PROPITIATION

(See Covenant of Redemption , Sacrifice , Atonement , Satisfaction , Jesus .) Propitiation is originally a Latin word, and signifies the appeasing of the wrath of God , or doing something whereby he may be rendered propitious, kind, or merciful, to us, notwithstanding that we have provoked him to anger by any sin or offence committed against him. And the original word, ἱλασμὸς , is used by the Greeks exactly in the same sense, as might easily be shown. But that we may fully understand the true notion of the word, as it is here used, our best way will be to consider how it is used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, made long before St. John’s time; for he, writing to those who were generally accustomed to the words and phrases in that translation, it cannot be supposed but he useth this, as well as other words, in the same sense as it is used there: for otherwise they would not so well have understood him. Now there we find that ἱλάσκεσθαι and ἐξιλάσασθαι all along answer to the כפר , which signifies to appease , to pacify , to reconcile , a person offended, to atone or make him at one again with the offender. So both the Hebrew and the Greek words are used, where it is said, “The wrath of a king is as me engers of death, but a wise man will pacify it.” And also where Jacob, having sent a present before him to his brother Esau, that was offended with him, saith, “I will appease him with the present that goeth before me.” He calls his present מנחה , a word commonly used for offerings to God . That was his propitiation, whereby his brother was reconciled to him. So were the sacrifices of the Levitical law: they were the Ιλασμοhὶ , the expiations, or propitiations, whereby God was atoned or appeased towards him which brought them; or, as it is there expre ed, they were accepted for him, to make atonement for him. And when a man had thus brought his offering, and the priest had therewith made atonement for him, for the sin he had committed, then it was forgiven him, as we often read. In all which places, both the Hebrew and Greek words before mentioned are used; the first by Moses himself, the other by the Seventy which translated him. And therefore we cannot doubt but that the Greek word, coming from the same root, is here also used in the same sense for such a propitiation, or propitiatory sacrifice, whereby God is reconciled, or rendered propitious, to us, and our sins are forgiven us; God accepting, as it were, of that sacrifice, instead of the punishment which was due unto us for them. The same appears also from several words derived from the same Hebrew root, as כפר , which the Seventy sometimes translate λύτρα , or λύτρον , which signifies a ransom , a price paid for the redemption of man’s life, that was forfeited by any capital crime, something given in recompence and satisfaction for the crime whereby it was done away; sometimes ἄλλαγμα , commutation or propitiation , as the vulgar Latin renders it: sometimes περικάθαρμα , “ piaculum ,” or a sacrifice offered for the purging or expiating some heinous crime; or for the diverting some heavy judgment from one to another, as in Prov. xxi. 18, where the wise man saith, “The wicked shall be a ransom (as we translate it) for the righteous;” that is, as he himself elsewhere explains it, “The righteous is delivered out of trouble, and the wicked cometh in his stead.” Sometimes they translate it Ἰξίλασμα , propitiation , expiation . And so the Jews anciently used this word in their common discourse; for when one of them would show the greatest love he could to another, he would say, כפרי הנני , “Behold, let me be his expiation;” that is, as one of their most learned writers interprets it, “Let his iniquities be upon me, that I may bear the punishments of them,” which will give us great light into the true notion of the word, as we shall see anon. Another word from the same Hebrew root is כפרים , which is commonly used likewise for a ransom , atonement , expiation , propitiation , or the like. As where we read of the כסף הכפרים , the atonement money, the Seventy render it τὸ ἀργύριον τῆς εἰσφορᾶς , the tribute money that every man was to give for the ransom of his life, when the people were numbered—the sin-offering of atonement , τῆς ἐξιλάσεως , of propitiation , as the Seventy translate it. The ram of the atonement , in the Greek, κριὸς τοῦ ἱλασμοὺ , the ram of propitiation . In all which places we see the word is used to denote something offered or laid down for the pardon of a man’s sins, and so for the redemption of his life that was forfeited by them. But that which is most observable in this case is, that the great day, when the two goats were chosen, the one for a sin-offering, with the blood whereof the high priest made atonement for the people in the most holy place; and the other for the scape-goat, upon the head whereof he confe ed and laid the sins of the people, and then sent him away into the wilderne , never to be heard of more: this day, I say, is called יום הכפרים , the day of atonement , or, as the Seventy render it, ἡμέρα τοῦ ἱλασμοῦ , and, which is the same, τοῦ ἐξιλασμοῦ , the day of propitiation . To which we might also add, that the lid or cover of the ark where the law lay, is called כפרת , which the Seventy translate ἱλαστήριον , the propitiatory , we, the mercy-seat . These things, I confe , may seem something too nice and critical, but I could not but take notice of them for the satisfaction of myself, and of all that understand the original languages, as being of great use to our finding out what the apostle here means by propitiation , according to the common notion of the word he useth in those days, and among those to whom he wrote; for hereby we may perceive, that, by the word propitiation here used, is meant such a sacrifice or offering made to God for the sins of men, which he is pleased to accept of as a sufficient atonement and satisfaction for the dishonour and injury that was done him by them, so as not to require the punishments which were due unto him for them, but to forgive them all, and to become again as kind and propitious to the persons that offended him as if he had never been offended by them. For he is now propitiated, he is pacified, and reconciled to them: he receives them into his love and favour again, and so into the same state they were in before he was displeased with them.— Beveridge.