"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy bath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead."—1 PETER 1. 3.
"If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God."
"He preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection. When they heard of the resurrection from the dead, some mocked."—Acts 17. 18, 32.
"Of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question." —Acts 23.6.
"Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?” Acts 26.8.
"If the dead rise not, let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." —1 Cor. 15. 32.
Bristol:
Printed And Published For The Author, By J. Chilcott, Wine Street.
1835
IF it is never unseasonable to examine our first principles; peculiarly necessary it is, when attacked by the cavils of unbelievers, to assure ourselves, that our replies are duly based on that authoritative Revelation, in which alone we have unmixed heavenly truth. And whatever may be our prejudices, we must needs feel, if upright at heart, that it is good to have our most deep-rooted notions torn up and scattered to the winds, if hereby the unchanging character and counsels of God may be more fully communicated.to us. Aware, as I am, that the sentiments herein contained are opposed to those of many whom I love and unfeignedly respect; the word of God speaks too plainly to me, and the truth involved is too important, to allow me to wish to conceal my convictions. Much rather would I, with as much importunity as my brethren's love will permit, urge them to examine the word of Christ, as spoken by himself or by his Holy Apostles, and see whether these things be not so. Doubtless the Christian's life is hid with Christ in God, whether he do or do not rightly conceive of the nature of that life, and of the great things which God has promised to them that love him. But it is no slight evil to bring in false expositions of heavenly truth, perplexing believers and hardening unbelievers. If in any matter I am guilty of this, I desire to avow and retract it as soon as it may be shown me. Yet neither should I dare to commit these pages to the press, without the testimony of my conscience that I abhor the darkness of man's pride, and love that light which by God's tender mercy has visited us: which light of truth I desire here to exhibit, according as I have been enabled to apprehend, that which was revealed to the Apostles and Prophets by the Spirit. To which feeble attempt may he give his blessing, to his own glory by Jesus Christ.
The Scriptural Hope of Eternal Life
Our hope is in Resurrection alone
On the state of the dead, or Hades
Scripture evidence concerning the soul's immortality
Results of that doctrine
Objections considered
Objections from philosophy
Ancient and Modern Notions—of the Jews
Ancient and Modern Notions—of the Greek Philosophers
Ancient and Modern Notions—of the early Christian Fathers
Ancient and Modern Notions—of the Papists
THE vanity and unsatisfactory nature of this passing life is so recognized by men of reflection, even without the testimony of revelation, that all will be ready to admit, that the doctrine of a future state of existence is of most vital importance. To assure us beyond all doubt that there is such a state, is among the very first objects of our holy religion. We are not taught that religion is a system for improving the present world; for if that were its direct object, a most signal failure is predicted. "Think ye, that I am come to send peace upon earth? I tell you nay; but a sword." It is no mere improvement of the present state that the all-wise Jehovah designs, but a complete rebuilding of the whole from the foundation. Behold! I make all things new.
Such being the all-absorbing predominance given to the doctrine of a future life, nothing is more important, than that our hope concerning it be rested on a distinct, on the true, basis. We must needs expect explicit information on this subject, and not to be left to pick up any how an answer to the unbeliever's question, What ground have you for expecting a life after death? Nor are we disappointed; nor need any complain, that a subject so fundamental does not hold a most prominent place in the sacred volume. Accordingly, the passages are so numerous in which our hope is fully declared, as to make selection the chief difficulty. But let us first listen to the apostle Paul.
Acts 23. 6. "Brethren, I am a pharisee, the son of a pharisee: of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question." Again, 24. 14, 15. "This I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call a sect, so worship I the God of my fathers; and have hope towards God, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and of the unjust 21. Let them say if they have found any evil doing in me, except it be for this one voice, that I cried, Touching the resurrection of the dead I am called in question by you this day." Again, 26. 6. "And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers; unto which our twelve tribes, instantly serving God, day and night, hope to come. Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?"
We here find the Apostle repeatedly and distinctly declare, that it was on the ground of his having hope of resurrection that he was accused by his enemies. This would have been a simple falsehood, an artifice to mislead his judges, (as indeed some have not shrunk to call it) had it not been true, that the long and short of the gospel which Paul preached, is resurrection of believers by the resurrection of Jesus.
But to prevent all doubt on the subject, he writes to the Corinthians in the following terms: 1 Cor. 15. 16-18. " If the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised; and if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished." Again, verse 32: "If the dead rise not, let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." It would seem impossible to find language more emphatic, to show the apostle's contempt for the happiness which some were expecting in a future state, separate from resurrection of the dead: to show, I say, that resurrection was to him no subsidiary matter, no mere additional comfort, but the turning point of all his hopes. And what gives such precision to his meaning, is this; that he is not arguing with those who denied all future existence. This is manifest by his thus confuting them; "then they who are fallen asleep in Christ are perished;" which conclusion he must suppose them unwilling to allow; for if they could reply, "True, that is just what we are maintaining;" all his refutation of them falls to the ground. It is then manifest in the argument itself, that these Corinthians must have been expecting happiness in a disembodied state; and in fact we might well infer, from their profession of Christianity, that they could not mean to avow that there is no life to come. But this, the apostle tells them plainly, would be a certain consequence of their doctrine; and he, for his part, would not give up earthly enjoyments for anything that they could promise him, apart from the resurrection of the dead.
But to return to the former quotations. It may naturally be asked, How is resurrection the promise of God to the fathers? or when did he promise it? The question is natural in those who think there is some life to come apart from resurrection; it is quite needless when we see the two things identified. However, for a complete reply, let us appeal to our Lord's argument against the Sadducees. "Now that the dead are raised," says he, Luke 20. 37, " even Moses showed at the bush."
Moses, he says, showed of resurrection: this needs to be well noted. Moses called Jehovah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and in so doing, foretold of a resurrection; because God is the God of the living, and all live unto him. Now it is not too much to say, that this is quite unmeaning, if there be any life after this life, save by means of resurrection. That be, who is God of the living, is Abraham's God, no doubt was meant to imply, that Abraham must live eternally with and by that God whose he is. But nothing is herein implied about resurrection, unless it be considered as a perfect axiom, (not needing to be stated, but unceremoniously assumed,) that there is no such thing to man as disembodied existence: and that a resurrection is therefore obviously essential, in order to verify to Abraham God's faithfulness, and bring him to the actual enjoyment of eternal life.
In chapter 11 of the epistle to the Hebrews the same idea is instructively set forth; verse 9, " By faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked for a city which bath foundations; whose builder and maker is God." 16, " But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He hath prepared for them a city." I desire not at present to implicate the question, whether that land of Canaan on which Abraham trod, is the very same as he shall hereafter dwell in, when it is to be made the residence of the Lord from heaven, and the seat of New Jerusalem. So much at any rate is plain, that the old fathers, out of the promise of the land of Canaan, learned to expect to be raised from the dead, for the enjoyment of a heavenly inheritance. But I will venture to say, that one, who believes in a state of disembodied consciousness, might read ten thousand times the declaration, that the God of the living is Abraham's God; and all the other promises to Abraham likewise; and the idea of the resurrection would never cross his mind as herein contained: and to such a one our Lord's argument to the Sadducees will seem unmeaning and inconclusive; though reverence cause him to quash the thought within his breast.
But to pass on to a much later period than Moses, we find in the prophet Ezekiel a most striking vision declarative of the resurrection of the dead. I know that there is a general conspiracy among Christians to explain this away; because we have been taught so to undervalue the resurrection, as that many will call it a " lowering" of the text to see no more in it than this. However, let the prophet speak for himself:
Ezek. xxxvii. "The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the Spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones and behold, there were very many, and lo, they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knows! Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, so I prophesied as I was commanded, and the bones came together, bone to his bone. And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above; but there was no breath in them. Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the breath; so I prophesied, as
he commanded me; and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood up on their feet, an exceeding great army."
Such is the vision: and how is it generally interpreted? It is said to represent sinners, who from being dead in trespasses and sins, are quickened to believe the gospel of Jesus: and Ephes. 1, 2, is alleged as parallel to it. But let us hear the interpretation given to the prophet.
Ver. 12-14 " Therefore prophesy, and say unto them, Behold, 0 my people, I will open your graves, and will cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves, and shall put my Spirit [breath] in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land." Here we see the promise made to Abraham again solemnly ratified. The heavenly possession of Canaan is promised to God's true Israel, just at the time when they are being scattered among the heathen: but that is here specified with most striking energy, which Abraham and Moses of themselves understood to be contained in the promise; viz.— that it is by a resurrection from the dead, that Israel is to be made possessor of his own land. And here is the fulness of the promise made by God to the fathers.
Marvellous indeed it seems, that any can fancy this to be a low interpretation of the text, or can ask, Does it mean no more than this? or can think it an unspiritual apprehension. For which is better;—to be born anew of the Spirit, and have to walk by faith, in the midst of sin and sorrow, in a body of death,—or to arise from the dead with a spiritual body, made after the glorious image of Christ? (1 Cor. 15. 44, 49.) Surely the former is but an earnest and earthly foretaste of that heavenly state, into which the latter actually brings us. It is then a pure misconception, to speak as though the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is a less spiritual or less happy view, than that of the present new birth of the soul by believing. To exalt present regeneration above future resurrection is to value the pledge more than the deposit. To explain away the scriptures, which speak of the resurrection, fancying thus to establish the spirit by removing the letter, is like destroying the reality of bliss, to augment the shadow: for all that we can have now is but the shadow of that, which is to be received at the appearing of Jesus Christ. And, while I admit Eph. 2. 1, to be parallel to Ezek. 37 it is because I am persuaded that each passage has been most unduly forced away from its natural and true meaning. The apostle Paul writes, Eph. 2. 1-6, "You, when ye were dead in trespasses and sins, God who is rich in mercy, I say, when we were dead in sins, God made us alive together with Christ: (by grace ye have been saved:) and raised us up with him, and seated us together in the upper heavens in Christ Jesus." This splendid passage is apt to be so misconceived, as that it evaporates into mysticism. The act of grace, which he is describing, took place once for all in Christ's resurrection and ascension. It is not the quickening of individuals into faith, but the bringing life and immortality to the whole church, when he raised Christ the first-fruits from the dead, and seated him, as our forerunner, within the veil. As he is our representative there, and in his life we live, and of his glory shall partake, so the apostle declares, that God made us alive together with Christ, and raised us to glory together with him. As says also Peter, God " hath begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ;" (1 Pet. 1. 3:) on which text I have more than once heard persons, accurately versed in the letter of scripture, confess that they cannot find out what the resurrection of Christ has to do with regeneration: naturally, while they misconceive the regeneration intended.
Conformably to this, we find this one comfort held out to the church of Christ through the whole New Testament; —that they shall be raised when he shall return in glory. "We ourselves," says Paul, Rom. 8 23, " who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Paul did not think the present possession of the Spirit the substance or full gift, and the resurrection of the body the shadow or earnest; but the reverse. He was not longing to be disembodied, but to have his body redeemed. So in 1 Cor. 15. 54, " When this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." He had, therefore, no notion of glory and triumph prior to resurrection. Again, when he was in daily danger of death from the malice of his enemies, he comforted himself by thinking of resurrection; (2 Cor. 1. 9:) " We had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God that raises the dead." Again, 4. 11-14, "We which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus, shall raise up us also by Jesus." (See also Rom. 8. 10, 11.)
