ESCHATOLOGY OR THE DOCTRINE OF LAST THINGS

Eschatology, as the term indicates, is the doctrine of Last Things. In preparation for the kingdom of God in its completeness, certain events must take. place which are of vital interest, from both a theological and a practical viewpoint. We have seen that the doctrines of Christianity all point to a final consummation, and that these all converge in one glorious hope the Second Advent of our Lord. As preceding this event, the questions of Death and the Intermediate State must claim our attention; as following it, those of the Resurrection and Final Judgment. "The high importance of the .eschatological problems," says Dr. Van Oosterzee, "scarcely needs to be formally indicated. The question, 'What shall be the end?' slumbers deep in every Christian heart; and it becomes of so much the greater significance, in proportion as for some and for all the end is nearer at hand. As all other articles of Dogmatics presuppose and prepare the way for Eschatology, so does this in turn shed the light of eternity on every cloud which yet rests upon the parts already traversed of the sanctuary of this science" (Van Oosterzee, Christian Dogmatics, II, p. 777). It should be observed also, that since the distance between the actual and the ideal is so great in the kingdom of God, it can never be filled up on this side of the grave. Consequently the life of faith and love on the part of the believer, necessarily becomes a life of hope also. To this lively hope, we have been begotten again, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (I Peter 1:3). It is, therefore, to the Word of God that we must turn for all authoritative information, not only concerning the individual, but also as to the consummation of all things.

 

[We spoke of the means of grace, by which the Holy Spimt calls forth and strengthens the life of faith, and cannot doubt that by a devout use thereof it is possible for each believer, and for the whole Church, to rise to a comparatively high degree of spiritual growth. Yet Scripture and experience equally proclaim that perfection (in the sense of deliverance from the consequences of sin) itself is never attained on this side of the grave; and the Israel of the New Covenant is on this account, like that of the Old, emphatically a people of the future. Thus then this last chapter also of the doctrine concerning salvation stands in direct connection with that which immediately precedes The necessity for understanding something of the things of the future is indeed so universal that every form of religion, of any degree of development, has its own eschatological expectations. - Van Oosterzee, Christian Dogmatics, II, p. 775.]

DEATH

The word "death" in the Christian system, carries with it a wide variety of interpretation. (1) It is a penalty imposed upon the human race because of sin, and in this sense the subject has already received ample treatment. (2) Physical death, or the separation of the soul from the body, must be viewed as the last event in the probationary history of man. (3) There is a realm of the dead, or death as a state, commonly known as the intermediate state, and (4) there is death, spiritual and eternal. The first three of these events precedes the Second Advent of Christ; the last follows it, and is bound up with the consummation of all things. In this chapter we shall consider physical death and the intermediate state as events of eschatological significance, reserving the subject of "eternal Death" for later consideration.

[ Death as a penalty, whether physically or spiritually considered, is abolished in the gospel of our redemption. (1) In the widest possible sense it is negatived or done away. There is no restriction in the words used to signify the Saviour's endurance of death in the stead of the human race. He underwent in dying the curse of the law; received the wages of sin not due to Himself; and all mankind are delivered as a whole from the original sentence. For the entire family of Adain it is virtually and provisionally abolished. Our Lord tasted death for every man (Heb. 2:9) (2) It is really abolished to all who are found in Christ. "He that believeth on the Son had everlasting life." . . . . It is true that the abolition is conditional, and gradually revealed both in the soul and in the body; even as the full revelation of the death from which we are saved is gradual. "we are saved by hope." This law runs through the Christian economy; we receive only the first fruits, every blessing and every deliverance being at best given in its earnest alone "until the redemption of the purchased pos session." But the day will come when every trace of this sentence shall be effaced. "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death (I Cor. 15:26). It was also the first enemy destroyed - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., III, p. 373.]

The Nature of Physical Death. Death never means annihilation. It was not existence which was forfeited by the original sin, but the separation of the soul from the body, and in a spiritual sense, the separation of both from God. Dr. Hodge speaks of it as "the suspension of personal union between the body and the soul, followed by the resolution of the body into its chemical .elements, and the introduction of the soul into that separate state of existence which may be assigned to it by its Creator and Judge" (A. A. Hodge, Outlines of Theology, p. 430). Dr. Pope calls it "the introduction to another world, and therefore as an event in the history of fallen and redeemed man: the separation of the soul from the body" (POPE, Higher Catechism of Theology, p.361). In the Scriptures physical death is mentioned as being gathered unto thy people (Deut. 32:50); a going the way of all the earth (Joshua 23:14); a being gathered unto their fathers (Judges 2:10); a return of the dust to the earth as it was, and the spirit returning unto God who gave it (Eccl. 12:7); a giving up, or a yielding up of the ghost (Acts 5:5, 10); a dissolving of our earthly house of this tabernacle (II Cor. 5:1); and a being absent from the body and present with the Lord (II Cor.5:8).

Death as a Penalty Abolished in Christ. The Scriptures teach that as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned (Rom. 5:12). Thus death is the penalty for sin, death physical, spiritual and eternal. But the Scriptures teach with equal clearness that death as a penalty is abolished in Christ. Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the . righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life (Rom. 5:18). Consequently, death as a penalty, whether considered physically or spiritually, is abolished by Christ, and this in two ways: (1) It is abolished provisionally for all mankind. When Christ underwent the curse of the law, and received the sentence of condemnation, He tasted death for every man (Heb. 2:9), and thus removed the specific condemnation from the race. (2) It is actually abolished for all who are in Christ. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him (John 3:36). This abolition is both conditional and gradual, even as the revelation of the death from which we are saved is gradual. This is the deep meaning of St. Paul's words, We are saved by hope (Rom. 8:24). The law of the Christian economy is, that we receive here only the first fruits, as the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession (Eph. 1:14). But we look forward in hope to the day when every trace of death shall be removed from God's created universe. Death is at once the first enemy, and the last enemy that shall be destroyed - such is the infinite sweep of this great salvation.

In this gradual abolition of death we may note the following stages: (1) Physical death is now bound up with the divine purpose concerning the destiny of mankind. What that development would have been, had sin not entered the world, we cannot know, but the eternal counsel concerning the human race now is, that It is appointed unto men once to die (Heb. 9:27). Thus death is retained as a law in the divine government.

(2) Christian death becomes a part of the probationary discipline of believers, and is hallowed as a ground of fellowship with Christ. It is a faithful saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him (II Tim. 2:11). Man by his federal relation with the first Adam dies that he may rise again with the last Adam. (3) Physical death for the Christian is now transfigured into a simple departure from this life to another. For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that would we be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life (II Cor. 5:1, 4). With the curse removed, death for the believer in Christ becomes a means to a blessed end. It is the door through which he enters into the new life, the method by which he receives in the resurrection which follows, a new and glorified body as the eternal habitation of his redeemed soul.

IMMORTALITY

The question of immortality first arises in connection with the nature of the divine image in man. It was therefore briefly, and in a preliminary manner discussed in our treatment of this subject (Vol. II, p.34). Now, however, the problem appears in a different light and must be given further consideration. Every man believes in the immortality of his own soul, although he can neither demonstrate it nor disprove it. This fundamental conviction is the strongest proof of immortality outside the teachings of the Holy Scriptures. It is

"A solemn murmur of the soul

Which tells of a world to be,

As travelers hear the billows roar

Before they reach the sea."

The life of man never ceases to be. As we have shown, the grave is only the tunnel through which men pass in order to reach the life beyond. The nature of

this future existence is determined by personal character ; and this in turn by the attitude of the soul toward the atoning work of Jesus Christ. To the believer, it is eternal life; to the unbeliever, eternal death.

 

[The Christian thought of being unclothed is an advance upon any former revelation: the body is the only clothing which, folded in the grave, will be hereafter refashioned for the naked spirit. Death is rest, as of old: but rest in the ceaseless service of the Lord. It is sleep: but it is sleep in Jesus. It is still the penalty of sin: but no longer only a penalty. For to those who believe in Jesus death is no more death: not only is its sting gone, but itself is already as to its terror - which is its shadow following it, the second death - annihilated: "whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die" (John 11:26). Finally, it is more than the Old Testament "going the way of all the earth" (Joshua 23:14); it is a departure or decease, for these two words are one. Such it was in the case of our Lord: Moses and Elias spoke of the decease "which he should accomplish at Jerusalem" (Luke 9:31). And among the last allusions to death in the New Testament it is regarded as only a removal to another sphere: "the time of my departure is at hand" (II Tim. 4:6); which is the simplest and sublimest description of it given to our faith and hope. - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., III, pp. 375, 376.]

