Hi, my name's David Bercot, and tonight we're going to be talking about what the early Christians believed about life after death. You know, if there's one question that has puzzled mankind ever since the time of Adam, it's what happens to us when we die. Now, just about everybody thinks they know the answer to that question. However, different people will tell you different things.
For example, an atheist is going to tell you that nothing happens, that you don't have a soul or a spirit, that when you die, that's the end of your existence. Your body decays, and that's all there is to it. At the other extreme, a Buddhist will tell you that when you die, you're just reincarnated as a different kind of creature, and you go on living in a different form. Even among people who profess to be Christians, there still are different answers.
For example, a Roman Catholic would believe that when you die, that if you're a saint, then you go directly to heaven when you die. On the other hand, if you're simply an ordinary Roman Catholic, well, you can expect when you die to go to purgatory. This is a place; it's neither hell nor it's heaven. It's a place where somebody who will ultimately have salvation is purged of their sins.
Now, in medieval Roman Catholicism, this was viewed as something almost like hell, that you would go through torment and torture and suffering, but after 10 years, 100 years, 10,000 years, depending on what kind of person you were, then your sins will finally be purged, and then you can go on to heaven. On the other hand, somebody who dies who isn't a Christian goes directly to hell, to a lake of fire.
Now, that would still be the Roman Catholic belief today, although I think most Roman Catholics would look at the time in purgatory as rather than being literal torture or torments or fire, things like that, that it's going to be a time of cleansing. And although it's not a pleasant place, it isn't quite the medieval view. And then again, once you're cleansed of your sins, you go on to heaven.
Now, most Protestants, whether they're liberal or whether they're evangelicals, would believe that a saved Christian, once he dies, goes straight to heaven. That is, his soul goes to heaven, his body is in the grave, and at some point in the future, there will be a resurrection when his soul will come down from heaven and will join his body from the grave.
Now, liberal Christians would tend to think that just about everybody is going to go to heaven, and an evangelical is going to believe that only if you are a saved Christian does that happen to you. Now, I was raised a Jehovah's Witness, and their view is quite different from either the Roman Catholic or the Protestant view. Their view is that you don't have a soul or spirit, that when you die, almost like the atheist view, that you simply go into nonexistence. Your body is put in a grave, and it eventually decays.
However, you live on in the perfect memory of God. And when Christ returns and the resurrection happens, then God will recreate you to be the exact person you were, the exact same memories, the exact same personalities, character faults and character good qualities, et cetera, and that those who are saved will live forever here on a paradise earth, a recreated Garden of Eden.
They would believe that only 144,000 Christians actually go to heaven, and most Jehovah's Witnesses would not view themselves as being one of those 144,000. But the idea of living forever in a paradise earth sounds pretty good to them.
The Seventh-day Adventists, and it was the Adventist movement that had a lot of effect on the later Jehovah's Witness movement, is that you have a soul, but when you die, your soul sleeps in Hades until the time of the resurrection when it's awakened and your soul and body are joined again. So anyway, those are some of the variant views within groups who claim to be Christians. Now, of course, none of these people have had the benefit of dying and then coming back to tell us what happens firsthand.
Still, we tend to pretty much accept without question whatever our church tells us or whatever our parents told us the way we were raised to believe. I mean, when I was a Jehovah's Witness, I never questioned that that's what death was about, how it would happen. And once I adopted the evangelical view, I never really thought very much about that either. Just when I die, I'm going to go to heaven.
And I'm going to guess that's pretty much how most of you would believe that when you die, assuming you're a saved Christian, you're going to go straight to heaven. Now, in 1985, I spent basically a year reading the writings of the early Christians because I had a lot of theological questions that I was wanting to find the answer to. And I wanted to find out how did Christians understand some of these doctrinal issues when they were only 5 or 10 years or 50 years removed from the apostles?
Now, what happens to us after we die wasn't one of the questions. Like you say, by that time, I pretty much assumed the evangelical or Protestant view was correct, that you're going to go straight to heaven when you die. So I was totally shocked when I discovered that the early Christians didn't hold to either the evangelical view or the Jehovah's Witness view or any of the views that I've mentioned to you. In fact, I had never even come across a view like what they held.
So it was something totally new to me, like it probably will be to most of you. Now, this is in a nutshell, this is what they believed: that when a person dies, whether they're good, evil, saved, unsaved, whatever, we all go to Hades. Hades is the realm of the dead. Now, I say we all go there. I mean, our soul lives on after we die, and we go to Hades. So they did not have the Jehovah's Witness view that you do not have a soul, nor did they hold to the Seventh-day Adventist view that your soul sleeps after you die.
Although in some ways, the Adventist view might be closer to the early Christian view than that which is accepted by most denominations or is being taught in the majority of churches. But there is a very clear difference because, as I said, you are conscious, you are aware, you live on after you die. That is, your soul lives on. But Hades, the realm of the dead, is divided into two parts.
