Chapter XXVI: Part VIII: Eschatology, or the Doctrine of Final Things (2)

_Mat. 10:28_—“_And be not afraid of them that kill the body, but
are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him who is able to
destroy both soul and body in hell_”; _Acts 7:59_—“_And they
stoned Stephen, calling upon the Lord, and saying, Lord Jesus,
receive my spirit_”: _2 Cor. 12:2_—“_I know a man in Christ,
fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I know not; or whether
out of the body, I know not; God knoweth), such a one caught up
even to the third heaven_”; _1 Cor. 15:45, 46_—“_The first man
Adam became a living soul. The last Adam became a life‐giving
spirit. Howbeit that is not first which is spiritual, but that
which is natural; then that which is spiritual_”—the first Adam
was made a being whose body was psychical and mortal—a body of
flesh and blood, that could not inherit the kingdom of God. So
Paul says the spiritual is not first, but the psychical; but there
is no intimation that the soul also was created mortal, and needed
external appliances, like the tree of life, before it could enter
upon immortality.

But it may be asked: Is not all this, in _1 Cor. 15_, spoken of
the regenerate—those to whom a new principle of life has been
communicated? We answer, yes; but that does not prevent us from
learning from the passage the natural immortality of the soul; for
in regeneration the essence is not changed, no new substance is
imparted, no new faculty or constitutive element is added, and no
new principle of holiness is infused. The truth is simply that the
spirit is morally readjusted. For substance of the above remarks,
see Hovey, State of Impenitent Dead, 1‐27.

Savage, Life after Death, 46, 53—“The word translated ‘soul’, in
_Gen. 2:7_, is the same word which in other parts of the O. T. is
used to denote the life‐principle of animals. It does not follow
that soul implies immortality, for then all animals would be
immortal.... The firmament of the Hebrews was the cover of a
dinner‐platter, solid, but with little windows to let the rain
through. Above this firmament was heaven where God and angels
abode, but no people went there. All went below. But growing moral
sense held that the good could not be imprisoned in Hades. So came
the idea of resurrection.... If a _force_, a universe with God
left out, can do all that has been done, I do not see why it
cannot also continue my existence through what is called death.”

Dr. H. Heath Bawden: “It is only the creature that is born that
will die. Monera and Amœbæ are immortal, as Weismann tells us.
They do not die, because they never are born. The death of the
individual as a somatic individual is for the sake of the larger
future life of the individual in its germinal immortality. So we
live ourselves spiritually into our children, as well as
physically. An organism is nothing but a centre or focus through
which the world surges. What matter if the irrelevant somatic
portion is lost in what we call death! The only immortality
possible is the immortality of function. My body has changed
completely since I was a boy, but I have become a larger self
thereby. Birth and death simply mark steps or stages in the growth
of such an individual, which in its very nature does not exclude
but rather includes within it the lives of all other individuals.
The individual is more than a passive member, he is an active
organ of a biological whole. The laws of his life are the social
organism functioning in one of its organs. He lives and moves and
has his being in the great spirit of the whole, which comes to a
focus or flowers out in his conscious life.”

(_b_) The account of the curse in Genesis, and the subsequent allusions to it in Scripture, show that, while the death then incurred includes the dissolution of the body, it does not include cessation of being on the part of the soul, but only designates that state of the soul which is the opposite of true life, _viz._, a state of banishment from God, of unholiness, and of misery.

_Gen. 2:17_—“_in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die_”; _cf._ _3:8_—“_the man and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of Jehovah God_”; _16‐19_—the curse of pain and
toil: _22‐24_—banishment from the garden of Eden and from the tree
of life. _Mat. 8:22_—“_Follow me; and leave the dead to bury their
own dead_”; _25:41, 46_—“_Depart from me, ye cursed, into the
eternal fire.... These shall go away into eternal punishment_”;
_Luke 15:32_—“_this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and
was lost, and is found_”; _John 5:24_—“_He that heareth my word,
and believeth him that sent me, hath eternal life, and cometh not
into judgment, but hath passed out of death into life_”; _6:47,
53, 63_—“_He that believeth hath eternal life.... Except ye eat
the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, ye have not life
in yourselves.... the words that I have spoken unto you are
spirit, and are life_”: _8:51_—“_If a man keep my word, he shall
never see death._”

_Rom. 5:21_—“_that, as sin reigned in death, even so might grace
reign through righteousness unto eternal life_”; _8:13_—“_if ye
live after the flesh, ye must die; but if by the Spirit ye put to
death the deeds of the body, ye shall live_”; _Eph. 2:1_—“_dead
through your trespasses and sins_”; _5:14_—“_Awake, thou that
sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine upon
thee_”; _James 5:20_—“_he who converteth a sinner from the error
of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall cover a
multitude of sins_”; _1 John 3:14_—“_We know that we have passed
out of death into life, because we love the brethren_”; _Rev.
3:1_—“_I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest,
and thou art dead._”

We are to interpret O. T. terms by the N. T. meaning put into
them. We are to interpret the Hebrew by the Greek, not the Greek
by the Hebrew. It never would do to interpret our missionaries’
use of the Chinese words for “God”, “spirit”, “holiness”, by the
use of those words among the Chinese before the missionaries came.
By the later usage of the N. T., the Holy Spirit shows us what he
meant by the usage of the O. T.

(_c_) The Scriptural expressions, held by annihilationists to imply cessation of being on the part of the wicked, are used not only in connections where they cannot bear this meaning (Esther 4:16), but in connections where they imply the opposite.