 

The Philosophical Arguments for Immortality. The philosophical arguments are, after all, less convincing than the inalienable conviction of immortality which every man has in his own breast; and hence the most that can be said of them is, that they are attempts to clarify this deep, underlying conviction. We present them, therefore, merely as a list of the traditional arguments commonly offered in support of immortality.

(1) The Psychological Argument is based on the nature of the soul as simple, immaterial essence, indivisible and hence indestructible. This argument tends to show that the soul is self-existent, and therefore will exist forever. (2) The Teleological Argument holds that the human soul does not, and cannot fulfill all its promise in this world; and hence necessitates another world and continued existence, in order to achieve its full complement of blessedness. (3) The Cosmical Argument is based on the fact, that in the natural realm there is the law of gravitation which binds the heavenly bodies together, and yet, there is no basis for the communion of the people of those other worlds. Hence there must be another mode of existence in order to fulfill the possibilities of human life. This argument was used by Kant, Herder, Lange, Chalmers and others. (4) The Analogical Argument is drawn from analogies in the organic world. The seed dies, and yet perpetuates its identity; the chrysalis bursts and the butterfly emerges as a new order of being, totally unlike its former mode of existence. (5) The Moral Argument is presented in both its individual and social aspects. It is essentially this - man in this world does not always receive justice. Mere annihilation would not permit degrees of punishment corresponding to the different degrees of guilt. Hence this is an argument from the justice of God to the continued existence of the wicked. Furthermore, in many of its moral aspects life would appear to be a mockery were there no world to come. Thus St. Paul reasoned when he said, If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable (I Cor. 15:19).

[ It may he considered to he universally acknowledged in our day that no independent proof can he given of the immortality of man, but that the doctrine of immortality must he derived from the contemplation of life as a whole. In the Christian view of life, immortality appears on every hand. It is implied in the doctrine of a special providence, in the doctrine of the eternal individuality of Christ, in the election of grace, in prayer, in baptism, in the Lord's Supper, all of which owe their true import to the presupposition of the destiny of the individual to eternal salvation; but the general and fundamental idea lies in the doctrine that man is created in the image of God. All questions concerning human immortality may he traced back to our idea of God. The true conception of man is, that he is the organ of revelation for the Godhead. If God be merely the impersonal spirit of the world, as Pantheism maintains - an impersonal universality - this impersonal spirit needs only impersonal instruments, intermediate channels for his universal life, which possess only a transitory immortality, an immortality limited to that moment only when the eternal Spirit shines through them, and like the rainbow which is formed in the clouds, only for a moment in the presence of the sun. The pantheistic Godhead can have no care for the personal and monadic, because it is itself impersonal. The personal God, on the contrary, cannot find a perfect form for the revelation of Himself in beings which are only impersonal mediums, but only in beings in His own image who are appointed to he permanent witnesses of His eternal power and Godhead. The God of Revelation is Love, and He therefore has interests in the monadic, the minute and individual. - Martensen, Christian Dogmatics, p.452.

My belief in the immortality of the soul springs from the Idea of activity; for when I persevere to the end in a course of restless activity I have a sort of guaranty from Nature, that, when the present form of my existence proves itself inadequate for the energizing of my spirit, she will provide another form more appropriate. when a man is seventy-five years old, he cannot avoid now and then thinking of death. This thought, when it comes, leaves me in a state of perfect peace; for I have the most assured conviction that our soul is of an essence absolutely indestructible an essence that works on from eternity to eternity. It is like the sun, which to our earthly eyes sinks and sets, but in reality never sinks, but shines on unceasingly. - Goethe.]

 

[ The history of primitive religion shows that the hope of immortality is not peculiar to the Christian, but finds expression in religions of the lowest order. Among the Karens the souls of the dead are supposed to assume different aspects as determined by their previous life. Some become divine spirits, while others especially those guilty of

murder or adultery assume the forms of monstrous animals. The good go to join their ancestors, while the bad wander about as restless phantoms. The Dyaks of Borneo believe that, as the smoke of the funeral pyre of a good man rises, the soul ascends to the sky; and that the smoke from the pyre of a bad man descends, and with it, his soul is borne down to the earth, and through it to the regions below. The Krumans maintain that the soul of the dead tarries for a while around a fire which is built on the occasion of a death, in order to warm and prepare itself to appreciate the new life into which it has been born. "The idea of a future life," says Pressense, "is inseparable from the idea of God in the credo of the savage."

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) has this sublime passage concerning this own faith in immortality. "I feel in myself the future life. I am like a forest which has been more than once cut down. The new shoots are stronger and livelier than ever. I am rising, I know, toward the sky. The sunshine is on my head. The earth gives me its generous sap, but the heaven lights me with the reflection of unknown worlds. You say the soul is nothing but the resultant of bodily powers. why, then, is my soul the more luminous when my bodily powers begin to fall? Winter is on my head, and eternal spring is in my heart. Then I

breathe, at this hour, the fragrance of the lilacs, the violets, and the roses as at twenty years. The nearer I approach the end, the plainer I hear around me the immortal symphonies of the worlds which invite me. It is marvelous, yet simple. It is a fairy tale, and it is history. For half a century I have been writing my thoughts in prose, verse, history, philosophy, drama, romance, tradition, satire, ode, song - I have tried all. But I feel that I have not said the thousandth part of what is in me. When I go down to the grave I can say, like so many others, "I have finished my day's work, but I cannot say, 'I have finished my life.' My day's work will begin again the next morning. The tomb is not a blind alley; it is a thoroughfare. It closes in the twilight to open with the dawn. I improve every hour, because I love this world as my father land. My work is only a beginning. My monument is hardly above its foundation. I would be glad to see it mounting and mounting forever. The thirst for the infinite proves infinity."]

 

The Doctrine of Immortality as Revealed in the Scriptures. The only authoritative teaching which we have concerning immortality, is that found in the Holy Scriptures. It is sometimes asserted that the immortality of the soul is not emphasized in the Old Testament, but as a matter of fact this teaching permeates both the Old and the New Testaments. No Hebrew writer, either inspired or uninspired, ever doubted the immortality of the soul, and this, not in a pantheistic but in an individual sense. The scriptures previously cited in disproof of annihilation, serve likewise as proofs of the immortality of the soul. In addition to these, we may note the following: Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth? (Eccl. 3:21). Dr. Clarke says that the literal translation of this text is, "Who considereth the immortal spirit of the sons of Adam, which ascendeth. It is from above: and the spirit or breath of the cattle, which descendeth? It is downward unto the earth, that is, it tends to the earth only." Here the spirit of a man is distinguished from that of an animal, as tending in different directions. That man's spirit goes upward, clearly denotes, not only continued but more elevated existence, and hence survives bodily death. Again, For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God (Job 19:25, 26). Here is a certainty of conviction that there is a life beyond. The psalmist also declared that The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away (Psalms 90:10). The argument hangs on the words "We fly

away." The figure itself is borrowed from the belief that man has a soul which departs when the body dies, and can mean nothing other than that the soul exists after death. In the New Testament we cite only a representative text. And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul (Matt. 10:28). From . this it is evident that the soul and the body are not identical, and that to kill the body does not kill the soul. This argument from the words of our Lord is conclusive. There are many other Scriptures bearing upon this subject, as the following list of references will show. (Cf. Luke l2:4, 5; Matt 17:3; Matt 22:31,32; Luke l6:22, 23; Luke 23:43, 46; Acts 7:59; Rom. 8:35, 38, 39; 2 Cor. 5:1, 6, 8; 2 Cor. 12:2, 3, 4; Phil. 1:21, 23, 24; Rev. 6:9).

