Date: January 14, 2026
For the month of January, the Dean’s Commentary will feature text by VTS & GTS faculty members writing about what they are currently teaching, reading, or writing about.
As we approach the spring semester, I am preparing to teach my new elective “The Doctrine of Salvation.”
Christians have always believed that Jesus Christ saves but have rarely agreed on the whole how salvation works. The Bible gives us kaleidoscopic images to describe salvation including sacrifice, ransom, rescue, debt redemption, and reconciliation. What are Christians to make of this?
This elective will take seminarians on a chronological whistle stop tour through soteriology’s greatest hits. They will learn from ancient theologians like Irenaeus of Lyons through his work On the Apostolic Preaching. They will befriend Medieval theologians like Peter Abelard, who is often thought of as the author of the “moral exemplarism” view of the atonement, and Julian of Norwich, whose Revelations of Divine Love are as moving as they are instructive. Rounding the corner into the 20th and 21st centuries, students will encounter the turn in the field of theology to explicitly recognize context as crucial in constructing theology. Here, they will get to know such figures as Gustavo Gutiérrez (A Theology of Liberation) and Delores Williams (Sisters in the Wilderness).
As students become acquainted with these authors, they will notice how theologians across time have relied on the Biblical witness and the wisdom of their forebears to construct their answers to the question of how Jesus saves.
Hannah Black, Ph.D.
Visiting Professor of History and Theology
Virginia Theological Seminary