_Esther 4:16_—“_if I perish, I perish_”; _Gen. 6:11_—“_And the
earth was corrupt before God_”—here, in the LXX, the word ἐφθάρη,
translated “_was corrupt_,” is the same word which in other places
is interpreted by annihilationists as meaning extinction of being.
In _Ps. 119:176_, “_I have gone astray like a lost sheep_” cannot
mean “I have gone astray like an annihilated sheep.” _Is.
49:17_—“_thy destroyers_ [annihilators?] _and they that made thee
waste shall go forth from thee_”; _57:1, 2_—“_The righteous
perisheth_ [is annihilated?] _and no man layeth it to heart; and
merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous
is taken away from the evil to come. He entereth into peace; they
rest in their beds, each one that walketh in his uprightness_”;
_Dan. 9:26_—“_And after the three score and two weeks shall the
anointed one be cut off_ [annihilated?].”

_Mat. 10:6, 39, 42_—“_the lost sheep of the house of Israel ... he
that loseth his life for my sake shall find it ... he shall in no
wise lose his reward_”—in these verses we cannot substitute
“annihilate” for “_lose_”; _Acts 13:41_—“_Behold, ye despisers,
and wonder, and perish_”; _cf._ _Mat. 6:16_—“_for they disfigure
their faces_”—where the same word ἀφανίζω is used. _1 Cor.
3:17_—“_If any man destroyeth_ [annihilates?] _the temple of God,
him shall God destroy_”; _2 Cor. 7:2_—“_we corrupted no
man_”—where the same word φθείρω is used. _2 Thess. 1:9_—“_who
shall suffer punishment, even eternal destruction from the face of
the Lord and from the glory of his might_” = the wicked shall be
driven out from the presence of Christ. Destruction is not
annihilation. “_Destruction from_” = separation; (_per contra_,
see Prof. W. A. Stevens, Com. _in loco_: “_from_” = the source
from which the “_destruction_” proceeds). “A ship engulfed in
quicksands is destroyed; a temple broken down and deserted is
destroyed”; see Lillie, Com. _in loco_. _2 Pet. 3:7_—“_day of
judgment and destruction of ungodly men_”—here the word
“_destruction_” (ἀπωλείας) is the same with that used of the end
of the present order of things, and translated “_perished_”
(ἀπώλετο) in _verse 6_. “We cannot accordingly infer from it that
the ungodly will cease to exist, but only that there will be a
great and penal change in their condition” (Plumptre, Com. _in
loco_).

(_d_) The passages held to prove the annihilation of the wicked at death cannot have this meaning, since the Scriptures foretell a resurrection of the unjust as well as of the just; and a second death, or a misery of the reunited soul and body, in the case of the wicked.

_Acts 24:15_—“_there shall be a resurrection both of the just and
unjust_”; _Rev. 2:11_—“_He that overcometh shall not be hurt of
the second death_”; _20:14, 15_—“_And death and Hades were cast
into the lake of fire. This is the second death, even the lake of
fire. And if any was not found written in the book of life, he was
cast into the lake of fire_”; _21:8_—“_their part shall be in the
lake that burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second
death._” The “_second death_” is the first death intensified.
Having one’s “_part in the lake of fire_” is not annihilation.

In a similar manner the word “_life_” is to be interpreted not as
meaning continuance of being, but as meaning perfection of being.
As death is the loss not of life, but of all that makes life
desirable, so life is the possession of the highest good. _1 Tim.
5:6_—“_She that giveth herself to pleasure is dead while she
liveth_”—here the death is spiritual death, and it is implied that
true life is spiritual life. _John 10:10_—“_I came that they may
have life, and may have it abundantly_”—implies that “_life_” _is
not_: 1. mere existence, for they had this before Christ came; nor
2. mere motion, as squirrels go in a wheel, without making
progress; nor 3. mere possessions, “_for a man’s life consisteth
not in the abundance of things which he possesseth_” (_Luke
12:15_). But life _is_: 1. right relation of our powers, or
holiness; 2. right use of our powers, or love; 3. right number of
our powers, or completeness; 4. right intensity of our powers, or
energy of will; 5. right environment of our powers, or society; 6.
right source of our powers, or God.

(_e_) The words used in Scripture to denote the place of departed spirits have in them no implication of annihilation, and the allusions to the condition of the departed show that death, to the writers of the Old and the New Testaments, although it was the termination of man’s earthly existence, was not an extinction of his being or his consciousness.

On שאול Sheol, Gesenius, Lexicon, 10th ed., says that, though שאול
is commonly explained as infinitive of שאל, to demand, it is
undoubtedly allied to שעל (root של), to be sunk, and = “sinking,”
“depth,” or “the sunken, deep, place.” Ἁιδης, Hades, = not “hell,”
but the “unseen world,” conceived by the Greeks as a shadowy, but
not as an unconscious, state of being. Genung, Epic of the Inner
Life, on _Job 7:9_—“Sheol, the Hebrew word designating the unseen
abode of the dead; a neutral word, presupposing neither misery nor
happiness, and not infrequently used much as we use the word ‘the
grave’, to denote the final undefined resting‐place of all.”

_Gen. 25:8, 9_—Abraham “_was gathered to his people. And Isaac and
Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of Machpelah._” “Yet
Abraham’s father was buried in Haran, and his more remote
ancestors in Ur of the Chaldees. So Joshua’s generation is said to
be ‘_gathered to their fathers_’ though the generation that
preceded them perished in the wilderness, and previous generations
died in Egypt” (W. H. Green, in S. S. Times). So of Isaac in _Gen.
35:29_, and of Jacob in _19:29, 33_,—all of whom were gathered to
their fathers before they were buried. _Num. 20:24_—“_Aaron shall
be gathered unto his people_”—here it is very plain that being
“_gathered unto his people_” was something different from burial.
_Deut. 10:6_—“_There Aaron died, and there he was buried._” _Job
3:13, 18_—“_For now should I have lain down and been quiet; I
should have slept; then had I been at rest.... There the prisoners
are at ease together; They hear not the voice of the taskmaster_”;
_7:9_—“_As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away, So he that
goeth down to Sheol shall come up no more_”; _14:22_—“_But his
flesh upon him hath pain, And his soul within him mourneth._”