 

[Dr. James H. White has grouped the Bible passages which indicate the soul's continuous existence, by words and phrases descriptive of its conditions and belongings, as follows:

1. It has an existence that is independent of the body, and therefore continuous beyond the death of the body. Man can kill the body, but cannot kill the soul (Matt. 10:28). The soul lives when the body is dead (Matt. 22:32). The soul is capable of suffering when the body is dead and buried (Luke 16:23). The body dead, and the soul in paradise (Luke 23:43). Stephen dies, and his soul is received into heaven (Acts 7:59). The soul may be absent from the body, and present with the Lord (II Cor. 5:8). Such a state is better than the present (Phil. 1:23).

2. Its existence is continuous, because it may suffer eternal or always continuing punishment (Cf. Matt. 18:8 and 25:41). "These shall go away into everlasting punishment"; literally, always enduring punishment (Matt. 25:46). The Revised New Testament in this verse gives us "eternal punishment" and "eternal life" (Cf. also, Mark 3:29; II Thess. 1:9; Jude 13; and Rev. 14:11).

3. Its existence is continuous, because it may enjoy an always enduring life. The passages are numerous wherein eternal and everlasting are connected with the future life and joy of the saints. I need give but a few: Matt. 25:46; John 6:27 ; Gal . 6.8 ; Titus 3.7 ; Hebrews 9.15 ; and II Peter 1:11. These are enough. God would not have us ignorant ''concerning them which are asleep,'' and to this end He has given us the sure testimony of His word. (Quoted in Potts, Faith Made Easy, p. 448).]

 

The Christian Victory

The doctrine of immortality comes into its clearest light through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. The ancient writers of the Church unanimously maintained that death as a consequence of sin, was a merciful provision of the Creator; since it was a means by which the spiritual results of sin might cease, and the holy dead no longer be included in the category of sinners. This could not be as long as they were in bodies capable of ministering to sin and under the penalty of death. But with the death and resurrection of Christ, there is a triumph over death, and consequently a changed attitude toward it. Christ's resurrection, therefore, was not only His own personal triumph over death, it was the triumph of His people also. This is expressly stated in the Epistle to the Hebrews as follows: Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same . that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Heb. 2:14, 15). It is this changed attitude toward death through Jesus Christ, that we must now consider.

Death in Relation to Jesus Christ. Our discussion must include three important facts: (1) Christ asserts the original law and the original purpose of God for men, not only as to His life on earth, but as to His exit from earth also. He overcame wrong by doing right; He Overcame sin by fulfilling the law of holiness; and He overcame death through the law of the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2). (2) Christ was made a curse for us, in that He brought Himself under the penalty of a fallen race (Gal. 3:16). But He not only died vicariously for sin, He also died unto sin (Rom. 6:10). For a time therefore, death had dominion over Him; but in subjecting Himself to death under the condemnation of the law, the penalty was fully satisfied, and all organic connection with the world of evil, at once and forever dissolved. Thus His death became an epoch of judicial peace, and an eternal triumph over the curse of the law. (3) Through the offering of Himself upon the cross, Christ endured in reality, the curse entailed by sin, but it became for Him also, a birth into a new order of being. It was the resolution of His earthly life into a post-earthly form of human existence. For this reason He is called the firstborn from the dead (Col. 1:18); and again He is said to be the first begotten of the dead (Rev. 1:5). By His bearing of our sins in His own body on the tree (I Peter 2:24; Gal. 3:13), He not only fulfilled the positive demands of the divine law, but He realized also in Himself, the perfection of human life both of these being demonstrated by the fact of the resurrection. This mystery of the cross is thus stated by St. Peter as being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit (I Peter 3:18). According to the flesh, Christ died a real death under condemnation; but according to the new law of the life-giving Spirit, He was like the grain of wheat which is quickened while it dies. Thus in surmounting death by the giving of His spirit, He at the same time advanced into a new stage of triumphant life. "This mysterious process of the vegetable kingdom," says Dr. Gerhart, "our Lord employs to set forth the more mysterious process of His spiritual kingdom. The one is a fact confronting natural perception; the other a fact concerning spiritual perception" (Gerhart, Institutes of the Christian Religion, II, p. 776).

 

[The exit of "the spiritual man" from the present world and the exit of "the natural man" are not in kind the same. The exit of each is an epoch in the history of human existence. Neither is the extinction or cessation of being; but the one is an epoch governed by the law of life in Christ Jesus, while the other is an epoch determined by the operation of the law of sin. The exit of "the natural man" is properly denoted by the word "death." Death and sin as to kind are the same, sin being the seed of death, death the bitter fruit of sin. An epoch of transition from the present world to the future world is not in itself abnormal or unnatural. Sound Christian speculation, justified by the history of the Son of Man, may teach that a transition was ordained by the divine idea of human history. It is typified by the translation of Enoch and of Elijah, and demonstrated by the ascension of our Lord. That normal epoch of departure became abnormal in consequence of the entrance of the vitiating power of sin; and because abnormal, the change has the false character which we call death . . . . The life of Jesus, on the contrary, is the ideal human life. He asserts the original law and the original teleology of man as formed in the image of God, both in His history on earth and in His exit from the earth. His exit was in one respect the normal epoch of transition from the lower to the higher realm which the original law of humanity anticipated and demanded. Considered under this aspect, the epoch is to be regarded as the organic resolution of the earthly order into the heavenly order of ideal human existence. - Gerhart, Institutes of the Christian Religion, II, pp. 773, 774.]

 

Christ as the Author of Eternal Life. Christ having triumphed over death, becomes the author of life to every believer. Death, therefore, which will eventually be swallowed up of life, is now a conquered enemy. This fact alone makes necessary a changed attitude toward death on the part of the believers. Eternal life as manifested in Christ is in the individual Christian marked by stages and degrees corresponding to the several fundamental epochs in the life of Christ on earth. We may note here three clearly marked periods in the history of the incarnate Christ: (1) From His conception and birth to His death and burial - the ordinary span of a man's life: (2) From His death and burial to His resurrection, including the descent into Hades. This marks a stage in the progress of the new creation, in which our Lord, through death, overcame him who had the power of death, and thus secured deliverance for His people (Heb. 2:14, 15). (3) His life on earth during the forty days between the resurrection and the ascension. This marks the establishment of a new order of being the resolution of the earthly into the resurrected state, with freedom from weakness, mortality and corruption for all His people.

 

[Dr. Olin A. Curtis in his chapter on the "Christian Meaning of Death," treats the subject of bodily death (1) as to its Personal Significance; (2) its Moral Significance; and (3) its Racial Significance. First, as to the personal significance of bodily death, he states that the province of the body to furnish man with the machinery of personal expression - a point, which if kept clearly in mind takes on large personal significance. In the experience of bodily death, man undergoes for the first time, the experience of being absolutely alone. As one as he remained in the body, there was something to hear or touch. A man may cease to have fellowship with other men, and as a consequence think that he has exhausted the torture of loneliness. But he has not exhausted it, for he can still see the sun, or hear the thunder, or feel the wind in his face. These things do not of course, meet his personal need at all, but they do occupy his attention, and thus protect him from the solitude of the profoundest introspection. But it is in death that the body is torn away, and no protection whatever is left to the man. All he has is his own isolated poverty of person - a solitary personality all alone in the reaches of the Infinite. Second, man in death is not absolutely alone only, but alone with his own conscience. Not one thing can for a moment shelter him from the violence of the moral smiting. Now, of all times, this lonely sinner needs the presence of God, but death is empty of the friendly God. His death expresses the holy anger of God. The man must now meet the insistence of God's moral concern closely and finally, before the last door of destiny is closed. Third, the death of the body has a racial significance also, since the body is the racial nexus. Not only does physical death isolate the individual person, but it also breaks him off from the race. He is now a man without a race the solidarity of the Adamic race as the groundwork of relations being destroyed by bodily death. One by one men are wrenched out of their racial relations by death, and flung out into the isolation of bare personal existence, to await as responsible persons, the final judgment. - CURTIS, The Christian Faith, pp. 295, 296.]

