Note 7 — Chapter III · GOD AS A MORAL BEING, OR LAW.

Yes, it applies only to the love which has flesh and blood, for only this can absolve from the sins which flesh and blood commit. A merely moral being cannot forgive what is contrary to the law of morality. That which denies the law is denied by the law. The moral judge, who does not infuse human blood into his judgment judges the sinner relentlessly, inexorably. Since, then, God is regarded as a sin-pardoning being, he is posited, not indeed as an unmoral, but as more than a moral being—in a word, as a human being. The negation or annulling of sin is the negation of abstract moral rectitude,—the positing of love, mercy, sensuous life. Not abstract beings—no! only sensuous, living beings are merciful. Mercy is the justice of sensuous life.7 Hence God does not forgive the sins of men as the abstract God of the understanding, but as man, as the God made flesh, the visible God. God as man sins not, it is true, but he knows, he takes on himself, the sufferings, the wants, the needs of sensuous beings. The blood of Christ cleanses us from our sins in the eyes of God; it is only his human blood that makes God merciful, allays his anger; that is, our sins are forgiven us because we are no abstract beings, but creatures of flesh and blood.8