Main Issues with Christian Universalism Topical Resource and Research 05/12/2013 Fellowship Church, Knoxville, TN Quick Hits Christian Universalism differs from Traditional Universalism in that Traditional Universalism says that all religions are equal and that all people will be saved regardless of beliefs. Christian Universalism says that all will be saved, but through Christ. All people will come to worship and adore Christ. This will happen during an almost Purgatory state where people will be held until they come to confess Christ. This keeps Christ center. This view can also be called Ultimate Reconciliation. Tentmaker.org is a website that many who hold this view reference and use to find scholarly articles (some articles are written by scholars and some are not) and sources. One of the tenents espoused by Tentmaker, et al, is that Scriptures have been mistranslated or that early traditions aren t correctly viewed. Defending a traditional view against such presuppositions can be difficult. 1
Main Issues There are two main points that need to be addressed, as they are the ones that the majority of the questions will come from. 1) The Greek word aion. This Greek word is used for the word eternal and forever in the New Testament. One of the main claims that the proponents of Christian Universalism make is that the word, from which we get our word eon, is mistranslated and means an age. In this, there is a sliver of truth. Aion is used in different ways in the New Testament and is a word that has no real English equivalent. In the ESV alone, the word is translated ever 71 times (as in forever and ever but would literally be from age to age ) world 38 times, never 6 times, evermore 4 times, age twice, eternal twice, and translated miscellaneously five times. Please note that aion is a noun. It is where is it used as an adjective, in the form of aionios, that the main rubs begin. Aionios is used some 70 times in the New Testament and is translated in the ESV 66 of those times as eternal. So while aion can be used to mean an age, it can mean eternal as well. Some Christian Universalist s have conceded this, but say that the particular meaning comes when you look at what the word is being used in reference to. In other words, when aion is used about God, it means eternal but when used about humans it means age. This argument falls apart when you look at verses like Matthew 25:46 which is the end of Jesus account of the sheep and the goats on Judgment Day. The verse reads And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. In both places where we have the English eternal, we are translating the Greek word aionios. If the Christian Universalism argument about hell being temporary holds up, then Jesus would be using aionios as age in the first usage but eternal in the second. This is simply nonsensical. It is rightly read to see that whatever the life is, the punishment is as well. Aionios is used in the New Testament to speak of the life given in Christ. Is that life eternal or temporary? It is used in the New Testament to describe the redemption Christ accomplished on the Cross. Is that redemption eternal or is it temporary? It is used in the New Testament to describe God s dominion. Is that dominion eternal or temporary? It is used in the New Testament to describe God s glory. Is God s glory eternal or temporary? The overwhelming evidence is that when the New 2
Testament authors used aion or aionios they could have, and often meant, eternal. 2) The use of all in many salvific passages. While there are several passages that use the all language about the salvation that God offers, we will focus on one as it will serve as a template for the others. 1 Timothy 4:10- For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. The Christian Universalist will use this passage to say see, those who believe are truly saved because they know the truth of Christ, but that doesn t mean the others are lost. They will be saved in time! Does this interpretation hold up? There are many ways that we have to interpret Scripture. Using several of them, we find that this interpretation does not hold. a) Lexical b) Author The word especially is used often in the New Testament to more closely in English mean more precisely 1. Paul is no Universalist. His teachings in Romans 9 and Ephesians 1 regarding election show this. More pointedly, one can look at 2 Thessalonians 1:7-10: when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels 8 in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 9 They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, 10 when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, because our testimony to you was believed. c) Historical Context One cannot overstate the importance of understanding the culture into which Paul was spreading the Gospel. Wherever he went, he was soon followed by the Judiazers, Jewish heretics who taught 1 See especially R. A. Campbell, A New Look at 1 Timothy 5:8, New Testament Studies 41 (1995):157-60 and T. C. Skeat Especially the Parchments : A Note on 2 Timothy 4:13, Journal of Theological Studies n.s. 30 (1979): 173-177. 3
that the Gentiles had to become Jewish in order to be saved. Paul, of course, stood immobile against this thought and even taught that to embrace it would be to make Christ worthless and salvation by grace naught. Paul s understanding of Christ s salvation was that there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:28). In other words, when he says all men he means to tell them that they don t have to become Jews, Christ offers salvation to all. This is clearly seen in the opening of 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy 1:7 shows that Paul is telling Timothy to watch out for men who desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions. It is clear in the following verses that he is dealing with arming Timothy against people who are Judiazing. In chapter 2, Paul uses a phrase almost identical to the one in Chapter 4 (in fact, the Chapter 4 phrase is an echo of this one) and says that God wants all men to be saved. He then notes that he had been appointed as an apostle to the Gentiles in v 7. Paul seems to be saying God wants the Gospel to go to all people and here is the proof: I was appointed to the Gentiles. d) Immediate Context In the passage in Chapter 4 that we are looking at, Paul ends the section in verse 16 by warning Timothy: Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers. If Paul truly believed that all would be saved, why turn around and admonish Timothy to keep a tight hold on a doctrine and teaching that was getting people persecuted and killed? 4
Minor Issues 1) Origen, an early Church father, taught this ideal of universal salvation. While Origen did indeed teach this idea of salvation, and can be very helpful in seeing what some practices and beliefs of the early Church were, he is hardly a paragon of Christian theology. Origen taught that souls were pre-existent and were incarnated into human bodies. He taught that Jesus was subordinate to the Father, not a full member of the Trinity. He tended in his theological writing to import too much Platonic philosophy as presupposition. As with any theological writer, there can be good and bad. In this area, Origen is not helpful. No notable Christian theologian taught ultimate reconciliation from the 500 s until the late 1800 s, when liberalism began to invade the church. 2) An eternal hell was not even an official Christian doctrine until 553. Just like critics of the canon of Scripture before them, Christian Universalist s tend to point to the centuries that passed from the Apostles until official Christian doctrine was codified. While it does seem to be a significant amount of time to have past, one must remember that Christianity was illegal in the Roman Empire until 313 and really wasn t able to gather and discuss doctrine until 325. At that time, the Church councils began and official rulings on what the Bible taught began to be agreed on. Church councils worked through multiple doctrines, everything from the deity of Christ to the books that should be included in the Bible. That the councils ruled on the doctrine of hell should not be surprising, nor should the fact that it took centuries to get to the doctrine of hell. Councils could last years and they were only called every 30 years or so. 3) How could a God of love send people to hell? This is systemic of the downgrading of all God s glory to a single attribute. Elevating only one of God s attributes to a place of authority over the others creates a false god, one that does not exist. Consider if we elevated one of God s other attributes and asked the relevant question. For example, how could a God of justice allow people to heaven? The Gospel allows us to keep a full vision of God and elevate all of His attributes while denying none. God s love, mercy, righteousness, holiness, justice and wrath are all on display in the Cross of Christ. 5
Resources for further study Francis Chan s book Erasing Hell is an excellent source for understanding the doctrine of hell and how Christian Universalism runs counter to it. Furthermore, it shows the high cost of Christian Universalism. Chan s book is a response to Rob Bell s book Love Wins, which advocates Christian Universalism. Greg Pinkner taught a sermon on the basics of the doctrine of hell at Fellowship titled Their Worm Does Not Die on June 28, 2009. It is available on itunes through the Fellowship Church podcast or our media player at fellowshipknox.org/watch+listen#168 The Gospel Coalition is a group of theologians and pastors who have banded together, crossing denominational lines, to celebrate the Gospel as central and our distinctions as wonderful diversity. The website, thegospelcoalition.org, is an excellent source for any resource in Christian theology and learning, this topic being no exception. 6