 

Since the experiences and achievements of Christ are to be made those of His people also, we may likewise discern three stages in the progress of eternal life as manifested in the individual Christian. (1) The first is that life communicated in the new birth. As Christ became incarnate of the Holy Ghost by the virgin Mary, so the Spirit of God infuses into the soul of the believer, the new life in Christ. (2) The second is that spiritual transformation which is symbolized by the death and resurrection of Christ. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom. 6:10, 11). This is accomplished through the baptism with the Spirit. Both of these stages are included in Soteriology, and have been previously treated in connection with the Person and Work of the Holy Spirit (Christian Theology, II, pp. 321-326). (3) The third stage belongs properly to Eschatology and has to do with the resurrection of the body. This is commonly known as glorification. Christ departed this life under the curse, but in such a manner as to dissolve His organic connection with the world of moral evil, and thereby realize the perfection of human life in a new order of being. Consequently the curse was removed and death resolved into victory. As in dying, Christ destroyed death in relation to Himself, so His people in dying likewise destroy death in relation to themselves. The curse being lifted, the Christian emphasis is placed upon the inner spirit of life. Hence death to the Christian believer is not now an abnormal event, but the operation of the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus. The whole process is taken up and glorified. Like the preceding stage, this is also a death to sin, but in a different sense. That was a death to sin as a ruling principle in the individual believer; this is death to sin as an eternal possibility. Consequently the Scriptures now regard physical death as in some sense a birth - not a spiritual birth into the kingdom of God, but a bursting forth of life into the post-earthly realm, a birth into the kingdom of glory. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you (Rom. 8:11).

 

[Of Jesus Christ as the Head of the new race we therefore predicate only life. "I am the life." By the realization in humanity of the law of holiness Christ annuls the law of sin; by quickening and perfecting the eternal life Christ destroys death. "The spiritual man," being a member of the destroyer of sin and death, lives the life of the ascended Conqueror. The end of his earthly history is not death, but an epoch which on the one hand is victory over the curse of sin, and on the other hand is the transition from a lower to a higher plane of eternal life. - Gerhart, Institutes of the Christian Religion, II, p.777. 

Christian death is abundantly and most impressively brought to light as not abolished absolutely; but as taken up into the divine plan for the individual just as it is for the race. It enters into the probationary discipline of believers. Hence it is hallowed and dignified as part of the fellowship of their lot with Christ . . . That unknown element in His suffering which negatived the sinner's eternal death is of necessity unshared, but His physical surrender to death admits us to a fellowship with it . . . . There is no grace of Christian life which is not made perfect in death; not that death is the minister of the Spirit to destroy sin, but the last earthly act and oblation of the sinless spirit in which the sacrifice of all becomes perfect in one. Therefore it is the appointed end of human probation. Other methods of placing a limit to the probationary career, especially in relation to the unfallen creature, may he imagined: this is the appointed end since sin and redemption began. The very execution of doom is made the goal of destiny, in which the sentence is finally reversed. And thus in a certain sense death is the preliminary and decisive judgement for every individual on earth who knows the connection between sin and deliverance. - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., pp. 374, 375.]

 

[Dr. Olin A. Curtis objects to the idealization of death as a friendly and even beautiful event, as is done by some philosophical and poetical writers. "This poetic idealization," he says, "is not to be explained by the natural temper of the poet but rather by the fact that he is (with notable exceptions) a heathen mystic made superficially hopeful by a Christian atmosphere. He is an easy optimist who has never paid the ethical price of a profound optimism." - Curtis, Christian Faith, p. 281.]

THE INTERMEDIATE STATE

The fact of the immortality of the soul having been established, the question next in order is concerned with its conscious existence between the death and the resurrection of the body. All who accept the teaching of the Scriptures as the Word of God, accept also the fact of an intermediate state; but the point on which opinions differ is the question as to the nature of this state. (1) Sheol is derived from the Hebrew word "to ask" and expresses probably the sense of the English proverb - the "grave crieth give, give." The word sometimes means indefinitely, the grave, or place or state of the dead; and at others, definitely, a place or state of the dead into which the element of misery, and punishment enters: but never a place or state of happiness, or good after death (Cf. BLUNT, Dictionary) . (2) Hades is a Greek word derived from a primitive and idein and signifies the invisible world of departed spirits. It was used by the authors of the Septuagint to translate the Hebrew word Sheol, as in Psalms 16:10 and Acts 2:27. Dr. A. A. Hodge points out that the word occurs only eleven times in the New Testament (Matt. 11:23; 16:18; Luke 10:15; 16:23; Acts 2:27, 31; I Cor. 15:55; Rev. i 18; 6:8; 20:13, 14); and that in every case except I Cor. 15:55, where the more critical editions of the original substitute the word qavnate in the place of hades is translated hell, and certainly always represents the invisible world as under the dominion of Satan, and as opposed to the kingdom of Christ (Cf. A. A. Hodge, Outlines of Theology, p. 435). (3) Paradise, from the Greek word paravdeiso", was adopted into both Greek and Hebrew from some oriental language. The word means a park, or pleasure garden, and was used by the translators of the Septuagint to represent the garden in Eden (Gen. 2:8ff). It occurs only three times in the New Testament (Luke 23:43; II Cor. 12:4; and Rev. 2:7), and the context shows that it is connected with the "third heaven" in one instance; and in the others with the "Garden of God" in which grows the tree of life - all three necessarily referring to a life beyond physical death.

 

[ Throughout the Scriptures, from Genesis to Revelation, the departed souls of men are represented as congregating in one vast receptacle, the interior conditions of which differ much in the two Testaments and vary in each respectively. On their estate a steady increase of light as revelation proceeds, though even in its final disclosures leave much obscurity which only the Lord's coming will remove. It Is, however, made certain that the intermediate state is under the special control of the Redeemer as the Lord of all the dead who have ever passed from the world; that those who have departed in unbelief are in a condition of imprisonment waiting for the final judgment, while those who have died in the faith are in Paradise, or rather with Christ, waiting for their consummation; and that the universal resurrection will put an end both to death and to the state of the disembodied dead. Some few hints which the New Testament gives as to the conscious personality of the subjects of the Lord's Kingdom in Hades have been .made the basis of doctrinal determinations and ecclesiastical institutions and speculative theories which belong to the department of historical theology. - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., III, p. 376.]

 

In our discussion of this doctrine we shall consider (I) the historical development of the doctrine; and (II) some of its theological implications.

I

In historical theology, the idea of Hades has undergone a number of modifications. These we shall consider in the following order: (1) The Patristic Doctrine of the Intermediate State; (2) The Heretical Doctrine of Soul Sleeping; (3) The Roman Catholic Doctrine of an Intermediate Place; and (4) The Protestant Doctrine of an Intermediate State.

The Patristic Doctrine of the Intermediate State. While the doctrine of the immortality of the soul is taught in the Old Testament, the Hebrew people generally seem to have held it in a more or less perverted form. The common belief appears to have been this, that all souls descended at death into Sheol or Hades, which was a gloomy, subterranean abode; and where the inhabitants were shades, existing in a weak, powerless and dreamy state. At other times, Sheol is represented as divided into two departments - Paradise, a place of positive bliss, and Gehenna, a place of positive torment. In the former or Abraham's bosom, were the Jews, or at least those who had been faithful to the law; in the latter were the Gentiles. It was held, further, that at the coming of the Messiah, the faithful Jews would be resurrected and have a part in His glorious kingdom; while the Gentiles would be left forever in the abode of darkness. The doctrine of an Intermediate State was prevalent in the early church, as is shown by the numerous references to it in the writings of the Fathers. In the main, their teachings were similar to those of later Judaism. Hades, or the invisible region, was an underworld, or realm of the dead. It was a place of partial rewards and punishments. Justin Martyr says of it, that "the souls of the pious are in a better place, those of the unjust and wicked in a worse, waiting for the time of judgment." Tertullian (220) states that "no one, becoming absent from the body, is at once a dweller in the presence of the Lord, except by the prerogative of martyrdom, whereby he gets at once a lodging in Paradise, not in Hades." Cyprian (258) appears to have taken a different view from that of Tertullian, and intimates that the departed saints come immediately into the presence of Christ. Origen (d. 254) taught that since the resurrection of Christ, Hades no longer holds the souls of the righteous - those of the former ages having been transported by Christ to Paradise.