He continues the same strain in the ten first verses of the following chapter (2 Cor. 5.); and they are too important to pass over slightly, the more particularly as the eighth verse is popularly quoted in such a sense, as to overthrow his whole argument. Detached from the context, it stands thus; "Absent from the body and present with the Lord;" that is, (it is argued,) we shall be with the Lord in a disembodied state. But let us examine the passage, verse by verse.
"Our light affliction," says he, "works for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look at things unseen and eternal. For we know that if our earthly tent-house be dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." He most obviously means our spiritual body (1 Cor. 15. 44); for the earthly tent-house is the present body, and what else can the new house or new garment mean, but the new body? If any say that immortality is the garment intended, it recurs, that not till the resurrection are we to be thus clothed. (I Cor. 15. 53, 54.) It cannot be any happiness of the disembodied spirit, for he proceeds thus; "For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed but clothed upon, that mortality may be swallowed up of life." Here we have another parallel to 1 Cor. 15. 54. What he there calls, Death swallowed up in victory, he here calls, Mortality swallowed up of life; and the period of this is, beyond all contradiction, at the resurrection of the just.
We see, then, how exceedingly distinct he is in telling us, that it is not a disembodied state that he wants, but he groans in earnest desire for the redemption of the body. He proceeds, verse 5;—"Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God; who hath also given to us the earnest of his Spirit." —Earnest, we may ask, to assure us of what? Reply: to assure us of the redemption of our body.—See Eph. 1. 14; 4. 30.—Rom. 8. 10, 11, 23.-1 Cor. 6. 13, 14, 19. It is nowhere said, that the Spirit is the earnest of our receiving disembodied bliss; but the earnest of being raised up, even as Jesus was raised "in accordance with the Holy Spirit" that dwelt in him. (Rom. 1. 4.) For the Spirit makes man partaker of the divine nature, (2 Pet. 1. 4,) which is eternal life; (1 Tim. 6. 16;) and as all who live, live to God, (Rom. 6. 10, 11,) therefore none such can be holden of death any more than was Jesus, but must needs rise again. (Luke 20. 37, 38.) Continuing then our comment;—The apostle proceeds, verse 6, 7. " Therefore," having the Spirit as an earnest of resurrection, " we are always confident, knowing that whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord: for we walk by faith, not by sight." Since it is not true, that in the spiritual body we are absent from the Lord, be clearly means this mortal body when he says the body. The same thing is apparent in verse 10, where he represents all as rising from the dead, to give account of the thinks done in the body, viz. in this present body. While in this body, we are absent from the Lord, because, (says he) we cannot yet live by sight, but are forced to put up with faith, a poor weak substitute. But in the new body, sense will supplant faith; our "eyes shall see the king in his beauty." This was the sight which Paul, as Job, longed for; and, in the happy expectation of it, he proceeds; "Therefore we are confident, I say, and are willing [well pleased] rather to be absent from the body"—viz. from this mortal body,—"and to be present with the Lord"—viz. when we stand before his judgment-seat, as be proceeds to tell us in the two next verses: and this is of course at the resurrection.
I find it difficult to speak with proper gentleness and respect towards those, who so cling to the hope of disembodied bliss, that, not satisfied with maintaining that a disembodied spirit walks by sight and not by faith, and is present with the Lord, they allege also, that every soul is separately summoned to Christ's judgment-seat on the moment of death, to receive his award. Let me with meekness say, such a view implies principles of interpretation, which turn the words of Christ and his Apostles into enigmas; and leave men at liberty to invent doctrines for themselves.
Indeed, to one tolerably read in the scriptures, it is so notorious, that the day of Christ's second coming is the day of judgment, both of the living and also of the dead, that it is childish to contest it. 2 Tim. 4. 1.-1 Cor. 4. 5, etc. But I will add, the scriptures also witness that there is no sight of Christ, or presence with him, till his return in glory.
1 John 3. 2. " When Christ shall be manifested, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." Could we see him earlier, we must
become like him earlier; 1. e. we should have bodies like his, which we shall not.—Phil. 3. 20, 21. In fact, it sounds like a contradiction to say, we shall see Christ before his manifestation. At present he is seen of angels, (1 Tim. 3. 16,) but of none else. But it is witnessed, (Col. 3. 4,) "when Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall we also be manifested with him in glory." 2 Cor. 4. 14, " He that raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you." Hence we shall not be presented to Christ before the resurrection. Ps. 17. 15. "As for me, I shall behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness."
To the same effect is Job's hope—19. 25, 26. I shall presently advert to a passage in 1 Thess. 4.
Returning to 2 Cor. 5 I must remark, that the 7th verse being in the opinion of most who hold a disembodied happiness, the most powerful text on their side of the argument, it is a striking fact, that the meaning should be the direct reverse of that which they, after isolating it from its context, assign to it: while in the very passage we find, that Paul not only does not retract his former assertion, that if there be no resurrection, we had better enjoy ourselves in this world as best we may; but distinctly repeats that be does not wish to be unclothed, but to be clothed upon, with the immortal body which he shall receive on that glorious day, when mortality shall be swallowed up of life.
Moreover, the passage which we have been just discussing, acts as a commentary on another, to which it is perfectly parallel; Phil. 1. 23. "I have a desire to depart and be with Christ; which is far better." To one with whom, as with Paul, it was an axiom, that there was "no knowledge in the grave whither he was going," (Eccles. 9. 10,) and that falling asleep in Jesus, he would instantaneously (as it were) wake at the day of judgment, such language was as natural, as it is (of course) unnatural to those who believe in the consciousness of disembodied souls. The complaint, therefore, on their part, that this interpretation is violent, is an assumption of the thing to be proved. If the doctrine, which I am advocating, was with Paul habitually realized as true, then are his expressions perfectly unconstrained. And that he did use like, or even (apparently) stronger expressions, without meaning to imply that he desired to be unclothed, is manifest in 2 Cor. 5. 8, on which I have been commenting.—If it be said, that Paul would have been willing to remain and serve the church, rather than sleep idly in the grave, the reply is obvious: he tells us that he was thus willing for their sakes.
Accordingly, much as he longed and prayed for the coming of the Lord in glory, we have not a hint, that he either prayed for his own death, or approved of others praying to die; an event which brings no particular glory to Christ nor benefit to the church, but mere relief from toil and sorrow to the individual. Thus all is consistent.
Another important passage must be commented on; in which the same apostle definitely sets himself to comfort those who are mourning for deceased friends. It is well to remember, how persons like to be addressed on this 'subject. Tell a weeping widow that her deceased partner shall be raised at the coming of Christ from heaven, and that then she shall join him, and so shall they ever be with the Lord: this will ordinarily dissatisfy and even pain her. She will reply, "Cold comfort indeed that would be! oh no! all my peace rises out of the belief that he is now, now already, with the Lord." This is natural, assuredly; we witness it continually. But it was equally natural in Paul's day as now. If now this be felt as cold comfort, it would be cold comfort then. If now those who soothe the mourner feel it so important to dwell on the topic that the departed saint is already in glory, it must have been a topic equally important with Paul for the same end. Let us then attentively review his mode of address. 1 Thess. 4. 13-18.
"I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we, which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we, which are alive and remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words."
Is it possible, that any should fail to be struck at the immense force of the negative argument here? That very topic to which we cling as all important, —which is alleged by mourners to be essential to their peace,—this he entirely omits. Language such as this could not have been used, I boldly say, never was used, (except by bare imitation) by any person who believed the souls of the departed to be with Christ and in glory. But it is more than a negative argument. It is a positive statement of an opposite truth. For, first, it distinctly lets us know, that the deceased are not to be with the Lord until his descent from heaven and their resurrection. The words are explicit: " So shall we ever be with the Lord." Some indeed try to interpret the apostle as though he had said: that then, and not till then, will the body be with the Lord; but that the soul was previously with him, notwithstanding. Yet if my soul be with the Lord, and I thus enjoy his presence, what comfort have I, from being told about my body? Paul is thus made to omit what is essential, and dwell on the unessential. Bodily presence is important only as personal presence depends upon it; and if it do not, if the body be not the person, then let it lie in the grave, or let it mount into the sky, and the person is in neither case, more or less present with the Lord. But such a gloss is, in fact, as far from the statement of the text, as from common sense; for we do not read: "So shall our bodies be ever present with the Lord;" but, "so shall we." Indeed, to use these two expressions as identical, would of itself be a declaration, that personal presence and bodily presence are one and the same thing. Else, it is as though, after enjoying for years the honor of the king's society, we were to send for some old vestments, never yet worn before him, and after putting them on, were to congratulate one another that now at length, we are admitted into his presence.
Every way, therefore, the truth is plain in the text, that there is no personal presence of the believer with Christ, until the redemption of his body. But, secondly, it must likewise be remarked, that the apostle uses a phrase exceedingly offensive to modern ears. He speaks of the deceased, as those who are asleep; a term indeed common in the New Testament. Contrariwise, it is among us popular to say, "a dear friend now in glory," or "now with Jesus," " gone to heaven," or more papist yet, "the sainted Brainerd:" while words, which indicate that they are asleep, and not active and conscious, are sedulously avoided. Yet the expression of the soul being "in heaven," and "in glory," is not to be found at all in the scripture. So untenable on all sides is this much-cherished doctrine.
We may fairly ask its supporters, whether they conceive Lazarus and Dorcas to have been brought back from the abodes of bliss and substantial reality, to sojourn anew in this world of vanity and vexation of spirit? To raise them into life were then, in truth, rather to be called a death; it were a sort of a cruelty to them. To say they did enjoy some days or hours of celestial glory, but on returning to their bodies forgot it all, would be a most dangerous approach to denying the conscious identity of the mortal man and the celestial spirit. Contrariwise, to allege, that they were exceptions, and that their souls did not go to heaven, as other men's, because they were about to be raised; seems equivalent to denying that their death was real. And when Lazarus's body must have already stunk, what is to be done with the soul, if it is not allowed to fare as the souls of other men? That there is, in short, but one scriptural hope, one source of joy and comfort, many who have written on prophecy have abundantly shown; the hope of resurrection at the last day, four times promised solemnly by our Lord Jesus in one discourse. (John 6.) It is not so necessary, therefore, to follow this, and point out how the mind of the church is constantly directed to the day of his coming, as their desire and delight. Various texts to this effect have indeed already been cited.
But I shall proceed to multiply yet further the direct proof, by positive and unambiguous declarations of scripture, that the dead are utterly insensible: and shall afterwards show, the total want of support for the specious doctrine of the soul's immortality; the mischief of which I shall then endeavor to set forth.
It may be needful to inform some readers that the word rendered hell in the authorized version of the New Testament, has two very distinct meanings. This is made manifest to the unlearned by Rev. 20. 13, 14. "Death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them,....and death and hell were cast into the lake of fire." The popular sense of the word hell is identical with the lake of fire; and twelve times in the New Testament it has been employed where the Greek has Gehenna, which is meant for the Hebrew gehennem, or valley of Hinnom. This is manifestly the place of fiery destruction to the wicked, called also Tophet: concerning which Jer. 7.31-33. Jer. 19. Isai. 30. 33. Isai. 66.15, 16, 24, may be consulted.* Contrariwise in the Old Testament, hell uniformly is the Hebrew sheol, the Greek hades; which words are often rendered the grave. Yet it has been pointed out by many, that it cannot always mean the grave in a physical sense, 1. e. a hole in the earth some few feet deep; but it is to be at any rate taken in a moral sense, as indicating the state of the dead. The phraseology, however, of the sacred writers is such as often to intimate that this hell or Sheol is, first, a pit as fathomless in depth, as heaven is in height; secondly, that not the body, but the soul goes thither; thirdly, that therein all souls meet together; fourthly, that souls came up from thence originally; fifthly, that it is a place of darkness, forgetfulness, and utter insensibility.
