Infinite Atonement

I had always thought that the atonement of Jesus offered salvation to the souls living during the time period spanning from Adam to the last person to be born. Yet, 2 Nephi 9:7 seems to suggest something else.

Wherefore, it must needs be an infinite atonement?¢‚Ǩ‚Äùsave it should be an infinite atonement this corruption could not put on incorruption. Wherefore, the first judgment which came upon man must needs have remained to an endless duration. And if so, this flesh must have laid down to rot and to crumble to its mother earth, to rise no more.

Here, Jacob is saying that the Saviour’s atonement is infinite and endless. Is this simply figurative, meaning that the atonement covers a very long period of time? Is it literal, suggesting that there is no beginning or end and that it extends to before Adam and past the last person to be born on this earth?

3 thoughts on “Infinite Atonement

  1. I think it depends greatly on our ideas about the atonement. I personally believe that I will need a sustained faith in Jesus Christ to maintain exaltation. That is to say that He had “power in himself” but I do not.

  2. When Joseph Smith put section 76 into verse (for the benefit of W.W.Phelps) he talked of the Saviour as being not just the Saviour of this Earth, but of countless others. While I know that doesn’t really answer the original question fully, it would appear that the Atonement is bigger than we can conceive.

  3. Neal Maxwell tantalizingly asked how many people there might be on other worlds who are also included in Christ’s atonement. His only answer, and the only possible answer given the current state of revelation, was, “We don’t know.”

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