The Narrow Path Ministries

The Final End of The Wicked by Edward Fudge

This is a good little 10-page defense of Conditional Immortality. Enjoy and please critique!!

God bless,

I'm not qualified to pipe in on either side ... but I stumbled across this link ...

The Hermeneutics of Annihilationalism: The Theological Method of Edward Fudge by Robert A. Peterson

http://www.mtio.com/articles/bissar21.htm

hi derek-

i read this and i found it quite enlightening. he makes a strong case; of course everything depends on whether his suppositions are correct. they seem to be.

i also am glad you posted this because i didnt realize the JETS site even existed-- there are a lot og good articles on there.

TK

Fudge quoted Judith as being the first of the intertestamental writings to suggest eternal concious pain. He quoted "They shall weep and feel their pain for ever." The Septuagint translation translated the words as "eōs aiōnos" (literally "into the ages"). But Fudge obviously agrees that the words should be "for ever".

To my mind, Isaiah 32:14-16 clearly shows that such phrases cannot mean "for ever".

For the palace will be forsaken, the populous city deserted; the hill and the watchtower will become dens for ever, a joy of wild asses, a pasture of flocks; until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is deemed a forest. Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field.

How can these places be deserted forever until the Spirit is poured out and then will no longer be deserted? Obviously the prophecy does not indicate that these places will be deserted forever, but for a long period of time until the Spirit is poured out, and the desert become a fruitful field.

In this passage the words translated as "for ever" are "eōs tou aiōnos"

But since Fudge thinks such phrases mean "for ever", then Rev 20:10 clearly mitigates against his annihilist views. He admits this in his own way, but seems to fudge with his uncertainty as to whether or not the beast and false prophet are people or personifications of civil and religious powers. But even if no human beings are said to be "tormented for ever", clearly Satan will be (if "for ever" is a correct translation). And Satan is a person (although some maintain that Satan is a personification of evil). If God allow any conscious person, whether man, or angel, or demon, to be tormented for ever, such action would conflict with His character of total LOVE.

If God allow any conscious person, whether man, or angel, or demon, to be tormented for ever, such action would conflict with His character of total LOVE.


Again it comes down to , what is justice? Is it God's intention to destroy evil or keep the mass of humanity quarenteened in a lake of fire forever? Here is another use of forever "I went down to the bottoms and the very roots of the mountains , the earth with it's bars closed behind me FOREVER." Jonah 2.6
Yet in verse 2.10 "And the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land."

Derek,

Conditional immortality seems to have much more scriptural support than the universalist view. We have discussed it relatively little.

I am not very familiar with this view. Do you see a period of punishment, perhaps long, before anihilation, or the process of anihilation taking any more time than, say, a person burned to death in a fire here on earth? I realize this is a philosophical question, but if there is no, or little, difference, then would not an innocent child burned to death in a house fire suffer equally to what someone like Hitler will? How would this be just?

My understanding of conditional immortality (i am not sure where i picked it up- maybe from steve g's lectures on the alternative views of hell) is that a person will be tormented (prior to annihilation) in accordance with his deeds while living. jesus talked about being punished with few stripes vs many stripes. accordingly, hitler, idi amin, and the like would seemingly be punished much more severely than someone not as culpable.

God decides, with each person, the intensity and duration of the punishment.

assuming conditional immortality to be true, what i am confused about is when the punishment starts. hitler's already dead; is he receiving his punishment now? might he already be annihilated? or does everyone's punishment start at the same time, at some future date? if so, what's happening to hitler right now? soul sleep?

TK

Hi Homer,

I am not very familiar with this view. Do you see a period of punishment, perhaps long, before anihilation, or the process of anihilation taking any more time than, say, a person burned to death in a fire here on earth? I realize this is a philosophical question, but if there is no, or little, difference, then would not an innocent child burned to death in a house fire suffer equally to what someone like Hitler will? How would this be just?

My answer to this would be pretty much like what TK stated above.

TK,

assuming conditional immortality to be true, what i am confused about is when the punishment starts. hitler's already dead; is he receiving his punishment now? might he already be annihilated? or does everyone's punishment start at the same time, at some future date? if so, what's happening to hitler right now? soul sleep?

There seems to be some support for the notion that those that die without Christ, are in "soul sleep" until the ressurection.

Rev 20:4 And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.
Rev 20:5 But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.

This would seem to teach that we live and reign with Christ during the church age (for an amillenialist anyway) while the dead don't live again until it's over (Jesus comes back/ressurection).

However, there is the parable (?) of Lazerus and the Rich Man which may teach something different. But it may not as well, if Jesus was in fact using a known parable to illustrate something different (i.e. not about the afterlife but about Jews/Gentiles).

It would also seem to be a raw deal for the guy that died six thousand years ago to have to suffer until the ressurection only to be punished more after the judgement, while a possibly worse offender may die the day before the judgement. So soul sleep for the wicked would make sense here as well.

God bless,