Facts and
Theories as to a Future State
CHAPTER XVI
IMMORTALITY: IS IT CONDITIONAL?
THE course we shall pursue in our examination is briefly
this: first, we shall seek out the meaning and use of the terms which are
employed in Scripture in relation to this subject; then we shall look at the
prophetic outline of the future, so far as may be needed to connect and apply
the various passages; next, we shall try and fill in this scheme with the
passages which bear upon the successive events which it marks out; and finally,
give some attention to the ethical questions.
We shall begin with
immortality and eternal life, two questions, which for annihilationists are
only one; and, however discordant up to this time may have been their
statements, we shall find them in almost perfect agreement now.
Says Mr.
Morris: -
"The Son of God came to give life, even eternal life; and if it
be asked, Who will live forever? the answer of the Lord and Giver
of life, who is also the Bread of life, is in these words; He that eateth
of this bread shall live forever. And it is most irreverent and evil for
any man to say, that in the vocabulary of the Son of God the word
life does not mean life; and that the words eternal
life do not mean eternal life, and that the words shall live
forever do not mean shall live forever. And yet, in their ecclesiastical
teaching, certain men are hurried into this kind of irreverence and evil by
reason of their having adopted the false doctrine of the innate and essential
immortality of the earthly race."*
*What is Man 1" p 48.
And at the other end of annihilationism, the follower of Dr. Thomas,
Mr. Roberts of Birmingham, after quoting various passages which speak of
eternal life, writes (Twelve Lectures, p. 82):
"Now, if immortality be the
natural attribute of every son of Adam from the very moment he breathes, what
can be the meaning of testimonies like these, which, one and all, speak of
immortality as a future contingency, a thing to be sought for, a reward, a
thing to be given, a thing brought to light through the gospel etc? There is an
utter incongruity in such language, if immortality be a natural and present
possession. How can you promise a man that which is already his own? The divine
promise is, that God will award eternal life to those who seek for glory,
honour and immortality; and this is the strongest proof that human nature is
utterly destitute of it at present."
Immortality and eternal life are
here confounded. And it does not make it better that Mr. Roberts quotes
apparent Scripture to justify the confusion. He may shelter himself under the
fact that he is not alone in it.* He is not; but that will not make him less
responsible for deception, even unwittingly practised.
*Messrs
Dobney, Hastings, Ham, Moncrieff, Z. Campbell, Minton, Goodwyn and Constable,
all agree with him. No doubt, others also.
He takes no notice of it
even in his review of my book, after its being plainly pointed out to him. But
this is no unaccustomed thing with him.
The true Scriptural statement
is this: -
In the New Testament the true word for immortality, athanasia,
occurs but three times: 1 Cor. xv. 53, 54, "this mortal must put on
immortality" "when. . . . this mortal shall have put on immortality,.." and
once of God it is asserted (1 Tim. vi. 16), that He "only hath immortality."
The adjective "immortals does not even occur.
There is indeed
another word, aphtharsia, twice translated in our version "immortality" and
that is the word Mr. Roberts with others has caught at as showing mans
seeking it; but its proper meaning is "incorruption," and so it is mostly
translated I cite all the passages: -
Rom. ii. 7: - "glory, honour and
immortality."
1 Cor. xv. 42: - "it is raised in incorruption."
1 Cor.
xv. 50: - "neither doth corruption inherit incorruption."
53: - "must put
on incorruption."
54: - "shall have put on incorruption."
Eph. vi. 24:
- "love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity."
2 Tim. i. 10: - " brought life
and immortality to light by the gospel."
Tit. ii. 7: - "incorruptness,
gravity, sincerity."
Its adjective, aphthartos, "incorruptible," is used
seven times, and applied to God (Rom. i. 23, 1 Tim. i. 17); the crown of the
righteous (1 Cor. ix. 25); our inheritance (1 Pet. i. 4); the word of God (1
Pet. i. 23); and once figuratively, "that which is not corruptible" (1 Pet.
iii. 4). It is only once in our version (1 Tim. 1. 17) rendered "immortal," but
with no more reason than in other places. Furthermore its opposite, phthartos,
corruptible," is six times found, and always so rendered: Rom. 1. 23; 1
Cor. ix. 25; xv. 53, 54; 1 Pet. i. 18,23.