 

[The opinions of the early fathers concerning the residence of the soul in its disembodied state, between death and the resurrection, were somewhat fluctuating. The idea of Hades, or underworld, where departed spirits dwell, was familiar to the Hebrew mind as it was to the Greek, and so far as this idea passed over to Christianity it tended to the doctrine of a state intermediate between this earthly life and the everlasting abode of the soul assigned to it in the day of judgment. Justin Martyr represents the souls of the righteous as taking up a temporary abode in a happy, those of the wicked in a wretched place; and stigmatizes as heretical the doctrine that souls are immediately received into heaven at death. Tertullian held that the martyrs went at once to the abode of the blessed, but that this was a privilege peculiar to them, and not granted to other Christians. Cyprian, on the other hand, says nothing of an intermediate state, and expresses the confident belief that those who die in the Lord, by pestilence or by any other mode, will he at once taken to Him. In the Alexandrian school, the idea of an intermediate state passed into that of a gradual purification of the soul, and paved the way for the later doctrine of purgatory. The doctrine of an intermediate state not only maintained itself, but gained in authority and influence during the polemic period (Ad. 250-730). Ambrose taught that the soul is separated from the body at death, and after the cessation of the earthly life is held in an ambiguous condition, awaiting the final judgment. Augustine remarks that "the period which intervenes between the death and the final resurrection of man contains souls in secret receptacles, who are treated according to their character and conduct in the flesh." "The majority of ecclesiastical writers of this period," Hagenbach remarks, "believed that men do not receive their full reward till after the resurrection of the body. Here and there, however, there was a dissenting voice. Gregory Nazianzen supposed that the souls of the righteous prior to the resurrection of the body, are at once admitted into the presence of God; in which opinion he seems supported by Gennadius and Gregory the Great. Eusebius also declares that Helena, the mother of Constantine, went immediately to God and was transformed into an angelic substance. In the Middle Ages and the Papal Church, the doctrine of an intermediate state was, of course, retained and defended in connection with that of purgatory. - Shedd, History of Christian Doctrine, II, pp. 400-403.]

 

The Doctrine of Soul Sleeping. According to this doctrine, the soul during the intermediate period is either in a state of unconscious sleep known as Psychopannychism (from pannucizein, to spend all night long, and yuch the soul) ; or that it is in a state of actual death known as Thnetopsychism (from qnhvskw, death and yuch the soul) . In neither form has the doctrine been extensively adopted in the church, and therefore has always been regarded as heretical. However, it has had its advocates in every age. Origen in the third century wrote against a small sect which held this doctrine ; Calvin wrote against it in the sixteenth century, and the Roman Catholic Church condemned it in several councils, notably that of Trent (1545-1563). The doctrine is based upon a misapprehension of those passages of Scripture which refer to death as a sleep. Furthermore, the doctrine presupposes that the soul cannot know itself, or in any sense energize except through the instrumentality of the body. It is for this reason that the soul during its disembodied state is regarded as dormant, or as virtually dead. This position, however, is philosophically, pure assumption. Because the soul cannot function except through the body in its relation to material things, it is assumed that it cannot function apart from the body in spiritual things. This error is refuted by the arguments commonly urged against materialism. From the standpoint of exegesis also, the doctrine is false. By no allowable interpretation, can the discourse concerning Dives and Lazarus be made to support the doctrine of soul sleeping; nor can the words of Jesus to the thief on the cross have any meaning unless he was to be consciously with Him in Paradise. Furthermore, the statement of St. Paul in regard to being absent from the body and present with the Lord, cannot be understood, if an interval of unconsciousness is to elapse between the two events.

[Dr. E. Y. Mullins points out that there is no basis in the New Testament, for what is known as the doctrine of "soul-sleeping." There are indeed passages which refer to death as a sleep, but it is nowhere said that the soul sleeps. The reference is to the personality as a whole, and the figure of sleep must be interpreted in harmony with the general teachings of the New Testament. Sleep means "not alive to surroundings." A man asleep knows nothing of the activities about him. So death is a sleep in the sense that men become alive to a new set of surroundings and cut off from those of the present life. In one passage the idea of death as a sleep and that of conscious fellowship with Christ are combined in a single statement. In I Thessalonians 5:10 the apostle refers to Christ "Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him." (Mullins, The Christian Religion, p. 461.)]

[The doctrine that the soul exists, during the interval between death and the resurrection, in a state of unconscious repose, properly supposes the soul to be a distinct substance from the body. It is therefore to be distinguished from the materialistic theory, which assumes that as matter in certain states and combinations exhibits the phenomena of magnetism or light, so in other combinations it exhibits the phenomena of life, and in others the phenomena of mind, and hence that vital and mental activity are as much the result of effect of the molecular arrangements of matter, as any physical operations in the external world. As in this view it would be absurd to speak of the sleep or quietude of magnetism or light when the conditions of their existence are absent, so it would be equally absurd on this theory, to speak of the sleep of the soul after the dissolution of the body "The more philosophical view as to the nature of the connection between life and its material basis, is the one which regards vitality as something super added and foreign to the matter by which vital phenomena are manifested. Protoplasm is essential as the physical medium through which vital action may be manifested; just as a conductor is essential to the manifestation of electric phenomena, or just as a paint brush and colors are essential to the artist. Because metal conducts the electric current, and renders it perceptible to our senses, no one thinks therefore of asserting that electricity is one of the inherent properties of a metal, any more than one would feel inclined to assert that the power of painting was inherent in the camel's hair or in the dead pigments. Behind this material substratum, in all cases, is the active and living force; and we have no right to assume that the force ceases to exist when its physical basis is removed, though it is no longer perceptible to our senses" (Cf. Nicholson, in Hodge, Systematic Theology, III, p. 731).]

The Roman Catholic Doctrine of an Intermediate Place. Since the time of Gregory the Great (c. 604), there has been connected with the belief in Hades as an intermediate state, a belief also, in Purgatory as an intermediate place. Purgatory, as the doctrine is elaborated by the Roman Catholic Church, insofar as the souls of departed human beings are concerned, seems to comprise the following departments.

1. The Limbus Patrum is a term referring to the state of the righteous dead, previous to the First Advent of Christ. It is held that when Christ descended into Hades after His crucifixion, He delivered the souls of .the patriarchs and carried them in triumph to heaven. This is, of course, similar to the common Jewish teaching concerning the Old Testament saints. Many hold that this compartment ceased to exist after the ascension, but others maintain that the souls of the departed since that time, are still confined in this intermediate place, awaiting deliverance at the Second Advent.

2. The Limbus Infantum refers to the supposed abode of the souls of unbaptized infants. This is not regarded as a place either of suffering or happiness. Thomas Aquinas states that although unbaptized infants are deprived forever of the happiness of the saints, they suffer neither sorrow nor sadness in consequence of the privation.

3. Purgatory is regarded as the intermediate abode of those who die in the peace of the church, but who need further purification before entering the final state of heaven. The doctrine of Purgatory as held by Romanists is fairly summed up by Dr. Charles Hodge as follows: "They teach: (1) That it is a state of suffering. The commonly received traditional, though not symbolical, doctrine on this point is, that the suffering is from material fire. The design of this suffering is both an expiation and purification. (2) That the duration and intensity of purgatorial pains are proportioned to the guilt and impurity of the sufferers. (3) That there is no known or defined limit to the continuance of the soul in purgatory, but the day of judgment. The departed may remain in this state of suffering for a few hours or for thousands of years. (4) That souls in purgatory may be helped ; that is, their sufferings alleviated or the duration of them shortened by the prayers of the saints, and especially by the sacrifice of the Mass. (5) That purgatory is under the power of the keys. That is, it is the prerogative of the authorities of the church, at their discretion, to remit entirely or partially the penalty of sins under which the souls there detained are suffering (Hodge, Systematic Theology, III, pp. 749, 750). This erroneous doctrine arises from the belief of the Roman Catholic Church, that the atonement of Christ is available for us only in respect to original sin and the exposure to eternal death. That is, Christ delivers us only from the reatus poenae, or culpability, not from the reatus poenae, or liability to punishment. For sins after baptism, the offender must make satisfaction by penance or good works. This satisfaction must be complete in this life if the soul is to enter heaven; if not, then this purification must be completed in purgatory. The Eucharist or Mass is the propitiatory sacrifice intended to secure the pardon of sins committed after baptism ; and since this takes effect according to the intention of the priests, he may if he so desires, by his intention, make it effective for souls in purgatory. The pope, being the vicar of Christ on earth, has full power to forgive sins in this sense - he may exempt offenders from the obligation to make sacrifices for their offenses. This is the doctrine against which Protestantism took such a vigorous stand.

