Meaning of term "satisfactory" in T. S Eliot's Journey of the Magi In T. S. Eliot's "The Journey of the Magi", the following line appears:


  Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory 


Context: The three magi have arrived at the barn and one of them states that it arriving there after their long journey was simply "satisfactory".

I read somewhere that the term has different meanings in religious contexts and was wondering if anyone could expand on them?

To any who are more familiar with Eliot, if the poem is said to be a metaphor for his conversion and reaching the barn is a symbol of him finally being converted, why would he feel that it was simply "satisfactory"?
You are right in thinking that the word satisfactory has a particular meaning in Christianity. It describes the effect of Christ's death in achieving reconciliation between humanity and God.

The root meaning of satisfy is to do enough.

There are several theories and beliefs about exactly how Christ's death achieves human salvation. Some, but not all, of these are based on the concept of the satisfaction of God's honour or justice. 

St Anselm of Canterbury in the 11th century developed the view that because God's honour had been offended by human sin, this honour needed to be restored. The death of Christ paid such honour to God that it satisfied, did enough, some say infinitely more than enough, to restore God's honour. This view was developed more fully by Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century.

A different understanding, known as the Penal Substitution theory, was developed by Calvin and others in the sixteenth century. This understanding is that God's justice, rather than his honour, was offended by human sin, and that Christ's suffering and death satisfied this justice.

There is a brief article inTheopedia which discusses these in slightly more detail, and shelf upon shelf in university libraries that go deeper. The Theopedia article summarises the Anselmian and Calvinist understandings of satisfaction as .


  For Anselm, Christ obeyed where we should have obeyed; for Calvin, he was punished where we should have been punished.


Most Catholics and Protestants hold to the Satisfaction theory in one or other form.

Although the word satisfactory sometimes has connotations of bare sufficiency, this is not the connotation here. To satisfy God's honour and/or justice required nothing less than Christ's sacrifice.

The Prayer of Consecration at Holy Communion in the Church of England Prayer Book includes these words about Jesus, who:


  suffered death upon the Cross for our redemption; who made there (by his one oblation of himself once offered) a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world


TS Eliot's poem belongs to the field of English Literature, but as a churchwarden in London, he would surely have been aware of the Christian understanding of "satisfactory", and the Prayer of Consecration.