The lower regions are where the wicked go, the unsaved, et cetera, and they are separated there from the righteous who are escorted by angels to paradise, also known as Abraham's bosom. Now, paradise is not heaven, but you might say it's a heavenly place. It's a wonderful place to be, even though it is part of Hades. Now, there in paradise, the righteous get to fellowship with all of the dead who have predeceased them.
So then, you know, we would get to talk with John the Baptist, with Abraham, with Moses, all of these people, and all of the famous Christians who have lived before us. We are in some way in the presence of Christ, and yet we aren't in heaven. Now, paradise would not be a bad place to spend eternity, and yet it is short of the final goal that we're looking forward to.
Now, for the unsaved, they're in a dark, gloomy place that is the lower part of Hades, where they are actually in the presence of, or are keenly aware of, the presence of the lake of fire where the wicked will eventually be cast, what is generally known as hell. And so their time in Hades, rather than being a joyful time, is a time of great sorrow and inner turmoil.
Now, when Christ returns, then all of the dead will be resurrected, both the good and the bad, and their souls and their bodies will be joined together, and then they stand before Christ on judgment day. And it's there at the final judgment that then the righteous are told to proceed on to heaven, and it's there that the wicked are cast into the lake of fire, which is not Hades, but rather the Greek word was Gehenna, the word that Christians use for the lake of fire.
So to sum it all up, nobody goes straight to heaven or to hell when they die. We all go to a waiting place that is part of Hades, but like I say, it's a pleasant wait for the saved. It's an unpleasant wait for those who are not. And then once Christ returns, everybody is resurrected, and then there's the final judgment and the final destinies. Now, a number of people have told me after hearing this that, oh, that's what they had always believed, or that's what they had been taught.
So it obviously isn't a belief that disappeared through time. It's just something I had never heard of myself before. Okay, I've sort of summed up what they believed. Now I want to read to you some passages from their own writings so you can hear it from the horse's mouth on what they believed about life after death. Now, for most of you, this may sound rather strange. Like I say, it was totally foreign to me when I first read these passages.
But as we're going to see later on this evening, everything they believed is right there in the New Testament. This wasn't some strange, weird thing that they dreamed of. This was something the apostles believed, the Jews in the first century believed, and the Christians in the centuries after that believed. Now, the longest description we have of Hades and what happens to us after we die is found in the writings of Hippolytus.
He writes, "Now we must speak of Hades, in which the souls of both the righteous and the unrighteous are detained. Hades is a place in the created system, undeveloped, a locality beneath the earth in which the light of the world does not shine. And since the sun does not shine in this place, there is necessarily perpetual darkness there. This place has been destined to be, as it were, a guardhouse for souls.
The angels are stationed there as guards, distributing temporary punishments for characters according to each one's deeds. And in this locality, there is a certain place set apart by itself, a lake of unquenchable fire into which we suppose no one has yet been cast. But the righteous who will obtain the incorruptible and unfading kingdom are indeed presently detained in Hades, but not in the same place with the unrighteous.
For to this locality, there is one descent, at the gate of which we believe an archangel is stationed with an army." So he's saying everybody goes down the same passageway, but then when they get there, there is an angel, or rather an army of angels led by an archangel. "And when those who are conducted by the angels who are appointed unto the souls have passed through the gate, they do not all proceed down one and the same path. Rather, the righteous are conducted in the light toward the right.
And being sung to by the angels stationed at the place, they are brought to a locality full of light. And there all the righteous persons from the beginning dwell. They are not ruled by any necessity. Rather, they perpetually enjoy the contemplation of the blessings that are in their view. Also, they delight themselves with the expectation of other blessings ever new. In fact, they consider the new blessings as ever better than the first ones. And that place brings no labors for them.
In that locale, there are neither fierce heat, cold, nor thorns. But the faces of the fathers and the righteous are seen to be always smiling as they wait for the rest and eternal revival in heaven that follow this location. And we call this place by the name of Abraham's bosom. However, the unrighteous are dragged toward the left by angels who are ministers of punishment. These souls no longer go of their own accord. Rather, they are dragged as prisoners by force.
And the angels appointed over them hurry them along, reproaching them and threatening them with an eye of terror, forcing them down into the lower parts. And when the souls are brought there, those appointed to that task drag them on to the vicinity of Gehenna. And those who are so near to Gehenna hear incessantly its agitation, and they feel the hot smoke.
And when that vision is so near, as they see the terrible and excessively glowing spectacle of the fire, they shudder in horror at the expectation of the future judgment, already feeling the power of their punishment. And again, when they see the place of the fathers and the righteous, they also suffer punishment merely from seeing this, for a deep and vast abyss is set there in the midst, so that neither can any of the righteous in sympathy think to cross it, nor do any of the unrighteous dare to cross it.
Well, I think I've said enough on the subject of Hades, in which all souls are detained until the time that God has determined. And then he will accomplish a resurrection of all, not by transferring souls into other bodies, but by raising the bodies themselves." End of quotation. Now, let me read to you from some of the other early Christian writers.