[Article VIII of the Tridentine Profession of Faith is as follows: "I firmly hold that there is a purgatory, and that the souls therein detained are helped by the suffrages of the faithful. Likewise, that the saints reigning with Christ are to be honored and invoked, and that they offer up prayers to God for us, and that their relics are to he had in veneration." This is a general statement and no mention is made as to whether these souls exist in a state of misery or happiness. However, in the catechism of the Council of Trent, drawn up by order of the Fathers, the statement is more explicit. "There is a purgatorial fire, where the souls of the righteous are purified by a temporary punishment, that entrance may be given them into their eternal home, where .nothing that is defiled can have a place. And of the truth of this doctrine, which holy councils declare to be confirmed by the testimony of Scripture and of apostolic tradition, the pastor will have to declare more diligently and frequently, because we are fallen on times in which men will not endure sound doctrine (Catech. Trident. Chap. VI).

Purgatory, as an assumed Christian doctrine, is peculiar to Romanism. It has no place in the creed of any other church, though in some it may be held by individual members. In Romanism Christians compose two classes: the imperfect, and the truly good. The former have impurities which must he cleansed away, and venial sins which must be expiated in penal suffering, in order to a neatness for heaven. Even the truly good, while free from the guilt of mortal sins, yet have deserts of temporal punishment which must be expiated. Purgatory provides for both classes, as in its penal and purifying fires both may attain to a fitness for heaven. But it provides only for such as the Romish Church recognizes as Christians: therefore it has no connection with the doctrine of a second probation. - Miley, Systematic Theology, II, p. 438.]

4. Heaven is defined to be the place and state of the blessed where God is, where Jesus is enthroned in majesty, and where the angels and the spirits of just men are made perfect. It is the place of the highest blessedness. Into this state of perfect blessedness, the 

Romanists hold that only a few, even of true believers, enter immediately at death. Instead, both the righteous and the wicked remain in an intermediate state, which for the righteous is known as Paradise or Abraham's Bosom, and for the wicked is called Purgatory. From this intermediate state the righteous go to their final reward, and the wicked to their eternal doom, at the last judgment. It is maintained, however, that there are two classes which may enter heaven previous to the resurrection - those who are perfectly pure at the time of death; and those who, although not perfect when they leave this world, have become perfect in purgatory.

5. Hell is defined as a place or state, in which wicked angels and the finally impenitent among men suffer forever the punishment of their sins. The sufferings of the lost are due to two things: (1) those of loss or deprivation, in which they are denied the vision, favor and presence of God; and (2) those of positive infliction, such as the sufferings arising from remorse, wicked passions and despair. The Romanists differ, however, as to whether the fire mentioned in this connection is literal or symbolical. Gousset says that on this subject the church has given no decisions. "It is of faith," he says, "that the condemned shall be eternally deprived of the happiness of heaven, and that they shall be eternally tormented in hell; but it is not of the faith that the fire which causes their suffering is material. Many doctors, whose Opinion has not been condemned, think that as 'the worm which never dies' is a figurative expression, so also is 'the fire that is never quenched' ; and that the fire means a pam analogous to that by fire rather than the real pain produced by fire. Nevertheless the idea that the fire spoken of is real material fire is so general among Catholics, that we do not venture to advance a contrary opinion" (Cf. Hodge, Systematic Theology, III, pp. 747, 748).

The Protestant Doctrine of an Intermediate State. Protestantism retains the idea of an intermediate state, but rejects generally the idea of an intermediate place. We may state the common Protestant doctrine as follows: (1) That at the death the souls of the righteous go immediately into the presence of Christ and of God. The Scriptures make no mention of a long delay; instead it is clearly taught that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (II Cor. 5:6). (2) The souls of the departed exist in a state of consciousness. In referring to the righteous, St. Paul declares that nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ (Rom. 8:38); that is, the moral and spiritual relationship to Christ is continuous and unbroken. No provision is made for an interrupted period of consciousness. (3) Not only are the righteous dead conscious, but they are in a state of blessedness and rest (Rev. 14:13). (4) The intermediate state is not the final state of believers. Man is body as well as spirit, and hence in his disembodied state there is an element of imperfection which can be supplied only by the resurrection. This belief in an intermediate state is perfectly consistent with the teaching of Protestantism, that after the Second Advent and the resurrection of the dead, the state of the soul will be still more exalted and blessed. What has been said of the righteous dead, is equally applicable to the state of the wicked: (1) That at death the souls of the wicked are banished from the presence of the Lord ; (2) that the wicked exist in consciousness ; (3) that this consciousness is one of suffering and unrest; and (4) that the state of the wicked is not final - they too will be raised, but to everlasting shame and contempt; and the judgment will fix their eternal doom.

 

[In the Protestant Church the doctrine of purgatory was rejected; but some difference of sentiment appears respecting the intermediate state. Calvin combated the theory of a sleep of the soul between death and the resurrection, which had been revived by some of the Swiss Anabaptists, and argues for the full consciousness of the disembodied spirit. The second Helvetic Confession expressly rejects the notion that departed spirits reappear on earth. Some theologians endeavored to establish a distinction between the happiness which a disembodied spirit enjoys, and that which it will experience after the resurrection of the body. They also distinguish between the judgment which takes place at the death of each individual, by which his destiny is immediately decided, and the general judgment at the end of the world. Speaking generally, the doctrine of an intermediate state has found most favor in the Lutheran division of Protestants. In the English Church, since the time of Laud, the doctrine has found some advocates, chiefly in that portion of it characterized by high church views, and a Romanizing tendency. The followers of Swedenborg adopt the tenet in a highly gross and materializing form. - Shedd, History of Christian Doctrine, II, pp. 402, 403.]

 

Growing out of the preceding historical discussion, there are certain questions which, because of their theological implications, demand further consideration. We refer especially to such questions as: (1) Is there an intermediate place as well as an intermediate state? and what are the theological and practical implications which are involved. (2) Is the intermediate state a period of future probation? and (3) Is the intermediate state one of progress and development? These are but a few of the questions which arise in connection with this important subject.

Is there an Intermediate Place as well as an Intermediate state? This is a question which has engaged the interest of many learned and pious men; and yet it is without value, except for its practical implications. The Scriptures leave the question undecided, some texts appearing to favor one view, and some another. As favoring the idea of an intermediate place, there is the account of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31), and also the words of Christ to the dying thief, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43). The word Paradise is sometimes used in a lower sense than that of heaven; and besides Jesus did not ascend into heaven on that day as His words to Mary indicate, for I am not yet ascended to my Father (John 20:17). As opposed to the idea of an intermediate place, we may cite such texts as the words of St. Stephen, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit (Acts 7 59); and those of St. Paul, to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord (II Cor. 5:8). These passages seem to indicate that the good at death go immediately into the presence of the Lord. But the question may be asked, Does not an intermediate state necessarily imply an intermediate place? We think not. It is the general belief of the church, that during the intermediate state the persons of men are incomplete while their souls and bodies are .separated, but this incompleteness is due to the state or condition, and not to the place. That is, the righteous .and the wicked each go to their place of final abode, but do not thereby enter upon their eternal state. This latter can take place only at the final judgment. The early church seems to have held to a belief in an intermediate place, due to Jewish influence.