* See also Parkhurst's Greek Lexicon on the words Geenna and Moloch.
Moreover they always set it forth as being odious and terrible, and as the great enemy of man.
On this subject let the following texts be considered:
First, Hades is immeasurably deep, as heaven is high.
Job 11. 8. It is high as heaven, and deeper than hell.
Ps. 139. 8. If I climb up into heaven, thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, thou art there also.
Isai. 14. 13-15. Thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven;....above the heights of the clouds;....yet shalt thou be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.
Amos 9. 2. Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down.
So Deut. 32. 22. Isai. 47. 9.
Secondly, That not the body, but the soul is in many places said to go to hell, or hades. In fact, the word soul frequently means the person, and we talk of persons dying, not of bodies dying. That the word soul may indeed indicate a body, even a dead body, is certain. [See Numb. 9.6, 6.6.] Nevertheless, let the following passages be compared:
Ps. 16. 10. Acts 2. 31. The soul of Jesus was not left in hell. Rom. 10. 7. Who shall go down into the bottomless pit, to bring up Christ from the dead? Matt. 12.40. So shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
See also Ps. 63.9, 71.20. His body was placed in a tomb hewn in the rock, which would hardly be called the heart of the earth. It may be objected, that Jonas, when in the fish, declared he was in the belly of hell. (2.2.) This is true; yet the prophet manifestly is speaking by anticipation, as though that had already happened, which seemed inevitable; viz. death. For he proceeds thus, verse 6: "I went down to the bottoms of the mountains: the earth with her bars was about me forever." That is, when he found himself in so strange a place as the fish's belly, he could not believe that he was a living man. He thought he was in hades, of which he had heard talk, and was under the bottoms of the mountains; and thus be 'cried to the Lord (as it were) from the belly of hell. And this strengthens the matter; for Jonah could not have supposed, that the body of a dead man went down under the bottoms of the mountains.
Thirdly, All souls meet in hell.
Isai. 14. 9,10. "Hell from beneath is moved for thee [Oh king of Babylon] to meet thee at thy coming. It stirreth up the dead for thee, even all the chief ones of the earth. It hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. All they shall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? art thou become like unto us?"
[This is manifestly a figurative rencontre of their souls; but concerning their bodies, he says, that the others are embalmed and enthroned in royal tombs, while the king of Babylon is cast out unburied; vv. 18-20.]
2 Sam. 12. 23. I shall go to him, but he shall not return unto me.
Gen. 25. 8. Abraham was gathered unto his people.
1 Kings 2. 10. David slept with his fathers.
Eccles. 6. 6. Do not all go to one place? Fourthly, Souls come up from hell, whither they go.
Ps. 139.16. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and fashioned curiously in the lower parts of the earth.
Job 1.21. Naked came I forth from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.
Isai. 51. 2. Look unto the hole of the pit whence ye were dug; look unto Abraham your father and unto Sarah that bare you.
The tendency of poetical language to confound the womb with hades will be remarked. Perhaps to the same effect is John 8. 23: "Ye are from beneath, I am from above; ye are of this world, I am not of this world." That is: My soul did not come up out of the pit, but I was in heaven before my birth.
Fifthly, Hell or hades is a place of silence and insensibility where none can praise God.
Ps. 6. 5. In death there is no remembrance of thee; in the grave [hades] who shall give thee thanks?
Ps. 31. 17. Let the wicked be silent in the grave.
Isai. 38. 10, 11, 18, 19. I said: I shall go to the gates of hades;....I shall not see the Lord; the Lord in the land of the living Hades cannot praise thee: death cannot celebrate thee: they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth. The living, the living, he shall praise thee: as I do this day. Alluding to the same is Ps. 94. 17.
Lastly, This hades or sheol into which even the righteous enter, is described as hateful to nature, as man's great enemy, that from which Christ came to deliver us, that at which he shuddered himself Ps. 18. 4, 5. The sorrows of hades [i.e. deadly sorrows].
So, pains of hades.—Ps. 116. 3.
Ps. 16. 10. My flesh shall rest in hope, for thou wilt not leave my soul in hades. See also 88. 11, 12.—49. 15. God shall redeem my soul from the power of hades.—86. 18. Thou bast delivered my soul from the lowest hades. (Frequent.)
Hosea 13. 14. I will ransom them from the power of hades, I will redeem them from death; 0 death, I will be thy plagues; 0 hades, I will be thy destruction.
1 Cor. 15. 54, 55. When this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: death is swallowed up in victory. Oh death, where is thy sting? Oh hades, where is thy victory?
Matt. 16. 18. On this rock will I build my church; and the gates of hades shall not prevail against it. [Compare Isai. 38. 10, quoted above.]
Rev. 20. 14. Death and hades were cast into the lake of fire.
Indeed the Psalms abound with expressions testifying Christ's horror at descending into the pit, into the place of darkness and the deep. It were tedious to quote all. At present one remark may be requisite, on the propriety of our identifying the two words, pit and hell (hades). The diligent . reader of Scripture will find abundant proof of this, and to refer to Ezek. 31. 14, 16, 17, 32. 18-30, might be sufficient; remarking by the way, how hades and the pit are put in contrast to the land of the living; as by Hezekiah. But in the matter of our Lord Jesus himself, it is well to pause on those two expressions: "His soul was not left in hades:" and, "Who shall descend into the bottomless pit, I mean, to bring up Christ from the dead?" Rom. 10. 7. From which it is manifest, that that same hades, into which (be it state or place) the souls of other men go, received also that of the divine sin-offering. And the strenuous maintenance of this point seems to have been in early days regarded as essential to the declaration of his real death; on which account the article, he descended into hell, was so prominent in the old creeds.
So much being manifest in the Scripture, the question whether hades be a state or a place, becomes of no moment to religion, though of importance to philosophy. If the soul, by a real locomotion, go after death into a deep pit under the bottoms of the mountains, and there remains in silence, inaction, and insensibility, sleeping until the day when the gates of hades shall be burst; then, in every practical view of the subject, we must abide by the very letter of Solomon's statement, that as the beast dies, so dies also the man. For my own part, I see no need to press the texts which speak about hades, so as to make me suppose this locomotion of a soul, as though it could sleep better in one place than another. Indeed we seem forced too far, if we press the form of expression on these points-- for we must believe that Christ will lay plagues on the aforesaid deep pit, and will cast the pit into the lake of fire. Moreover, in that land of darkness and forgetfulness, where none can worship God, we are then nevertheless to believe, that the souls of dead kings rose from their thrones, to welcome with derision the king of Babylon's soul sent down to keep them company. Lastly, it will also need to be believed that the soul was in that same pit before birth. And this settles the whole practical question: for it appears, that the soul after death returns to the same state as it was in before birth—to distinguish which from non-existence is no concern of religion. No doubt, the difference is important to philosophy. But for all purposes of practical religion, a sleeping soul is a nonentity.
There are some passages of Ecclesiastes, which have not been yet insisted on, and which yet ought not to be omitted. They are so strong, that some have wished to think them ironical: but the liberal and obvious sense is alone in harmony with the book and with the argument. 9. 4, 5.—" To him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything; neither have they any more a reward, for their memory is forgotten." Of course we must modify the phrase, " they have no more a reward," by the following clause; which shows it to mean that they have no longer anything to hope for from men. But this leaves quite unimpaired the strength of the assertion that the dead know not anything: which it is ridiculous to say means that " dead bodies know nothing;" for neither do living bodies know anything, on any view of the subject, save that of materialism. The same evasion is with equal vanity attempted on those irrefragable texts already quoted, from Ps. 6. and from Isai. 38. Again, in Eccles. 3. 18-21, we read:
"I said in my heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that they might clear God [Margin] and see that they themselves are beasts. For that which befalls the sons of men befalls beasts; even one thing befalls them: as the one dies, so dies the other; yea, they have all one BREATH; so that a man bath no pre-eminence above a beast; for all is vanity. All go into one place: all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who know-eth the SPIRIT of man that goes upward, and the SPIRIT of the beast that goes downward to the earth?"
This striking passage suggests various remarks: First, The translators have turned the Hebrew word as was natural to their own views. The first time it occurred, they rendered it breath; because they did not like the sound that man and beast have one spirit. Afterward they would not say "the breath of man that goes upward," because it would not convey the idea of disembodied personality.
Secondly, No one can read the whole extract, without being struck by the apparent inconsistency of the last verse with what precedes. As the text stands, this last verse conveys the idea, however obscurely, that there is (after all) some pre-eminence of men's breath or spirit over that of a beast, in the matter of death; and that they do not go to the same place; for one goes upward and the other downward. Those whose sole object is to get rid of the whole passage, will seek to make one part contradict the other, and will so leave it. But one who desires to know the truth, will rather inquire, what is the instruction that God intended us herein? for ther6 must needs be some way of reconciling and explaining the whole.
Thirdly, It seems impossible to suppose the earlier part was a mere passing thought of the preacher's, (like Asaph's envy at the wicked,) which he afterwards retracted; for the argument is formed for continuity; and the burden of the whole book is agreeable to the earlier part of the extract: viz. to show the vanity of man, and of man's pursuits; and that their common end is death. Neither does verse 21. " Who knows," open with any indication that he is retracting the sentiment just uttered: moreover verse 22. " Wherefore I perceive" is drawn from the tenor of vv. 18-20.
Fourthly, If the preacher had meant to tell us, that man's spirit after death survives in distinct personality, and a beast's spirit does not survive; he would hardly have adopted the phrase Who knows? In fact it seems scarcely to give sense; for what means: For who knows the spirit of a beast g It is little to his purpose to insist on the mysterious nature of a beast's spirit: which appears the only sense to be extracted from the words, Much less is his mode of contrast adapted to convey the above sentiment: for even had he plainly told us that man's spirit goes upward, and the beast's spirit goes downward, even this would have given us to suppose that both or either retained personality after separation from the body. He does not contrast them in this respect, but solely as to the locality assigned them.
Fifthly, It is directly opposed to the numerous passages on the subject of hades, to imagine that the soul of man goes upward. That the soul, if it undergo any locomotion in separate existences goes to hades, is beyond all controversy; and that hades, if it be a place, is under the bottoms of the mountains, is equally clear. Consult the words of Samuel's ghost, 1 Sam. 28. 13, 15. It is then every way incredible, that our translators can have caught the royal preacher's argument.
Sixthly, On the whole, I feel convinced that the following version contains the spirit of the passage:
"Who knoweth that the breath of man goes upward, and that the breath of the beast goes downward to the earth?" That is: Some philosophers pretend this; but which of them can prove it So much I had written, before referring to the version of the LXX: wherein we find, "And who hath seen the spirit of the sons of man, whether it goes upward; and the spirit of the beast, whether it goes downward?" The Greek translators merely followed a different punctuation of the Hebrew, and the sense which they assign, is just that which the argument requires.
