Jesus — the implication being that he had been, as all Christians have been, redeemed from slavery to sin, because Christ paid the price to buy us back.²See Adam Kotsko, ‘The Persistence of the Ransom Theory of the Atonement,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 277-94.

‘A person or thing was redeemed out of a condition of slavery, captivity, or danger by the payment of a price.’

An Everyday Transaction

In the Greco-Roman world, redemption language belonged to ordinary economic and commercial transactions — most notably the redemption of slaves, whose freedom could be secured by payment of a price.

At the time,

‘redemption was a common transaction and therefore an understandable concept. A person or thing was redeemed out of a condition of slavery, captivity, or danger by the payment of a price (the ransom), thereafter to be at the disposal of the purchaser (the redeemer). Jesus (the Redeemer) will give his life (the ransom) to redeem many people from a manifold captivity into the freedom of belonging to God’s Kingdom.’³Seccombe, The Gospel of the Kingdom, 121.

The New Testament writers understood the value of Jesus’ bloody death in exactly these terms, for ‘redemption … is in Christ Jesus’ (Rom 3:24).

As Augustine explains: ‘he was able to pay for our sins by dying precisely because he died and, at the same time, did not die for any sin on his part.’⁴Augustine, The City of God, 10.24; trans. Babcock, 378. See also David Vincent Meconi, ‘Augustine,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 381-88.

More popularly put, the good news tells us that Christ ‘paid for our freedom with his priceless life’⁵Billy Graham, The Reason for My Hope: Salvation (Thomas Nelson, 2013), xii. (cf. Titus 2:14). And the outcome of ‘redemption’ by Jesus’ ‘blood’ is ‘the forgiveness of our sins’ (Eph 1:7; also Rom 3:24-25; Col 1:12-14; Heb 9:12; 1 Pet 1:18-19).

Captive to What, Exactly?

The kind of captivity from which Christ’s death ransomed us is a complex web of consequences flowing from sin: satanic spiritual power, divine judgment, guilt, the evils of the present age, and death itself.

The price paid through Jesus’ violent death purchases our transition from one realm to another: ‘He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins’ (Col 1:13).

Christ’s redeeming death thus brings liberation from demonic darkness and entry into God’s kingdom of light. Out of one, into the other.

Two Hebrew Words

Redemption is simply one of the ways the New Testament describes Jesus’ death, standing alongside sacrifice, victory, propitiation and reconciliation — all clarified in the simple statement that Jesus ‘died for our sins’ (1 Cor 15:3).

The Old Testament employs two principal terms.

gā’al occurs some 118 times, describing a relative kinsman who purchases a relation out of difficulty or danger. Ten uses fall within Leviticus 25, and the pattern is enacted narratively in Ruth 4:1-12.

pādâ, occurring some sixty times, denotes payment of a required sum for the purchase of property or life (Exo 13:11-16). Deuteronomy 7:8 speaks of redemption from the house of slaves — the whole Exodus event — liberty achieved by God’s own power.

So Israel’s departure from Egypt is itself termed a redemption (Exo 6:6; 15:13), with the Most High God named ‘their redeemer’ (Psa 78:35). Scripture repeatedly stresses God’s strength to accomplish Israel’s redemption from captivity, whether in the Exodus or the return from Babylonian exile (Jer 31:11; 50:33-34).

Job expresses trust in the Lord as his own personal, individual, living Redeemer (19:25).

Worth noting, though: redemption from sin appears only twice in the Old Testament (Psa 130:8; Isa 59:20, cited in Rom 11:26).

‘Against the background of the Old Testament, particularly the Book of Exodus, it is not surprising that this image should be used by the New Testament writers to describe the meaning of the death of Christ. “Redemption” means to secure the release of someone or something by the payment of a price. “Ransom” indicates the price that is paid.’⁶Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 6.

The New Testament Vocabulary

The relevant terms are the verb lytrousthai and the nouns lytrōsis and apolytrōsis, together with agorazein and exagorazein — words drawn from the marketplace and used particularly of purchasing slaves.

The corresponding words for ‘ransom’ are lytron and antilytron, used some 140 times in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, referring to ‘deliverance from bondage by payment or offering.’⁷Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 5.

The conceptual link between the Testaments lies in the power of God to save, deliver, liberate and set free.

Mark 10:45 records the definitive saying: ‘For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’ ‘Ransom’ here is an image used to carry the more fundamental notion of substitution which effects release. The use of ‘many’ connects it with the basic ideas of Isaiah 53.’⁸Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 5.

Paul’s Developments

Paul develops the theme in several directions.

Galatians 3:13 and 4:5 speak of Christ redeeming his people from the law’s curse. Romans 3:24 links redemption to justification and propitiation. Ephesians 1:7 applies it specifically to the forgiveness of sins through Christ’s blood.

Romans 8:23 marks a significant conceptual development, extending redemption beyond the moral and forensic to the physical: ‘not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies’ — that is, redemption from corruption itself.

Ephesians 4:30 names that future event — when Christ’s redeeming work will be applied fully to body and soul alike — ‘the day of redemption.’

Why This Image Is Effective

The value of teaching on ransom and redemption lies in what it discloses of the cost of our purchase by God. Christ gave himself, at infinite personal cost, to acquire us — to bring us out of slavery and back into his own loving possession.

There’s a particular attractiveness about the language too.

It clearly focuses attention on Christ himself, the ransom for many. It speaks of a real, objective change, not merely a shift in status or perception.

And through the idea of a change of ownership, it binds together justification and sanctification: the one who has been purchased out of slavery belongs, thereafter, wholly to his new master — so that the acquittal secured at the cross and the transformed life that follows from it are two aspects of a single act of redemption rather than two separate transactions.⁹Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 6.

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• 1
  See Jonathan T. Pennington, ‘Matthew and Mark,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 631-68. ↩︎
• 2
  See Adam Kotsko, ‘The Persistence of the Ransom Theory of the Atonement,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 277-94. ↩︎
• 3
  Seccombe, The Gospel of the Kingdom, 121. ↩︎
• 4
  Augustine, The City of God, 10.24; trans. Babcock, 378. See also David Vincent Meconi, ‘Augustine,’ in T & T Clark Companion to Atonement, 381-88. ↩︎
• 5
  Billy Graham, The Reason for My Hope: Salvation (Thomas Nelson, 2013), xii. ↩︎
• 6
  Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 6. ↩︎
• 7
  Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 5. ↩︎
• 8
  Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 5. ↩︎
• 9
  Thompson and Doyle, ‘Death of Christ 2,’ 6. ↩︎