Facts and
Theories as to a Future State
CHAPTER XXXIV
THE APOCALYPTIC VISIONS. - 2
"If we are to learn anything with regard to what will
happen to the persons here represented," says Mr. Minton,* "we must first
inquire what would happen to that which represents them, as the consequence of
being cast into a lake of fire. Now it so happens that in every one of the five
or six cases here specified, the result would be utter destruction. They are
all living things, and not one of them could possibly exist in a lake of fire.
A wild beast; a false prophet; the devil, evidently under the form
of the dragon, seen first in ch. xii., and again in xxii. 2;
death and hell (hades), as evidently under the form already seen in
ch. vi. 8, of a rider or riders on horseback; and whosoever of the
dead, small and great, that stood before God, was not found written in
the book of life. If these things be intended to predict the final doom
of wicked men and wicked spirits, then their doom is set forth under images
which point to nothing less than extinction of being."
*Way Everlasting, p.
58, etc.
This shows how utterly at fault as to these figures is the
speculation Mr. Minton recommends. How long would a wild beast live in a lake
of fire? Certainly, if we follow our thoughts, an exceedingly short space of
time. How long if we take Scripture? A thousand years as first seen, and then
the ages of ages. Similarly as to the false prophet. So as to the devil from
the time he is cast in. How worse than vain to speculate! How entirely
Scripture contradicts Mr. Mintons suggestions.
But this Mr. Minton
is candid enough to own, and he says:
"I at once admit my inability to
explain this in any way that is quite satisfactory to my own mind. But I do not
admit that the view which it seems to oppose must therefore be radically wrong
(!). . . A wild beast could no more live in such a condition for a day than for
an age." What then? "This inclines me to think that the ages of ages indicate,
not the period of suffering to the condemned, but the eternal destruction that
comes upon them. . . .What then, you will ask again, do I understand by
torment? I understand by it - destruction (!) And to all objections
that torment and destruction are two different things, I reply that the Spirit
of God Himself has most pointedly applied the word torment to destruction in
one of those very passages. Read the account in chap. xviii of Babylons
destruction. The inhabitants perish in one day by death and
mourning and famine; and then the city itself is utterly burned
with fire. Now in the long description of the burning which follows,
there is not a word of any living persons or things being left in the city, to
suffer torture from the fire that consumes it. The city is, of course,
destroyed for the sin of its inhabitants; but their destruction is
distinguished in ver. 8 from its destruction. Yet they who gaze upon that
burning mass stand far off for the fear of her torment. What can
the word mean there but destruction?"
Thus must words be perverted by
mans will, and torment mean what torment never meant, and the sanction of
the Spirit of God be claimed for an unnatural and impossible use of language,
such as never could be imputed to anything beside Scripture. And what is the
ground for this notable absurdity? Babylons inhabitants perish "in one
day," says Mr. Minton, by "death and mourning and famine," but the city as
distinguished from these is burned with fire, no living inhabitant being in it;
and ver. 8 distinguishes the destruction of the inhabitants from that of the
city! It is ver. 8 he is citing for all this: of course he must have read it,
but this is what it says : - "Therefore shall her plagues COME in one day,
death and mourning and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire; for
strong is the Lord God that judgeth her!" Where is it said, Mr. Minton, that
the inhabitants all perish in one day? Nowhere: her plagues come in one day,
not are over! Where is the city distinguished from the inhabitants, so as to
imply that these do not suffer in the burning of the former? Again, nowhere! it
is bold perversion of the language: and all to give to the word torment in the
subsequent verse an impossible meaning, which would scarcely have been
attempted to be fastened upon any other book than Scripture, as I have already
said.
We can well believe that his interpretation is not satisfactory
to Mr. Minton. It is the only encouraging thing about it, that it is not.