But even taking our authorized version, the truth is most manifestly inculcated in it, that in death man has no pre-eminence, over a brute. (He would have every pre-eminence, if the soul were immortal.) Again, it gives us to apprehend, that, as regards the question of separate identity after death, the spirit of man and of beast are on the same footing: and the use made of this, is TO RUMBLE MAN'S PRIDE, who, when he surveys the power of his mind and the works of his genius, hates the thought that his end is that of a beast; hates, justly hates, that curse which Adam brought on his children; and vanity strives to prove, that death is no humiliation, but is a liberation from a gross material existence into a life of ethereal independence.
It is enough to allude to another verse of the same book (12. 7), "the spirit shall return unto God who gave it;" which is often quoted in proof of the soul's immortality. Had the translators put breath for spirit, as they did in 3. 19, no reader would have dreamed of such an idea, any more than in Ps. 146. 4, " His breath goes forth, he returns unto his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish."
And this brings us to inquire into the alleged proofs of the immortality of the soul, which is by many Christians regarded as the foundation of the faith. I have read an account of an excellent missionary in South Africa, who went to teach the Caffres, and fell in with some who were as yet ignorant (of course) of the unity of God, and, probably, did not believe either in a Creator, or in a Governor of the world; having at most, only a notion of superior beings or demons. The first lesson which the missionary gave, was, that the soul is immortal; this was the basis on which every thing else was to be built. I mention the tale by way of illustration, as I believe it to be a widely spread opinion: indeed the two terms, materialists and atheists, are popularly confounded. If now this doctrine bear the place which most modern nations assign to it, it is obvious that we shall find it brought out in all the prominence which it deserves, in the Holy Scriptures. It affects the meaning of those cardinal words, life and death. Hence, I repeat, if it be true, it must needs be very prominent in the inspired record. Now what is the fact? Are Christians really aware, that from one end to the other of the whole Scripture, it is no where stated that man has an immortal soul? We indeed are used to be addressed as immortal creatures, we are exhorted to remember our never dying souls, and our language distinguishes the spirit of man from the spirit of beast by a peculiar name, SOUL. But in the Holy Scriptures nothing of the kind appears. On turning to the word immortal in Cruden's Concordance, I find it to be contained in five passages only: viz. Rom. 2. 7. To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory, honor, and immortality, God shall give eternal life, [at the great day of judgment.]
1 Cor. 15. 53, 54. This mortal must put on immortality, [viz. at the resurrection.]
1 Tim. 1. 17. Now unto the king eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be glory for ever.
1 Tim. 6. 16. God only hath immortality, dwelling in light unapproachable, whom none of men hath seen, nor can see.
2 Tim. 1. 10. Christ hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
On turning to the word incorruptible, I find equally, that nothing is so termed, save God, the saint's inheritance, and their resurrection bodies.
The third term that strikes me, in addition to immortality and incorruption, as that by which the several writers might have described, had they meant to teach, the doctrine in question, is eternal life. But it is too notorious to need references, that this is the gift of Christ, not the inheritance that Adam left us.
[There are two other expressions which in this matter may also be considered. In Luke 20. 35, 36, our Lord, in replying to the Sadducees, declares: "They that are counted worthy to obtain that age, and the resurrection from the dead,....cannot die any more; for they are like angels; and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection." Here we find nothing about " never dying souls," but (agreeably to Rev. 20. 6. over such the second death hath no power) the state of immortality is entered upon by resurrection. Again, who has failed to remark the awful emphasis placed on that name, the living God? He who sits on the throne is styled, "He who lives for ever and ever." This is generally, and I think correctly, understood to be a sort of Greek translation of the name Jehovah. Any how, there is no attribute which God more awfully vindicates as His distinctive prerogative, than that of having life in Himself. And only one shares this prerogative with Him; for it is written, "As the Father bath life in Himself, so bath He given to the Son to have life in Himself," (John 5. 26). Nay, and Jehovah's most solemn oath runs thus: I LIVE, saith Jehovah: (Ezek. 18. 3.) and again: "I lift up my hand to heaven, and say: I LIVE FOR EVER." (Deut. 32. 40.) While, therefore, both the declarations and the phraseology of Scripture most emphatically and repeatedly testify to the immortality of God, and of those whose God he makes himself: I find absolutely nothing, either in the direct statements, or in the phraseology, calculated ,to teach that sinful man, whose connection with the eternal is broken, has in his natural state any immortality.]
If the above argument were merely negative, it would be of tremendous power: nay, ought to be decisive, considering the nature of the question.
But it is far more than negative. When it is declared that God only has immortality, and that He will impart this immortality as a reward to the righteous who wait for it in well-doing; I ask no more explicit denial of man's natural immortality. I feel it hard to over-rate the power of declarations so distinct. Paul, at Athens, preached Jesus and the resurrection; and when they heard of the resurrection from the dead, they mocked. Had he preached Jesus and the immortality of the soul, or (better still) the soul immortal without Jesus, as did the missionary to the Caffres; the whole school of Plato and Zeno would have opened their ears to him. But they sought in vain from Paul, that which they called wisdom, for he did but preach Christ crucified and risen; Christ the wisdom of God, and the power of God, bringing life and immortality to light through the gospel. In short, he was consistent with himself, believing that if the dead rise not, it became a rational man to get all the enjoyment he could out of this life, knowing that " a living dog is better than a dead lion."—The Scriptures do not teach, that God is holy and incorruptible, man unholy and incorruptible, but God is immortal; man, sinful man, is mortal, corruptible, vanishing before the moth, full of death, ready to go down into the pit.
This brings us to the argument on which many rest, as to the alleged immortality of Adam's soul implied in the words: "God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became A LIVING SOUL." No doubt these words sound imposing in the English language. But to analyze their meaning, let us make Paul the commentator. He speaks thus: 1 Cor. 15. 44, 45. " It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body • and so it is written, the first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit."
Here the opposition of spiritual body to quickening spirit (lifegiving spirit) is very manifest; but the reader is left in darkness, what natural body has to do with living soul, which to an English ear are so opposed. On turning to the original, the riddle is solved. The terms should be rendered, an animal body, and a living animal: and Moses, so far from inculcating an immortal soul in man, was taking special pains to tell us (only that the translators disapproved) that man, like beast, was a living animal. This is the more inexcusable, for the same term is four times applied to brutes in the first chapter of Genesis (1. 20, 21, 24, 30,) and once again in the second chapter (v. 19.) But in verse 7. they have wantonly deviated, though the LXX has been faithful to the Hebrew, and though it is destructive of St. Paul's argument in 1 Cor. 15.
As regards the Hebrew and Greek, it is notorious that they constantly mean a breathing creature, or life sustained by breath, being even applicable to the organized frame that once breathed, but is dead. In the book of Revelation we find souls twice ascribed to the fish: (8.9, 16.3.) Thus the vocabulary of the Scripture is perfectly consistent with its doctrine, that " man and beast have both one breath;" while our vocabulary, which gives men a SOUL, is equally consistent with our doctrine that man's natural spirit is immortal.
But farther, it is important to consider what it was that Adam forfeited by sin: what was that death which was first threatened, afterwards denounced upon him.—The word ran thus: "In the day that thou eats thereof thou shalt surely die." It is too usual to expound this death to mean three things,—a separation of soul and body—a moral taint passing on the soul, which, by defiling, separates it from God—and thirdly, eternal torment: all which, it is said, the one man Adam left as his inheritance to all his posterity. A sufficient refutation of this, is to protest that the text will not bear the meaning. Death is a popular word, well understood, needing no comment, and allowing of none. Those who set about " spiritualizing" it, in a perfectly plain passage, where the literal sense is adequate and consistent, do by their example justify others who insist on " spiritualizing," that is, denying, the whole tale of the fall of man. But if comment we must have, God himself gives us the comment: for after Adam's sin, he pronounced the following words:
"Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." Humbling words to the pride of man, dust thou art! and hard indeed is this found to believe. Men would flatter themselves that they are not dust, but are ethereal spirit. They spurn as most abominable what they call the " degrading" doctrine that man is but a living animal; organized dust; having (as Solomon says) no pre-eminence over a brute. But the word of God is explicit. It does not represent the dust as an accidental accompaniment of man's being; but as the very man. It says not, "An immortal spirit art thou, clothed in clay; and now, as thy punishment, thou shalt be unclothed of that encumbrance." But, "dust thou art; and unto dust thou shalt return;" and this returning to dust is obviously the fulfilment of the previous threat, " thou shalt surely die." But if the soul, and not the body, is the man, and the soul be immortal, then death is not death; then nothing dies: we do but cast off a garment.—Another inspired comment on the subject is in the fifth chapter of the Romans, where we read that death came into the world by Adam, and so passed by Adam upon all. By one man's offence death reigned; and that, even from Adam to Moses, when there was no law: manifesting that it is not our individual sins that cause us death, but the bare fact of Adam's sin, which brought in death upon all.
This makes it to my mind incontrovertible, that the death intended has nothing to do with future punishment. No man shall be condemned at the judgment day, no man shall miss of eternal life, because of Adam's iniquity; and if by death any one understand " everlasting torment," he makes the apostle Paul assert that all mankind shall suffer this. What God solemnly pronounces, He assuredly inflicts; and moreover, the apostle asserts that the "death" in question has actually reigned over all. Yet further: when we read that death was the punishment of sin, death the great enemy of man, (an idea repeated in numerous shapes,) death that which Christ came to destroy; when moreover, it appears that He himself " took part in flesh and blood, that by means of death He might destroy Him that had the power of death, even the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage,"—Heb. 2. 14: it is hence manifest, that the death which all men naturally fear, the death which Adam brought in, the death which Christ endured, the death which Christ destroys; are identical. If Adam brought eternal torment on all, then this is the fear which kept all men in bondage till Christ came and removed it; then also must it be asserted that Christ endured eternal torment, and that " He took part in flesh and blood," for this purpose: nay, and that He has destroyed eternal torment. It would almost seem, that there is no notion so wild, and self-destructive, no imputation on the divine character so revolting, which some will not adopt, if any how they can hereby get rid of the obvious sense of the Scripture, that through Adam's sin, man is become mortal, and (in spite of his intellectual and moral capacities) has in this respect no preeminence over a beast. "Man, being in honor, abides not," says the Psalmist; "he is like the beasts that perish." Ps. 49.12.
But two texts, it is to be confessed, are adduced which seem, at first sight, to teach the immortality of the soul, and are often so used as to produce a great impression. The former is: " "What is a, man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own SOUL; or what shall a man give in exchange for his SOUL?" (Matt. 16. 26.) Asserted, indeed, here it is not, that the soul is immortal; but it is on the emphatic sense of the word SOUL, that the effect of the passage depends. Yet this very word is used of fish in Rev.
viii. 9, and elsewhere means life. The mere possibility of such a sense would destroy all power in the passage to prove what it is used to prove. But here it is a matter of certainty, not of possibility; for the preceding verse runs thus: " Whosoever will save his LIFE shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his LIFE for my sake shall find it." The argument then is manifest. Nothing is so valuable as one's life, (Job 2. 4.;) for what gain is everything else, to one who loses his life? Strive therefore to save this; but know that the way of saving it (in the world to come) is to be willing to lose it for my sake (in this world.) And such is nearly the phrase in John 12. 25. Luke in reporting the same conversation, expresses it thus: (9. 25.) " What is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose or forfeit himself?" He clearly understood the word soul in the sense of self, a meaning common to it in all the Shemitic languages, and in many others beside.