 

[According to the doctrine of the New Testament, therefore, there is no third place, or medium, between heaven and hell or between being happy and miserable, although there are very different degrees both of the one and the other. The intermediate condition of which we have spoken must not be understood to imply anything like this. Still an opinion like this got footing very early in the Christian Church. And this gave rise to the custom of praying for the dead, since men were foolish enough to imagine that there is room to obtain an alteration in the yet undecided destiny of departed spirits, while in truth their destiny must depend solely upon their own actions during the present life. This custom had become very general in the fourth century, and was at that time opposed by Aerius, presbyter of Pontus, as we learn from the testimony of Epiphanius, who is very indignant against him on this account. It was also opposed by the Spanish presbyter, Vigilantius, in the fifth century, in reply to whom Hieronymus wrote a violent book. The doctrine was afterward brought into connection with that respecting purgatory, and then followed masses for souls, as sacrifices for the departed. There are also some traces of prayers for the dead, even among Grecian Jews (Cf. II Mac. 12:43-46) - KNAPP, Christian Theology, p. 350.]

This view was held at a later time also, being strongly supported by the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory. The churches of the Reformation, however, rejected it, both because of their revolt against the abuses which attached to the doctrine of purgatory, and because of the theological implications involved in it. Dr. Enoch Pond sums up these theological implications as follows: "I have examined, in as few words as possible, the question of an intermediate place, and find no foundation for it in the Word of God. It is of heathen and not Christian origin, and better becomes a believer in the mythology of Greece and Rome than a disciple of the Saviour. I regard the theory, too, as of dangerous influence. Could it be generally received by evangelical Christians, it would be followed, I have no doubt, in a little time, with prayers for the dead, and with the doctrine of a future probation and restoration - perhaps with all the superstitions of purgatory. This is the course which things took in the ancient church, and in all probability they would take the same again. Let us, then, 'hold fast the form of sound words' on this subject - the words of Scripture and of most of our Protestant confessions of faith, and not be 'driven about by every wind of doctrine'"(POND, Christian Theology, p. 552).

[ The saints who are in life and death united to Him are spoken of - as those who "sleep in Jesus" He is their koimthrivon or Cemetery, where sleep is life while life is sleep. The current language of the Epistles refers to their death as departure "to be with Christ," the entering "an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens," and the attainment of an almost consummate state in "the general assembly and church of the firstborn which are written in heaven," where are "the spirits of just men made perfect." All this seems inconsistent with a locality in any sense corresponding to the underworld of Sheol: in fact the term Hades would be all but lost, save in the symbolical Apocalypse, were it not for the explicit declaration that in the resurrection its victory will be taken away "0 Hades where is thy victory?" With the Lord's resurrection Paradise seems to' have risen also into .a lower heaven: as it were the third heaven if not the seventh. Of the elevation of Paradise some hint was given when "many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection"; these may have been the mysterious symbolical first-fruits, whose .spirits reunited to their bodies "appeared unto many" on their way with Christ from Paradise to heaven. The disembodied ungodly are never spoken of save as being generally or by implication in Hades. - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., III, pp. 379, 380.

But though there is no intermediate place in which the soul is confined between death and the resurrection - no umbus patrum, just below heaven; no limbus infontam for unbaptized children, or purgatory, just above hell, for unsanctified Christians, as the Papists dream yet there is an intermediate state which some have strangely confounded with the intermediate place the hades, grave, or dormitory of souls - of which the Bible is silent. - Summers, Systematic Theology, I, p. 351.

 

Is the intermediate State a Period of Future Probation? To this question we must reply that there can be no future probation for the wicked beyond the grave. This is evident for the following reasons: (1) It is unreasonable because it is unnecessary. God can extend probation in this life to any extent He pleases, and to suppose another probation, gives rise to more problems than it solves. (2) The very abundance of light and truth would seem to make the next world unfit for a period of trial. The outshining of truth with such effulgence and glory would be compelling rather than probationary. There the very devils believe and tremble, even though afar off from the realms of glory. (3) If the wicked are on probation in the next world, why not the righteous also? If the wicked can be saved after death, then by a parity of reasoning the righteous may fall away and perish. (4) Sinners sometimes finish their probation before leaving this present world, as in the case of those who have committed the "unpardonable sin." (5) Those who believe in a future restoration, must of necessity regard the punishments of the next world as wholly disciplinary, that is, as designed for the sufferer and not for the public good. If this be true, then they are not a curse but a blessing. But the inhabitants of hell are said to be under the curse of God (Jude 7), and objects of His vengeance (II Thess. 1:8, 9). (6) If it be said that previous to their restoration sinners suffer all that they deserve, then they are saved by works and not by grace - a position entirely out of harmony with the teachings of the New Testament. (7) The Scriptures teach that it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment (Heb. 9:27). Here it is evident that between death and the judgment there are no important changes, which indicates that only while men are in the body are they on probation (II Cor. 5:10). Besides, if sinners are not reclaimed in the judgment, of what value is a second probation? (8) There will be no opportunity for the wicked to return to God through a Mediator, for at the judgment the mediatorial kingdom will come to an end, insofar as it is a provision for the salvation of the lost (I Cor. 15:24-28). We may add also, that the idea of a probation beyond the grave and preceding the final judgment, is out of harmony with the general tenor of the Scriptures, but this subject must be reserved for further treatment in connection with the final state of the wicked. 

[The Scriptures make no announcement of any probation after the present life. The merest suggestion of such a state is all that may reasonably be claiined; and rarely is anything more actually claimed. As to any explicit utterance in favor of a second probation, there is a dead silence of the Scriptures. How is this? Probation, with its privileges and responsibilities, very deeply concerns us. No period of our existence is fraught with deeper interest. The Scriptures are replete with such views of our present probation. They constantly press it upon our attention as involving the most solemn responsibilities of the present life and the profoundest interests of the future life. In a future probation there must be a renewal of all that so deeply concerns a present probation; yet there is not an explicit word respecting it. Such silence of the Scriptures is utterly irreconcilable with the reality of such a probation. - Miley, Systematic Theo1ogy, II, p. 435.]

Is the Intermediate State one of Progress and Development? This is not merely a speculative question, but is bound up with psychological and philosophical theory concerning the soul and its relation to the body. While Protestantism rejects the doctrine of a purgatory, the soul's activity in a disembodied state is a question which has been peculiarly attractive to philosophically minded theologians. The breaking off of the soul from the body as the racial nexus, and the tearing away of the veil of the flesh, furnishes the "aloneness" which underlies Dr. Olin A. Curtis' chapter on "The Christian Meaning of Death" (CURTIS, The Christian Faith, Chap. XX). Bishop Martensen fairly states the problem as follows: "The departed are described in the New Testament as souls, or spirits (I Peter 3:19, 20); they are divested of corporeity, have passed away out of the whole range of full daylight activity, and are waiting for the new and perfect body with which they shall be 'clothed upon.' That state immediately following death must therefore be the direct contrast of the present. In contrast with the present state, it must be said that the departed find themselves in a condition of rest, a state of passivity, that they are in 'the night wherein no man can work' (John 9:4). Their kingdom is not one of works and deeds, for they no longer possess the conditions upon which works and deeds are possible. Nevertheless, they live a deep spiritual life ; for the kingdom of the dead is a kingdom of subjectivity, a kingdom of calm thought and self-fathoming, a kingdom of remembrance in the full sense of the word, in such a sense, I mean, that the soul now enters into its inmost recesses, resorts to that which is the very foundation of life, the true substratum and source of all existence" (Martensen, Christian Dogmatics, pp. 457, 458). Dr. Curtis denies that the intermediate state is one of a second or even continued probation, but holds that its province is that of adjusting a person's mental life to his moral meaning. This world is planned for an ethical test, but we all reach death holding various sorts of false or fragmentary opinions. These opinions do not determine our central intention or influence our moral ideals; but they do confuse the expression of intention, and entire consistency at the point of judgment. "Therefore in the intermediate state," he says, "our relation to truth and reality is to be fully cleared up. No longer will a perfect purpose be held back by an imperfect judgment. No longer can any man's moral meaning be hidden under a false opinion" (CURTIS, Christian Faith, p. 402). It is further pointed out that the clearing up of the mental life may result in a new formal adjustment to Jesus Christ.