_Ez. 32:21_—“_The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out
of the midst of Sheol_”; _Luke 16:23_—“_And in Hades he lifted up
his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and
Lazarus in his bosom_”; _23:43_—“_To‐day shalt thou be with me in
Paradise_”; _cf._ _1 Sam. 28:19_—Samuel said to Saul in the cave
of Endor: “_to‐morrow shalt thou and thy sons be with
me_”—evidently not in an unconscious state. Many of these passages
intimate a continuity of consciousness after death. Though Sheol
is unknown to man, it is naked and open to God (_Job 26:6_); he
can find men there to redeem them from thence (_Ps. 49:15_)—proof
that death is not annihilation. See Girdlestone, O. T. Synonyms,
447.

(_f_) The terms and phrases which have been held to declare absolute cessation of existence at death are frequently metaphorical, and an examination of them in connection with the context and with other Scriptures is sufficient to show the untenableness of the literal interpretation put upon them by the annihilationists, and to prove that the language is merely the language of appearance.

Death is often designated as a “_sleeping_” or a “_falling
asleep_”; see _John 11:11, 14_—“_Our friend Lazarus is fallen
asleep; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep.... Then Jesus
therefore said unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead._” Here the
language of appearance is used; yet this language could not have
been used, if the soul had not been conceived of as alive, though
sundered from the body; see Meyer on _1 Cor. 1:18_. So the
language of appearance is used in _Eccl. 9:10_—“_there is no work,
nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in Sheol whither thou
goest_”—and in _Ps. 146:4_—“_His breath goeth forth; he returneth
to his earth; In that very day his thoughts perish._”

See Mozley, Essays, 2:171—“These passages often describe the
phenomena of death as it presents itself to our eyes, and so do
not enter into the reality which takes place beneath it.”
Bartlett, Life and Death Eternal, 189‐358—“Because the same Hebrew
word is used for ‘spirit’ and ‘breath,’ shall we say that the
spirit is only breath? ‘Heart’ in English might in like manner be
made to mean only the material organ; and David’s heart, panting,
thirsting, melting within him, would have to be interpreted
literally. So a man may be ‘eaten up with avarice,’ while yet his
being is not only not extinct, but is in a state of frightful
activity.”

(_g_) The Jewish belief in a conscious existence after death is proof that the theory of annihilation rests upon a misinterpretation of Scripture. That such a belief in the immortality of the soul existed among the Jews is abundantly evident: from the knowledge of a future state possessed by the Egyptians (Acts 7:22); from the accounts of the translation of Enoch and of Elijah (Gen. 5:24; _cf._ Heb. 11:5; 2 K. 2:11); from the invocation of the dead which was practised, although forbidden by the law (1 Sam. 28:7‐14; _cf._ Lev. 20:28; Deut. 18:10, 11); from allusions in the O. T. to resurrection, future retribution, and life beyond the grave (Job 19:25‐27; Ps. 16:9‐11; Is. 26:19; Ez. 37:1‐14; Dan. 12:2, 3, 13); and from distinct declarations of such faith by Philo and Josephus, as well as by the writers of the N. T. (Mat. 22:31, 32; Acts 23:6; 26:6‐8; Heb. 11:13‐16).

The Egyptian coffin was called “the chest of the living.” The
Egyptians called their houses “hostelries,” while their tombs they
called their “eternal homes” (Butcher, Aspects of Greek Genius,
30). See the Book of the Dead, translated by Birch, in Bunsen’s
Egypt’s Place, 123‐333: The principal ideas of the first part of
the Book of the Dead are “living again after death, and being born
again as the sun,” which typified the Egyptian resurrection (138).
“The deceased lived again after death” (134). “The Osiris lives
after he dies, like the sun daily; for as the sun died and was
born yesterday, so the Osiris is born” (164). Yet the immortal
part, in its continued existence, was dependent for its
blessedness upon the preservation of the body; and for this reason
the body was embalmed. Immortality of the body is as important as
the passage of the soul to the upper regions. Growth or natural
reparation of the body is invoked as earnestly as the passage of
the soul. “There is not a limb of him without a god; Thoth is
vivifying his limbs” (197).

Maspero, Recueil de Travaux, gives the following readings from the
inner walls of pyramids twelve miles south of Cairo: “O Unas, thou
hast gone away dead, but living”; “Teti is the living dead”;
“Arise, O Teti, to die no more”; “O Pepi, thou diest no
more”;—these inscriptions show that to the Egyptians there was
life beyond death. “The life of Unas is duration; his period is
eternity”; “They render thee happy throughout all eternity”; “He
who has given thee life and eternity is Ra”;—here we see that the
life beyond death was eternal. “Rising at his pleasure, gathering
his members that are in the tomb, Unas goes forth”; “Unas has his
heart, his legs, his arms”; this asserts reunion with the body.
“Reunited to thy soul, thou takest thy place among the stars of
heaven”; “the soul is thine within thee”;—there was reunion with
the soul. “A god is born, it is Unas”; “O Ra, thy son comes to
thee, this Unas comes to thee”; “O Father of Unas, grant that he
may be included in the number of the perfect and wise gods”; here
it is taught that the reunited soul and body becomes a god and
dwells with the gods.