But yet he has not done with Babylon. If she perishes so as not to be
"found any more at all" - "what then," he asks, "is the meaning of her smoke
rising up forever and ever? What, but that her guilt and her destruction will
never be forgotten; that she will be preeminently an object of everlasting
contempt? Such destruction I believe to be the torment of all
impenitent sinners, and such an eternal memory of sin and its destruction to be
the smoke of that torment ascending up forever and ever."*
* Mr. Roberts,
who in his "Man Mortal" does nothing but repeat Mr. Mintons arguments,
and to whom no separate reply is needed therefore, quotes, however, "her smoke
rose up forever and ever," to remark: "If the sense here were the popular
notion of absolutely endless futurity, how absurd to describe it in the past
tense - rose up - as a thing having happened! How can a thing have
happened forever in the English sense? " Aye, or in the Greek
either? Mr. R. has forgotten his Greek here, although be quotes it in the very
next words. The Greek is anabainei, "goeth up."
The only
additional thing to be noticed as to him is, that he makes the casting "alive"
of the systems into the lake of fire to intimate that they will not die of
themselves, but be destroyed by the Lord at His coming"! Do the "kings of the
earth" die of themselves, because they die! And how is it the systems are still
"alive" after a thousand years. if they are destroyed (in his sense) by the
Lord at His coming?
So that we must read instead of "torment,"
"destruction day and night for the ages of ages"!
I do not believe that
Babylons smoke ascending up forever and ever means that the memory of it
will be forever.* The memory of all that has ever been will endure forever and
this is more than the assertion of such a common-place thought. The key to the
expression is that identification of the city and people which Mr. Minton so
vainly contends against. The expression is, of course, figurative, but
identical with that in ch. xiv. 11, yet to be looked at. Babylon suffers
forever, of course in those to whom her guilt really belongs.
* In a former
work I did accept this, but on more mature consideration must withdraw that
acceptance.
But Mr. Minton goes on: -
"But it is urged that the
wild beast and false prophet, who were cast into the lake of fire before the
millennium, are spoken of at its close as if still there. This is, however, a
mistake, the word are not being in the original. When a word
has to be supplied, it should be supplied from what has preceded, and not made
to assert an independent fact. The devil that deceived them was cast into
the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet -
what? Surely were cast. To supply are is just to beg
the question, and assert a fact which is not stated in the record. The words
which follow, and (they - the verb being plural) shall be tormented day
and night forever and ever, merely contain a declaration that the
destruction of the beast and the false prophet and the dragon would be final
and irremediable; none of them would ever appear again. The two former are
included in this subsequent declaration, because nothing of the kind had been
said when they were first cast into the lake of fire."
That is, again,
we must transform torment into destruction, and say "they shall be destroyed
day and night forever and ever"! And even so we must believe that "they shall
be destroyed" means that two of them have been already, and only the third
"shall be"! These are somewhat large demands upon our faith - the sceptical
would say "credulity"; but where mans will is at work there is still
credulity enough for this and more. Yet Mr. Minton finds it himself not quite
satisfactory, it would seem. he cannot blame us if we sympathize with him.
But he has still a resource, if his explanation of these texts fails to
be "wholly satisfactory," as he admits it may, he can still question ours! If
he can make nothing else out of them, he will not accept what they plainly say:
-
"Now, waiving the question which a Universalist would raise, as to the
ages of ages" - If the doubt is not Mr. Mintons own, why does he affect
to raise it? - "your argument manifestly depends upon the assumption that the
torment spoken of in these visions represents torment in the future
realities which are therein predicted. But how can you prove that? You can
produce a string of texts to show the precise meaning of basanos
(torment); and so can I produce a string of texts to show the precise meaning
of therion (a wild beast). Does the beast in the vision represent a
beast in the reality? Then why should torment in the vision represent torment
in the reality ?"
Before we answer this, let us hear Mr. Mintons
summing up of conclusions against this
"1. The word torment is
applied to the burning of the city Babylon, when its inhabitants had already
perished." This has been disproved.
"2. Its smoke is said to rise up
forever and ever, after it has been so completely destroyed that it cannot be
found." This is also a mere confusion arising out of the first mistake.
"3. While the beast and the false prophet are cast into the lake of fire, all
their adherents are slain with the sword; which, on your principle
of interpretation, would show, that some of the wicked will be punished with
eternal torment, others with death."