The second passage is in Matt. 10. 28. " Fear not them which kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell [Tophet]." It is not to be denied, that the early part of the verse leaves an impression that A SOUL subsists while the body is in dissolution. But it is again proper to contrast Matthew's account of the words uttered, with that of Luke (12.4, 5.) " Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that, have no more that they can do; but fear Him, which after He bath killed, hath power to cast into hell." As Christ did not talk Greek, and indeed in no case should we have reason to suppose that the historians (where they thus verbally differ) have given his exact words; it is manifestly proper in such cases to study the general sentiment which is COMMON TO BOTH, in spite of their diversity of expression. And we may remark that Luke, whose Greek is more classical, here avoids the term soul (as he did in the former passage) which to a reader of Plato would convey the philosophic idea now familiar to all of us; while Matthew, writing in a more Hellenistic Greek, employs the word as the LXX use it. The two evangelists thus combine to shew us the same meaning: "that there is a life, which they who can extinguish natural life, have no power to reach:" viz. that eternal life, which at the resurrection the righteous shall receive—while the mention of casting into hell (Tophet) equally shews, that that is the time of second life, or second death, which the Lord intended; and not any disembodied existence.
As far as I am aware, there are no more passages adduced by the advocates of the soul's immortality as teaching that doctrine. On a review of the evidence, I am deliberatively of opinion, that there are few truths, more prominently stated, and more unceremoniously taken for granted in the Holy Scriptures, than that there is no future life for man save by resurrection from the dead; nor any resurrection of mankind, whether of the just, or of the unjust, but through the resurrection of Christ; who for this cause both died, and rose, and revived, that He might be Lord and Judge, both of the dead and of the living.
But I can well believe that some readers will say in their hearts: what is the use of laying stress on this? is it not a safe error to believe the immortality of the soul? is not the denial of it strengthening the hands of unbelievers and Socinians?—Reasonings such as these weigh so heavy with many; that I cannot leave the subject, without endeavoring to set forth the importance of the truth which I am advocating, by shewing the mischiefs of the prevalent error.
As to the argument, that we are strengthening unbelievers, this is true or false according as that which we advocate is false or true. To leave them in possession of any portion of truth, and contend ourselves against it; this would indeed be strengthening their prejudices, and giving double edge to all their weapons of attack. Is it so hard to learn, that the unbelievers in any system are the keenest to see its weak parts? Would it have been right in a Romanist to uphold superstitious doctrines or practices of his church, because Voltaire had attacked them? A small amount either of honesty or of common sense might make a man ashamed of such an argument: yet I am well aware, that it works unseen with fearful power: inasmuch that I anticipate, many a reader (if many readers there shall be) of these pages, will shrink from- a scriptural, wholesome, and blessed doctrine, because they have heard it called Socinian. The following, I apprehend, to be some of the evils springing out of the popular belief on this subject.
(1.) It puts out of sight the realities to which the Scriptures testify; resurrection, judgment, a new heaven, and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness; the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior; the times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord, whereunto (says Peter) all the prophets testify since the world began: and in the place of these substantial realities, so solemnly witnessed by the spirit of God, it sends persons to speculations about immateriality and heavenly bliss, where their fancy may run wild, and their intellect feed on its own conjectures, till many of them lose alike their common sense, and their subjection to the word of God. The greatness of this evil has been keenly felt, and strongly exposed by many writers on unfulfilled prophecy; but those of them who cannot gain strength to face the popular odium connected with a denial of the soul's immortality; spend the best of their labor in vain. They pull down with one hand what they build up with the other.
(2.) By introducing new senses of the words life and death, it sets on foot the sham science of technical divinity; giving rise to controversies, innumerable and interminable, embarrassing to the intellect, and withering to the heart. It is too large a subject here to follow; but I am fully persuaded, that the controversies about original sin, infant baptism, the incarnation and person of Christ, are all intimately connected with the notion of the soul's immortality. I think I may say the same even of the Calvinistic controversy. This too it is on which saint worship and purgatory are alike founded. In short, not till we are brought to see that man neither has, nor can have, any future life at all, except by resurrection through the mighty power of Christ, can we avoid being caught by one noose or other of the mighty polemical net.
(3.) But there is one point so momentous, as to need to be peculiarly specified. I fearlessly affirm that this notion, followed to its just conclusions, makes void the sacrifice of the death of Christ. It involves an entire denial that the Son of God ever died at all. That greatest, that most marvelous of marvels, shrivels into an empty riddle, bemazing, not instructing the mind. The death, I say, of the Prince of life; at which all heaven and all nature was aghast; because of which the Father loved him; (John 10. 17.) that curse of the law; that last possible humiliation to which He without whom nothing was made, could stoop: to be blotted out of existence! what does it all amount to, according to these interpretations? Forsooth, that after he bad worn some three and thirty years a garment of flesh, (which formed no part of his proper self, and on which his life no wise depended,) he then in the fulness of his love submitted to take it off again! It was thus an escape from creaturely vanity, and no degra-dation.at all: his resurrection becomes an enigma, unmeaning, unaccountable, undesirable. His cries to him who was able to save him from death (Heb. 5.7.) must seem to us unintelligible. His joy in the thought that his Father would not leave his soul in Hades nor suffer him to see corruption, will find nothing sympathetic in our bosoms.
A dead Christ will suit as well as a risen and living Christ, for one who supposes that nothing of Christ, which had pre-existed, died; that nothing superhuman died at all; that he who was possessed of an eternal spirit kept and did not lay down his life; and that that which lay awhile in the tomb had thus no more intrinsic value than the bodies of bulls and goats. (Heb. 9. 13, 14.) If more proof were needed, how fundamentally this doctrine destroys all value in the sacrifice of Christ, it is to be found in the bewilderment of the most approved divines when they treat on this subject. For in the Scripture we find all redemption to depend on his death and resurrection. But how many a good man, anxious to uphold the sacrifice of Christ, finds that he can make nothing of his death, as death; but is forced to place all the emphasis of his sacrifice on certain torments of mind and body suffered before death: nay, many forgetting the meaning of the word blood (i.e. violent death of an undiseased victim,) forgetting that "the blood is the life" (Lev. 17. 11.) will talk, as do the Romanists, of a few drops of his blood sufficing for redemption. Hence also arises the odious controversy about universal and particular redemption, which ever must exist, so long as any fancy it was a bargain between Christ and God, so much blood for so many souls; painfully reminding one of Shylock the Jew; an exact sum payed down, and an exact remuneration due, more or less than which justice dares not give. The sinews of this controversy are cut, so soon as it is seen, that blood means death, and death is an indivisible act; which Christ must equally have borne, in order to bring immortality to one child of Adam or to millions of millions. That he did endure agonies of mind previous to death, is certain; but equally certain is it that they were mainly caused by his prospect of death. The Psalms throughout witness to his dread of going down into the pit; and that he stayed himself by faith on the promise of him who should save him from death, viz. by raising him up. Nor do the Scriptures any more ascribe an atoning power to the pains of mind which he bore, than teach us in the Law, that the sacrificial victim must first be put to torture. But some go farther yet. Great names might be quoted who have maintained, that Christ after death went into fiery Tophet, and there endured in a finite time infinite torments. Some say that while on the cross, his infinity endured in a few hours previous to death, the torments of hell due to countless millions through infinite ages.
Others again say, that his whole life was one great act of atonement: e.g. his meekness under provocation atones for our want of meekness, his love for our selfishness; and thus all his active obedience is made over to us for righteousness. They agree in nothing but this, that it was not the act of death that made him the sin bearer. Among them all, who, holding these views, can see any real beauty, glory, or necessity, in the resurrection of Christ? Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life that I may take it again. A sentence intelligible, it is feared, to few; but what is worse, many make up for their inability to defend their weak points by denunciations against human reasonings, and a practical avowal that no one ought to reason except their own selves. I can but appeal to the word and to the testimony; and if I speak not according to this rule, I ask no kindness, but the most powerful scriptural refutation, dashing to pieces all that I believe most incontrovertible.
Before concluding this part, I think it well, in order to prevent misconceptions, through the great rapidity with which some minds follow up their own inferences, formally to state:
(1.) That I must not be supposed to charge on all who hold the soul's immortality, the consequences which I believe legitimately and generally to flow from it. I well know that many would much rather throw away this belief, than that of the atonement of Christ: but while I believe the two things in-compatible, they think them beautifully harmonious. We both agree, that to say, Christ's existence was not dependent on his bodily frame, is to allege that no divine person ever died; but they reject, as self-contradictory, the assertion that that which was Divine died; thereby in my judgment, destroying the fundamental principle of the gospel by virtual infidelity. While I am desirous of not. imputing to them anything which they disown, I claim likewise the same for myself. Let them not, by means of their own proposition, that " what is Divine cannot die," impute to me a denial of Christ's divinity; for I believe, on the authority of Scripture, that the word was therefore made flesh, in order that, although he was the only begotten Son of God, he might yet be able to die. (Heb. 2. 14.)
(2.) The Scriptural doctrine that man has only death from Adam, life from Christ alone; has, as I judge, gained much discredit, because some who have held it have pushed on to the unscriptural and mischievous denial of the resurrection of the wicked, and their future judgment and punishment. While this is far too long a subject to discuss here, yet as many will be apt hastily to catch at my supposed meaning, where I bare but quoted the inspired word; I most distinctly avow, that in my apprehension the resurrection of the unjust, judgment to come, "tribulation and anguish, indignation and wrath, on every soul that doeth evil," a righteous retribution according to their deeds; is a prominent and vital doctrine of the Scripture, with which Christianity must stand or fall.
I have reserved for a second part the consideration of special objections which are often urged against the view which I am advocating. They are founded partly on the Scripture; partly on general arguments of philosophy. I begin with the former sort.
First many would make prominent those words of Christ to the thief, " Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in Paradise:" (Luke "Ira 43) from whence it is urged, that immediately on the death of the thief, before the sun had set, he was in celestial bliss. And if this were the only text in all the Scripture on the subject, we may readily allow, that such is the interpretation which would be put on it. But it is not with my views of the Scripture only, that such an interpretation is not reconcilable. The truth is testified too plainly and strongly for any who are well read in the word of God to deny, that Christ's soul went to Hades, into the bottomless pit, (Rom. 10. 7.) into the depths of the earth; and not into Paradise, which is before the throne of God. (2 Cor. 12. 4.—Rev. 2. 7.—21.1, 2.) That Scripture universally testifies men's souls go to Hades, has been abundantly shown by quotations above. Accordingly, divines have been driven to allege, that Hades has two compartments, the one called Tartarus, where are the souls of the wicked; the other, an Elysium called Paradise, where the righteous await the day of resurrection. It is to be confessed, that this view is less repugnant to Scripture than the idea that souls go to heaven. Nevertheless, on the face of the matter, it is too obviously borrowed from the Greek mythology. There is no sort of Scriptural ground for alleging that Paradise is a subterraneous abode. Yet more, we have the most striking and positive assertions that the Hades to which Christ went, was not a place of pleasure and happiness; but one of darkness and gloominess and silence. He himself exclaims, "My flesh shall rest in hope; FOR thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades."