The difference between these
words comes out in 1 Cor. xv., in which they are all to be found. Speaking of
the dead body of the saint (ver. 42-50) the apostle uses the word "corruptible"
and "corruption." It was not mortal, but dead. Then, speaking of the
resurrection of those " that are Christs at His coming" (ver. 23), he
brings in also the change of the living saints which would accompany it: "We
shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed;" "the dead shall be raised
incorruptible, and we (the living) shall be changed; for this corruptible
(applying to the dead saints) must put on incorruption, and this mortal
(applying to the living) must put on immortality."
Thus there is
evident distinction in the use of these words in Scripture; and when it is said
(Rom. ii. 7) that God will render "to them who by patient continuance in well
doing seek for glory and honour and incorruption, eternal life," it is not at
all the same as seeking for immortality, but the blessed, incorruptible state
in which resurrection or the "change" will put the saints at the coming of
Christ. .And it applies only to the saints, as the whole description in 1 Cor.
xv. 42-50 does. The wicked are not those of whom it is said, "It is sown in
corruption, it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonour, it is raised
in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power." Such words are
applicable alone to the bloom and beauty of the " resurrection of life."
Quite true that the saints, alive but mortal when Christ comes, will
then get "immortality." The liability and tendency to death will in their case
be of course removed. But that word is the expression of a different fact from
that which is pointed out in the case of those who have died. All will alike of
course possess incorruption, putting on alike the image of the heavenly; but
the fact noticed as to the living is that they shall not sleep at all,
"mortality" in their case being "swallowed up of life."
For of course
mortality is our condition down here. "Immortality" is not "our natural and
present condition." Immortality is eathlessness, and who among the people Mr.
Roberts is opposing asserts that we do not die? It is a poor quibble that. The
soul does not die; nor the spirit; but man does surely. The question is as to
what death is, not whether men are subject to it. Of course with Mr. R. it is
cessation of existence, but then that is not what we mean by death. We mean the
dust returning to the earth as it was, while the spirit returns to God who gave
it. Under the same word we are in reality speaking of different things.
General Goodwyn has indeed another application of the words in this
chapter: -
"Ver. 50 applies the word corruption to flesh and
blood, the entire natural man; ver. 52 applies the word
incorruptible to dead bodies raised. In ver. 53,
therefore, the word incorruption evidently applies to the body, and
consequently immortality to the soul, but only in resurrection,
when body and soul are reunited. The apostle Peter, in contrasting the
source of the children of God with the natural birth of the Adam race, says
that the former are born again, not of corruptible seed, but of
incorruptible. The truth, therefore, remains that the latter are born of
corruptible seed; and the apostle Paul gives further force to this
expression when he says, We that are in this tabernacle do groan, being
burdened, not that we would be unclothed - uncovered with a body -
but clothed upon, that MORTALITY might be swallowed up of LIFE.
Here is a distinct assertion that the personality - apart or not from the body
- is mortal (2 Cor. v. 4)."
If boldness would carry the day
the field were won. As it is we are not convinced. We dispute the fact of
"flesh and blood" being the "entire natural man"; we agree that "incorruption"
everywhere applies to the body. We deny the "consequence" that mortality or
immortality refers to the soul. It refers to the bodies of the living when
Christ comes, as corruption and incorruption to the bodies of the dead. Let any
one compare 1 These. iv. 15-17, where the same event is spoken of and where the
dead in Christ, and "we" who are alive and remain are similarly contrasted. The
"we shall be changed" is contrasted in I Cor. xv. 52, with the dead being
"raised incorruptible," and so similarly in the next verse, "this corruptible"
applies to the dead, "this mortal" to the living: both expressions to the body,
the "mortal flesh" (2 Cor. iv. 11).
Again, in the passage from 1 Pet.
i. 23, the "incorruptible seed" is the "word of God, which by the gospel is
preached unto you." What has that to do with the physical constitution of man?
And if we are born, as I have no wish to deny, of "corruptible seed," how does
that show that such a term applies to the physical constitution of the soul or
spirit? Nay, he has himself just now applied "corruptible" to the condition of
the body, and "mortal" in contrast with this to the state of the soul. Neither
assumption can bear the least examination.
The quotation from 2 Cor. v.