Quite true, as to the time of the
Lords coming; but the latter are raised among "the rest of the dead," and
then cast into the lake of fire also. How, if the beast and the false prophet
are "phases of evil," as Mr. M. suggests, and not persons, they should be cast
into the lake of fire into which Satan and all the wicked afterwards are cast,
is a difficulty upon his side he can never explain. If their adherents had been
at the same time cast in, it might have been contended that they shared the
fate of their adherents, or if all had been slain this might have been said.
But that "phases of evil" should be cast into a place of torment is
inexplicable in the way the verses stand.
His fourth objection applies
only to Rev. xiv. 10, so must be reserved.
His fifth is the old mistake as
to death and hades being cast in.
His sixth is, that torment is not
mentioned with regard to the dead in ver. 15. But the lake of fire is not (as
he asserts) "the very embodiment of destruction," in his sense of it, as we
have seen, and death being destroyed at the beginning of the ages makes it
impossible thereafter that men should die. He asks: -
"But does the lake
of fire itself go on burning forever? Is it everlasting or
unquenchable in that sense? What are the very next words? And
I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth
were passed away. What then has become of the lake of fire which St. John
saw on the first earth? Why, of course, it has passed away with the earth of
which it formed part. Is there any lake of fire on the new earth?"
I
think it useful to quote exact words, or people might really believe there was
some strange perversion on my part, or misconception at least of an
adversarys arguments. Mr. Minton proceeds with a full page more of
reasonings upon this foundation, in which it is, of course, quite useless to
follow him, for the foundation itself is lacking. Where does the passage speak
of the lake of fire being on earth at all? He would seem to be reading from
another Bible than that which is in all our hands. Why, the devil is only cast
into this lake of fire at the close of the millennium, there to he tormented
day and night for the ages of ages. Whatever that means, a long lapse of time
is surely indicated. But in the very next words we read of the great white
throne set up, and the earth and the heavens fleeing away. Are the ages of ages
all expired in the meantime, and before the final judgment?
But again,
the throne is set, the earth and the heavens flee away; but the dead summoned
from their graves are cast into the lake of fire, which, of course, has ceased
to exist with that earth which has fled away!
We will now answer Mr.
Mintons question as to why "torment" in the vision should represent
torment in the reality. And we answer: -
1. Because it is impossible to say
what it does represent figuratively. No one has given us, - no one (it seems)
can give us, any meaning in the least degree satisfactory.
2. Because the
language throughout the twentieth chapter becomes more and more literal
continually. The "devil," when cast in, is distinguished by the title given him
in the interpretation of the previous vision, not by "the dragon," as in the
vision itself.* The interpretation in verse 6 of the "first resurrection" shows
us the exceeding simplicity of the vision it interprets. Souls (persons) slain
are seen to live again, and that signifies literal resurrection. The "thousand
years," the reign as kings and priests, are the same in the vision and the
interpretation alike. And as the solemn subject of judgment is approached, the
plainest words seem studied by which to set it forth. How simple and decisive
they are we can realize the better, after their survival of the treatment which
we have seen them endure.
*The "beast" is indeed still that, but I see not
how else he could be spoken of without revealing the mystery which is left to
the "mind which hath understanding." The second "beast" has become "the false
prophet."
3. Because literal death in the lake of fire we have seen to be
impossible, and fire which does not annihilate must apparently torment.
4.
Because the devils in the gospel speak of torment as their future doom, and
here, therefore, the word is guaranteed as literal.
We ask Mr.
Mintons attention seriously to these reasons as well as to the
examination of his own views which has been given. He cannot complain of
misrepresentation or of partial representation, nor do we think we have dealt
with them more severely than he would himself desire if God give him another
mind upon this subject every way so important to souls.
There is but
one more argument, adduced by Blain, and repeated by Goodwyn,* that "day and
night are characteristic lements of this dispensation," but in that case, for
the purpose of his argument, "this dispensation" must last "for the ages of the
ages." That "night" is not found in the New Jerusalem (xxii. 5) or the new
earth is nothing to the purpose self-evidently. I grant the language may be
figurative, but its obvious use is to convey the thought of what is continuous
or ceaseless, which in addition to the phrase" forever and ever" shows even by
itself that annihilation cannot be meant. What would be the force of
"annihilation day and night forever and ever"?