Truly extraordinary would it be, that Christ should promise to the thief as a blessing, under the name of Paradise, to be with him in that place in which he (Christ) was so unwilling to remain! nay, which Christ came to plague, as man's great enemy; which he will destroy and cast into the lake of fire. "The gates of Hades," said he, " shall not prevail against my church." But now, behold! this same
Hades is transformed into the Paradise where the thief's soul is to enjoy itself! Truly, whether I can or cannot give a satisfactory interpretation of the text, I feel warranted in saying, this cannot be it. Nor am I therefore bound to make up my mind upon its meaning. Two interpretations are often proposed, neither of which I dare reject, while each seems to me doubtful, because only one can be true. The one alters the punctuation thus: "I say unto thee this day, with me thou shalt be in Paradise:" which I hold to be certainly a possible, but not altogether a natural sentence. The other explains the expression, This day; by alleging, that Christ verified his word to the sensations of the thief, who, shutting his eyes on this world, opens them without conscious lapse of time, at the day of judgment, and finds himself in Paradise. And this is countenanced by Paul's language in Phil. 1. 2 Cor. 5 already quoted; and by the text, "A thousand years is with the Lord as one day." (2 Pet. 3. 8.)
Another extraordinary consequence has been avowed by some of the most candid partisans of the subterranean Paradise; viz. that since Christ has left it, the souls of his saints which now go thither are not with him! They are alleged to see him from a distance only. He is like a sun, whose light, as he sits in heaven, shines through the thick crust of this earth, and penetrates to the interior recesses. (See Abdiel's Letters on Prophecy.) Such appears the nearest attempt that can be made to accommodate the belief to the general doctrine of the Scripture. Yet they call the sleep of the soul a chilling doctrine!
A SECOND OBJECTION is founded on two passages in St. Peter's first epistle, supposed to be connected. 3. 18-20. " Christ was put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the spirit, by which [in which] also he went and preached to the spirits in prison, which sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah." And, 4. 5, 6. " They shall give account to him who is ready to judge both the living and the dead. For this cause was the gospel preached also to them who are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit."—Hence it is inferred, that Christ, between his death and resurrection, went and preached to dead men's souls. On this I have various remarks to make.
First, The connection between the two passages is a mere surmise, and quite imaginary, as I believe. The latter passage appears to contain no particular difficulty. It does not allege that the men were dead when they heard preaching; but that the gospel had been preached to them, and that they were dead when the apostle wrote. And this is enough to make the text inapplicable to the present argument. At the same time, I feel no doubt that its sense is as follows. "For this cause was the gospel preached to those saints who are now fallen asleep; that they might not for ever lie in the grave, but that though, as being men, they are condemned to suffer the death of nature, yet by the will of God they may be made alive into spiritual existence, at that time of which I am speaking, when Christ shall judge not the living only, but also the dead."—Who would quote the text, " Christ shall judge the dead," to prove that the dead have sensations? The truth is; the sacred writers so take it for granted, that we all know the dead to be utterly void of consciousness, that it is left to our common sense to infer that the dead must be raised in order to be judged; and equally so, that the dead were not dead, when they listened to preaching.
Secondly, The former of the two texts does not allege that it was between his death and resurrection that Christ went and preached. The words are: "Put to death in flesh, but made alive in spirit, in which also he went and preached." that is: who underwent loss of natural life, but was raised into spiritual life; in which spiritual life also he went and preached. If any weight is to be given to the connection of the words, it is certainly after his resurrection that he thus preached. At any rate, there is not a shadow of pretense for saying, it was between death and resurrection. Every whit as well may it have been in the days of Abraham or of Noah himself. However, I feel no doubt of the sense, by comparing Rom. 6. 9. " In that Christ died, he died unto [by?] sin once, but in that he lives, he lives unto God." Rev. 1.18. "I am he that lives and was dead: and behold, I am alive for evermore." He rose in the glory of the Father, in a spiritual incorruptible form: he was quickened in the spirit, or, in heavenly, spiritual, divine life: and in this life he went and preached, etc. So we read: "justified in the spirit," 1 Tim. 3. 16.
Thirdly, It is not said that he preached to souls generally, but to certain who were disobedient in the days of Noah. Some learned men have assured us, that Christ preached not to the unrighteous, but to the saints; and that his preaching did not imply the offer of mercy, but was a mere announcing of his triumph and they say, that prison means only a place of safe keeping, that is, "Elysium." I would readily grant that the place of which Jonah says, "The earth with her bars was over me forever," might well be called prison. But, however wholesome their comment may be for the avoiding of purgatory, it seems to me every way untenable. The apostle is distinct, that it was not to the saints that Christ preached, but to certain who were disobedient in the days of Noah; moreover, the word preach always, as far as I am aware, implies the offering of mercy and peace. If then the text really speaks of dead men, I see no possibility of denying, that those who were disobedient in the time of Noah had a second offer made to them of repentance and pardon in Hades, after Christ's resurrection.
Fourthly, It remains unexplained, why it should be limited to those who were disobedient in Noah's day, to the exclusion of other ages. Moreover, they are not called men at all, nor dead, but spirits. Now on referring to the history, I find it distinctly mentioned, (Gen. 6.) that certain sons of God, enamored with the beauty of the daughters of men, left their first estate and went after strange flesh, (Jude 6, 7): and that their progeny became men of renown, filling the earth with wickedness, until God was obliged to destroy it with a flood. The angels themselves he cast down to Tartarus, and reserved them in chains of darkness. (2 Peter 2. 4. Nevertheless, from this apostle's first epistle, I infer, that as they were entangled in sin by man, so also does the redemption that Christ has effected for man in some sense or mode reach to them.
And this seems to throw light on the declaration that " things in heaven, things on earth, and things under the earth, shall bow the knee to Jesus." Phil. 2. 10.
I am not of course ignorant of the interpretation which, since the Reformation, has generally been held by Protestant divines, that " sons of God" mean "pious men;" but for many very cogent reasons I cannot adopt it. I know not whether I shall be tedious in setting them forth.
1. As the phrase "sons of God," when used absolutely in the Old Testament, appears elsewhere to indicate " angels," it would at best be arbitrary to say that it here means " pious men." But when put in contrast to " daughters of men," such a sense does not appear even bearable. It should be " daughters of Belial," or something equivalent. But " daughters of men," is a term neither of censure nor of praise; hence sons of God contrasted with daughters of men, must mean heavenly beings opposed to human creatures.
2. The effects attributed to the union are such as need to be accounted for. The progeny became " men of renown," and the earth became full of wickedness; so full, that God was forced to destroy all but eight persons. It does not appear why the children of pious fathers and worldly mothers should turn out so formidable and surprising personages.
3. It is equally strange that all the piety should be on the fathers' side. Why not also daughters of God married to the sons of men? Did the latter kind of union never happen? or had it other effects?
4. Peter and Jude seem to refer to this same event; and the passages are mutually explanatory of each other, while, if I understand sons of God to mean men, all is turned into darkness. Peter says, (2 Pet. 2. 4.) " God spared not the angels who sinned, but cast them down to Tartarus, and delivered them into chains of darkness, reserved unto judgment" This seems inapplicable to Satan and his angels, who are uniformly described in Scripture as principalities and powers, NOT CHAINED, BUT ENTHRONED; not cast down yet to Tartarus, but roaming through heaven and earth, dwelling in the air, daring even to present themselves in heaven before the face of Jehovah. Jude is yet more distinct, if I rightly apprehend his Greek; 6, 7, " The angels which kept not their principality, but left their own habitation," viz, to come and dwell on earth with the daughters of men, " he bath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighboring cities, in like manner with these (angels), giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh," etc.
The word these, omitted by our translators, being in the masculine gender, appears most naturally, if not necessarily to refer to the angels just named.
While I would be very jealous not to give much weight to authoritative exposition, some may be moved by the assertion that all the ancient writers, Jewish and Christian, follow the view here advocated. I have been informed that Mr. Maitland of Gloucester, has alleged and proved this in a tract on the subject, which has not fallen into my hands. In Bloomfield's Greek Testament, however, I find in a note on 2 Pet. 2. 4, the following extract from a Jewish Rabbi. "After the sons of God had begotten sons, God took them and brought them to a mountain of darkness, and bound them with iron chains, reaching to the middle of the bottomless pit."
5. The harmony of all these passages with that in 1 Peter 3. on the spirits in prison, is to me a most satisfactory confirmation of this one interpretation for all. For it precisely accounts for the singular limitation of Peter, in saying those who were disobedient IN THE TIME OF NOAH.
It was exactly in Noah's time and Noah's only, that such a fall of the angels took place. It accounts farther for his not saying, " who being disobedient were swept away by the flood," as might have been expected: for the angels were not carried away by the flood, nor were they killed. He, therefore, only marks the flood out as the sera of the event. Finally, it accounts for his saying nakedly the spirits in prison; alluding to them as to personages whose tale was known to his readers.
Such is the interpretation which I embrace of this much contested text. If any disapprove of it, let them find a better. But I shall not admit any interpretation to be better, which forces it to speak a language opposed to the universal tenor of the Scripture; and which leaves unexplained the various particulars above named.
A THIRD OBJECTION is based on a passage in Heb. 12. 22, 23, where the sacred writer says, "ye are come unto heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the just made perfect." Here it is alleged that the last clause implies disembodied spirits. There are not wanting, indeed, persons who, while they believe that doctrine, object to such an interpretation of this text. In truth, the word perfect is very ambiguous: for in a vague sense Christ is said to have perfected all his people, (Heb. 10. 14.) while in the strictest sense it is not until the resurrection of the body that a saint is perfect. I confess I have no certain conviction what the meaning of the passage is, from an inability to choose between opposite expositions. But if any press much the word perfect, let us consider what is its fullest sense. It will then amount to a declaration, that certain saints have been already perfected in spiritual bodies, as Paul speaks in 1 Cor. 15. This conclusion I am far from rejecting; nay, I feel persuaded of its truth. Enoch and Elijah seem incontrovertibly to be such, who never died. Of those who died we further read, that after Christ's resurrection some rose from the dead, and came into the holy city and appeared to many. (Matt. 27. 52.) For myself, I am unable to believe, that they could ever die again, when once they had risen by the power of Christ's resurrection. I am therefore disposed to think, these are those of whom Christ despoiled principalities and powers, (Col. 2. 15.)—these are the multitude of captives whom be carried up with him on high; (Eph. 4. 8.) these are, perhaps, " Jerusalem above, who is the mother of us all;" if that expression is to be taken literally. (Gal. 4. 26.)
If I may speak an opinion, it appears to me that the monstrous notions of some of the fathers, as recorded in Pearson (on the Creed), are a corruption of this truth. Gregory Nazianzen and Augustine say, that when Christ arose, he saved many of the damned; but they doubt whether he saved all, or only some. Cyril has these fantastical words: "Having instantly despoiled the whole of Hades, and spread open the inevitable gates to the spirits of those who slept, he arose, having left the devil there deserted and alone." Did not these fathers confound Christ's saving dead saints out of hades, at his resurrection, with a saving of the damned out of Tophet?
However, the passage in Heb. 12. contains such vivid oratory, and is so manifestly redundant in expressions, so rapid in transitions, that I know not whether to think, with Macknight, that " the spirits of the just made perfect," mean the same as the words preceding,—the universal church of Christ,—or whether it mean those who rose and ascended with the Lord.
