ETERNAL, ETC.
In order to learn just what this important word signifies when connected with the penalties of sin, it will be instructive to inquire into its history. We shall ascertain that the original word whence it is derived, denotes indefinite, and not endless, duration, and that it never has the force of endless, except when it is applied to a subject that is intrinsically endless, and that it then acquires an added force from its subject. The Hebrew word olam and the Greek aion, and their reduplications and derivatives are the original Scripture terms that are rendered everlasting in the English Bible. We can best ascertain the meaning of the translated words by consulting the history of the original Greek term.
LEXICOGRAPHY.
Indefinite duration is the real meaning of the word. The oldest lexicographer is Hesychius, (A.D. 400) and he defines it thus: “The life of man, the time of life.” Theodoret, at the same time gives this definition; “Aion is not an existing thing, but an interval denoting time, sometimes infinite when spoken of God, sometimes proportioned to the duration of the creation, and sometimes to the life of man.” John of Damascus (S. D. 750) says, “1, The life of every man is called aion….3, The whole duration or life of this world is called aion. 4. The life after the resurrection is called ‘the aion to come.'” Phavorinus (sixteenth century) shows that theologians had corrupted the word. He says: “Aion, time, also life, also habit, or way of life. Aion is also the eternal and endless as it seems to the Theologian.” Theologians had succeeded in using the word in the sense of endless, and Phavorinus was forced to recognize their usage of it and his phraseology shows conclusively enough that he attributed to theologians the authorship of that use of the word. Schleusner: “Any space of time whether longer or shorter, past, present or future, to be determined by the persons or things spoken of, and the scope of the subjects; the life or age of man.
Aionios, a definite and a long period of time, that is, a long enduring, but still definite period of time.” Grove: Aion “Eternity; an age, life, duration, continuance of time; a revolution of ages; a dispensation of Providence, this world or life, the world or life to come; aionios, eternity, immortal, perpetual, forever, past, ancient.” Macknight: (Scotch Presbyterian) “These words being ambiguous, are always to be understood according to the nature and circumstances to which they are applied. They who understand these words in a limited sense, when applied to punishment, put no forced interpretation upon them.” Alex. Campbell: “Its radical idea is indefinite duration.” T. Southwood Smith: “Sometimes it signifies the term of human life; at other times an age, or dispensation of Providence. Its most common signification is that of age or dispensation.” Scarlett: “That aionion does not mean endless or eternal, may appear from considering that no adjective can have a greater force than the noun from which it is derived. If aion means age (which none either will or can deny) then aionion must mean age-lasting, or duration through the age or ages to which the thing spoken of relates.” Donnegan: “Time, space of time, life-time and life, the ordinary period of man’s life; the age of man; man’s estate; a long period; eternity; the spinal marrow. Aionios, of long duration, lasting, eternal, permanent.” Dr. Taylor, who wrote the Hebrew Bible three times with his own hand, said of Olam, (Greek Aion) it signifies a duration which is concealed, as being of an unknown or great length. “It signifies eternity, not from the proper force of the word, but when the sense of the place or the nature of the subject requires it, as God and his attributes.”
The definitions of other lexicographers and critics are to the same purport. We name: Schrevelius, Schweighauser, Valpey, Haley, Lutz, Wright, Benson, Gilpin, Clarke, Wakefield, Boothroyd, Simpson, Lindsey, Mardon, Acton, Locke, Hammond, Rost, Pickering, Hincks, Ewing, Pearce, Whitby, Le Clerc, Beausobre, Doddridge, Paulus, Kenrick, Lenfant, Olshausen, etc.
Dr. Edward Beecher remarks, “It commonly means merely continuity of action…all attempts to set forth eternity as the original and primary sense of aion are at war with the facts of the Greek language for five centuries, in which it denoted life and its derivative senses, and the sense eternity was unknown.” “Pertaining to the world to come,” is the sense given to “These shall go away into everlasting punishment,” by Prof Tayler Lewis, who adds: “The preacher in contending with the Universalist and the Restorationist, would commit an error, and it may be suffer a failure in his argument, should he lay the whole stress of it on the etymological or historical significance of the words aion, aionios and attempt to prove that of themselves they necessarily carry the meaning of endless duration. ‘These shall go away into the restraint, imprisonment of the world to come,’ is all we can etymologically or exegetically make of the word in this passage.”—His. Fut. ret.
Undoubtedly the definition given by Schleusner is the accurate one: “Duration determined by the subject to which it is applied.’ Thus it only expresses the idea of endlessness when connected with what is endless, i.e. God. The word great is an illustrative word. Great applied to a tree, or mountain, or man, denotes different degrees, all finite, but when referring to God, it has the sense of infinite. Infinity does not reside in the word great, but it has that meaning when applied to God. It does not impart it to God, it derives it from him. So of aionion; applied to Jonah’s residence in the fish, it means seventy hours; to the punishments of a merciful God, as long as is necessary to vindicate his law and reform his children; to God himself, eternity. What great is to size, aionios is to duration. Human beings live from a few hours to a century; nations from a century to thousands of years; and worlds, for aught that we know, from a few to many millions of years, and God is eternal. So that when we see the word applied to a human life, it denotes somewhere from a few days to a hundred years; when it is applied to a nation, it denotes anywhere from a century to ten thousand years, more or less, and when to God it means endless. In other words it denotes indefinite duration.
Dr. Beecher well observes: “The word olam, as affirmed by Taylor and Fuerst in their Hebrew Concordance means an indefinite period, age past or future and not an absolute eternity. When applied to God, the idea of eternity is derived from him, and not from the word.”
This is the deduction as we study the lexicography of the word. It expresses the indefinite duration according to the subject with which it is connected.*
*See “Aion-Aionios,” by J. W. Hanson, D.D., for an exhaustive treatise on the lexicography, etymology, classic usage and of the usage of the Old and New Testaments, and of the Christian Fathers.
CLASSIC USAGE.
Before the Hebrew Old Testament was translated into Greek (200-300 B.C., according to Prideaux, or during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, 384-347 B.C., say other authorities) this word was in common use by the Greeks. Homer, Hesiod, Æschylus, Pindar, Sophocles, Aristotle, Hippocrates, Empedocles, Euripides, Philoctetes, and Plato, all use the word, but never once does one of them give it the sense of eternity. Homer says:
(Priam to Hector) “Thyself shall be deprived of pleasant aionios,” (life). Andromache over dead Hector, “Husband, thou hast perished from aionos,” (life or time). Hesiod: “To him (the married man) during aionos (life) evil is constantly striving, etc.” Aeschylus: “This life, (aion) seems long, etc.” “Jupiter, king of the never-ceasing world” (aionos apaustau). Pindar: “A long life produces the four virtues.” (Ela de kai tessares aretas ho makros aion.) Sophocles: “Endeavor to remain the same in mind as long as you live.” Aristotle: “The entire heaven is one and eternal (aidios) having neither beginning nor end of an entire aion.” The adjective is never found until Plato. He uses aion eight times, aionios five, diaionios once, and makraion twice. Of course if he regarded aion as meaning eternity, he would not prefix the word meaning long to add duration to it.
Plato uses the adjective to denote indefinite duration. Referring to certain souls in Hades, he describes them as in aionion intoxication. But that he does not use the word in the sense of endless is evident form the Phaedon, where he says, it is a very ancient opinion that souls quitting this world, repair to the infernal regions, and return after that, to live in this world. After the aionion intoxication is over, they return to earth, which demonstrates that the word was not used by him as meaning endless. Again, he speaks of that which is indestructible, (anolethron) and not aionion. He places the two words in contrast, whereas, had he intended to use aionion as meaning endless, he would have said indestructible and aionion.