From Justin Martyr, writing about the year 160, he says, "The souls of the godly remain in a better place, while those of the unjust and wicked are in a worse place, waiting for the time of judgment." Tertullian writes, "All souls, therefore, are shut up within Hades. Do you acknowledge this? It's true, whether you say yes or no. Moreover, there are already experienced there punishments and consolations.
And there you have a poor man and a rich man." Obviously referring there to Jesus' parable or account of the rich man and Lazarus. He continues, "It must therefore be evident to every man of intelligence who has ever heard of the Elysian fields that there is some determinate place called Abraham's bosom. It is designed for the reception of the souls of Abraham's children, even from among the Gentiles. This region, therefore, I call Abraham's bosom. Although it is not in heaven, it is yet higher than Hades.
And it is appointed to afford an interval of rest to the souls of the righteous until the consummation of all things completes the resurrection of all men with the full recompense of their reward. By Abraham's bosom is meant some temporary receptacle of faithful souls, wherein is even now foreshadowed an image of the future, and where is given some foresight of the glory of both judgments." Now, in a few minutes, we're going to be talking about some of the variations in the early Christian model.
They all believe basically the same thing, but you see a few variations from writer to writer. He mentions Abraham's bosom. He says it's not in Hades. It's somewhere else. I don't know there's any great significance in that, but as he conceives it, it is someplace outside of Hades, rather than being a compartment within Hades.
Novatian, writing about the year 235, said, "What lies beneath the earth is not itself void of distributed and arranged powers, for there is a place where the souls of the just and the unjust are taken, conscious of the anticipated dooms of future judgment." Victorinus, writing about the year 280, said, "The bronze altar," talking about the bronze altar that is mentioned in the book of Revelations, he says, "The bronze altar refers to the earth, under which is Hades.
This is a region away from punishments and fires. It is a place of rest for the saints. Here indeed, the wicked see the righteous, but they cannot be carried across to them." So Victorinus places paradise, or Abraham's bosom, definitely within Hades, rather than a place outside of it. Again, there's no really significant difference, however you want to picture it. Finally, I want to read from Lactantius, who wrote about the year 304.
He said, "Let no one imagine that souls are immediately judged after death, for all are detained in one and a common place of confinement until the arrival of the time in which the great judge will make an investigation of their deserts. Those whose piety will have been approved will receive the reward of immortality. However, those whose sins and crimes will have been brought to light, these will not rise again.
Rather, they will be hidden in the same darkness with the wicked, being destined to certain punishment." Now, is what the early Christians believe just a lot of nonsense and myth? Or is it indeed what the scriptures actually teach? Is this really what happens to us when we die? Well, the most detailed and vivid discussion of life after death in the New Testament, indeed in the whole Bible, is in Jesus' account of the rich man and Lazarus, which is in Luke chapter 16.
And here Jesus says, "So it was that the beggar died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom.
Then he cried and said, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame.' But Abraham said, 'Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted and you are tormented.
And besides all this, between us and you, there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us." Okay, so let's compare this to the description that Hippolytus gives us. He says that when we die, we are escorted by the angels. And here Jesus verifies that, at least as to the beggar Lazarus, that he was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. We also find here, again, the name of the place where the righteous wait, and it's called Abraham's bosom.
We also see the rich man being in torments in Hades. Now, Jesus doesn't definitively say, "Is Abraham's bosom a part of Hades?" But he says that the rich man in Hades is in torments, again, as Hippolytus described, not because he's yet being thrown in the lake of fire, but that the lower regions of Hades are near the lake of fire where they can feel the heat of it.
And then again, it mentions that there is a chasm or gulf between the lower part of Hades and Abraham's bosom so that people cannot, at least on their own, pass over from one place to the other. Now, it's important to realize that when Jesus gave this account in Luke 16, he wasn't teaching something that was entirely new. You know, there was no response from the Pharisees of, "What on earth are you talking about? I thought we go to heaven when we die." I mean, this is what the Jews believed.
Josephus gives us an account of what Jews believed about life after death, and it's virtually the same as what Hippolytus says. In fact, it's not clear whether Hippolytus is actually just quoting from Josephus, because what they both say is virtually the same. So this was not just a Christian belief, but it's what the Jews believed as well, at least in the first century. Now, I've mentioned that Abraham's bosom is also the same place as paradise.
The reason I say that is from Luke chapter 23, verse 43, when Jesus is on the cross and he says to the thief, "Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise." So if the righteous or the saved wait in Abraham's bosom, and Jesus told this thief that he would be with that thief that very day in paradise, then Abraham's bosom in paradise must be the same place. Now, some might say, "Well, paradise, that means heaven." Well, the early Christians never understood paradise to be heaven.
And let me show you why scripturally it can't be heaven. Matthew 12:40, Jesus said, "As Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." So Jesus didn't go to heaven when he died on the cross. He said he was in the earth, that he would be in the earth for three days and three nights.
And this is verified then after his resurrection, after his ascension also, in Acts chapter 2, verses 22 through 27, where Peter said, "Jesus of Nazareth, whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be held by it. For David says concerning him, 'You will not leave my soul in Hades.'" So Jesus' soul was in Hades during those three days, and yet he told the thief that he would be with him in paradise that very day.
