Anselm of Canterbury — translated by James Gardiner Vose (Bibliotheca Sacra, 1854–55), printed with the Deane volume, from CCEL.
Why God Became Man (1094–98), a dialogue with the monk Boso and the classic statement of the satisfaction theory of the atonement: sin is an infinite dishonour to God which man owes and cannot pay, and God alone can pay but does not owe — so the one who makes satisfaction must be both God and man.
Contents (49)
- Preface
- Book First, Chapter 1. The question on which the whole work rests
- Book First, Chapter 2. How those things which are to be said should be received
- Book First, Chapter 3. Objections of infidels and replies of believers
- Book First, Chapter 4. How these things appear not decisive to infidels, and merely like so many pictures
- Book First, Chapter 5. How the redemption of man could not be effected by any other being but God
- Book First, Chapter 6
- Book First, Chapter 7. How the devil had no justice on his side against man; and why it was, that he seemed to have had it, and why God could have freed man in this way
- Book First, Chapter 8
- Book First, Chapter 9
- Book First, Chapter 10. Likewise on the same topics; and how otherwise they can be correctly explained
- Book First, Chapter 11. What it is to sin, and to make satisfaction for sin
- Book First, Chapter 12. Whether it were proper for God to put away sins by compassion alone, without any payment of debt
- Book First, Chapter 13
- Book First, Chapter 14. How the honor of God exists in the punishment of the wicked
- Book First, Chapter 15. Whether God suffers his honor to be violated even in the least degree
- Book First, Chapter 16. The reason why the number of angels who fell must be made up from men
- Book First, Chapter 17. How other angels cannot take the place of those who fell
- Book First, Chapter 18. Whether there will be more holy men than evil angels
- Book First, Chapter 19. How man cannot be saved without satisfaction for sin
- Book First, Chapter 20. That satisfaction ought to be proportionate to guilt; and that man is of himself unable to accomplish this
- Book First, Chapter 21. How great a burden sin is
- Book First, Chapter 22. What contempt man brought upon God, when he allowed himself to be conquered by the devil; for which he can make no satisfaction
- Book First, Chapter 23. What man took from God by his sin, which he has no power to repay
- Book First, Chapter 24. How, as long as man does not restore what he owes God, he cannot be happy, nor is he excused by want of power
- Book First, Chapter 25. How man’s salvation by Christ is necessarily possible
- Book Second, Chapter 1. How man was made holy by God, so as to be happy in the enjoyment of God
- Book Second, Chapter 2. How man would never have died, unless he had sinned
- Book Second, Chapter 3. How man will rise with the same body which he has in this world
- Book Second, Chapter 4. How God will complete, in respect to human nature, what he has begun
- Book Second, Chapter 5
- Book Second, Chapter 6. How no being, except the God-man, can make the atonement by which man is saved
- Book Second, Chapter 7. How necessary it is for the same being to be perfect God and perfect man
- Book Second, Chapter 8. How it behoved God to take a man of the race of Adam, and born of a woman
- Book Second, Chapter 9. How of necessity the Word only can unite in one person with man
- Book Second, Chapter 10
- Book Second, Chapter 11. How Christ dies of his own power, and how mortality does not inhere in the essential nature of man
- Book Second, Chapter 12. How, though he share in our weakness, he is not therefore miserable
- Book Second, Chapter 13. How, along with our other weaknesses, he does not partake of our ignorance
- Book Second, Chapter 14. How his death outweighs the number and greatness of our sins
- Book Second, Chapter 15. How this death removes even the sins of his murderers
- Book Second, Chapter 16. How God took that man from a sinful substance, and yet without sin; and of the salvation of Adam and Eve
- Book Second, Chapter 17. How he did not die of necessity, though he could not be born, except as destined to suffer death
- Book Second, Chapter 18. (a)
- Book Second, Chapter 18. (b.). How Christ’s life is paid to God for the sins of men, and in what sense Christ ought, and in what sense he ought not, or was not bound, to suffer
- Book Second, Chapter 19. How human salvation follows upon his death
- Book Second, Chapter 20. How great and how just is God’s compassion
- Book Second, Chapter 21. How it is impossible for the devil to be reconciled
- Book Second, Chapter 22. How the truth of the Old and New Testament is shown in the things which have been said