Aristotle uses the word in the same sense. He says of the earth, “All these things seem to be done for her good, in order to maintain safety during her aionos,” duration, or life. And still more to the purpose is this quotation concerning God’s existence: “Life and ‘an aion continuous and eternal, zoe kai aion sunekes kai aidios.'” Here the word aidios, (eternal) is employed to qualify aion and impart to it what it had not of itself, the sense of eternal. Aristotle could be guilty of no such language as “an eternal eternity.” Had the word aion contained the idea of eternity in his time, or in his mind, he would not have added aidios.
Ezra S. Goodwin, in the Christian Examiner, sums up an exhaustive examination of the word in the Greek classics, thus: “Those lexicographers who assign eternity as one of the meanings of aion, uniformly appeal for proofs to either theological, Hebrew or Rabbinical Greek, or some species of Geek subsequent to the age of the Seventy, if not subsequent to the age of the apostles, so far as I can ascertain. I do not know of an instance in which any lexicographer has produced the usage of ancient classical Greek, in evidence that aion means eternity. Ancient classical Greek rejects it altogether.
So when the seventy translated the Hebrew Bible into Greek, and rendered the Hebrew olam, (or gnolam) into aion and its reduplications, they must have understood that aion meant indefinite duration, for that was its uniform usage in the Greek at that time. When Jesus quoted from the Old Testament he quoted from the Septuagint, and when he used the word aionion, he used it with the exact meaning it had in Greek literature, to denote indefinite duration. This will appear as we examine.
THE OLD TESTAMENT.
The noun is found 394 times, and the adjective 110 times in the Old Testament. We will give instances of its use, that the reader may see that limited duration is the sense it carries, and we print the words translated from aion aionion in italics.
Gen. 6:4, “Mighty men which were of old, men of renown.” Gen. 9:12; God’s covenant with Noah was “for perpetual generations.” Gen. 9:16; The rainbow is the token of “the everlasting covenant” between God and “all flesh that is upon earth.” Gen. 13:15; God gave the land to Abram and his seed ‘forever‘. Dr. T. Clowes says of this passage that it signifies the duration of human life, and he adds, “let no one be surprised that we use the word Olam (Aion) in this limited sense. This is one of the most usual significations of the Hebrew olam and the Greek aion.” In Isa. 58:12, it is rendered “old” and “foundations.” “And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places; thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations.” In Jer. 18:15-16, ancient and perpetual. “They have caused them to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths, to walk in paths, in a way not cast up; to make their land desolate, and a perpetual hissing.” Such instances may be cited to an indefinite extent. Exod. 15:18. “for ever and ever, and further.” Exod. 12:17, “Ye observe this day in your generations by an ordinance forever.” Num. 10:8, “For an ordinance forever, throughout your generations.” “Your generations” is here idiomatically given as the precise equivalent of “forever.” Canaan was given as an “everlasting possession;” (Gen. 17:8, 48:4; Lev. 24:8-9) the hills are everlasting (Hab. 3:6) the priesthood of Aaron (Exod. 40:15; Num. 25:13; Lev. 16:34) was to exist forever, and continue through everlasting duration. Solomon’s temple was to last forever, (1 Chron. 17:12) though it has long since ceased to be; slaves were to remain in bondage forever (Lev. 25:46;) though every fiftieth year all Hebrew servants were to be set at liberty. (Lev. 25:10;) Jonah suffered an imprisonment behind the everlasting bars of earth, (Jonah 2:6) the smoke of Idumea was to ascend forever, (Isa. 34:10) though it no longer rises; to the Jews God says (Jer. 32:40); “and I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten;” and yet, after the fullness of the Gentiles shall come in, Israel will be restored. Rom. 11:25-26.
Not only in all these and multitudes of other cases does the word mean limited duration, but it is also used in the plural, thus debarring it from the sense of endless, as there can be but one eternity. In Dan.12:3, the literal reading, if we allow the word to mean eternity, is, “to eternities and farther.” Micah 4:5, “We will walk in the name of the Lord our God to eternity, and beyond,” Ps. 119:44, “So shall I keep thy law continually, forever and ever.” This is the strongest combination of the aionian phraseology: eis ton aiona kai eis ton aiona tou aionos, and yet it is David’s promise of fidelity as long as he lives among them that “reproach” him, in “the house of his pilgrimage.” Ps. 148:6, “The sun and moon, the stars of light, and even the water above the heavens are established forever,” and yet the firmament is one day to become as a folded garment, and the orbs of heaven are to be no more. Endless duration is out of the question in these and many similar instances.
This is the general usage: Eccl. 1:10, “Is there anything whereof it may be said, see, this is new! it hath been already of old time, which was before us.” Ps. 25:6, “Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies and thy loving kindnesses; for they have been even of old.” Ps. 99:52, “I remembered thy judgments of old, O Lord; and have comforted myself.” Isa. 46:9, “Remember the former things of old.” Isa. 64:4, “since the beginning of the world.” Jer. 28:8, “The prophets that have been before me and before thee of old prophesied both against many countries, and against great kingdoms, of war, and of evil, and of pestilence.” Jer. 2:20, “For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands.” Prov. 8:23, “I (wisdom) was set up from everlasting from the beginning, or ever the earth was.” Here aionos and “before the world was,” are in opposition. Ps. 73:12, “Behold, these are the ungodly, who prosper in the world.” Deut. 32:7, “Remember the days of old.” Isa 1:9, “Generations of old.” Micah 7:14, “Days of old.”—Same in Malachi 2:4. Ps. 48:14, “For this God is our God, for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death.” This plural form denotes “even unto death.” Christ’s kingdom is prophesied as destined to endure “forever,” “without end,” etc. Dan. 2:44; Isa. 59:21; Ps. 110:4; Isa. 9:7; Ps. 89:29. Now if anything is taught in the Bible, it is that Christ’s kingdom shall end. In 1 Cor. 25, it is expressly and explicitly declared that Jesus shall surrender the kingdom to God the Father, that his reign shall entirely cease. Hence, when we read in such passages as Dan. 2:44, that Christ’s kingdom shall stand forever, we must understand that the forever denotes the reign of Messiah, bounded by “the end,” when God shall be “all in all.”
Servants were declared to be bound forever, when all servants were emancipated every fifty years. Thus in Deut. 25:16-17, we read, “And it shall be, if he say unto thee, I will not go away from thee; because he loveth thee and thine house, because he is well with thee, then thou shalt take an awl, and thrust it through his ear unto the door, and he shall be thy servant forever.”
No one can read the Old Testament carefully and fail to see that the word has a great range of meaning, bearing some such relation to duration as the word great does to size. We say God is infinite when we call him the great God—not because great means infinite, but because God is infinite. The aionion God is of eternal duration, but the aionion smoke of Idumea has expired, and the aionion hills will one day crumble, and all merely aionion things will cease to be.
Prof. Tayler Lewis says, “‘One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever.’ This certainly indicates, not an endless eternity in the strictest sense of the word, but only a future of unlimited length. Exod. 31:16, ‘Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.'” Where the context demands it, as “I live forever,” spoken of God, he says it means endless duration, for “it is the subject to which it is applied that forces to this, and not any etymological necessity in the world itself.”