*Death not Life, Truth and
Tradition, p. 32.
The arguments on the side of " conditional
immortality" close then here. But we have still to glance at those of the
restorationist school.
Dr. Farrar is "quite content that texts should
decide" this question. That would give us hope that in telling us what hell is
not, he would have shown us at least what this connected prophecy of Revelation
on the very subject does not mean. But although he has spent pages upon the
rabbis, I cannot find ten lines upon this main text throughout his book. Indeed
the only thing at all to the purpose that I can find is one note of two lines
quoted from Dr. Chauncey, that "If all things without exception be subjected to
Christ, then death, the second death, as well as the first death, will be
finally swallowed up in victory." This belongs properly to another branch
of our subject, but a word or two is amply sufficient in answer. For the
"second death" is always subject to Christ, and never opposed, never needs to
be subjected. Are the prisons to which a king commits his prisoners not subject
to the king who commits them there? Dr. Farrars reasoning is scarcely
equal to his powers in other respects, if he believes this.
Eternal
Hope, Excursus 5, p. 222.
Mr. F. N. Oxenham in his "letter" to Mr.
Gladstone, again spends pages upon two lines of Keble, and not a line upon the
Scripture so all important in this matter.
We must depend then upon
Mr. Jukes mainly to represent the restorationist view here, apart of course
from the general reasoning upon the expressions for eternity which we have
already examined. And we shall allow him as usual to speak for himself. He
says: - *
"I cannot even attempt here to trace the stages or processes of
the future judgment of those who are raised up to condemnation . . . but what
has here been gathered from the word of God as to the course and method of His
salvation, throws great light upon that resurrection of judgment
which our Lord speaks of."
*Restitution of All Things, pp. 88-95.
How the method of Gods salvation should throw great light upon
the process of final judgment, it is very hard to say. Mr. Jukes of course
assumes that that judgment is itself a process of salvation. In that case of
course it would throw light. But on the contrary, Scripture contrasts these as
two incompatible things. He that believes in Christ "has everlasting life, and
shall not come into judgment," while "he that believeth not the Son shall not
see life." "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, and he that
believeth not shall be condemned." "To them an evident token of perdition, but
to you of salvation." "There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to
destroy." "And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and
the sinner appear?" This is the uniform tenor of Scripture, in a great
variety of expressions which assure us that the judgment of the wicked is the
very opposite of being a method of salvation: it is a method of destruction.
But we will let Mr. Jukes proceed.
John v. 24; iii. 36; Mark xvi.
16; Phil. i. 28; James iv. 12; 1 Pet. iv 18.
"Awful as it is, who can
doubt the end and purpose of this judgment? for God, the judge of
all, changes not, and Jesus Christ is still
the same yesterday, to-day, and for the ages."
Which
assures us of His unrepenting performance of all that He has threatened, as of
all that He has promised.
"And the very context of the passage which
describes the casting of the wicked into the lake of fire, seems to show that
this resurrection and the second death are both parts of the same redeeming
plan, which necessarily involves judgment on those who will not judge
themselves, and have not accepted the loving judgments and sufferings which in
this life prepare the firstborn for the first resurrection. So we read, -
And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new . . .
He that overcometh shall inherit all things, and I will be His God, and he
shall be my son. But the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and
murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall
have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the
second death. What does He say here but that all things shall be
made new, though in the way to this the fearful and unbelieving must pass
the lake of fire?"
He says the very opposite. For instead of "passing"
the lake of fire, He says they "have their part" in it, as the saints have
theirs in the first resurrection. And these (or among these) are they who have
their "part" taken out of the book of life (xxii. 19) of whom Mr. Jukes teaches
they have their part there really still.