A FOURTH OBJECTION is parallel to the last, drawn from Rev. 6. " white robes were given them for a season," viz. to those who had been slain for the word of God. I have again to avow, that I do not understand the vision with any sort of distinctness. If, however, it be intended to allege, that there are some souls who having been slain for the word of God, have at this present time a sort of partial triumph allotted to them, previous to the completion of the number of their fellow-martyrs, it makes no sort of difficulty to me, inasmuch as I have just declared my apprehension that there is such a body of persons, namely, those who were raised with Christ. But I profess my ignorance whether this be the meaning of the vision.
A FIFTH OBJECTION I notice, just that I may not seem to overlook it; which many endeavor to found on the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. But in truth I know of no consistent interpretation of that parable upon any view of the subject, except by supposing that an anachronism was introduced as a part of the machinery of the tale. The rich man is NOT disembodied. He has a tongue, and he is suffering flames of material fire—both implying that the resurrection is past.
I have thus gone through all the Scriptural objections of which I am aware, and I find in them nothing to shake those conclusions which were firmly based on texts so numerous and so explicit.
I come to the second head of objections: those drawn from philosophy. And here I find it hard to state the case without knowing to whom I am speaking. Some consider it an objection to a doctrine of Scripture, if it can be called the doctrine of philosophers, others think it an equal objection, if it be called impossible by philosophers. Then such is the infirmity of intellect to which we are all subject, that we are apt to use the same fact in opposite ways. If the doctrine that we oppose was held by heathens, we stigmatize it as "a heathen notion;" but if we change our mind and embrace it, we then declare that " even the very heathens acknowledged it." So the term "philosophical" is used either in praise or dispraise.
Without claiming myself to be exempt from this frailty, I would not willingly use the invidious term " heathen doctrine," except where I am persuaded that it was adopted from heathens. Concerning philosophy, my apprehension is this: that Paul's language is to be understood of that sham philosophy which was current in his day, and of modern philosophy just in so far as it partakes of the same character: viz. the departing from the investigation of things properly human, and pretending by wisdom to fathom the counsels and limit the power of God. It is ridiculous to allege Paul's aspersions on philosophy, as though there could be no such thing as a true philosophy on human subjects. On the other hand, so soon as philosophy ventures to diverge, undertaking to teach that which can only be known by revelation, it is obviously mischievous: nor less so, where its dogmas are false, concerning morals or God's moral character. In the former case, we may disown the controversy; in the latter case we must reply to the disputant.
That moral philosophy, as maintained by the average of Christian teachers, is on a higher ground than that taught by heathens, is most obvious. But far more certain is it that physical philosophy is in the present day cultivated with the most surprising accuracy, upon a most extensive basis of well-ascertained fact. And what is the consequence The most alarming result, as some judge it, that medical students are exceedingly prone to the doctrine of materialism. I know that individual splendid names are easily enumerated, who have disowned and reasoned against it. But it must be remembered, that they almost universally suppose the Scripture to be against it: so that both religion and reputation bias them one way. However, that they believe the immortality of the soul, not because of, but in spite of, their medical knowledge, seems undeniable. The half-jocose proverb: " Of three physicians two are atheists," appears descriptive of the strong tendency of the study to undermine that which modern. Christians make the basis of all religion. When there is so powerful a testimony of philosophical study, under its most accurate and experienced form, against the doctrine of the soul's immortality; I confess I feel it hard that any should press me with philosophical objections against the denial of that doctrine. I might at least be allowed to require the two classes of philosophers to come to an agreement first: else I must myself turn medical student, to form an independent judgment on a religious doctrine.
But on examining the particular objection levelled against me, new considerations present themselves. It is urged,- that "it is impossible even for God" to preserve the identity of him who dies, with him who rises again, except by means of an immortal soul. This objection is meant to be a pious one, nor do I charge with impiety those who advance it; yet I must make remarks upon it.
First. An apprehension that they can fix the limits of God's omnipotence, is thus an element of the modern philosophic objection against the Scripture doctrine of the resurrection. It is striking to find, that in ancient times a like objection was urged against the resurrection of the dead, as taught by Christ and Paul. "Ye do err," says the former to the Sadducees, " not knowing the Scriptures, neither THE POWER OF GOD." It is most apparent that those Scriptures uniformly regard resurrection from the dead, as the extreme act of almighty power, and to believe it, is made the grand effort and triumph of faith. No man who believes in a Creator at all, could doubt his power to reinvest immortal souls with a fleshly covering, such as they once before wore, though all will wonder at the utility of it. But to restore dead bones to life, this is a different matter, about which we can only answer with Ezekiel, whether it be possible, Oh Lord God, thou knows. (37) Paul had then cause to ask Agrippa, " Why should it be thought incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?"—cause to make this the praise of Abraham's faith, that " he believed in God, who makes alive the dead, and calleth those things which be not, as though they were;" (Rom. 4. 17.) for "he accounted that God was able to raise Isaac up, even from the dead." (Heb. 11.19.)
So again, " righteousness shall be imputed to us also, if we believe on him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead." (Rom. 4. 24.) And again: " Ye are become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead." (7. 4.) [What thick darkness is shed over these blessed passages by the popular views! Compare 2 Cor. 5. 14, 15. — Rom. 14. 9.] Again: "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thy heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." (10. 9.)—" We had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead." (2 Cor. 1. 9.)—" That ye may know the exceeding greatness of God's power to usward who believe, [to raise us from the dead, and give us glory,] according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places." (Eph. 1. 19, 20.)—" That I may know Christ, and the power of his resurrection." (Phil. 3. 10.)—" Ye are buried with Christ in baptism, wherein also ye. are risen with him, through faith of [in] the operation of God, who raised him from the dead." (Col. 2. 12.)
The bottomless mystery of power which so filled Paul's soul, appears to affect neither heart nor mind now-a-days. To a man who believes the soul immortal, and consequently, that after Christ was dead, he was still as much alive as before his incarnation; to such a one, all the above, I fearlessly affirm, is shadowy mysticism, containing only abortive efforts at sense. Such a one would not miss the resurrection out of Scripture if it were not there. He knows that there must be some " power in Christ's resurrection," because Paul says that there is; but it bears no part in his own general view, nor practical apprehension. So far from seeing in Christ's resurrection the exceeding greatness "of the energy of the power of the might of God," as Paul, laboring for expressions, calls it; men seem hardly aware that God needed to operate at all, or what was the use of it; much less are they disposed to make it the emphasis of Christian faith, whereby we rise with Christ, to believe on God who raised up Christ from the dead. Hence in Col. 2. 12, it is exceedingly common to explain "faith of the operation of GO," to mean, "faith which God has wrought in us;" leaving out the last clause which is the marrow of the whole. I fear to be tedious in quoting the numerous texts on this subject: yet there are a few more which I do not like to pass over.—"Christ shall transform our vile body, and make it like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able to subdue even all things to himself (Phil. 3. 21.)
"By Christ ye believe in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God." (1 Pet. 1. 21.) When Paul declared that Christ had suffered, and was the first to arise from the dead, Festus exclaimed: " Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad." (Acts 26. 23, 24.) So did the subtle Athenians listen attentively to Paul till he pronounced this sentence: " God will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained: whereof he bath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead." And when they heard of the resurrection from the dead, they mocked. (Acts 17.) Lastly, our Lord Jesus, in a very remarkable and instructive discourse, (John 5.) utters these words, vv. 20, 21. "The Father loveth the Son, and shows him all things that himself doeth; and he will show him greater works than these, that ye may marvel. For as the Father raises up the dead, and makes them alive, so the Son makes alive whom he will."
I think, therefore, I have shown that the argument urged against me, is identically the same as that which philosophers of the apostolic day urged against the apostolic doctrine. I remember then that it is written: " I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and I will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent."
Secondly. The Scripture is not written to teach us physical, but moral truth. It does not undertake to instruct us in metaphysics, and open the deep difficulties on the subject of identity. It is founded on the common sense of all men, not on the speculations of a few. And while I am contented to feel, that consciousness is the only valuable practical criterion of identity, (though it be not identity) I also believe, that mankind at large are right in apprehending an old dog or horse to be the same identical being as the young animal: though they do not, with Bishop Butler, attribute immortal souls to them.
Thirdly. As far as this argument carries us, there seems no more propriety in conjuring up an immortal soul for the mere sake of preserving identity, than arbitrarily to fix on some part of the brain, and allege that it is on this that identity depends: and that God has so organized us, as that this, however decomposed, steadily refuses to intermix with other brains; and so all men are kept distinct. I say; if there be no other argument for the immortality of the soul than this of identity, then my latter conjecture seems not more arbitrary, while it is vastly more agreeable to Scripture than the other: and it has the advantage of avoiding to attribute immortality to beasts.
Fourthly. " While I pretend not to know whereon identity depends, nor how God will preserve it; I cannot overlook the fact, that most important Scriptural arguments turn on the belief, that this mortal body and the future spiritual body are rightly called the same. While the heathen philosophers, under pretense that pollution is in the soul, not in the body, justified impurities; Paul opposes them by declaring, that the body is the temple of the Holy Ghost; that it is for the Lord, .and the Lord for it; that though it seem made for meats and meats for it, and to be destroyed together; yet God, who raised up the Lord, shall also raise it up: and hence his argument that we should glorify God in our bodies. (1 Cor. 6.) He declares, that " if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus dwell in us, he who raised up Christ from the dead shall also make alive our mortal bodies, because of his Spirit that dwelleth in us." (Rom. 8. 11.) Now the doctrine of the soul's immortality, while it readily maintains identity of the being, by denying that the body is the being; yet wholly fails of making an identity of the old and the new body: a thing, as I judge, vital to Christianity itself.
This may seem strong speaking. But have words any meaning which can be trusted? or what is meant by resurrection of the dead If the soul be merely unclothed and reclothed, no dead thing is brought into new life. On this theory, the body is improperly said to live or die: but it is the soul which lives, in the body or out of the body. Nor only so; but since the philosopher alleges that there is no identity of the old and new body, then it is at any rate false, that the old body has come to life: equally false is it that the soul has come to life. Then nothing rises from the dead: and if the dead rise not, let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die. I do not speak more strongly than Paul. But if the philosopher see, that he is thus forced to admit a bona fide identity between the old and new body; then has he himself utterly abandoned this argument for an independent soul.
And this may lead us to inquire, whether the objection against which I am contending, is not at bottom an asserting of this axiom: "Not even God can raise that which is really dead." Forsooth he can give or take away bodies as often as he pleases, when the person never dies—but if the living being once cease to live, God cannot raise it to fresh life. If this be the meaning, (and I cannot otherwise understand it,) our Savior's grave rebuke is very pertinent: "Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures; neither the power of God."
And how express is Christ! "The hour is coming when all (all persons) who are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and come forth." "The body is for the Lord, and the Lord for the body." It is dearer to him than the body of a deceased wife is to her husband—and "he will raise it up at the last day." If this be hard to believe at the oft-repeated assertion of him, whom God raised from the dead, with the express object, that he might bring us life and immortality, as also to give us assurance of the same, can we say that we have any faith at all? To believe the soul naturally immortal has no more to do with faith in Christ, than to believe in the fixed courses of the sun and planets. To doubt of the resurrection of the dead,—that is, whether dead men will be called into life at the voice of Christ, —is flinging away that hope which Christ died and rose to obtain for us.