The End of Aionian [Eónian] Things.
The Jews have lost their excellency; Aaron and his sons have ceased from their priesthood; the mosaic system is superseded by Christianity; the Jews no longer possess Canaan; David and his house have lost the throne of Israel; the Jewish temple is destroyed, and Jerusalem no longer the holy city; the servants who were to be bondmen forever, are all free from their masters; Gehazi is cured of his leprosy; the stones are removed from Jordan, and the smoke of Idumea no longer rises; the righteous do not possess the land promised them forever; some of the hills and mountains have fallen, and the tooth of Time will one day gnaw the last of them into dust; the fire has expired from the Jewish altar; Jonah has escaped his imprisonment; all these and numerous other eternal, everlasting things—things that were to last forever, and to which the various aionion words are applied—have now ended, and if these hundreds of instances must denote limited duration why should the few times in which punishments are spoken of have any other meaning? Even if endless duration were the intrinsic meaning of the word, all intelligent readers of the Bible would perceive that the word must be employed to denote limited duration in the passages above cited. And surely in the very few times in which it is connected with punishment it must have a similar meaning. For who administers this punishment? Not a monster, not an infinite devil, but a God of love and mercy; and the same common sense that would forbid us to give the word the meaning of endless duration, were that its literal meaning, when we see it applied to what we know has ended, would forbid us to give it that meaning when applied to the dealings of an Infinite Father with an erring and beloved child.
Everlasting Contempt.
The principal passage in the Old Testament containing the word everlasting, connected with suffering, is Dan. 12:2, “and many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” When was this to take place? “At that time.” What time? Verse 31, chap. 11, speaks of the coming of “the abomination that maketh desolate.” Jesus says, Matt. 24:15-16; Luke 21:20-21, “When ye therefore (the disciples) shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet stand in the holy place, then let them which be in Judea flee to the mountains. And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto.” Daniel says this was to be (12:7) “when he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people.” And he says, “At that time there shall be a time of trouble, such as there never was since there was a nation even to that same time.”
Jesus says, “for then shall be great tribulations, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time; no, nor ever shall be.” And when that was Jesus tells us, “this generation shall not pass away till all these things be fulfilled.” The events announced in Daniel are the same as those in Matt. 24, and occurred in the generation that crucified Jesus. The phrase “sleep in the dust of the earth” is employed figuratively, to indicate sloth, spiritual lethargy, as in Ps. 44:25; Isa. 25:12, 26:5; 1 Tim. 5:6; Rev. 3:1; “For our soul is bowed down to the dust;” “And the high fort of thy walls shall he bring down, lay low, and bring to the ground, even to the dust;” “For he bringeth down them that dwell on high; the lofty city, he layeth it low; he layeth it low even to the ground; he bringeth it even to the dust;” “But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth;” “I know thy works; that thou hast a name, that thou livest and art dead.” Cruden says that “dust” signifies “a most low and miserable condition.” “God raised up the poor out of the dust.” (1 Sam. 2:8) “Thy nobles shall dwell in the dust.” (Nahum 3:18) They shall be reduced to a mean condition.”
It was a prophecy of the moral awakening that came at the time of the advent of Jesus, and was then fulfilled. When we come to Matt. 24 and 25 we shall see the exact nature of this judgment. Walter Balfour describes it, “They,” (those who obeyed the call of Jesus) “heard the voice of the Son of God and lived.” See John 5:21,25,28,29; Eph. 5:14. The rest kept on till the wrath of God came on them to the uttermost. They all, at last, awoke; but it was to shame and everlasting contempt, in being dispersed among all nations, and they have become a by-word and an hissing even unto this day. Jeremiah in chapter 23:39-40 predicted this very punishment, and calls it an “everlasting reproach and a perpetual shame.”
Isaiah uses similar language: “Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion: put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city; for henceforth there shall no more come unto thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem.” etc. Isa 52:1-2. This call was obeyed, and the language of Daniel was fulfilled when “among the chief rulers, also many believed on him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue. For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.” John 12:42-43. Those who accepted him enjoyed the eternal life of the gospel, but those who rejected him had shame and contempt. This language is exactly parallel to Matt. 24, 25.
Everlasting Burnings.
In Isa. 33:14, we read, “Who among you shall dwell with everlasting burnings?”
This language refers entirely to this life. The prophet had said (Isa. 31:9) that the Lord’s “fire is in Zion and his furnace in Jerusalem,” and he adds: “And the Lord shall cause his glorious voice to be heard, and shall show the lighting down of his arm, with the indignation of his anger, and with the flame of a devouring fire, with scattering, and tempest, and hailstones.”
When he asks who shall dwell amid these “everlasting burnings” he refers to those fires which he had spoken of as about to consume the land. Ezekiel describes them, 20:47.
“Behold, I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour every green tree in thee, and every dry tree; the flaming flame shall not be quenched, and all faces from the south to the north shall be burned therein.”
Jeremiah agrees with the other prophets, 17:27.
“But if ye will not hearken unto me, to hallow the Sabbath day and not to bear a burden, even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day; then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.”
The “everlasting burnings” denote the temporal judgments about to come upon the Jewish people.
Out of more than five hundred occurrences of the word in the Old Testament more than four hundred denote limited duration, so that the great preponderance of the Old Testament usage fully agrees with the Greek classics.
Now if endless punishment awaits millions of the human race, and if it is denoted by this word, is it possible that only David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and Malachi use the word to define punishment, in all less than a dozen times, while Job, Moses, Joshua, Ruth, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Solomon, Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habbakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai and Zachariah never employed it thus? Such silence is criminal, on the popular hypothesis. These holy men should and would have made every sentence bristle with the word, and thus have borne the awful message to the soul with an emphasis that could neither be resisted or disputed. The fact that the word is so seldom, and by so few applied to punishment, and never in the Old Testament to punishment beyond death, demonstrates that it cannot mean endless.
The best critics of all creeds agree that endless punishment is not taught in the Old Testament, and if so, of course the world everlasting cannot mean endless in the Old Testament, when applied to punishment.
Says Milman” “The lawgiver (Moses) maintains a profound silence on that fundamental article, if not of political, at least of religious legislation—rewards and punishments in another life.” Warburton: “In no one place of the Mosaic institutes is there the least mention of the rewards and punishments of another life.” Paley, Jahn, Whately are to the same purport, and H. W. Beecher says, “if we only had the Old Testament we could not tell if there were any future punishment.”
Three questions here press the mind with irresistible force, and they can only receive one answer. 1st, Had God intended endless punishment, would the Old Testament have failed to reveal it? 2d, If God does not announce it in the Old Testament, is it supposable that he has revealed it elsewhere? 3d, Would he for thousands of years conceal so awful a destiny from millions whom he had created an exposed to it? No child of God ought to be willing to impeach his Heavenly Father by withholding an indignant negative to these questions.
JEWISH GREEK USAGE
Josephus and Philo, Jewish Greeks, who wrote between the Old and New Testaments, use the word with the meaning of temporal duration, always.