Moreover it is only as to the
condition of the blessed that God says, "Behold, I make all things new," as the
context proves. "He that overcometh, I will be his God, and he shall be my son;
but" - but what? He that overcometh not shall be also in the end my son? No,
surely, "but the fearful and unbelieving, etc., shall have their part in the
lake of fire." Mr. Jukes explanation is a destruction of the sense, a
sense which is as plain as can be. But again he says: -
"The second
death therefore, so far from being, as some think, the hopeless shutting
up of man forever in the curse of disobedience, will, if I err not, be
Gods way to free those who in no other way than by such a death can be
delivered out of the dark world whose life they live in. . . . To get out of
this world there is but one way, death; not the first, for that is passed, but
the second death. Even if we have not light to see this, ought not the present
to teach us something of Gods future ways; for is He not the same
yesterday, to-day, and forever?"
So it is "forever" now, instead of
"to the ages"! but now is the accepted time, behold, now is the day of
salvation." Is the day of judgment and of wrath still the same? If God is (as
of course He must be) essentially always the same, does that make grace and
wrath the same, or judgment and salvation? Does it not rather assure us that He
who has threatened will make good? And that the word will fully be sustained,
"he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth
on him"? Is it no perversion of the truth of His unchangeableness, to say that
His wrath abideth not, and all shall finally "see life"? He goes on
"We know that in inflicting present death, His present purpose is to destroy
him that has the power of death, that is, the devil."
We know nothing of
the kind; it is Christs death, not ours, which does this. Has Mr. Jukes
read the next words in the text he quotes?
"How can we conclude from
this, that in inflicting the second death, the unchanging God will act on a
principle entirely different from that which now actuates Him ?"
That is,
again, why should a day of salvation and a day of judgment differ in character?
But as to death itself the principle is not different; for as the first death
is the judgment upon the natural world, so the second death is upon the world
beyond the grave for those who endure it. And as the first is final as to this
present scene, the second will be as to that.
"And why should it be
thought a thing incredible that God should raise the dead, who for their sin
suffer the penalty of the second death? Does this death exceed the power of
Christ to overcome it? Or shall the greater foe still triumph, while the less,
the first death, is surely overcome? Who has taught us thus to limit the
meaning of the words, Death is swallowed up in victory?"
I
answer to the last question, God Himself; if 1 Cor. xv. be inspired of Him. For
the apostle there tells us that it is fulfilled at the resurrection of the
body, and that is no question of the second death at all. Nor is the second
death Christs foe, as the first death is. For the first death does (while
it lasts) prevent the fulfilment of the eternal purpose fully, whether with
saint or sinner. The second death does not, and is not an enemy, as I have
before replied to Dr. Chauncey. As to what is "credible," all is that God
reveals. This He has not revealed, but the very opposite.
"Is
Gods will to save all men limited to fourscore years, or
changed by that event which we call death, but which we are distinctly told is
His appointed means for our deliverance ?"
We are not told this as to
physical death. Are the saints who do not die, but are changed at the
Lords coming, not delivered? God would indeed have all men to be saved,
but this is not purpose or counsel, which is always another word,* but desire.
"How often would I," says our Lord as to Jerusalem, "and ye would not." And
"now is the accepted time" applies only to living men. But all this will come
up again elsewhere, and the rest of Mr. Jukes argument will then be
considered more fittingly. They are not based upon the text before us.
*
bulimia, boule: as Matt. xi. 27; Luke xxii. 42; Acts ii. 23; iv. 28; xxvii. 42;
Eph. i. 11; Heb. vi. 17, etc. But we shall have to recur to this again.
Thus then we have examined every objection which has been raised to that
simple reading of this important Scripture with which we first began. We have
surely seen that the metaphors are not ambiguous, but written in the speech of
Him who cannot lie, nor call by the name of "revelation" an exaggerated, or at
least "mysterious and highly-wrought" account, which, when reduced to the
"sober hue" of truth, becomes the total opposite of what is on the face of it.
Thank God, His word never fails to justify itself; and its witness is neither
to be brow-beaten nor cajoled from its first statements for the simplest
honest-hearted hearer. He has hid these things from wise and prudent, to reveal
them unto babes.
Go To Chapter Thirty Five
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