So this is the basis that the early Christians had for believing that paradise, or Abraham's bosom, was a region within Hades. In fact, this was so universally believed that it was part of the apostles' creed, the basic baptismal statement of faith that the early Christians professed.
It says, "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He descended to Hades.
On the third day, rose again from the dead, ascended to heaven." So all of the early Christians understood that Jesus was three days in Hades, not in Gehenna, as some have imagined, but in the place of the dead, which is where Abraham's bosom and paradise are located, and also where the ungodly are waiting as well for their punishment. Actually, once the blinders are taken off of our eyes, it becomes very obvious that this is what the New Testament teaches.
The problem is we've all been indoctrinated that, "Oh, we go straight to heaven." And so all of the verses that indicate otherwise just go right past us. But there is no passage in the New Testament, nor in the Old, that says when we die, we go straight to heaven or that the wicked go straight to hell or Gehenna. Let me just show you some examples. John 14, verses 1 through 3. This is Jesus talking to his apostles on the night of his arrest.
He says, "If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me." Now, I'm sure you have read that passage probably dozens, maybe even hundreds of times in your lifetime, and it's probably never sunk in what he's saying there. It didn't for me anyway. He says, "I'm going to go and prepare a place for you." And then did he say, "And then when you die, you're going to join me there?" No, he says, "I will come back." Well, that's not when we die.
He comes back at the end of the ages, his second coming. He says, "I will come back and take you to be with me." He didn't say, "You're going to have been with me all of those centuries." He says, "I'm going to come back and take you to be with me." You see, this is exactly what the early Christians believed, because it's what the New Testament teaches, is what the apostles had taught. We wait. John chapter 5, verses 28 and 29. Again, this is Jesus himself saying this.
He says, "The hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come forth. Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation." Okay? So he said, "The hour is coming in which all who are in the graves are going to come forth for a resurrection." So Hades is going to be emptied, and he said, "Those who've done good will be raised to a resurrection of life.
Those who've done evil to the resurrection of condemnation." You see, if we were already in heaven or already in hell, then what would be the point of this? I mean, like I say, the modern-day teaching is, "Oh, the resurrection, you've already been in heaven for, at least for some Christians, for about 2,000 years, and then you're going to come back to earth to get your body and then go back up to heaven." So what's the big deal about the resurrection? Well, the resurrection was such an important thing.
It was one of the key doctrines of the Christian faith because you're waiting in Hades until the resurrection. Now, as I've said, Abraham's bosom or paradise is a wonderful place. It wouldn't be that horrible if that's where you spent eternity. But the point is, it's not the consummation. It's not your ultimate destiny. You're not going to be reigning as kings in paradise. It's not until you get to heaven. And so that's why the resurrection is so important. You don't want to be in Hades for eternity.
You want to be up in heaven where we've been promised by the Lord that we will be. And likewise, what would be the point of the resurrection if people have already been sent to hell? So what are you resurrecting them for? To then send them right back to where they've been? See, it makes no sense when you think about it, the modern teaching, what the early Christians believe fits the scriptures exactly. 1 Corinthians 15, verses 22 and 23. Paul wrote, "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.
But each one in his own order. Christ the firstfruits. Afterward, those who are Christ's at his coming." Those last three words are extremely crucial, at his coming. Okay, he said, "We're all going to be made alive." He's not talking about our souls living on after us. I mean, that was already assumed. But it's separated from the body. Being made alive, he means coming back together. Now, he said, "The firstfruit is Christ, okay?
And then afterwards, the rest of us." Is that afterwards when we die, when we're made alive? No, he says, "Those who are Christ's at his coming." So when are we made alive in Christ fully? It's not when we die. It's at his coming. Also from 1 Corinthians 15, this time verses 51 and 52, he said, "Behold, I tell 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 trumpet.
For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." Okay, so you notice that? He first says, "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed." That is, when Christ returns, there will be Christians still living who will never sleep in death. And he says, "It's then we're going to be changed at the last trumpet. The trumpet will sound, and then the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." It's not when we die. It's at the resurrection.
Again, why the resurrection was so important all throughout the New Testament. Let me read to you another one. 1 Thessalonians 4, verses 16 and 17. It says, "The Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first." The dead who are in Christ will rise. He didn't say their bodies will rise. He said the dead. They're there in Hades waiting, and they're going to rise first.
Then he says, "Then we who are alive," that is, Christians who are still living at the second coming and remain, "shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air." I mean, the dead are meeting the Lord. Again, I know the modern-day teaching is, "Oh, the dead come back with Christ." When he returns, all Christians who've died during the last 2,000 years are all coming back with him. Well, then why does it say that they're going to meet the Lord in the air? They've been with him.
So what is so significant? The significance is that they've been waiting for some of them 2,000 years to meet the Lord, to actually be with him in a physical sense. Finally, let me read you one more. 1 Peter 5, verse 4. "When the chief shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that does not fade away. Not when you die, but when the chief shepherd appears." That is, at his second coming. Now, you may be wondering, if this is what the early Christians taught, why doesn't anyone teach this today?