Josephus applies the word to the imprisonment to which John the tyrant was condemned by the Romans; to the reputation of Herod; to the everlasting memorial erected in re-building the temple, already destroyed, when he wrote; to the everlasting worship in the temple, which in the same sentence he says was destroyed; and he styles the time between the promulgation of the law and his writing a long aion. To accuse him of attaching any other meaning than that of indefinite duration to the word, is to accuse him of stultifying himself. But when he writes to describe endless duration he employs other, and less equivocal terms. Alluding to the Pharisees, he says:
“They believe that the wicked are detained in an everlasting prison [eirgmon aidion] subject to eternal punishment” [aidios timoria] and the Essenes [another, Jewish sect] “Allotted to bad souls a dark, tempestuous place, full of never-ceasing punishment [timoria adialeipton] where they suffer a deathless punishment, (athanaton timorian).
Philo, who was contemporary with Christ, generally used aidion to denote endless, and always used aionion to describe temporary duration. Dr. Mangey, in his edition of Philo says he never used aionion for interminable duration. He uses the exact phraseology of Matthew, 25:46, precisely as Christ used it. “It is better not to promise than not to give prompt assistance, for no blame follows in the former case, but in the latter there is dissatisfaction from the weaker class, and a deep hatred and everlasting punishment (kolasis aionios) from such as are more powerful.” Here we have the exact terms employed by our Lord, to show that aionion did not mean endless but did mean limited duration in the time of Christ.
Thus the Jews of our Savior’s time avoided using the word aionion to denote endless duration, for applied all through the Bible to temporary affairs, it would not teach it.
THE NEW TESTAMENT
The different forms of the word occur in the New Testament one hundred and ninety-nine times, the noun one hundred and twenty-eight, and the adjective seventy-one times.
In our common translation the noun is rendered seventy-two times ever, twice eternal, thirty-nine times world, seven times never, three times evermore, twice worlds, twice ages, once course, once world without end, and twice it is passed over without any word affixed as a translation of it. The adjective is rendered once ever, forty-two times eternal, three times world, twenty-five times everlasting, and once former ages.
Of course the word must mean in the New Testament what it does in all Greek books and among Greek-speaking people. Temporal, indefinite duration, we have shown to be its meaning in the Classics, the Old Testament, and the Jewish Greek. The New Testament meaning is the same. The fact its usage shows.
The Noun.
1. It is applied to the kingdom of Christ. Luke 1:33, “And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.” See also 1:55; Heb. 6:20; 7:17-21; 1 Pet. 4:11; 2 Pet. 1:11, 3:18; Rev. 1:6; 11:15. But the kingdom of Christ is to end, and he is to surrender all dominion to the Father, therefore endless duration is not taught in these passages. See 1 Cor. 15.
2. It is applied to the Jewish age more than thirty times: 1 Cor. 10:11, “Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples; and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.” Consult also Matt., 12:32; 13:22,39,40,49; 24:3; 27:20; Mark 4:19; Luke 1:70; 16:8; 20:34; John 9:32; Acts 3:32; 15:18; Rom. 12:2; 1 Cor. 2:6,7,8; 3:18; 2 Cor. 4:4; Gal. 1:4; Eph. 1:21; 2:2; 3:9; 1 Tim. 6:17; 2 Tim. 4:10; Titus 2:12; Heb. 9:26. But the Jewish age ended with the setting up of the kingdom of Christ. Then the word does not denote endless duration here.
3. It is used in the plural in Eph. 3:21; “the age of the ages,” tou aionas ton aionon. Heb. 1:2; 11:3, “By whom he made the worlds.” “The worlds were framed by the word of God.” There can be but one eternity. To say “By whom he made the eternities” would be to talk nonsense. Endless duration is not inculcated in these texts.
4. The word clearly teaches finite duration in such passages as Rom. 16:35; 2 Cor. 4:17; 2 Tim. 1:9; Philemon 1:15; Titus 1:2. Read Rom. 16:25: “Since the world began.”—2 Cor. 4:17: “a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” Here “and” is a word supplied by the translators, and the literal is “an excessively exceeding aionian weight.” But endless cannot be exceeded. Therefore aionion does not here mean eternal.
Let us give more definitely several passages in which all will agree that the word cannot have the sense of endless. We print the word denoting duration in italics; Matt. 12:22: “The care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, the cares of that age or “time.” Verses, 39, 40, 49, “The harvest is the end of the world” i.e. age, Jewish age, the “end” taught in Matt. 24, which some who heard Jesus speak were to live to see, and did see. Luke 1:33, “And he (Jesus) shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end.” The meaning is, he shall reign for ages. That long, indefinite duration is meant here, but limited, is evident from 1 Cor. 15:28, “And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.” His reign is forever, i.e. to the ages, but it is to cease. Luke 1:55, “as he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever, (to an age, aionos). Luke 1:70. “As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began, or “from an age.” “Of old,” would be the correct construction. Luke 16:8, “For the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light.”
That is, the people of that time were more prudent in the management of their affairs than were the Christians of that day in their plans. John 9:32, “Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind.” From the age, that is from the beginning of our knowledge and history. Rom. 16:25, “Since the world began,” clearly shows a duration less than eternity, inasmuch as the mystery that had been secret since the world began, was then revealed. The mystery was aionian but did not last eternally. It was “now made manifest” “to all nations.” Phil. 4:20. “Now unto God and our Father be glory for ever and ever,” for the ages of the ages. “For the eternities of the eternities,” is an absurd expression, but ages of ages is a proper sentence. Eternity may be meant here, but if the word aion expressed the idea, such a reduplication would be weak and improper. 1 Tim. 6:16, “Charge them that are rich in this world,” (age or time). 1 Tim. 1:17, “Now to the King eternal (of the ages) be glory for the ages of the ages.” What is this but an ascription of the ages to the God of the ages? Eternity can only be meant here as ages piled on ages imply long, and possibly endless duration. “All the ages are God’s; him let the ages glorify,” is the full import of the words. Translate the words eternity, and what nonsense. “Now to the God of the eternities be glory for the eternities of the eternities.” Heb. 1:8. “The age of the age” Eph. 2:7, “That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace.” Here at least two aions are in the future.
Certainly one of them must end before the other begins. Eph. 3:21, “The generations of the ages of the ages.” 2 Tim. 4:18, “The ages of the ages.” The same form of expression is in Heb. 13:21; 1 Pet. 4:11; Rev. 1:6, 4:9, 5:13, 7:12, 14:11, 15:7, 20:10. When we read that the smoke of their torment ascends for ages of ages, we get the idea of long, indefinite, but limited duration, for as one age is limited, any number, however great, must be limited. The moment we say the smoke of their torment goes up for eternities of eternities, we transform sacred rhetoric into jargon. There is but one eternity therefore as we read of more than one aion, it follows that aion cannot mean eternity. Again, 1 Cor. 10:11, “Our admonition, on whom the ends of the aions have come.” That is, the close of the Mosaic and the beginning of the Gospel age. How absurd to say “ends of the eternities!” Here the apostle had passed more than one, and entered consequently, upon at least a third aion. Heb. 9:26, “Now at an end of the ages.” Matt. 13:39,40, 24:3. “The conclusion of the age.” Eternity has no end. And to say ends of eternity is to talk nonsense. 2 Tim. 1:9, “Before the world began, i.e. before the aionian times began. There was no beginning to eternity, therefore the adjective aionion here has no such meaning as eternal. The fact that aion is said to end and begin, is a demonstration that it does not mean eternity.
