Asle EIKREM. God as Sacrificial Love: A Systematic Exploration of a Controversial Notion. New York: Bloomsbury, 2018. pp. vii+304. $114.00 hb. ISBN 9780567678645. Reviewed by Christopher DENNY, St. John’s University, Queens, NY 11439.

Eikrem wants “to develop a theory-language with a vocabulary that is more nuanced than the biblical and traditional theological” (5).  Recognizing biblical metaphors of sacrifice are too dangerous without systematic explanation, he seeks to integrate post-Enlightenment and feminist critiques of sacrificial love into his constructive theological project.

The second and third chapters constitute one of the most thorough historical overviews of Christian sacrificial theologies, and the criticisms of these theologies, currently available in English.  Eikrem traces the development, beginning with patristic authors like Origen, by which the sacrificial metaphor was transplanted from the imperial context of Jesus’ execution into a paradigm governing relationships between the trinitarian God and humans.  While many criticisms of Anselm still rely on interpretations developed three generations ago by Gustav Aulén, Eikrem reminds readers that Anselm did not defend the theory of Jesus’ death as penal substitution, while arguing that Abelard’s soteriology conflates satisfaction and punishment “in a way that is closer to the later penal-substitutionary paradigm of the reformers than Anselm” (25).  Because presumptions of Enlightenment thought opposed cultic sacrifice and favored individual initiative, philosophers judged vicarious sacrifice deficient.  Liberationist and feminist theologians likened Christian atonement theology to justifying child abuse, but Derrida insisted sacrifice is inevitable because human action on behalf of another always excludes other persons and possibilities.   

In chapters four through six Eikrem addresses bloodshed, violence, and death, issues at the heart of disputes over sacrificial theology.  Eikrem critiques theopaschite and kenotic theologies influenced by Moltmann, demonstrating how kenotic theology provoked criticisms from Dorothee Sölle, Rita Nakashima Brock, and J. Denny Weaver, who deny that God requires suffering.  Eikrem responds that we must assess Jesus’ sacrifice against the background of his whole life rather than just his death.  Remembering the communal context when doing sacrificial theology allows theologians to define sacrifice as self-limitation rather than as destructive self-victimization, and sacrifice understood as a dignified gift of self for others permits resistance to injustice to be incorporated into Christian sacrificial theology.  To those appealing to Jesus’ crucifixion to support a mandate to empty oneself, Eikrem answers, “It was not the cross that manifested the judgment of the judged judge, but Easter morning” (140).  Eikrem sides with Pannenberg in claiming Jesus’ death was willed by God to reveal Jesus’ human finitude and Jesus’ distinction from God the Father and the God the Spirit, but Eikrem holds “the revelation of his divinity did not require him to suffer and die the way he did” (159, emphasis in original).

In the latter half of the book Eikrem expounds a foundational ethics rooted in Jesus’ sacrificial love, which can be epistemically hidden when people reject God’s invitation to participate in the Eucharist.  God’s love is nevertheless ontologically omnipresent.  Eikrem claims the Lord’s Supper should not be described in sacrificial terms, but instead explained in the language of trinitarian self-giving love.  Eikrem defends a theodicy in which suffering and exclusion are not moral or pedagogic tools used by God to achieve a higher good.  Contingencies within the indeterminate universe God opened up through divine self-limitation create space for the cooperative love that Jesus’ example vicariously instantiates through disciples.

The final three chapters acknowledge counterfeit exemplars of self-sacrifice that unjust social structures introduce into society.  Eikrem alleges that the reduction of sin to social and historical aspects constitutes “the fundamental weakness of most modernist and liberationist critiques of many traditional atonement theories” (209).  He denies dependence on God is antithetical to mutual love and human freedom.  Suffering is not mandated in itself, but suffering results in a sinful world when people exercise freedom so that communities may flourish: “Vulnerability is constitutive of the love through which we truly love one another” (244).  Eikrem appeals to human finitude to support his relational justification for a self-sacrificial ethic.  Given our fragile interdependency, “because of its finite character human existence is inherently sacrificial” (250).    

This excellent book succeeds at bringing two theological loci often pitted against each other—sacrifice and relationality—into coherence.  Eikrem’s retrieval incorporates critiques of sacrifice into a communitarian model steering between individualism and self-degradation.  The author has read widely and interprets interlocutors generously, all while making a case against the dichotomy of “self versus other” plaguing theological assessments of sacrifice.  He is persuasive arguing that God is affected by human suffering, but does not reify suffering as a penal or soteriological necessity; the chapter on the “trinitarian logic of self-giving” is a highpoint.   Using God’s self-giving as foundational for Christian praxis, even when such giving justifies keeping distance between victims and victimizers (234), can help build more bridges between systematic and moral theologies.  This is no apologia for “passive passion-mysticism” (255).  Bolstered with copious notes and an expansive bibliography, this book is highly recommended for scholars in the fields of soteriology, sacrifice, and trinitarian theology.