In my research for this paper, I re-read a book by Francis Chan called "Erasing Hell". The book was written mostly in response to Rob Bell's "Love Wins". In the book, Chan makes frequent use of scripture to support his view that Hell is a place of everlasting, eternal punishment (though he does admit that scripture does hint heavily towards a doctrine of annihilationism). I found it very interesting that, in his chapter entitled "What Jesus Actually Said about Hell", he uses a lot of Old Testament apocryphal references.
(For those of you who aren't sure what that is, many Catholic and Anglican bibles have a few "extra" books tagged onto their Old Testaments. Most protestant churches reject these books because they are not a part of the official canon. The Book of Common prayer tells us that these documents are to be "read for example of life and instruction of manners; but yet it doth not apply them to establish any doctrine".)
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| Have fun burning in Hell, losers! |
Anyhow, I found it interesting that he would use those verses, but outright reject what canonized scripture has to say about Christ's descent. In his FAQ, he says about 1 Peter 3, (quoted below) that "it almost certainly doesn't mean that Jesus was preaching the gospel to unbelievers who had died." and goes on to suggest that the passage may be referring to disobedient spirits from the time of Noah. His ultimate point is that Jesus went to hell to proclaim victory in light of the cross and to those imprisoned there, which seems a little juvenile.
Anyway, thats kind of neither here nor there and may or may not end up actually being a part of my paper. Here is a rough draft of what I've written about what scripture has to say about it:
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All four gospels mention Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection, though none of them make any mention of what happened the day he lay in the grave. However, scripture is not silent on the matter. Luke also tells us that Peter, in his famous day of Pentecost preaching in Acts 2:31, tells us that “he (Jesus) was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.” Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:20-22 that “Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have died. For since death came through a human being, the resurrection of the dead has also come through a human being; for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ." 1 Peter 3:18-19: “Christ also [died] once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and [preached] to the spirits in prison” and later in Ch. 4:6, “For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does.” Peter and Paul are telling us that after his death, Christ defeated death, went to Hades and preached to the dead. This was, in fact, foreshadowed in the Old Testament. In the book of Job 38:17 in the Septuagint, God asks Job: “And do the gates of death open to thee for fear; and did the porters of hell quake when they saw thee?” As a result, Revelation 1:18 tells us that Jesus “[is] alive for evermore, and [has] the keys of Death and Hades.”
Christ’s descent into Hell is also mentioned in more detail in much of the early Christian apocryphal literature. While some of these ‘gospels’ were condemned by the church and rejected as gnostic teaching, some of the books that did not contradict church doctrine were kept in church tradition, even though they did not make the New Testament.
One such work, the “Epistle to the Apostles”, commonly dated to the 2nd century, tells us that not only did Christ preach in Hades, but he also baptized the righteous:
For to that end I went down unto the place of Lazarus, and preached unto the righteous and the prophets, that they might come out of the rest which is below and come up into that which is above; and I poured out upon them with my right hand the water of life and forgiveness and salvation from all evil.
Another text, which heavily influenced church doctrine on this subject, was “The Gospel of Nicodemus”, containing material that dates to apostolic times, around the third century. Here, Jesus is shown bringing Adam and all the saints out of hell with him.
And the Lord, stretching forth his hand, said: “Come unto me, all ye my saints which bear my image and likeness... And forthwith all the saints were gathered in one under the hand of the Lord... And the Lord stretched forth his hand and made the sign of the cross over Adam and over all his saints, and he took the right hand of Adam and went up out of hell, and all the saints followed him... and he brought them all into the glory and beauty of paradise.”
While Apocryphal literature does not hold the same level of doctrinal authority as the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, sacred Scripture, did in fact, grow out of early church tradition with the support of the Patristic Fathers. It is therefore reasonable to take a look at what they have they have to say about this matter.
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Which, we will get to... later!
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