Translate the word eternity, and how absurd the Scriptural phraseology becomes! We represent the Bible as saying, “To whom be the glory during the eternities even to the eternities.” Gal. 1:5, “Now all these things happened unto them, for ensamples, and they are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the eternities are come.” 1 Cor. 10:11. “That in the eternities coming he might show the exceeding riches of his grace.” Eph. 2:7. “The mystery which hath been hid from the eternities and from the generations.” Col. 1:26. “But now once in the end of the eternities, hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” Heb. 9:26. “The harvest is the end of eternity.” Matt. 13:39. “So shall it be in the end of eternity.” Matt. 13:40, “Tell us when shall these things be, and what the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the eternity.” Matt. 24:3. But substitute “age” or “ages” and the sense of the Record is preserved.
The Adjective
occurs seventy-two times in the New Testament. Of these fifty-seven are used in relation to the happiness of the righteous; three in relation to God or his glory; four are of a miscellaneous nature; and seven only relate to the subject of punishment. The word in all its forms describes punishment only fourteen times in thirteen passages in the entire New Testament, and these were uttered on ten occasions only. The Noun. Matt. 12:32, Mark 3:29, 2 Pet. 2:17, Jude 13, Rev. 14:11, 19:23, 20:10. The Adjective, Matt. 17:8, 25:41, 46, Mark 3:29, 2 Thess. 1:9, Heb. 6:2, Jude 7.
Now if God’s punishments are limited, we can understand how this word should be used only fourteen times to define them. But if they are endless how can we explain the employment of this equivocal word so few times in the entire New Testament? A doctrine, that if true, ought to crowd every sentence, frown in every line, only stated fourteen times, and that too, by a word whose uniform meaning everywhere else is limited duration! The idea is preposterous. If the word denotes limited duration, the punishments threatened in the New Testament are like those that experience teaches follow transgression. But if it mean endless, how can we account for the fact that neither Luke nor John records one instance of its use by the Savior, and Matthew but four, and Mark but two, and that Paul employs it but twice in his ministry, while John and James in their epistles never allude to it?
Let us consider all the passages in the New Testament in which the word is connected with punishment.
The Great Proof Text.
Matt. 25:46 is the great proof text of the doctrine of endless punishment: “These shall go away into everlasting punishment, and the righteous into life eternal.”
1. That the popular view of this language is incorrect is evident, because those punished are those who have not been good to the poor. Only such are to suffer everlasting punishment. Endless life is the reward, and endless punishment the penalty of works, if this passage teaches the doctrine of endless punishment. Those receive that punishment who have not been kind to the poor.
2. God’s punishments are remedial. All God’s punishments are those of a Father, and must therefore be adapted to the improvement of his children. Heb. 12:5-11, “My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: for whom the lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons: for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not: Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit that we might be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless, afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.” Prov. 3:11-12, “My son despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction: For whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son of whom he delighteth.” Lam. 3:31-33. “For the Lord will not cast off forever: But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.” See also Job 5:17; Lev, 26; Psalms 119:67,71,75; Jer. 2:19.
3. The word translated punishment means discipline, improvement. The word is kolasin. It is thus defined: Greenfield, “Chastisement, punishment.” Hedericus, “The trimming of the luxuriant branches of a tree or vine to improve it and make it fruitful.” Donnegan, “The act of clipping or pruning—restriction, restraint, reproof, check, chastisement.” See Grotius, Liddell, and others. Says Max Muller, “Do we want to know what was uppermost in the minds of those who formed the word punishment, the Latin poena or punio, to punish, the root pu in Sanscrit, which means to cleanse, to purify, tells us that the Latin derivation was originally formed, not to express mere striking or torture, but cleansing, correcting, delivering form the stain of sin.” That it had this meaning in Greek usage we cite Plato: “For the natural or accidental evils of others, no one gets angry, or admonishes, or teaches or punishes (kolazei) them, but we pity those afflicted with such misfortunes. * * For if, O Socrates, you will consider what is the design of punishing (kolazein) the wicked, this of itself will show you that men think virtue something that may be acquired; for no one punishes (kolazlei) the wicked, looking to the past only, simply for the wrong he has done,—that is, no one does this thing who does not act like a wild beast, desiring revenge, only without thought—hence he who seeks to punish (kolazein) with reason, does not punish for the sake of the past wrong deed, * * but for the sake of the future, that neither the man himself who is punished may do wrong again, nor any other who has seen him chastised. And he who entertains this thought, must believe that virtue may be taught, and he punishes (kolazei) from the purpose of deterring from wickedness.”
4. These events have occurred. The events here described took place in this world within thirty years of the time when Jesus spoke. They are now past. In Matt. 24:3, the disciples asked our Lord when the then existing age would end. The word (aion) is unfortunately translated world. Had he meant world he would have employed kosmos, the Greek word for world. After describing the particulars, he announced that they would all be fulfilled, and the aion end in that generation, before some of his auditors should die. If he was correct, the end came then. And this is demonstrated by a careful study of the entire discourse, running through Matt. 24 and 25. The disciples asked Jesus how they should know his coming and the end of the age. They did not inquire concerning the end of the actual world, as it is incorrectly translated, but age. This question Jesus answered by describing the signs so that they, his questioners, the disciples themselves, might perceive the approach of the end of the Jewish dispensation, (aion). He speaks fifteen times in the discourse of his speedy coming, (Matt. 24:3,27,30,37,39,42,46,48,50, and 25:6, 10,13,19,27,31). He addresses those who shall be alive at his coming. Matt. 24:6. “Ye shall hear of wars, etc.” 20, “Pray that your flight be not in the winter,” 33, 34. “So likewise ye when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, this generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.”
This whole account is a parable describing the end of the Jewish aion, age, or economy, signalized by the destruction of Jerusalem, and the establishment of the new aion world, or age to come, that is the Christian dispensation. Now on the authority of Jesus himself, the aion then existing ended within a generation, namely, about A. D. 70. Hence those who were sent away into aionian punishment, or the punishment of that aion, were sent into a condition corresponding in duration to the meaning of the word aion, i.e. agelasting. A punishment cannot be endless, when defined by an adjective derived form a noun describing an event, the end of which is distinctly stated to have come.
Therefore, (1) the fulfillment of the language in this life, (2) the meaning of aionion, (3) the meaning of kolasis, and (4) the nature of the divine punishments, demonstrate that the penalty threatened in Matt. 25:46 is a limited one. Prof. Tayler Lewis, (orthodox) thus translates Matt. 25:46: “These shall go away into the punishment (the restraint, imprisonment) of the world to come, and those into the life of the world to come.” And he says “that is all that we can etymologically or exegetically make of the word in this passage.”
But did Christ come the second time as he had said he would before the death of some of his hearers? He did not personally, but spiritually, by the power of his grace and truth. On this subject here is what the most prominent orthodox commentators say:
Archbishop Newcome: “The coming of Christ to destroy the Jews, was a virtual and not a real one, and was to be understood figuratively and not literally. The destruction of Jerusalem by Titus is emphatically the coming of Christ. The spirit of the prophecy speaks particularly of this, because the city and temple were then destroyed, and the civil and ecclesiastical state of the Jews subverted. The Jews also suffered very great calamities under Adrian; but not so great as those under Vespasian; and the desolation under Adrian is not so particularly foretold. But I think that any signal interposition in behalf of his church, or in the destruction of his enemies, may be metaphorically called a coming of Christ.” Dr. Campbell remarks on the expression, “Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven: We have no reason to think that a particular phenomenon in the sky is here suggested. The striking evidences which would be given of the divine presence, and avenging justice, are a justification of the terms.”