Howard Osgood: “Osiris, the son of gods, came to live on earth.
His life was a pattern for others. He was put to death by the god
of evil, but regained his body, lived again, and became, in the
other world, the judge of all men.” Tiele, Egyptian Religion,
280—“To become like god Osiris, a benefactor, a good being,
persecuted but justified, judged but pronounced innocent, was
looked upon as the ideal of every pious man, and as the condition
on which alone eternal life could be obtained, and as the means by
which it could be continued.” Ebers, Études Archéologiques,
21—“The texts in the pyramids show us that under the Pharaohs of
the 5th dynasty (before 2500 B. C.) the doctrine that the deceased
became god was not only extant, but was developed more thoroughly
and with far higher flight of imagination than we could expect
from the simple statements concerning the other world hitherto
known to us as from that early time.” Revillout, on Egyptian
Ethics, in Bib. Sac., July, 1890:304—“An almost absolute
sinlessness was for the Egyptian the condition of becoming another
Osiris and enjoying eternal happiness. Of the penitential side, so
highly developed in the ancient Babylonians and Hebrews, which
gave rise to so many admirable penitential psalms, we find only a
trace among the Egyptians. Sinlessness is the rule,—the deceased
vaunts himself as a hero of virtue.” See Uarda, by Ebers; Dr.
Howard Osgood, on Resurrection among the Egyptians, in Hebrew
Student, Feb. 1885. The Egyptians, however, recognized no
transmigration of souls; see Renouf, Hibbert Lectures, 181‐184.

It is morally impossible that Moses should not have known the
Egyptian doctrine of immortality: _Acts 7:22_—“_And Moses was
instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians._” That Moses did
not make the doctrine more prominent in his teachings, may be for
the reason that it was so connected with Egyptian superstitions
with regard to Osiris. Yet the Jews believed in immortality: _Gen.
5:24_—“_and Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took
him_”; _cf._ _Heb. 11:5_—“_By faith Enoch was translated that he
should not see death_”; _2 Kings 2:11_—“_Elijah went up by a
whirlwind into heaven_”; _1 Sam. 28:7‐14_—the invocation of Samuel
by the woman of Endor; _cf._ _Lev. 20:27_—“_A man also or a woman
that hath a familiar spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be
put to death_”; _Deut. 18:10, 11_—“_There shall not be found with
thee ... a consulter with a familiar spirit, or a wizard, or a
necromancer._”

_Job 19:25‐27_—“_I know that my Redeemer liveth, And at last he
will stand up upon the earth: And after my skin, even this body,
is destroyed, Then without my flesh shall I see God; Whom I, even
I, shall see, on my side, And mine eyes shall behold, and not as a
stranger. My heart is consumed within me_”; _Ps.
16:9‐11_—“_Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth: My
flesh also shall dwell in safety. For thou wilt not leave my soul
to Sheol; Neither wilt thou suffer thy holy one to see corruption.
Thou wilt show me the path of life: In thy presence is fulness of
joy; In thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore_”; _Is.
26:19_—“_Thy dead shalt live; my dead bodies shall arise. Awake
and sing, ye that dwell in the dust; for thy dew is as the dew of
herbs, and the earth shall cast forth the dead_”; _Ez.
37:1‐14_—the valley of dry bones—“_I will open your graves, and
cause you to come up out of your graves, O my people_”—a prophecy
of restoration based upon the idea of immortality and
resurrection; _Dan. 12:2, 3, 13_—“_And many of them that sleep in
the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and
some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that are wise
shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn
many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.... But go
thou thy way till the end be: for thou shalt rest, and shalt stand
in thy lot, at the end of the days._”

Josephus, on the doctrine of the Pharisees, in Antiquities,
XVIII:1:3, and Wars of the Jews, II:8:10‐14—“Souls have an
immortal vigor. Under the earth are rewards and punishments. The
wicked are detained in an everlasting prison. The righteous shall
have power to revive and live again. Bodies are indeed
corruptible, but souls remain exempt from death forever. But the
doctrine of the Sadducees is that souls die with their bodies.”
_Mat. 22:31, 32_—“_But as touching the resurrection of the dead,
have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I
am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?
God is not the God of the dead, but of the living._”

Christ’s argument, in the passage last quoted, rests upon the two
implied assumptions: first, that love will never suffer the object
of its affection to die; beings who have ever been the objects of
God’s love will be so forever; secondly, that body and soul belong
normally together; if body and soul are temporarily separated,
they shall be united; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are living, and
therefore they shall rise again. It was only an application of the
same principle, when Robert Hall gave up his early materialism as
he looked down into his father’s grave: he felt that this could
not be the end; _cf._ _Ps. 22:26_—“_Your heart shall live
forever._” _Acts 23:6_—“_I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees:
touching the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in
question_”; _26:7, 8_—“_And concerning this hope I am accused by
the Jews, O king! Why is it judged incredible with you, if God
doth raise the dead?_” _Heb. 11:13‐16_—the present life was
reckoned as a pilgrimage; the patriarchs sought “_a better
country, that is, a heavenly_”; _cf._ _Gen. 47:9_. On Jesus’
argument for the resurrection, see A. H. Strong, Christ in
Creation, 406‐421.

The argument for immortality itself presupposes, not only the
existence of a God, but the existence of a truthful, wise, and
benevolent God. We might almost say that God and immortality must
be proved together,—like two pieces of a broken crock, when put
together there is proof of both. And yet logically it is only the
existence of God that is intuitively certain. Immortality is an
inference therefrom. Henry More: “But souls that of his own good
life partake He loves as his own self; dear as his eye They are to
him: he’ll never them forsake; When they shall die, then God
himself shall die; They live, they live in blest eternity.” God
could not let Christ die, and he cannot let us die. Southey: “They
sin who tell us love can die. With life all other passions fly;
All others are but vanity. In heaven ambition cannot dwell, Nor
avarice in the vaults of hell; They perish where they had their
birth; But love is indestructible.”