Well, actually, there are a number of Christians who still hold to this view today. As I said, when I first came across this view, it was totally new to me. I had never heard it. But I found that there are a number of Mennonites, brethren, Amish people who believe this. I've met people in the churches of Christ and other churches associated with the restoration movement. And there was a number of conservative Anglicans who also still hold to this original view of life after death.
But in general, Western Christians lost this teaching because the original doctrine about the intermediate state got corrupted and changed through the Roman Catholic teaching of purgatory. Now, the earliest references I've been able to find that turn the intermediate state into a concept of purgatory are in some of the Montanist writings of the early third century. But it didn't really become a doctrine of the Western Church until the time of Pope Gregory I, which was in the sixth century.
Now, in the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory, a number of things were changed from the original Christian view. Now, Hades, instead of being the place of rest for everybody, good and bad alike, it became only the place for Christians who are saved but who fall short of the saintly life that God expects of us. So they spend time there suffering and being punished or disciplined until their sins have been paid for or purged away, and then they go on right to heaven.
You see, instead of waiting for the resurrection, they do go straight to heaven before judgment day, but they first have to spend a period of time, which could have been tens of thousands of years, depending on the type of sins the person committed, before they're allowed to go to heaven. But saints went under this doctrine of purgatory. Saints go directly to heaven.
And likewise, under this doctrine, a Christian who's committed a mortal sin and dies unrepentant of that, or somebody who was never a Christian at all, they go straight to hell upon their death. Actually, the first generation of reformers, Luther, Calvin, etc., returned to the early Christian teaching, the New Testament teaching of the intermediate state.
For example, John Calvin in his Institutes wrote, "Moreover to pry curiously into their intermediate state," talking about the dead, "is neither lawful nor expedient. Many greatly torment themselves with discussing what place they occupy and whether or not they already enjoy celestial glory. It is foolish and rash to inquire into hidden things farther than God permits us to know.
Scripture, after telling that Christ is present with them and receives them into paradise and that they are comforted, while the souls of the reprobate suffer the torments which they have merited, goes no farther. As to the place of abode, the question is not less futile and inept, since we know that the dimension of the soul is not the same as that of the body.
When the abode of blessed spirits is designated as the bosom of Abraham, it is the place that on quitting this pilgrimage, they are received by the common father of the faithful, who imparts to them the fruit of his faith.
Still, since Scripture uniformly enjoins us to look with expectation to the advent of Christ and delays the crown of glory till that period, let us be content with the limits divinely prescribed to us, that the souls of the righteous, after their warfare is ended, obtain blessed rest where in joy they wait for the fruition of promised glory, and that thus the final result is suspended till Christ the Redeemer appear." So as you can see, he basically taught the same thing the early Christians did.
He just downplayed and said, "Well, let's not talk about it because then we're speculating. Let's just remember that the souls of the righteous obtain blessed rest and that the final glory doesn't occur until Christ returns." And yet, by the time of the Puritan Revolution in England in the mid-1600s, a century later, this whole teaching of the intermediate state was just simply dropped.
I'll read to you from the Westminster Confession, which is what the Puritans pushed through Parliament when they were in control of England. It says, "The bodies of men after death return to dust and see corruption. But their souls, which neither die nor sleep, having an immortal subsistence, immediately return to God who gave them.
The souls of the righteous, being then made perfect in holiness, are received into the highest heavens, where they behold the face of God in light and glory, waiting for the full redemption of their bodies. And the souls of the wicked are cast into hell, where they remain in torments and utter darkness, reserved to the judgment of the great day. Besides these two places for souls separated from their bodies, the Scripture acknowledges none." So that was it.
Like I say, the reformers downplayed it, although they actually returned to the historic teaching of life after death. But because of their downplaying it, within a century, the Puritans, who were disciples of John Calvin, just dropped it all together. And most evangelical churches in the United States either came out of the Puritan movement or were heavily influenced by it. And so, like I say, just it got dropped entirely. And yet they're so very wrong when they say the Scriptures speak of only two places.
Well, to a degree, their mistake is understandable. The reason is that when William Tyndale translated the Bible into English, for whatever reason, and I don't know why, he took three Greek words, Hades, Gehenna, which is the lake of fire, and Tartarus, which is where the wicked angels are thrown. And he translated all three of them by one English word, and that was hell. And then the King James translators, well, 90% of the King James New Testament is Tyndale's translation.
So they didn't really do any digging to look behind that. So when you read the King James, you would get the honest impression there's just two places, heaven and hell. But anybody who has any familiarity with the writings of the early Christians knows beyond any doubt that those three places, Hades, Gehenna, and Tartarus, were three very different things to the early Christians. They weren't one in the same place.
And to take three different Greek words and translate them with one single English word, well, as I said, I think Tyndale was a great man, but he made a huge error there. Why would God have inspired the writers to use three different words if the whole time he meant one in the same place?