Kenrick observes: “The great power and glory of Christ were as conspicuously displayed at the destruction of Jerusalem, and other circumstances which accompanied that event, as if they had seen him coming upon the clouds of heaven, to punish his enemies. When the prophet Isaiah represents God as about to punish the Egyptians, he speaks of him as riding upon a swift cloud for that purpose. (Isa. 19:1) In that case there was no visible appearance of Jehovah upon a cloud; but it was language which the prophet adopted, in order to express the evident hand of God in the calamities of Egypt. The same thing may be said of the language of Christ upon the present occasion.” Dr. Hammond interprets Christ’s coming, to be a “coming in the exercise of his kingly office to work vengeance on his enemies, and discriminate the faithful believers from them.”
Again he says: “The only objection against this interpretation is, that this destruction being wrought by the Roman army, and those as much enemies of Christianity as any, and the very same people that had joined with the Jews to put Christ to death, it doth thereupon appear strange that either of those armies which are called abominable, should be called God’s armies, or that Christ should be said to come, when in truth it was Vespasian and Titus that thus came against the people. To this I answer, that it is ordinary with God, in the Old Testament, to call those Babylonish, Assyrian heathen armies his, which did his work in punishing the Jews, when they rebelled against Him. Christ is fitly said to come, when his ministers do come, that is, when either heathen men, or Satan himself, who are executioners of God’s will, when they think not of it, are permitted by Him to work destruction on his enemies.” Dr. Whitby says: “These words, this age or generation shall not pass away, afford a full demonstration that all which Christ had mentioned hitherto, was to be accomplished, not at the time of the conversion of the Jews, or at the final day of judgment, but in that very age, or whilst some of that generation of men lived; for the phrase never bears any other sense in the New Testament, than the men of this age.”
The End of The World.
Matt. 13:40-50: “The harvest at the end of the world,” should be “end of this age.” Dr. Wakefield thus comments: “The harvest is the conclusion of this age, and the reapers are the messengers; as therefore the weeds are picked out and burned up with a fire, so shall it also be in the conclusion of this age.” Dr. A. Clarke renders end of the world (vs. 19, 43) “end of the age—Jewish polity.” So also Dr. Macknight. Dr. Campbell translates it the “conclusion of the state.” Bishop Pearce says, on verse 40: “End of this world; rather end of this age, viz: that of the Jewish dispensation.” And Dr. Hammond translates it, “conclusion of this age.”
The end of the material world is never taught in the Bible. We have no Scriptural evidence that the earth will ever be destroyed. The word rendered world in all passages that speak of the end, is aion, which means age, and not kosmos, which denotes world. The phrase only occurs seven times in the whole Bible, and that in three books, all in the New Testament.
In Matt. 13:36-42, “the field is the world (kosmos) but “the harvest is the end of the age,” (aion, improperly rendered world) that is, the end of the Jewish dispensation. But one passage need be consulted to learn when that event was to occur. Jesus told his disciples when they asked (Matt. 24:3) “What shall be the sign of the end of the world,” (Matt. 24:34) “This generation shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled.” It had almost arrived, a little later when Paul said (Heb. 9:26) “But now once in the end of the world hath he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” The end of the world in all cases means the end of the age, or epoch then transpiring, that is the Jewish dispensation.
The Last Days.
The terms “last days,” “end of the world,” etc. found in connection with judgment, are made very clear to the careful reader of the Bible. The words “last day,” “last days,” etc., refer to the closing of the Mosaic dispensation, and not, as is often supposed, to the final closing up of mundane affairs. Peter demonstrates this, by applying the words of Joel to what was then transpiring, Acts 2:16— 20, “But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel, And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: and on my servants, and on my handmaidens, I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy: and I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath, blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke: the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come.” Paul testifies to the same idea, Heb. 1:1-2, “God, who at sundry times, and in divers manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds,” 1 Peter 1:20. “Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you.” See, also, 1 John 2:18, “Little children, it is the last time.” Peter says, 1 Peter 4:7, “But the end of all things is at hand.“
The “last days” always refer to the end of Judaism, and the establishment of Christianity, and not to the closing of human affairs on earth.
An Objection Answered.
Objectors sometimes say, “Then eternal life is not endless, for the same Greek adjective qualifies life and punishment.” This does not follow, for the word is used in Greek in different senses in the same sentence; as in Hab. 3:6. “And the everlasting mountains were scattered, his ways are everlasting.” Suppose we apply the popular argument here. The mountains and God must be of equal duration, for the same word is applied to both. Both are temporal or both are endless. But the mountains are expressly stated to be temporal—they “were scattered,” —therefore God is not eternal. Or God is eternal and therefore the mountains must be. But they cannot be, for they were scattered. The argument does not hold water. The aionion mountains are all to be destroyed. Hence the word everlasting may denote both limited and unlimited duration in the same passage, the different meanings to be determined by the subject treated.
The phrase “everlasting” or “eternal life” does not usually denote endless existence, but the life of the gospel, spiritual life, the Christian life, regardless of its duration. In more than fifty of the seventy-two times that the adjective occurs in the New Testament, it describes life. What is eternal life? Let the Scriptures answer. John 3:36, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” John 5:24, “He that believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation. but is passed from death unto life.” John 6:47, “He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.” So verse 54. John 17:3, “This is life eternal to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” Eternal life is the life of the gospel. Its duration depends on the possessor’s fidelity. It is no less the aionion life, if one abandon it in a month after acquiring it. It consists in knowing, loving and serving God, regardless of the duration of the service. How often the good fall from grace. Believing, they have the aionion life, but they lose it by apostasy. Notoriously it is not, in thousands of cases, endless. The life is of an indefinite length, so that the usage of the adjective in the New Testament is altogether in favor of giving the word the sense of limited duration. Hence Jesus does not say “he that believeth, in this life, shall enjoy endless happiness in the next, but hath everlasting life,” and “is passed from death unto life.”
Clemence in his work on “Future Punishment” observes, correctly, that aion and aionion are “words that shine with reflected light,” i.e., says Canon Farrar, “that their meaning depends entirely on the words with which they are joined, so that it is quite false to say that aionios joined with zoe must mean the same as aionios joined with kolasis. The word means endless in neither clause.” Clemence continues: “If good should come to an end, that would come to an end which Christ died to bring in; but if evil comes to an end, that comes to an end which he died to destroy. So that the two stand by no means on the same footing.”
Words Denoting Endlessness.
Besides, the endless life is described by words that are never applied to anything of limited duration. This appears from the following passages:
Heb. 7:15-16, “And it is yet far more evident: for that after the similitude of Melchizedek there ariseth another priest, who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless (akatalutos, imperishable) life.” 1 Pet. 1:3-4, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, (aphtharton) and undefiled, and that fadeth not (amaranton) away.” 1 Pet. 5:4, “and when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not (amarantinos) away.” 1 Tim. 1:17, “Now unto the King eternal, immortal (aphtharto), invisible, the only wise God be honor and glory forever and ever, Amen.” Rom. 1:23, ‘And changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man.” 1 Cor. 9:25, “Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.” 1 Cor. 15:51-54, “Behold I shew you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, (aphthartoi) and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, (aphtharsian) and this mortal must put on immortality (athanasian) So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, (aphtharsian) and this mortal shall have put on immortality, (athanasian) then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.” Rom. 2:7, “To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and immortality (aptharsain) eternal life.” 1 Cor. 15:423, “So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption (aphtharsian).” See also verse 50. 2 Tim. 1:10, “Hath brought life and immortality (aphtharisan) to light, through the gospel.” 1 Tim. 6:16, “Who only hath immortality (athanasian).
