177. III. Eternity Of Punishment.
III. Eternity Of Punishment.
1. Recoil from the Doctrine.—There is a recoil of the sensibilities from the doctrine of future punishment, especially in respect to the duration of such punishment. This should cause no surprise. Indeed, we might say that it is justified by the divine reluctance to inflict such a doom. This reluctance is expressed in many words of entreaty and compassionate yearning; most of all in the burden of sacrifice which divinity itself has borne, that we might be saved from such a doom. This recoil is easily made the occasion of a plausible appeal against the truth of the doctrine. But that is not a question to be settled by our sensibilities, especially by such as suffer this recoil. Such instinctive feelings have no rectoral function, and, if allowed sway, would be subversive of all government. No human government could survive their dominance. Hence they can have no part in determining the necessary punitive ministries of the divine government, which must rule over all moral beings.
2. Fruitless Endeavor Toward a Rationale.—Many attempts have been made to interpret the doctrine of eternal punishment in the light of reason; that is, to bring it within the grasp of our intelligence. Our own view is that all such attempts are fruitless. We shall notice three of the leading modes in which such interpretation is attempted. The first assumes an infinite demerit of sin; and that it has such demerit on account of the perfections of the being against whom it is committed. Sin is committed against an infinite being, and therefore has infinite demerit. Such is a summary statement of the view. If the principle be true, seemingly, it must equalize all sins, which is neither rational nor scriptural. Further, we may posit another principle: Sin is the deed of a finite being, and therefore can have only finite demerit. And who shall say that the former is any clearer than the latter? In truth, neither has any solution in our reason.
Another interpretation is attempted on the ground of a limitation of the atonement to the present life. As there is no saving grace in a future state, punishment must be eternal. There is, in fact, no new principle in this view. In the absence of atonement there could still be no such punishment, except on the ground of demerit. Hence we are brought back to the very principle on which the former interpretation is attempted; and in this new relation it none the less remains beyond the grasp of our reason. The rationale is often attempted on the ground of an endless sinning. As the future state of the wicked must be one of eternal sinning, so their punishment must be endless. Such is the doctrine. It may seem plausible, but is not above criticism. The doctrine assumes a moral responsibility of the wicked in a state of necessity; for such must be the state of final retribution. There the good is no longer possible, and the evil, such as it may be, is unavoidable. Can there be moral responsibility m such a state? Our reason cannot affirm it, and therefore cannot thus find any rational interpretation of eternal punishment. A fixed state of reward after a state of trial, whether of blessedness or misery, must be constituted in a manner peculiar to itself. Just what it is, or what its relation to moral law, as viewed from the divine side, we have no power of knowing. Hence there is no explanation of eternal punishment in this manner.
Further, this attempted rationale begins with the concession that eternal punishment is not for the sins of this life, and that they do not deserve it. Yet it is an explicit truth of Scripture that such punishment, even in its uttermost duration, is for the sins of this life. There is neither mention nor intimation of any other. Hence the theory surrenders the scriptural ground of the doctrine, and offers instead an inferential basis, which for our reason is g, mere assumption.
3. Purely a Question of Revelation.—If the punishment of sin is eternal it must be consistent with the justice and goodness of God; but for us it is thus consistent only through faith, not in the comprehension of our reason. On the other hand, our reason is equally incompetent to pronounce against eternal punishment. Government in all its human forms is replete with perplexities. The gathered experiences of the ages bring us no solution. A chief perplexity respects the use of penalty as a necessary means of government. If such, then, be the state of facts with us in all the forms of human government, we surely cannot determine what shall be the provisions and ministries of the divine government, the sway of which is over all intelligences. The assumption of any such ability is most pretentious. And yet the man who finds the government of his little boy an utter perplexity can tell you just how God should govern the moral universe. With the narrow limitations of our own knowledge the Scriptures are the only sufficient source of truth respecting the duration of future punishment.
4. Obvious Sense of Scripture.—The principal words employed to express the duration of the doom of sin are
These are the words by which the Scriptures express the eternal things of God (Romans 1:25; Romans 9:5; Romans 11:36; 2 Corinthians 11:31; Galatians 1:5; Php 4:20; 1 Timothy 1:17; 1 Peter 5:11); of Christ (Luke 1:33; Hebrews 1:8; Hebrews 13:8; 2 Peter 3:18; Revelation 1:18; Revelation 5:13; Revelation 11:15); and of the Holy Spirit (Hebrews 9:14). As used in these references they can mean nothing less than an endless future. The same words are employed for the expression of the future happiness of the righteous (Matthew 19:29; Matthew 25:46; Mark 10:30; John 3:15-16; John 3:36; John 4:14; John 6:51; John 6:58; John 10:28; John 11:26; Romans 2:7; 2 Corinthians 4:17; 2 Corinthians 9:9; 1 John 2:17). No one who accepts the truthfulness of the Scriptures ever thinks of putting any limitation upon the future blessedness which is thus set forth in the use of these words. The solemn truth follows that future punishment is expressed in the use of the same words (Matthew 18:8; Matthew 21:19; Matthew 25:41; Matthew 25:46; Mark 3:29; 2 Thessalonians 1:9; Hebrews 6:2; 2 Peter 2:17; Jude 1:13; Revelation 14:11). In none of these instances is there any intimation of a qualified sense; hence they must here mean a limitless future. This meaning is emphasized, indeed, unalterably fixed, by the association of future happiness and future misery in the same texts. Indeed, while in one we have simply the word life—
Such has been the interpretation of these words through all the Christian centuries, and such the interpretation of other words in application to the same subject. There have been differences respecting the ground of amenability to such punishment; as, for instance, whether we could be so amenable for the sin of Adam, or on the ground of an inherited depravity of nature, or whether only for personal sins, committed with the responsibility of moral freedom. Also there have been differences respecting the nature of the penal doom. The materialistic interpretation of its figurative representations, as held in the earlier centuries, and particularly by the medieval Church, is now discarded and replaced by a more rational and truthful interpretation. But through all these differences and disputations a very remarkable unanimity has remained respecting the duration of such punishment. On this question the best scholarship of to-day is in full accord with the historic doctrine of the Church. This is a significant fact, and the more so because such accordance is not from any predilection or preference, but simply by constraint of the plain sense of Scripture.
Hovey: The State of the Impenitent Dead; George: Annihilation Not of the Bible; McDonald: The Annihilation of the Wicked Scripturally Considered; Underwood: Future Punishment; Anderson: Future Destiny; Vernon: Probation and Punishment; Cochrane: Future Punishment; Farrar: Eternal Hope; Future Probation: A Symposium; Reimensnyder: Doom Eternal; King: Future Retribution; Jackson: The Doctrine of Retribution, Bampton Lectures, 1875.