So when you read Luke 16, verses 22 and 23, the account of the rich man and Lazarus, when you read it in the King James, it says, "The rich man also died and was buried, and in hell he lifted up his eyes being in torment." So it sounds to a modern-day reader that he's in the lake of fire, that he's thrown there after he dies rather than waiting for the resurrection.
Now, I should explain that in the days of William Tyndale and the King James translators, the English word hell did not necessarily mean the lake of fire. The root meaning of hell is simply to cover.
It was Hades in its original use, but then slowly over the centuries, and perhaps because of misreading the King James Bible and the fact that both Gehenna and Hades are translated as hell, that in the minds of most people, or English-speaking people, I should say, the term hell has become equivalent to the lake of fire, Gehenna.
And one of the rather absurd teachings that has come out of this misunderstanding is that when the creed states that Jesus descended into hell after he died, a number of theologians have thought that that meant that Jesus was cast into the lake of fire and was tortured there. I won't go into more detail today because I discussed that in a message I previously gave on Christ's descent into Hades.
Well, the culmination of all of this confusion is at Revelation 20, verses 13 and 14, which says, "And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them." I'm reading from the King James. "And they were judged, every man according to their works, and death and hell were cast into the lake of fire." This is the second death. Okay, so if hell is the lake of fire, how is hell cast into the lake of fire?
But of course, the Greek word there is Hades, this intermediate place that will eventually be done away with after the resurrection of all. Then it says that Hades will be cast into the lake of fire. It will disappear. Now, when I originally discovered what the early Christians believed about life after death and saw that that's exactly what the New Testament was teaching, I began sharing that with my various friends at church and with other evangelical friends I had.
And usually their reaction was, "Now, are you sure, David, that that's what they believed? I mean, weren't there any persons back then teaching that we go straight to heaven when we die?" Well, my answer is yes. There were people back then who claimed to be Christians who taught we go straight to heaven when we die. And that was the Gnostics. Now, Gnosticism was the major heresy that early Christianity faced.
They believed that the world was created by an evil God, who is the God of the Old Testament, and that Jesus and his Father are not connected with the God of the Old Testament, that Jesus came preaching a whole new gospel and introducing mankind to his Father, and that all things material are inherently evil, including our human bodies are depraved. Okay, let me just read to you some quotes from the early Christians concerning the Gnostics and the subject of life after death.
Justin Martyr, in a conversation that he was having with unbelievers explaining Christianity to them, he said, "You may have fallen in with some Gnostics who are called Christians. However, they do not admit this." He's talking about the intermediate state. "And they venture to blaspheme the God of Abraham. They say there is no resurrection of the dead.
Rather, they say that when they die, their souls are taken to heaven." And he says, "Do not imagine that they are Christians." Irenaeus, who wrote the most lengthy works against the various Gnostic sects, said this, "The heretics do not acknowledge the salvation of their flesh, but claim that immediately upon their deaths, they will pass above the heavens and the Creator and go to the Mother or to that Father whom they pretend exists.
For they do not choose to understand that if these things are as they say, the Lord himself, in whom they profess to believe, did not rise again upon the third day. Rather, immediately upon his expiring on the cross, he undoubtedly departed on high, leaving his body to the earth. The Lord observed the law of the dead so that he might become the first begotten from the dead. And he waited until the third day in the lower parts of the earth.
Accordingly, these men," talking about the Gnostics, "must be put to confusion who allege that the lower parts refer to this world of ours, but that their inner man, leaving the body here, ascends into the superheavenly place." He continues, "The Lord went away in the midst of the shadow of death, where the souls of the dead were. However, afterwards, he arose in the body. And after the resurrection, he was taken up into heaven.
From this, it is clear that the souls of his disciples also, upon whose account the Lord underwent these things, will go away into the invisible place allotted to them by God. And they will remain there until the resurrection, awaiting that event.
Then, receiving their bodies and rising in their entirety, that is, bodily, just as the Lord arose, they will come in that manner into the presence of God." It is a bit shocking when you realize that the view that all of us have been taught about what happens when we die and we go straight to heaven was actually the view of the Gnostics and the early Christians, the Orthodox, were having to counter that, explaining, "No, we wait in Hades first and then we're resurrected, just like Jesus went to Hades and was
resurrected from the dead." In another work, Irenaeus writes, "No disciple is above the Master.
Our Master, therefore, did not at once depart, taking flight to heaven. Rather, he awaited the time of his resurrection as determined by the Father. Likewise, we also should await the time of our resurrection determined by God." Tertullian wrote, "Hades is not understood by us to be a bare cavity, nor some subterranean sewer of the world. Rather, it is a vast, deep space in the interior of the earth. For we read that Christ, in his death, spent three days in the heart of the earth.
He did not ascend into the heights of heaven before descending into the lower parts of the earth. This was so that he might there in Hades make the patriarchs and prophets partakers of himself. You must believe Hades is a subterranean region. You should keep at arm's length those people," talking about the Gnostics, "who are too proud to believe that the souls of the faithful deserve a place in Hades.