Now these words are applied to God and the soul’s happiness. They are words that in the Bible are never applied to punishment or anything perishable. They would have been affixed to punishment had the Bible intended to teach endless punishment. And certainly they show the error of those who declare that the indefinite word aionion is all the word, or the strongest one in the Bible, declarative of the endlessness of life beyond the grave.
All Nations Not Gathered Then.
If it be said “all nations were not gathered, we reply that the terms of this parable are not to be understood as literal, but as they are used in the New Testament. Matt. 24:9, Christ says the disciples are to be hated by all nations. The Gospel was to be preached to all nations before the destruction of Jerusalem. (5;14) Paige says, “The terms nation and kingdom were sometimes applied by the Jews to any state, province, or even a separate municipal district.”
Is it objected that the fire was prepared for the devil and his angels. We answer wicked men are called devils in 2 Tim. 3:3, (diabolos) translated false accusers. Rev. 2:10, “Behold the devil shall cast some of you into prison.” Judas was called a devil, John 6:70. Titus 2:8, Aged women are exhorted not to be devils (diabolos, rendered false accusers). The devil and his angels were wicked people.
The events in Matt. 25 have all taken place; the life and the punishment were both limited, and neither the reward promised nor the punishment threatened was to be in the future life. There is no reference to a “General Judgment” in any part of the language.
Eternal Judgment.
“Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment..”—Hebrews 6:1-2.
The word eternal is here used in the sense of ancient, and alludes to the calamities that had come upon wrong-doers. The comments of Bishop Pearce are clear and accurate: “I think, therefore, that the words are to be understood in a very different manner, and krima here seems to me to be put for temporal judgments. Thus the word used 1 Pet. 4:17 ‘the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God,’ where the context will not suffer us to take it in any other sense; compare verses 16, 18, 19. So again, 1 Cor. 11:29, ‘He that eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body.’ What this judgment was, appears by the next verse: ‘For this cause many are weakly and sick among you, and many sleep.’ The word aionios, which we have rendered eternal, I take to respect not the time to come, but the time past, and to signify ancient, or past long ago.” Thus the destruction, fire, punishment and judgments of God that are called eternal or everlasting, are limited. They are ordained by a Father for the correction and discipline and welfare of his children, the issue of which is restoration to righteousness.
Everlasting Chain.
“And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.”—Jude 1:6
The word here rendered everlasting is not aionios, indefinite duration, but aidios, whose intrinsic meaning is endless. It is found in one other place in the New Testament, Rom. 1:20, “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.”
Now it must be admitted that this word among the Greeks had the sense of eternal, and should be understood as having that meaning wherever found, unless by express limitation it is shorn of its proper meaning. It is further admitted that had aidios occurred where aionios does, there would be no excape from the conclusion that the New Testament teaches Endless Punishment. It is further admitted that the word is here used in the exact sense of aionios, as is seen in the succeeding verse: “Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of aionian fire.” That is to say, the “aidios chains” in verse 6 are “even as” durable as the “aionion fire” in verse 7. Which word modifies the other?
1. The construction of the language shows that the latter word limits the former. The aidios chains are even as the aionion fire. As if one should say “I have been infinitely troubled, I have been vexed for an hour,” or “He is an endless talker, he can talk five yours on a stretch.” Now while “infinitely” and “endless” usually convey the sense of unlimited, they are here limited by what follows, as aidios, eternal, is limited by aionios, indefinitely long.
2. That this is the correct exegesis is evident from still another limitation of the word. “The angels . . . he hath reserved in everlasting chains unto the judgment of the great day.” Had Jude said that the angels are held in aidios chains, and stopped there, not limiting the word, it might be claimed that he taught their eternal imprisonment. But when he limits the duration by aionios and them expressly states that it is only unto a certain date, it follows that the imprisonment will terminate, even though we find applied to it a word that intrinsically signifies eternal duration, and that was used by the Greeks to convey the idea of eternity, and was attached to punishment by the Greek Jews of our Savior’s times, to describe endless punishment, in which they were believers.
But observe, while this word aidios was in universal use among the Greek Jews of our Savior’s day, to convey the idea of eternal duration, and was used by them to teach endless punishment, Jesus never allowed himself to use it in connection with punishment, nor did any of his disciples but one, and he but once, and then carefully and expressly limited its meaning. Can demonstration go further than this to show that Jesus carefully avoided the phraseology by which his contemporaries described the doctrine of endless punishment? He never adopted the language of his day on this subject. Their language was aidios timoria, endless torment. His language was aionion kolasin, age-lasting correction. They described unending ruin, he, discipline, resulting in reformation.
Who these angels were, that fell from their first estate, it does not belong to our purpose to inquire at length. Their chains were to be dissolved when the judgment should come. They were only to last “unto judgment.” See remarks under Tartarus in this volume.
Everlasting Destruction.
“Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you; who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.”—2 Thessalonians 1:6-9
Who were troubling the Christians of the Thessalonican Church? We are told in Acts 17:5-8, that their persecutors were the Jews.
“But the Jews which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. And they troubled the people, and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things.”
Also, 1 Thess. 2:14-15: “For ye also have suffered like things of your own countrymen….Who have killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us.”
When were they persecuted? In a few years from that time:
“For the son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”—Matt. 16:27-28.
Presence of The Lord.
How were they banished from the “presence of the Lord?” “The presence of the Lord” is a form of expression denoting God’s approbation. Such is its usage in the Bible. “Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden.” Gen. 4:16. “Jonah rose up to flee into Tarshish, from the presence of the Lord, and went down to Joppa.” Jonah 1:3 “My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.” Exodus 33:14.
In the former years when the Jews were captive in Babylon, they were cast out of the presence of the Lord. 2 Kings 24:20.
So when, during that generation, the Jews were overwhelmed, they went into everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord. Long before these very terms had been applied to them as a people, and to their sorrows in this world.
“Therefore, behold I, even I will utterly forget you, and I will forsake you, and the city that I gave you, and your fathers, and cast you out of my presence; and I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you, and a perpetual shame which shall not be forgotten.”—Jer. 23:39-40
A similar doom was visited upon them when they were again overwhelmed, before the death of some who were then living. (Matt. 16:2-28. Matt. 24) Was this everlasting destruction without end, and final? Paul expressly says not. “For if the casting away of them [the Jews] be the reconciling of the world, [the Gentiles] what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead.” Rom. 11:15. “Blindness in part has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in; and so all Israel shall be saved.” Rom. 11:25-26. “For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.” Rom. 11:32
The Commentator, Gill, says: “‘And to you who are troubled rest with us;’ this is another branch of the justice of God, in rendering to them who are afflicted and persecuted for righteousness sake, rest; a relaxation or rest from persecutions, for a while, at least; as the churches of Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had, from that persecution, raised at the death of Stephen, (Acts 9:31) and as the Christians had, at the destruction of Jerusalem; which, though it was a day of vengeance to the unbelieving Jews, were times of refreshing to the saints, who were now delivered from their persecutors.”
Thus the word everlasting connected with destruction denoted limited duration, for it is followed by restoration. The word destruction denotes sometimes annihilation, Matt. 5:17, “I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill;” 1 John 3:8, “Might destroy the works of the devil;” Hos. 13:14, “O grave, I will be thy destruction;” 1 Cor. 5:5, “Deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus,” that is, the mortification or subjection of the fleshly propensities, etc. Sometimes it indicates tribulation as Ps. xc:3. “Thou turnest man to destruction;” Hos. 4:6, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge;” and 13:9, “O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thy help.’