4 is, however, still more recklessly misapplied. Where is the "assertion that
the personality, apart from the body, is mortal"? It is Gen. Goodwyns
own, not the apostles. He has distinctly stated that he groaned, not to
be unclothed, but clothed upon. Now this is the very change of the living we
have before been looking at. Paul, the living but mortal man, longed not to be
unclothed - to be apart from the body - but, in opposition to that, to be
clothed upon, that mortality, his present condition, might be swallowed up of
life.
How could the "personality," apart from the body, be according to
Gen. Goodwyn, "mortal" any more? Would he call a dead body mortal? And for him,
apart from the body, the soul is as strictly dead as is the body itself
Mr. Roberts makes an effort to show that immortality and incorruption
are interchangeable terms; and we will allow him to state how in his own words:
"The first (athanasia) tells us that the life of the age is deathless. In
entering it we are told that this mortal shall put on immortality. By this we
know the truth declared by Christ, that They who are accounted worthy of
the age. . . cannot die any more (Luke xx. 36). But how is it that life
is thus made endless to those that were before but mortal? The second word
(aphtharsia) answers it: This corruptible must put on incorruption
(1 Cor. xv. 53). Men are mortal - liable to death - because their natures are
corruptible; they decay. But make them incorruptible, and endlessness of life
is the necessary consequence. Hence to seek for incorruption is equivalent to
seeking for deathlessness or immortality."
Mr. Roberts
physiological knowledge is as defective as his knowledge of Scripture. I have
already pointed out that his theory of life being the result of organization is
the very reverse at least of what the acutest physiologists of the day assert.
Prof. Huxley, well known to be as stout a materialist as he is undeniably an
unbeliever, admits over and over again that life is the cause of organization,
and not organization the cause of life. (Introd. to Classification of Animals.)
I have before quoted from another of the same school. It is almost the
universally accepted doctrine now.
Mr. R.s present assertion is
but the logical outgrowth of his former one. If life be the result of
organization, doubtless immortality will be that of incorruption. But as the
former statement needs to be reversed, so will the latter require to be.
Incorruption will be based rather upon immortality, but even so is not (as it
would appear) its necessary result. We must bear in mind that we are speaking
here of what is almost outside the sphere of mere human knowledge, and where a
verse or two of Scripture is all the Biblical material to draw from either. But
all that we do know is against the view Mr. Roberts advocates.
That
"immortality" as a term is applied in Scripture only to the righteous is not of
striking force when we remember that it is only applied to them in two
consecutive verses (1 Cor. xv. 53, 54), one of which is but really the
repetition of the other.
But, say these writers (quoting 1 Tim. vi. 16),
"God only hath immortality." What then? Why, it is argued, "the soul cant
have it." Let them go a little farther, and the result will be apparent. The
angels then cannot either. Does death then reign throughout the ranks of
created, sinless beings? That will not of course be contended for; but it is
involved necessarily in the argument; and must follow, or the argument be given
up. No, says Mr. Roberts, for the angels "are God to us; for they are of His
nature, and come only on His errands". . . "they are of the divine nature they
are spirit. " And so is mans spirit "spirit," and we have
seen that, if angels be "Sons of God" on that account, just so are men also
"His offspring." Whatever therefore this proves as to angels, it proves also
for the spirit of man. That the angels represent God to us, as coming on His
errands, proves nothing nor disproves.
The Scripture sense of the
passage does indeed make it apply to angels, and to all created beings. It is
the essential difference between the Creator and all His works, that He alone
by Himself subsists. "By Him," on the other hand, "all things subsist." "He
upholdeth all things by the word of His power." Thus we by no means maintain
what Mr. Morris calls, and rightly calls, "the false doctrine of the innate and
essential immortality of the earthly race." So far from that we contend that
the race is mortal, and that immortality innate and essential belongs to no
creature, fallen or unfallen. It is the assurance of this that this passage in
Timothy gives. In that sense, as possessing it in Himself God alone hath it,
and in Him "we live, and move, and have our being." "By Him all things
subsist."
But this no more proves that the soul dies, than that angels
die. Dependent derived immortality it may have equally with them, and in that
sense its immortality is affirmed; for they that kill the body cannot kill the
soul.
Eternal life, which they confound with immortality, is a wholly
different thing; and this we shall now proceed to show.
Go to Chapter Seventeen
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