These persons who are servants above their Lord and disciples above their Master would no doubt spurn to receive the comfort of the resurrection if they must expect it in Abraham's bosom. But it was for this purpose, they say, that Christ descended into Hades, that we might not ourselves have to descend there. Well, then what difference is there between pagans and Christians if the same prison awaits them all when dead?
How indeed will the soul mount up to heaven where Christ is already sitting at the Father's right hand? For the archangel's trumpet has not yet been heard by the command of God. To no one is heaven opened. When the world indeed will pass away, then the kingdom of heaven will be opened." So basically, there you have it. I mean, take your pick. You either have the Gnostic view, the ones that John calls the Antichrist, the one that he says, "Don't even let their teachers in their house.
Don't even say a word of greeting to them." Or you have the historic faith. That is so clear, once your eyes are open, you see that, boy, that's all throughout the New Testament. We just had been all so indoctrinated that we read right past it and didn't see it. Before ending our discussion of what the early Christians believed about life after death, there was one primary variation on the detailed scheme that I've laid out to you that I do want to mention.
Some of the early Christians held to the view that faithful martyrs who die go straight to heaven rather than waiting in Hades. Now, these Christians believed everything else that we've already talked about. The only exception was they taught that martyrs go straight to heaven, and that gave an incentive, or I should say an added incentive, to remain faithful even in the face of death.
Now, the scriptural argument they used for this teaching was Revelation 6, verse 9, that says, "When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held." And they said, "Well, see, the altar is in heaven and their souls were underneath it, so it shows that the souls of the martyrs are in heaven." Well, perhaps so, but I'm not inclined to that view in light of the scriptures that we've read.
I mean, Jesus said he was going to return for his apostles, and all but one of his apostles did die as martyrs. So if they went on to heaven, then why would he say, "I'm going to return and bring you back to where I am?" Now, this, like I say, one exception to the general view later got changed after the time of Constantine, when very few Christians were dying anymore as martyrs. It got changed to the view that if you live a saintly life, that then you go straight to heaven.
I mentioned that the Roman Catholic teaching is that most Christians go to purgatory, which would be the intermediate place, but ones who live a life of a saint go straight to heaven. Well, what Christians began arguing in the fourth century was, well, these super godly Christians, if they had lived in a time of persecution, they no doubt would have been put to death, would have died as martyrs, and gone straight to heaven.
So why should they miss out on that extra reward just because they lived during a time of peace? And so that's where that teaching came into the Roman Catholic Church. Now, let's get back to the general view about the intermediate place after we die. I know many of you, this is very new to you.
You're probably struggling with this, and you're saying, "Well, yeah, but what about this verse or that verse?" Because all of us have been used to reading the New Testament with a totally different frame of mind, and we thought the New Testament was saying we go straight to heaven or to hell. One of the most common objections I hear is, "But the Bible says that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord." Well, I guess my response is, so does the Bible contradict itself?
We've already seen ample testimony in scripture that we must wait for Christ to return before we're resurrected and ascend to heaven. So did the Holy Spirit throw out conflicting views so we could pick and choose which version of life after death we prefer? Did the Holy Spirit inspire the New Testament writers to throw out differing proof texts so that we could pick the ones we liked and ignore the other ones? No, I don't think so.
Or are we to believe that somehow the whole church lost the original teaching on life after death? And are we to believe that the Gnostics, the Antichrist, were the ones who actually preserved the original apostolic doctrine while the Orthodox Christians abandoned it? Well, that's not reasonable at all. So the problem must be how we're reading the scripture. Let's look at that verse, which, like I say, so many have quoted to me. This is what it says.
It says, "We are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased, rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord." That's found in 2 Corinthians 5, verses 6 and 7. Now, let me ask you this. Does that verse say that there's not an intermediate place that the faithful go to, that there's not a paradise or Abraham's bosom? Does it say that we go straight to heaven when we die?
No, it says no such thing. The passage is not a passage about what happens to us when we die. Paul was just talking about the reward we can all look forward to of being with Christ, and we don't get there until after we die. As long as we're here in the physical body, we're absent from the Lord in a sense.
In another sense, as Jesus said, "I am with you until the end of the days." Now, as I've already mentioned, the early Christians certainly believe that we're present with the Lord in paradise, but we're not in the body when we're in paradise, are we? So there's no contradiction there at all. Paul says nothing about heaven, just about being in the body, we're absent from the Lord in a certain sense.
And we're present with the Lord when we're in paradise, but there will be an even greater sense of being in the presence of the Lord when we're in heaven. And we're talking about things that none of us can possibly understand because there are things outside the physical realm. Now, another verse that some Christians have quoted to me is Hebrews 9, verses 27 and 28.
That simply says, "And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many." I see. Now, how does that passage contradict or disprove the teaching that we await in Hades for the resurrection and final judgment until Christ return? I mean, the early Christians certainly believe that we die once and that the judgment is not in this life, but after we die. That's all the writer of Hebrews is saying.