Under this head I am not proposing any deep or doubtful investigations; but shall endeavor to throw together facts illustrative of our subject, such as may be found in every compendium of ancient philosophy. And on the opinions of the fathers of the Christian church, not to get on debateable ground, I refer only to Bp. Pearson on the Apostles' Creed.
As to the opinions of the ancient Jews, they may be safely gathered from the phraseology of their own Scriptures: wherein, as has been shown, we constantly find the idea, that when the body descends into the grave, the soul goes down to stillness and unconsciousness in the depths of the earth. The language used concerning Samuel's apparition will be at least allowed to indicate popular opinions. (1 Sam. 28.) "The woman said unto Saul: I saw gods ascending out of the earth. And he said unto her: What form is he of? And she said: An old man cometh up, and he is covered with a mantle. And Saul perceived that it was Samuel And Samuel said unto Saul: Why bast thou disquieted me to bring me up?" The very ancient book of Job contains much of the same tendency with what has been already adduced: which I here only note, as, if it be doubtful whether the speeches of afflicted Job and his censorious friends can be quoted to prove doctrine, they at least show the prevailing views.
The earliest doctrine concerning the separate soul among western philosophers, would seem to be that of its transmigration. Herodotus writes thus concerning it. (2.123.) "The Egyptians were the first to deliver this tenet, that the soul of man is immortal; and when the body perishes, it enters successively into new animals.
And when it has gone through all creatures, beasts, fish, and fowl, it again returns into the body of a man, completing the circuit in three thousand years. This doctrine some of the Greeks adopted as their own; some at an earlier period, others later: whose names I know, but refrain to write." The same notions are occasionally professed in the dialogues of Plato. But this may seem rather to have been the wholesome threat held out to awe the vulgar, than the deliberate and private opinion of the teacher. Speculations on the nature of matter seem to have given the impulse to all the doctrines concerning the soul. Matter was supposed by many to be an uncreated substance, inherently base and bad; whence evil came into the universe. But the soul was a particle of the divinity, immaterial, indiscerptible, and therefore incorruptible. It was argued, that since it had no parts nor extension, it could not be pulled to pieces; hence neither could it perish. Thus the belief of its immortality was founded on the supposition, that it was not within the power of God to annihilate it. Such views could not exist without a reaction in the minds of many, by whom the opposite notions, known by the name of Epicurus, were cherished. All alike wandered in the dark: when instead of inquiring what God meant to do, they tried to find out by speculation what must be, and settle everything without him.
It is the province of divine faith to cry, "O Lord, my hope is in thee! in thy favor is life." Others look out for life independently of God, and professing themselves to be wise, they become fools. Having reached the point, that the soul is essentially indestructible, because uncomposite; they could not help inferring that it was uncreated: for what has been made, may be unmade. Hence it had existed in a past eternity. Wherefore all souls are little gods, eternal, untreated; or rather, portions of the one divine being. This is Pantheism; and Pantheism is hidden Atheism. For, while there is much fine talk about the universal Spirit, this spirit is nothing else than the soul which animates the world, having no existence or personality separate from that world. Souls departing from their bodies are absorbed in this great Spirit, as water mingles with the ocean: their distinctive personality is lost: judgment to come, there is none: indeed the soul has no more interest in its future self, than in its fancied past self. Such appears to be the circle in which these philosophers moved.
Some of them hit on a difficulty perfectly analogous to one which has embarrassed the moderns. Believing that matter was the cause of misery, they impugned the goodness of Him who had so unkindly shut up ethereal souls in prisons of clay. Just so have some Christians been embarrassed concerning original sin. They have argued, that a body cannot beget a soul; hence though men's bodies are derived from Adam, their souls are not. Then souls must be infused by God, having been created independently. Then how are we to account for their being put into defiled sinful bodies? Surely, they must have been sinful themselves previously. They could not have been created sinful, Therefore they must have been beings of another order, who having fallen into sin, have been punished by confinement in sinful bodies.—A late Jewish idea must have been very similar, as intimated in the question of the Apostles to Christ: " Lord, who did sin? this man, or his parents? that he was born blind."
It is easy to speak of these notions as wild, incoherent, unscriptural, superstitious: doubtless, so they are. But can the difficulties be fairly answered, by anyone who holds the soul to be independent of the body? If the soul came into existence by corporeal conception and birth, can it be supposed that its existence is independent of the body? Is not the notion of its subsisting in distinct personality after the dissolution of the body, inconsistent with believing that the soul simultaneously with the body, is derived from the parent animal? Hence men are driven to maintain the soul's pre-existence: nor is there ground for deriding this opinion, unless we can show the way out of the difficulty. I see but one way; which I -learn from the word of God: to maintain that man is dust; that there is an animal body, and there is a spiritual body: the former from Adam; the latter from Christ, at the great day of resurrection.
Among the fathers, Justin Martyr, one of the earliest, thus avows his belief concerning the soul. "But however," says he, "I for my part would not even allow that all souls die: for it would be truly a gain to the wicked: but what? why, that the souls of the righteous stay somewhere in a better place; and the wicked and unjust souls in a worse, expecting the time of judgment." He was much imbued with the Greek philosophy: yet, as Bp. Kaye remarks, he denies the soul's essential immortality: perhaps in a dread of ascribing to it a divine prerogative.
Elsewhere lie says of certain heretics who denied the millennium: "They even say that there is no resurrection of the flesh; BUT that immediately on death, men's souls are taken up into heaven." It will be perceived that his statement about the two places to which men's souls go, is delivered more as a private sentiment, than as a doctrine of Scripture and of the church. He does not here declare, that the soul goes down into the abyss; but he distinctly denies that it goes up into heaven. Iraneus alleges that the soul will not see God until the resurrection; else the disciple would be above his Master. Tertullian says that the soul is in a subterraneous place; and rebukes the pride of those who think such a place not worthy of the souls of the faithful, when Christ entered it. " Heaven is open to no one," says he, " while the earth is safe, not to say shut up." Novatian believed Hades a place underground, where pious and impious souls still wait, though with a presentiment of their destinations. Bp. Pearson's words are these: " The most ancient of all the fathers whose writings are extant, thought the saints not to be in heaven yet; nor ever to be removed from that place in which they were before Christ's death, until the general resurrection."
But I should have quoted the language of the Creeds. For my present purpose it is sufficient to confine myself to the three which are most known, as being adopted by the Church of England. The Apostles' Creed says: "—the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting." The Nicene* Creed: "I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the age to come." The Creed called Athanasian: "At Christ's coming all men shall rise with their own bodies, to give account of their own works." It is thus manifest, that however widely speculations about the soul had spread in the early church, they had no idea of making its immortality an article of faith; or of abating one whit the essential necessity of the resurrection.
But when saint-worship and purgatory bad gradually won their way, it had become requisite not only to maintain that the soul lived in disembodied personality, but to transport those of the saints from Hades into heaven. This was accordingly guarded with great jealousy. To suppose that St. Peter, St. James, and our blessed Lady, have at present no more knowledge than a dead dog, would of course be called blasphemy: but equally intolerable was the thought, that they were (as Tertullian says) in a subterraneous place, safe shut up. In Campbell's Lectures on Ecclesiastical History, (Lecture 24) I find it related that when Pope John the XXII. had maintained in a sermon, that the saints departed are not admitted to the beatific vision till after the resurrection, the University of Paris, with all the bishops and abbots in that metropolis, as also a synod assembled at Vincennes, unanimously condemned the Pope's opinion as repugnant to Scripture and heretical. Philip 6., king of France, sent the Pope an authentic copy of this decision, and (says Dr. Campbell,) if Cardinal d'Ailly may be credited, threatened to have his holiness burned for heresy, if he did not submit. The Pope, unable to resist the public outcry, made public declarations, which were understood to amount to an apology. His successor took an early opportunity of preaching on the beatific vision, and inculcating the opposite sentiment. This was in the fourteenth century.
At the Reformation,—to confine our view to England,—on rejecting the popish doctrines on these subjects, the Church of England almost reverted to primitive integrity of the faith. Indeed, except one passage in the burial service, I know not whether there be any thing in her present formulas which leans to the doctrine of the soul's separate existence. The Puritans, however, on various points, brought in both the truth and the error of the Continental Reformed Churches—and I believe it is correct to say, that from them the whole body of English Dissenters, and most of the• Clergy, who are called Evangelical, have inherited the doctrine denounced by Justin Martyr as heretical, that" immediately on death men's souls are taken up into heaven."
The principal use of thus passing in review the opinions of distant ages, is, to dispel that blinding falsehood, that all Christians have always held the same views on any subject as are now held by a majority among ourselves. In spite of the differences between man and man, each age has its own peculiarities. The stress laid upon general consent is an argument of very little value, unless it rest upon an induction of opinions of distant ages and places. After all, our rule of life and of doctrine is the sacred record itself, which can speak and does speak as plainly as any commentator can speak, if it be not obscured by false translations and by a technical vocabulary obtruded upon it. And he who is truly taught of God will exclaim: Thy word is a light unto my feet and a lamp unto my paths: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple: more to be desired is it than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honey-comb.—Buy therefore wisdom, and sell it not; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon-day.
It would, perhaps, have been proper to introduce some mention of the transfiguration, as illustrating our subject; the more especially as some objects to be answered by that remarkable event seem often to escape notice. It was important that on Christ's resurrection, he should be seen by the apostles in the very same form as that which he had been used to bear before his death; otherwise the proof to their senses that he was really risen from the dead, would have been very inadequate. He did not, therefore, on rising assume that glorious form which he now wears, and in which he will return to judge the living and the dead. But before his death, he on one signal occasion assumed that form, and while displaying it before the eyes of three Apostles, received a second time from heaven the witnessing voice, that he was the beloved Son of God; as on the occasion when the Spirit came down upon him in bodily shape as a dove. Besides giving them an opportunity of thus seeing the glory which he display in his kingdom, (2 Pet. 1. 16, 17.) there was hereby afforded us a matter of fact demonstration, that the individual may remain the same, while his form changes from animal to spiritual, from the likeness of sinful flesh to that which is heavenly and incorruptible. The appearance of Moses and Elias could not of course answer this same purpose; and is, perhaps, rightly explained by those who say it was meant, 1st. to typify the future glorification of the dead and the living (i.e. of those found alive at Christ's coming): it being remarked that Elias was snatched up to heaven, and that of Moses it is recorded the Lord buried him. 2ndly, to introduce by the words Hear ye him! (following Peter's proposal to build three tabernacles) a divine witness to the superiority of Christ as teacher and lawgiver, to the law or the prophets. But as no saint is glorified save in and by Christ's glory, it is to be believed, that the glorious forms here assumed by Moses and Elias were, as those of Christ, merely temporary, and adapted to the particular occasion.
A sceptic will, of course, allege, that we have no sufficient proof that it was Moses and Elias at all; but such doubts do not affect my argument. It will also be said, that they were probably deceived by a dream, as the narrative mentions them to have been sleepy. But the presence of three persons, whose senses all witnessed the same result, seems intended to anticipate this objection. Again: it is consonant to probability, and agrees with the account of similar appearances in the Scriptures, that so glorious a sight should bemaze the eyes and half stupify the senses, making the persons doubt whether they were asleep or awake, and in fact feel as oppressed with slumber. Lastly, the very mention of the fact thus simply, is one among the thousand marks of candor, and the absence of any disposition to argue in support of a system, while professing merely to narrate.