Why did Jesus have to be sacrificed for our sins to be forgiven?

By CopticBot.ai (Coptic Space Inc.) · Last reviewed 2026-10-10

The necessity of the Incarnation and the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ is rooted in the very nature of God’s justice, His boundless love, and the ontological reality of what sin did to humanity.

St. Athanasius the Apostolic thoroughly expounds this in his foundational work, On the Incarnation, outlining what is known as the "Divine Dilemma."

1. The Divine Dilemma: Justice and Mercy

When Adam sinned, he broke the divine commandment. God had warned: "For in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die" (Genesis 2:17).

• The Truth and Justice of God: God cannot lie. The sentence of death had to be carried out. It was unfitting for God to speak a decree and then ignore it, as that would compromise His absolute truth and justice.
• The Goodness and Love of God: At the same time, it was utterly unfitting for God’s goodness that humanity—created in His own image and likeness—should perish and return into non-existence through corruption.

If God merely pardoned man without the debt of death being paid, He would violate His own justice and truth. Yet, if He allowed man to be utterly destroyed, His love and purpose in creation would be frustrated.

2. Why Repentance Alone Was Not Enough

Repentance could not resolve the problem. As St. Athanasius explained:

• Repentance cannot alter human nature once corruption has set in.
• Repentance does not satisfy the sentence of death decreed by God.
• Repentance could make a man turn from sin, but it could not wash away the ontological infection of death and mortality that had taken hold of the human race.

A deeper, life-giving remedy was required: the renewal of the nature itself and the destruction of death.

3. Why Only the Word of God Could Fulfill This

Neither a mere man nor an angel could save humanity:

• A mere human could not be the savior because all mankind inherited the fallen, mortal nature of Adam and were themselves under the condemnation of sin. A drowning man cannot rescue another drowning man.
• An angel could not save man because an angel is a created being. An angel did not create man in his image, nor does an angel possess infinite or divine life.
• The Creator alone had to come. Since man was created through the Word and in the image of the Word, only the Word could recreate the image of God in man and conquer death.

4. The Infinite, Impeccable Sacrifice

Sin against an infinite God carried an infinite consequence: eternal separation from life. Therefore, the remedy required an offering of infinite value:

• The Sinless God took flesh: The Word became flesh without change, confusion, or alteration, taking a human body from the Holy Theotokos St. Mary.
• Capable of death: Because the Word, in His divine nature, is immortal and cannot die, He took a mortal human body capable of dying so that He could offer it on behalf of all.
• Voluntary offering: He offered Himself willingly as an immaculate, pure, and eternal sacrifice on behalf of Adam’s transgression. As St. John Chrysostom noted, God allowed His Son to suffer as if a condemned sinner, bearing the penalty of our sins so that we might receive the righteousness of God.

5. Defeating Death by Death

The sacrifice on the Cross was not merely a legal transaction; it was a cosmic victory over Satan, sin, and death:

• Through His death on the cross, Christ descended into Hades to shatter its power, because death worked through sin.
• By dying as the Author of Life, death could not hold Him. He trampled death by His death and bestowed eternal life upon mankind through His holy Resurrection.
• As we pray in the Divine Liturgy of St. Basil: "He descended into Hades through the cross... He rose from the dead on the third day... He has unloosed the pains of death."

6. The True Meaning of Atonement

Unlike the distorted views introduced in later Western theology (such as Protestant penal substitution, which erroneously portrays the Father as inflicting His wrath upon the Son to be appeased), the Orthodox understanding has always been that the sacrifice was an act of the entire Holy Trinity working in unison out of infinite love. The Father sent the Son; the Son willingly offered His life; and through the Holy Spirit, redemption was wrought.

Christ’s sacrifice did not change God’s disposition toward us from anger to love; rather, because God loved us from the beginning, Christ offered Himself to deliver us from death, corruption, and the dominion of the devil, restoring us to communion with God.