 

[ Dr. Olin A. Curtis says, "whatever one may think of the doctrine of the intermediate state from a merely religious standpoint, it has large Christian importance. For no one can see total Christianity, no one can grasp the philosophy of the Christian faith, until he has caught the peculiar significance of that personal experience between death and the resurrection. The systematic theologian is wont to consider the intermediate state as a doctrinal fragment of eschatology; but to me the profounder connection is soteriological." He notes five things that must be considered in a constructive doctrine: (1) The ethical spirit of the New Testament must he protected; (2) we should give this earthly life a full philosophical significance; (3) In the same spirit of Christian economy we must give also to the intermediate state a full philosophical significance; (4) The view of personality and bodily life, already gained, must be maintained watchfully; and (5) the doctrine must he so constructed as to protect the awful Christian emphasis upon death. - Curtis, Christian Faith, pp. 397, 398.

As long as man is in this present world, he is in a kingdom of externals, wherein he can escape from self-contemplation and self knowledge by the distractions of time, the noise and tumult of the world; but at death he enters upon a kingdom the opposite of all this. The veil which this world of sense, with its varied and incessantly moving manifoldness, spreads with soothing and softening influence over the stern reality of life, and which man finds ready to his hand to hide what he does not wish to see this veil is torn asunder from before him in death, and his soul finds itself in a kingdom of pure realities. The manifold voices of this worldly life, which during this earthly life sounded together with the voices of eternity, grow dumb, and the holy voice now sounds alone, no longer deadened by the tumult of the world; and hence the realm of the dead becomes a realm of judgment. "It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgement," - Martensen, Christian Dogmatics, p. 458.[

 

[After death, the difference in principle, which existed here below, between the children of light and the children of darkness, is thus ever more developing; and the man finds himself placed in a very real and just state of retribution, although a state of retribution as yet only in its beginning, in relation to God and to himself. Upon the broad as upon the narrow way, falls the impenetrable curtain of death; but the first step after borders immediately upon the last step, before this curtain. Death alters our condition and our surroundings, but in our personality, nothing. Individuality, self-consciousness, memory, remains. - Van Oosterzee, Christian Dogmatics, II, p. 781.

Dr. Pope states that the Scriptures indicate "a progress in blessedness and in the development of moral energy during the disembodied state. They have the discipline of hope; and of hope as not yet eternal in the heavens, though no longer probationary. They wait for the consummation, their Lord's and their own. And their progress in the spiritual life is not simply that which after the judgment will go on forever, but an advance from stage to stage peculiar to the intermediate state. Time is behind them; time is also before them; the day of eternity is not yet fully come." - Pope, Compend. Chr. Th., III, p. 384.

Steffens calls attention to the fact that what is an evolution within the though - that is a growth and development, must in the intermediate state perfect itself by becoming an involution ever more intense.]

 

Here again we must turn to the Scriptures for our authoritative teaching on this subject. Nor do they leave us without any light on this important subject. In the Apocalypse we are told that the spirits of the redeemed from among men, follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth (Rev. 14:4); and that having washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, they serve him day and night in his temple (Rev. 7:15). There is one instance also, in which the rapid development in the intermediate state is clearly set forth. St. John having heard the messenger of God says, I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God (Rev. 19:10). So transformed was the messenger, that St. John did not recognize him as a martyr, but supposed him to be a divine being to be worshiped. We may well believe then, on the authority of the Scriptures, that the intermediate state will be one of progress in righteousness for the righteous, and in wickedness for the wicked.

 

[THE DOCTRINE OF PURGATORY

1. History of the Doctrine. The idea of purification by fire was familiar to the Greek mind, having been taken up and made a part of his philosophy by Plato. He taught that no one could become perfectly happy after death until he had expiated his sins; and that II they were too great for expiation, his sufferings would have no end. That this doctrine passed from the Greeks to the Jews is inferred from the fact that Judas Maccabeus sent money to Jerusalem to pay for sacrifices to he offered for the sins of the dead. Also from the fact that the Rabbins taught that children by means of sin offerings could alleviate the sufferings of their deceased parents. Paradise, it seems, was regarded as encompassed by a sea of fire, wherein the blemishes of souls must he consumed before their admission to heaven. For this reason they taught that all souls not perfectly holy must wash themselves in the fire-river of Gehenna; and while the just would soon he cleansed, the wicked would he retained in its torments indefinitely.

The doctrine of purgatorial purification first began to he approached in the third century by Clement of Alexandria, who speaks of a spiritual fire in this world; and was followed by Origen, who held that this purifying fire continues beyond the grave. There were two the ones in the early church, which although they differed from each other, were not necessarily exclusive, and may have been held together in many cases. (1) There was the judgment day purgatory which was based upon the words of St. Paul taken literally, that the "fire shall try every man's work"; and that even those who had built with wood, hay and stubble, would be saved if they had built upon the right foundation saved . as by fire (I Cor. 3:11-15). Both Hilary and Ambrose speak of the severity of the judgment day purification. Origen often speaks of judgment day fire through which even St. Peter and St. Paul must pass, though they shall hear the words, "When thou passest through the fire, the flame shall not harm thee." Basil says that baptism may he understood in three senses - in the one of regeneration by the. Holy .Spirit; in another, of the punishment of sin in the present life; and in a third, of "the trial of judgment by fire." Both Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory Nazianzen mention the fire of the judgment This judgment day purgation differs widely from the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory. (2) There was the doctrine of a purification in the intermediate state, or a temporary punishment between death and the resurrection. This was held chiefly by the western divines, who followed Augustine and developed the Roman Catholic doctrine as it is now understood. Augustine taught with respect to purgatory, first, that the souls of a certain class of men who are ultimately saved, suffer alter death; and second, that they are aided through the Eucharist, and the alms and prayers of the faithful. Cesarius of Aries (543) further developed the idea of purgatory by making a distinction between mortal crimes .and lesser sins, holding that the latter might be expiated by good works in this life, or the cleansing fire in the life to come.

Gregory the Great (604) gathered together the vague and conflicting views of purgatory, and brought the doctrine into such shape that it became effective both for discipline and for income. For this reason he is commonly known as "the inventor of purgatory." "It is believed," he says, "that there is, for some light faults, a purgatorial fire before the judgment." However, the idea must have been vaguely entertained as early as the time of Perpetua, or even Augustine tacitly admitted the truth of her vision. From the eighth century on through the Middle Ages, the doctrine of purgatory took fast had upon the popular mind, and was one of the most prominent topics of public conversation. Both scholastics and mystics were explicit and vivid in their descriptions of purgatory, and the belief was supported by a multitude of dreams and visions. Among these were the visions of Fursey and Drycthelm mentioned by Bede (736). Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventura, Garson and other great men of the Middle Ages held that the fires of purgatory were material, although Aquinas admitted the difficulty of understanding how literal fire could infllct pain on disembodied spirits. He held, also, that only those would go to purgatory who required it, but the saints would go at once to heaven, and the wicked to perdition.

The Greek Church never fully accepted the views of purgatory held in the west, and at the Council of Florence (1439) it was one of the irreconcilable differences between them. The mystic Weasel (1489) allegorized the popular language as "a spiritual fire of love, which purifies the soul of its remaining dross, and consists in the longing alter union with God." John Tauler rejected the popular trifling with the doctrine, and maintained that "to behold the glory of God is Paradise." The Cathari, Waldenses and Wycliffe (1384) rejected the doctrine. The Reformers unanimously denounced the doctrine in unmeasured terms. The Council of Trent on the other hand, pronounced an anathema against all those who reject the doctrine.

II. Objections to the Doctrine of Purgatory. As indicated, the Reformers rejected the whole purgatorial theory as out of harmony with the teachings of the Scriptures, and the fundamental doctrines of grace. Excellent treatises on this subject may be found in the writings of the Reformed theologians, The following is Dr. Charles Hodge's summary of his own teaching on the subject He says: (1) That it is destitute of scriptural support. (2) That it is opposed to many of the most clearly revealed and most important doctrines of the Bible. (3) That the abuses to which it has always led and which are its inevitable consequences, prove that the doctrine cannot be of God. (4) That the power to forgive sin, in the sense claimed by the Romanists, and which is taken for granted in their doctrine of purgatory, finds no support in the words of Christ, as recorded in John 20:23 and Matt 16:19, which are relied on for that purpose. (5) The fifth argument against the doctrine is derived from its history, which proves it to have had a pagan origin, and to have been developed by slow degrees into the form in which it is now held by the Church of Rome (Cf. Hodge, Systematic Theology, III, p. 766).]