Emerson, Threnody on the death of his beloved and gifted child:
“What is excellent, As God lives, is permanent: Hearts are dust,
hearts’ loves remain; Heart’s love will meet thee again.”
Whittier, Snowbound, 200 _sq._—“Yet Love will dream, and Faith
will trust (Since He who knows our need is just), That somehow,
somewhere, meet we must. Alas for him who never sees The stars
shine through his cypress trees! Who hopeless lays his dead away,
Nor looks to see the breaking day Across his mournful marbles
play! Who hath not learned, in hours of faith, The truth to flesh
and sense unknown, That Life is ever lord of death, And Love can
never lose its own.” Robert Browning, Evelyn Hope: “For God above
Is great to grant as mighty to make, And creates the love to
reward the love; I claim you still for my own love’s sake! Delayed
it may be for more lives yet, Through worlds I shall traverse not
a few; Much is to learn and much to forget, Ere the time be come
for taking you.”

The river St. John in New Brunswick descends seventeen feet
between the city and the sea, and ships cannot overcome the
obstacle, but when the tide comes in, it turns the current the
other way and bears vessels on mightily to the city. So the laws
of nature bring death, but the tides of Christ’s life counteract
them, and bring life and immortality (Dr. J. W. A. Stewart).
Mozley, Lectures, 26‐59, and Essays, 2:169—“True religion among
the Jews had an evidence of immortality in its possession of God.
Paganism was hopeless in its loss of friends, because affection
never advanced beyond its earthly object, and therefore, in losing
it, lost all. But religious love, which loves the creature in the
Creator, has that on which to fall back, when its earthly object
is removed.”

(_h_) The most impressive and conclusive of all proofs of immortality, however, is afforded in the resurrection of Jesus Christ,—a work accomplished by his own power, and demonstrating that the spirit lived after its separation from the body (John 2:19, 21; 10:17, 18). By coming back from the tomb, he proves that death is not annihilation (2 Tim. 1:10).

_John 2:19, 21_—“_Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this
temple, and in three days I will raise it up.... But he spake of
the temple of his body_”; _10:17, 18_—“_Therefore doth the Father
love me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again....
I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again_”;
_2 Tim. 1:10_—“_our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death, and
brought life and immortality to light through the gospel_”—that
is, immortality had been a truth dimly recognized, suspected,
longed for, before Christ came; but it was he who first brought it
out from obscurity and uncertainty into clear daylight and
convincing power. Christ’s resurrection, moreover, carries with it
the resurrection of his people: “We two are so joined, He’ll not
be in glory and leave me behind.”

Christ taught immortality: (1) By exhibiting himself the perfect
conception of a human life. Who could believe that Christ could
become forever extinct? (2) By actually coming back from beyond
the grave. There were many speculations about a trans‐Atlantic
continent before 1492, but these were of little worth compared
with the actual word which Columbus brought of a new world beyond
the sea. (3) By providing a way through which his own spiritual
life and victory may be ours; so that, though we pass through the
valley of the shadow of death, we may fear no evil. (4) By thus
gaining authority to teach us of the resurrection of the righteous
and of the wicked, as he actually does. Christ’s resurrection is
not only the best proof of immortality, but we have no certain
evidence of immortality without it. Hume held that the same logic
which proved immortality from reason alone, would also prove
preëxistence. “In reality,” he said, “it is the Gospel, and the
Gospel alone, that has brought immortality to light.” It was
truth, though possibly spoken in jest.

There was need of this revelation. The fear of death, even after
Christ has come, shows how hopeless humanity is by nature. Krupp,
the great German maker of cannon, would not have death mentioned
in his establishment. He ran away from his own dying relatives.
Yet he died. But to the Christian, death is an exodus, an
unmooring, a home‐coming. Here we are as ships on the stocks; at
death we are launched into our true element. Before Christ’s
resurrection, it was twilight; it is sunrise now. Balfour: “Death
is the fall of the curtain, not at the end of the piece, but at
the end of the act.” George Dana Boardman: “Christ is the
resurrection and the life. Being himself the Son of man—the
archetypal man, the representative of human nature, the head and
epitome of mankind—mankind ideally, potentially, virtually rose,
when the Son of man rose. He is the resurrection, because he is
the life. The body does not give life to itself, but life takes on
body and uses it.”

George Adam Smith, Yale Lectures: “Some of the Psalmists have only
a hope of corporate immortality. But this was found wanting. It
did not satisfy Israel. It cannot satisfy men to‐day. The O. T. is
of use in reminding us that the hope of immortality is a
secondary, subordinate, and dispensable element of religious
experience. Men had better begin and work for God’s sake, and not
for future reward. The O. T. development of immortality is of use
most of all because it deduces all immortality from God.”
Athanasius: “Man is, according to nature, mortal, as a being who
has been made of things that are perishable. But on account of his
likeness to God he can by piety ward off and escape from his
natural mortality and remain indestructible if he retain the
knowledge of God, or lose his incorruptibility if he lose his life
in God” (quoted in McConnell, Evolution of Immortality, viii,
46‐48). Justin Martyr, 1 Apol., 17, expects resurrection of both
just and unjust; but in Dial. Tryph., 5, he expressly denounces
and dismisses the Platonic doctrine that the soul is immortal.
Athenagoras and Tertullian hold to native immortality, and from it
argue to bodily resurrection. So Augustine. But Theophilus,
Irenæus, Clemens Alexandrinus, with Athanasius, counted it a pagan
error. For the annihilation theory, see Hudson, Debt and Grace,
and Christ our Life; also Dobney, Future Punishment. _Per contra_,
see Hovey, State of the Impenitent Dead, 1‐27, and Manual of
Theology and Ethics, 153‐168; Luthardt, Compendium, 289‐292;
Delitzsch, Bib. Psych., 397‐407; Herzog, Encyclop., art.: Tod;
Splittgerber, Schlaf und Tod; Estes, Christian Doctrine of the
Soul; Baptist Review, 1879:411‐439; Presb. Rev., Jan. 1882:203.