He does not say that the judgment is immediately after we die, just that it's after we die. I mean, after all, Matthew chapter 25 describes judgment day, and it shows clearly it's going to be at the end. There's not a separate judgment day for each person. Like when David Bercot dies, okay, we're going to bring together the heavenly court, and David Bercot appears before the judge. And then when somebody else, John Smith, dies, then the court reconvenes and meets with him. I mean, that's not what the Bible says.
Everyone is going to be gathered together on judgment day. Okay, the final objection that I've heard, and this has only been from a handful of people, and it's usually people who have studied in seminary or some kind of Bible college. And this is what they say to me, "David, what you've described is what we were taught in seminary, except that what we were taught is that the intermediate place existed only up until the time of Christ's death.
And then he took all of the faithful out of Hades and up to heaven with him." So no longer is that the situation. Now we just go straight to heaven or to hell when we die. You only had Hades, the intermediate place, up until the death of Christ. Well, I guess my first response is, that's interesting. Now, where does it say that in scripture?
Well, the only passage that's ever quoted to me is Ephesians 4, verses 8 through 10, where Paul writes, talking about Christ, "When he ascended on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men." Now, this "he ascended," what does it mean? But that he also first descended into the lower parts of the earth. He who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens that he might fill all things. Now, does that say that the intermediate state was done away with once Christ descended into Hades?
If you say yes, please show me where. Where does it say anything about that? To me, it's a classic example of when we're given a preconception, then we read something in the scripture that's not there at all. It says nothing about that. I mean, let me ask you, when did Jesus ascend into heaven? Did he ascend to heaven before he was resurrected from the dead? Was he lying to us when he said that he would be in the belly of the earth for three days? I mean, we have several accounts of his resurrection.
Do any of the accounts mention faithful ones of old who were resurrected with him? And we have an account of the ascension. They're in the first chapter of Acts. Does it say that there were a group of faithful ones who, when Christ ascended, he brought them with him to heaven? They ascended to heaven along with Christ? No, there's nothing about that. Acts chapter 1 mentions only Jesus, that he ascended to heaven. There was no one with him who ascended with him.
Again, are we to believe that the apostles taught that the intermediate state had been done away with, and yet none of their disciples knew anything about it? I mean, the early Christians were obviously aware of this passage in Ephesians. They make references to it. Let me read to you a few examples. Tertullian wrote, "Now, hear how he declares that by Christ himself, when returned to heaven, these spiritual gifts were to be sent." It says, "He ascended upon high, that is, into heaven.
He led captivity captive, meaning death or slavery of men. He gave gifts to the sons of men, that is, the gifts that we call charismata." I mean, what could be more clear? Jesus ascended to heaven. He led captivity captive, that is, death, that we are captive to. He broke the bonds of death through his death. Otherwise, we couldn't even be talking about the resurrection and all of these things. And he gave gifts. That was what we all know, the gifts of the Spirit.
Irenaeus wrote, "His death gave rise to strength and power. For the Lord, his suffering ascended into the lofty place, led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men. Our Lord, by his death, destroyed death and put an end to corruption." Hippolytus wrote, "Through death, he overcame death." I mean, that's the message that's all throughout the New Testament, that Christ destroyed death, the power of death, through his own death.
So there's nothing in there that contradicts what was universally believed by the early Christians, that the dead await in Hades for the resurrection and for the final judgment. So where did this teaching come from that, oh, we had an intermediate place, but it was done away with after Jesus died? Well, as I mentioned earlier, the reformers originally taught this intermediate place, but then in the generations after the Reformation, it slowly got dropped until people forgot about it.
But Bible scholars, in reading the early Christian writings and in reading Jewish writings, they came to the realization that there was this understanding of an intermediate place, that Hades is where people wait.
Now, they didn't want to make a U-turn and go back to the original teaching, which is what they should have done, but by then, everyone was used to hearing, "We go to heaven when we die if we are saved." And so they came up with this very clever teaching that, okay, yes, everything the Jews said, that's true about it, and well, the early Christians talk about that, but that's no longer true. That was done away with Christ.
And of course, what they're saying by implication is somehow none of the Christians heard about that. They still thought they were going there, even though it was done away with. Somehow we know better today than what they did, those who received the gospel directly from the apostles. See, it's trying to have the best of both worlds, and it doesn't work.
As I've stated many times before in other messages, the beautiful thing about the teachings of the early Christians is that invariably they fit all of the verses of the New Testament. You don't have problem passages that you have to twist and make, say, something different from what they obviously say.
Our modern way of interpreting scriptures tends to be to find proof texts for something that we already want to believe, and then we ignore other verses that don't fit that, or we explain them away with some pseudo history or something like that. But the early Christians always gave full weight to all of the verses, that all of the verses of the New Testament speak. We don't have to hide any of them away.
Now, I just want to say in conclusion, that should always be our approach in understanding scripture and interpreting it. Look at the totality of what the New Testament said. Look at the history of what Christians believed in the beginning. Verify, does this fit the totality of the New Testament teaching? If it does, you've got it. You've got scripture that is inspired, and you've got the historic record of how Christians understood those scriptures.
And when you've got those two things, you can be quite certain you've got the truth.