Banished From God’s Presence.
The following extract from Balfour’s Second Inquiry presents this subject correctly:
“By the presence of God, or presence of the Lord, in scripture, is sometimes meant his being everywhere present. Thus, David says, Ps. 139:8, ‘If I ascend up into heaven thou art there; if I make my bed in hell (sheol), behold, thou art there,’ etc. Admitting for argument’s sake, that hell is a place of endless punishment, how could the wicked even there be out of God’s presence? Yet, in 2 Thess. 1:9, the Jews are said to be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord. Again; I find the phrase presence of the Lord, refers to heaven, or the dwelling-place of the Most High. Christ is said to have gone ‘into heaven now to appear in the presence of God for us.’ Heb. 9:24. And it is said, Luke 1:19, ‘I am Gabriel, that stand in the presence of God.‘ But how could the wicked be punished with everlasting destruction from God’s presence in this sense? For surely no one will say that they were in heaven, and like Gabriel stood in the presence of God.
“But there are still some passages which deserve our particular notice, because they clearly decide what is the meaning of the phrase, presence of the Lord. The first is, 2 Kings 13:24, ‘And the Lord was gracious unto them, and had compassion on them, because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not destroy them, neither cast them from his presence as yet.’ This was spoken of the Jews; and just notice, that God speaks of destroying them, and casting them from his presence. What he here says. That as yet, he would not do to this people, in the following passage we find that he did do. 2 Kings 24:20, ‘For through the anger of the Lord it came to pass in Jerusalem and Judah, until he had cast them out from his presence, that Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.’ God’s presence was enjoyed by the Jews in Judea, and in their temple service. To be cast out of God’s presence, is to be banished form Judea into captivity, and from all the privileges which the Jews enjoyed in their land, and temple worship. This was the same as destroying them. They were thus destroyed or cast out of God’s presence for seventy years in their captivity at Babylon.
“But they were brought back from this captivity, and again enjoyed God’s presence in their own land. At the time Paul wrote the words in Thessalonians, the time was drawing near when they were to be again cast out of God’s presence, and dispersed among all nations. Paul adopts the very language of the above passages, used in speaking of their former captivity, to describe the judgments of God which awaited them in their being cast out of their land, their city and temple destroyed, and they destroyed with an everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord. The Jews now are just as certainly destroyed from the presence of the Lord, as they were during the seventy years’ captivity in Babylon. How, them, can any man affirm that Paul meant, by this phrase, either annihilation or endless misery? If the Scriptures are allowed to interpret themselves, Paul only describes the temporal destruction and banishment of the Jews, and in the very language by which the prophets had described their former punishments. It is added by the apostle, ‘and from the glory of his power;’ or, as some render it, ‘his glorious power.’ Should this be understood of Jehovah, the God of Israel, it is certain his glorious power was displayed among the Jews. Should it be understood of Christ, it agrees with what is said of him; for at the destruction of Jerusalem he is said to have come in the glory of his Father; and he was then seen coming with power and great glory. Matt. 16:27, and 24:30.”
Of course it is impossible to go out of the presence of God. Even in hell, God is there. Ps. 139:7-13. The term is used figuratively. To act in accordance with God’s commands, and enjoy communion with him, is to be in his presence. To be out of his presence is to act contrary to God’s laws.
Those who persecuted the early Christians, their countrymen, (Acts 17:1-7) were driven away from the place they loved best of all, where God’s honor and glory dwelt, and were manifested. But they will be restored, for “when the fullness of the Gentiles shall come in, all Israel shall be saved,” so that his “everlasting destruction” is not without end.
Smoke of Torment For Ever And Ever.
“And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.”—Rev. 14:11.
The two chapters preceding this, and also this, treat of the church in this world, and its enemies. The pagan power is the “red dragon,” and the Roman Empire is “the beast.” The Lamb is Christ. The 144,000 denotes the Jewish converts, etc. The wrath of God on the worshippers of the beast and his image indicates the judgment of God on those who rejected Christ. “Fire and brimstone” and smoking torment is the imagery that the Revelator uses to describe such calamities as befell the wicked people of those times. All the scenery is on earth, as the careful reader will see.
This torment was to continue “forever and ever,” not literally without end, but as the smoke of Idumea, Isa. 34:10, went up “forever and ever,” though it has long ceased; so that of the worshippers of the beast would be forever and ever. This language is applied to length of days. Ps. 21:4, to the duration of a book, Isa. 30:8, to the sojourn of the Jews in Canaan, Jer. 7:7; 25:5, etc. All these have ceased.
The language refers to scenes and events occurring in this world. The smoke and fire and torment are all of temporary duration.
The Christian Fathers.
That the words “Eternal,” etc., did not denote endless duration at the time of Christ is demonstrated by the usage of the Christian fathers. Justin Martyr and Ireneus believed in punishment to end in annihilation, and Origen, Theodore of Mopsuestia, and others were Universalists, and yet they all employed the Greek words aion-aionios, to denote their ideas of the duration of future punishment. This proves that from A.D. 115 to A.D. 400, these words meant limited duration when applied to punishment. (See Beecher’s His. Fut. Ret.)
The fact that Origen and others taught an aionion punishment after death, and salvation beyond it demonstrates that at that time the word had not the meaning of endless, but did mean at that date, indefinite or limited duration.
The Emperor Justinian.
And still later the Emperor Justinian (A.D. 540) in calling the celebrated local council which assembled in 544, addressed his edict to Mennos, Patriarch of Constantinople, and elaborately argued against the doctrines he had determined should be condemned. He does not say, in defining the Catholic doctrine at that time “We believe in aionian punishment,” for that was just what the Universalist Origen himself taught. Nor does he say, “The word aionion has been misunderstood, it denotes endless duration,” as he would have said had there been such a disagreement. But, writing in Greek, with all the words of that copious speech from which to choose, he says, “The holy church of Christ teaches an endless aionios (ateleutetos aionios) life to the righteous, and endless (ateleutetos) punishment to the wicked.” Aionios was not enough in his judgment to denote endless duration. and he employed ateleutetos to describe endless duration. This demonstrates that even as late as A.D. 540 aionios meant limited duration, and required an added word to impart to it the force of endless duration.
These and other testimonies (See Hanson’s “Aion-Aionios,”) prove that these words did not mean endless duration among the early Christians for about six centuries after Christ. To say that any one who contradicts these men is correct, and that they did not know the meaning of the word, is like saying that an Australian, twelve hundred years hence, will be able to give a more accurate definition of English words in common use today than we ourselves. These ancients could not be mistaken, and the fact that they required qualifying words to give aionion the sense of endless duration—that they used it to describe punishment when they believed in the annihilation of the wicked, or in their restoration subsequent to aionion punishment, irrefragably demonstrates that the word had not the meaning of endless to them, and if not to them, then it must have been utterly destitute of it.
The uniform usage of these words by the early Church demonstrates that they signify temporal duration in the New Testament.
Unavoidable Conclusion.
From these and other considerations it is evident that there is nothing in the use of the words Everlasting, Eternal, Forever, etc., to teach endless punishment. All forms of the word mean substantially the same, limited duration, such being the meaning of the noun aion, and of course its reduplications and derivatives can mean no more.