II. The Intermediate State.

The Scriptures affirm the conscious existence of both the righteous and the wicked, after death, and prior to the resurrection. In the intermediate state the soul is without a body, yet this state is for the righteous a state of conscious joy, and for the wicked a state of conscious suffering.

That the righteous do not receive the spiritual body at death, is plain from 1 Thess. 4:16,17 and 1 Cor. 15:52, where an interval is intimated between Paul’s time and the rising of those who slept. The rising was to occur in the future, “at the last trump.” So the resurrection of the wicked had not yet occurred in any single case (2 Tim. 2:18—it was an error to say that the resurrection was “past already”); it was yet future (John 5:28‐30—“the hour cometh”—ἔρχεται ὤρα, not καὶ νῦν ἐστίν—“now is,” as in verse 25; Acts 24:15—“there shall be a resurrection”—ἀνάστασιν μέλλειν ἔσεσθαι). Christ was the firstfruits (1 Cor. 15:20, 23). If the saints had received the spiritual body at death, the patriarchs would have been raised before Christ.

1. Of the righteous.

Of the righteous, it is declared:

(_a_) That the soul of the believer, at its separation from the body, enters the presence of Christ.

_2 Cor. 5:1‐8_—“_if the earthly house of our tabernacle be
dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with
hands, eternal in the heavens. For verily in this we groan,
longing to be clothed upon with our habitation which is from
heaven: if so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked.
For indeed we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being
burdened; not for that we would be unclothed, but that we would be
clothed upon, that what is mortal may be swallowed up of life ...
willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with
the Lord_”—Paul hopes to escape the violent separation of soul and
body—the being “_unclothed_”—by living till the coming of the
Lord, and then putting on the heavenly body, as it were, over the
present one (ἐπενδύσασθαι); yet whether he lived till Christ’s
coming or not, he knew that the soul, when it left the body, would
be at home with the Lord.

_Luke 23:43_—“_To‐day shalt thou be with me in Paradise_”; _John
14:3_—“_And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and
will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be
also_”; _2 Tim. 4:18_—“_The Lord will deliver me from every evil
work, and will save me unto_ [or, ‘_into_’] _his heavenly
kingdom_” = will save me and put me into his heavenly kingdom
(Ellicott), the characteristic of which is the visible presence of
the King with his subjects. It is our privilege to be with Christ
here and now. And nothing shall separate us from Christ and his
love, “_neither death, nor life ... nor things present, nor things
to come_” (_Rom. 8:38_); for he himself has said: “_Lo, I am with
you always, even unto the consummation of the age_” (_Mat.
28:20_).

(_b_) That the spirits of departed believers are with God.

_Heb. 12:23_—Ye are come “_to the general assembly and church of
the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the Judge of
all_”; _cf._ _Eccl. 12:7_—“_the dust returneth to the earth as it
was, and the spirit returneth unto God who gave it_”; _John
20:17_—“_Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended unto the
Father_”—probably means: “my body has not yet ascended.” The soul
had gone to God during the interval between death and the
resurrection, as is evident from _Luke 23:43, 46_—“_with me in
Paradise ... Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit._”

(_c_) That believers at death enter paradise.

_Luke 23:42, 43_—“_And he said, Jesus, remember me when thou
comest in thy kingdom. And he said unto him, Verily I say unto
thee, To‐day shalt thou be with me in paradise_”; _cf._ _2 Cor.
12:4_—“_caught up into Paradise, and heard unspeakable words,
which it is not lawful for a man to utter_”; _Rev. 2:7_—“_To him
that overcometh, to him will I give to eat of the tree of life,
which is in the Paradise of God_”; _Gen. 2:8_—“_And Jehovah God
planted a garden eastward, in Eden; and there he put the man whom
he had formed._” Paradise is none other than the abode of God and
the blessed, of which the primeval Eden was the type. If the
penitent thief went to Purgatory, it was a Purgatory with Christ,
which was better than a Heaven without Christ. Paradise is a place
which Christ has gone to prepare, perhaps by taking our friends
there before us.

(_d_) That their state, immediately after death, is greatly to be preferred to that of faithful and successful laborers for Christ here.

_Phil. 1:23_—“_I am in a strait betwixt the two, having the desire
to depart and be with Christ; for it is very far better_”—here
Hackett says: “ἀναλῦσαι = departing, cutting loose, as if to put
to sea, followed by σὺν Χριστῷ εἶναι, as if Paul regarded one
event as immediately subsequent to the other.” Paul, with his
burning desire to preach Christ, would certainly have preferred to
live and labor, even amid great suffering, rather than to die, if
death to him had been a state of unconsciousness and inaction. See
Edwards the younger, Works, 2:530, 531; Hovey, Impenitent Dead,
61.

(_e_) That departed saints are truly alive and conscious.

_Mat. 22:32_—“_God is not the God of the dead, but of the
living_”; _Luke 16:22_—“_carried away by the angels into Abraham’s
bosom_”; _23:43_—“_To‐day shalt thou be with me in
Paradise_”—“_with me_” = in the same state,—unless Christ slept in
unconsciousness, we cannot think that the penitent thief did;
_John 11:26_—“_whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never
die_”; _1 Thess. 5:10_—“_who died for us, that, whether we wake or
sleep, we should live together with him_”; _Rom. 8:10_—“_And if
Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit
is life because of righteousness._” Life and consciousness clearly
belong to the “_souls under the altar_” mentioned under the next
head, for they cry: “_How long?_” _Phil. 1:6_—“_he who began a
good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus
Christ_”—seems to imply a progressive sanctification, through the
Intermediate State, up to the time of Christ’s second coming. This
state is: 1. a conscious state (“_God of the living_”); 2. a fixed
state (no “_passing from thence_”); 3. an incomplete state (“_not
to be unclothed_”).

(_f_) That they are at rest and blessed.

_Rev. 6:9‐11_—“_I saw underneath the altar the souls of them that
had been slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which
they held: and they cried with a great voice, saying, How long, O
Master, the holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our
blood on them that dwell on the earth? And there was given them to
each one a white robe; and it was said unto them, that they should
rest yet for a little time, until their fellow‐servants also and
their brethren, who should be killed even as they were, should
have fulfilled their course_”; _14:13_—“_Blessed are the dead who
die in the Lord from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they
may rest from their labors; for their works follow with them_”;
_20:14_—“_And death and Hades were cast into the lake of
fire_”—see Evans, in Presb. Rev., 1883:303—“The shadow of death
lying upon Hades is the penumbra of Hell. Hence Hades is
associated with death in the final doom.”

2. Of the wicked.

Of the wicked, it is declared:

(_a_) That they are in prison,—that is, are under constraint and guard (1 Peter 3:19—φυλακή).

_1 Pet. 3:19_—“_In which_ [spirit] _also he went and preached unto
the spirits in prison_”—there is no need of putting unconscious
spirits under guard. Hovey: “Restraint implies power of action,
and suffering implies consciousness.”

(_b_) That they are in torment, or conscious suffering (Luke 16:23—ἐν βασάνοις).

_Luke 16:23_—“_And in Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in
torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send
Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool
my tongue; for I am in anguish in this flame._”

Here many unanswerable questions may be asked: Had the rich man a
body before the resurrection, or is this representation of a body
only figurative? Did the soul still feel the body from which it
was temporarily separated, or have souls in the intermediate state
temporary bodies? However we may answer these questions, it is
certain that the rich man suffers, while probation still lasts for
his brethren on earth. Fire is here the source of suffering, but
not of annihilation. Even though this be a parable, it proves
conscious existence after death to have been the common view of
the Jews, and to have been a view sanctioned by Christ.

(_c_) That they are under punishment (2 Pet. 2:9—κολαζομένους).

_2 Pet. 2:9_—“_the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of
temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment unto the
day of judgment_”—here “_the unrighteous_” = not only evil angels,
but ungodly men; _cf._ _verse 4_—“_For if God spared not angels
when they sinned, but cast them down to hell, and committed them
to pits of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment._”

In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, the body is buried,
yet still the torments of the soul are described as physical.
Jesus here accommodates his teaching to the conceptions of his
time, or, better still, uses material figures to express spiritual
realities. Surely he does not mean to say that the Rabbinic notion
of Abraham’s bosom is ultimate truth. “Parables,” for this reason
among others, “may not be made primary sources and seats of
doctrine.” Luckock, Intermediate State, 20—“May the parable of the
rich man and Lazarus be an anticipatory picture of the final
state? But the rich man seems to assume that the judgment has not
yet come, for he speaks of his brethren as still undergoing their
earthly probation, and as capable of receiving a warning to avoid
a fate similar to his own.”

The passages cited enable us properly to estimate two opposite errors.

A. They refute, on the one hand, the view that the souls of both righteous and wicked sleep between death and the resurrection.

This view is based upon the assumption that the possession of a physical organism is indispensable to activity and consciousness—an assumption which the existence of a God who is pure spirit (John 4:24), and the existence of angels who are probably pure spirits (Heb. 1:14), show to be erroneous. Although the departed are characterized as “spirits” (Eccl. 12:7; Acts 7:59; Heb. 12:23; 1 Pet. 3:19), there is nothing in this ’absence from the body’ (2 Cor. 5:8) inconsistent with the activity and consciousness ascribed to them in the Scriptures above referred to. When the dead are spoken of as “sleeping” (Dan. 12:2; Mat. 9:24; John 11:11; 1 Cor. 11:30; 15:51; 1 Thess. 4:14; 5:10), we are to regard this as simply the language of appearance, and as literally applicable only to the body.

_John 4:24_—“_God is a Spirit_ [or rather, as margin, ‘_God is
spirit_’]”; _Heb. 1:14_—“_Are they_ [angels] _not all ministering
spirits?_” _Eccl. 12:7_—“_the dust returneth to the earth as it
was, and the spirit returneth unto God who gave it_”; _Acts
7:59_—“_And they stoned Stephen, calling upon the Lord, and
saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit_”; _Heb. 12:23_—“_to God the
Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect_”; _1
Pet. 3:19_—“_in which also he went and preached unto the spirits
in prison_”; _2 Cor. 5:8_—“_we are of good courage, I say, and are
willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with
the Lord_”; _Dan. 12:2_—“_many of them that sleep in the dust of
the earth shall awake_”; _Mat. 9:24_—“_the damsel is not dead, but
sleepeth_”; _John 11:11_—“_Our friend Lazarus is fallen asleep;
but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep_”; _1 Cor.
11:30_—“_For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and
not a few sleep_”; _1 Thess. 4:14_—“_For if we believe that Jesus
died and rose again, even so them also that are fallen asleep in
Jesus will God bring with him_”; _5:10_—“_who died for us, that,
whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him._”

B. The passages first cited refute, on the other hand, the view that the suffering of the intermediate state is purgatorial.

According to the doctrine of the Roman Catholic church, “all who die at peace with the church, but are not perfect, pass into purgatory.” Here they make satisfaction for the sins committed after baptism by suffering a longer or shorter time, according to the degree of their guilt. The church on earth, however, has power, by prayers and the sacrifice of the Mass, to shorten these sufferings or to remit them altogether. But we urge, in reply, that the passages referring to suffering in the intermediate state give no indication that any true believer is subject to this suffering, or that the church has any power to relieve from the consequences of sin, either in this world or in the world to come. Only God can forgive, and the church is simply empowered to declare that, upon the fulfilment of the appointed conditions of repentance and faith, he does actually forgive. This theory, moreover, is inconsistent with any proper view of the completeness of Christ’s satisfaction (Gal. 2:21; Heb. 9:28); of justification through faith alone (Rom. 3:28); and of the condition after death, of both righteous and wicked, as determined in this life (Eccl. 11:3; Mat. 25:10; Luke 16:26; Heb. 9:27; Rev.22:11).

Against this doctrine we quote the following texts: _Gal 2:21_—“_I
do not make void the grace of God: for if righteousness is through
the law, then Christ died for nought_”; _Heb. 9:28_—“_so Christ
also, having been once_ [or, ‘_once for all_’] _offered to bear
the sins of many, shall appear a second time, apart from sin, to
them that wait for him, unto salvation_”; _Rom. 3:28_—“_We reckon
therefore that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of
the law_”; _Eccl. 11:3_—“_if a tree fall toward the south or
toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth there shall
it be_”; _Mat. 25:10_—“_And while they went away to buy, the
bridegroom came; and they that were ready went in with him to the
marriage feast: and the door was shut_”; _Luke 16:26_—“_And
besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed,
that they that would pass from hence to you may not be able, and
that none may cross over from thence to us_”; _Heb. 9:27_—“_it is
appointed unto men once to die, and after this cometh judgment_”;
_Rev. 22:11_—“_He that is unrighteous, let him do unrighteousness
still: and he that is filthy, let him be made filthy still: and he
that is righteous, let him do righteousness still: and he that is
holy, let him be made holy still._”

Rome teaches that the agonies of purgatory are intolerable. They
differ from the pains of the damned only in this, that there is a
limit to the one, not the other. Bellarmine, De Purgatorio,
2:14—“The pains of purgatory are very severe, surpassing any
endured in this life.” Since none but actual saints escape the
pains of purgatory, this doctrine gives to the death and the
funeral of the Roman Catholic a dreadful and repellent aspect.
Death is not the coming of Christ to take his disciples home, but
is rather the ushering of the shrinking soul into a place of
unspeakable suffering. This suffering makes satisfaction for
guilt. Having paid their allotted penalty, the souls of the
purified pass into Heaven without awaiting the day of judgment.
The doctrine of purgatory gives hope that men may be saved after
death; prayer for the dead has influence; the priest is authorized
to offer this prayer; so the church sells salvation for money.
Amory H. Bradford, Ascent of the Soul, 267‐287, argues in favor of
prayers for the dead. Such prayers, he says, help us to keep in
mind the fact that they are living still. If the dead are free
beings, they may still choose good or evil, and our prayers may
help them to choose the good. We should be thankful, he believes,
to the Roman Catholic Church, for keeping up such prayers. We
reply that no doctrine of Rome has done so much to pervert the
gospel and to enslave the world.

For the Romanist doctrine, see Perrone, Prælectiones Theologicæ,
2:391‐420. _Per contra_, see Hodge, Systematic Theology,
3:743‐770; Barrows, Purgatory. Augustine, Encheiridion, 69,
suggests the possibility of purgatorial fire in the future for
some believers. Whiton, Is Eternal Punishment Endless? page 69,
says that Tertullian held to a delay of resurrection in the case
of faulty Christians; Cyprian first stated the notion of a middle
state of purification; Augustine thought it “not incredible”;
Gregory the Great called it “worthy of belief”; it is now one of
the most potent doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church; that
church has been, from the third century, for all souls who accept
her last consolations, practically restorationist. Gore,
Incarnation, 18—“In the Church of Rome, the ’peradventure’ of an
Augustine as to purgatory for the imperfect after death—’non
redarguo’, he says, ’quia forsitan verum est,’—has become a
positive teaching about purgatory, full of exact information.”

Elliott, Horæ Apocalypticæ, 1:410, adopts Hume’s simile, and says
that purgatory gave the Roman Catholic Church what Archimedes
wanted, another world on which to fix its lever, that so fixed,
the church might with it move this world. We must remember,
however, that the Roman church teaches no radical change of
character in purgatory,—purgatory is only a purifying process for
believers. The true purgatory is only in this world,—for only here
are sins purged away by God’s sanctifying Spirit; and in this
process of purification, though God chastises, there is no element
of penalty. On Dante’s Purgatory, see A. H. Strong, Philosophy and
Religion, 515‐518.

Luckock, After Death, is an argument, based upon the Fathers,
against the Romanist doctrine. Yet he holds to progress in
sanctification in the intermediate state, though the work done in
that state will not affect the final judgment, which will be for
the deeds done in the body. He urges prayer for the departed
righteous. In his book entitled The Intermediate State, Luckock
holds to mental and spiritual development in that state, to active
ministry, mutual recognition, and renewed companionship. He does
not believe in a second probation, but in a first real probation
for those who have had no proper opportunities in this life. In
their reaction against purgatory, the Westminister divines
obliterated the Intermediate State. In that state there is gradual
purification, and must be, since not all impurity and sinfulness
are removed at death. The purging of the will requires time. White
robes were given to them while they were waiting (_Rev. 6:11_).
But there is no second probation for those who have thrown away
their opportunities in this life. Robert Browning, The Ring and
the Book, 232 (Pope, 2129), makes the Pope speak of following
Guido “Into that sad, obscure, sequestered state Where God unmakes
but to remake the soul He else made first in vain; which must not
be.” But the idea of hell as permitting essential change of
character is foreign to Roman Catholic doctrine.

We close our discussion of this subject with a single, but an important, remark,—this, namely, that while the Scriptures represent the intermediate state to be one of conscious joy to the righteous, and of conscious pain to the wicked, they also represent this state to be one of incompleteness. The perfect joy of the saints, and the utter misery of the wicked, begin only with the resurrection and general judgment.