General Editor Preston Sprinkle wrote in the Introduction to this 2016 book, “There have been three main developments over the last twenty years that have cultivated a need for this new Counterpoints book. First, the annihilation view of hell has grown in popularity among evangelicals. Many theologians, pastors, and Christian laypeople today are leaning toward or embracing an annihilation view of hell… now many evangelicals are arriving at this view in light of a fresh look at the biblical text. Second, Christian universalism is gaining ground as well… there are some powerful biblical arguments that Christians need to wrestle with… Third, an ecumenical spirit is growing among evangelicals… With regard to hell and the afterlife, Protestants are exploring view that are traditionally considered Catholic, and vice-versa. Purgatory… is becoming a theological option among evangelicals, and it needs to be evaluated based on its exegetical and theological strength…. The last twenty years have witnesses many robust defenses of the traditional view of hell in response to these three developments… This is why this new Counterpoints book is so needed… It brings the three developments into dialogue with the traditional view of hell.” (Pg. 10-11)
Denny Burk [“Eternal Conscious Torment” view] summarizes, “So the question of eternal conscious torment really does come down to who God is. Is God the kind of God for whom this kind of punishment for sin would be necessary? Or is he not? What does the Bible say about God and the judgments that issue forth from him? The aim of this essay will be to answer these questions and to argue that the Bible teaches eternal conscious torment in a place called ‘hell’ as the lot of every person who dies in an unrepentant state. All those who fail to experience saving faith in Jesus while they are alive in this age will be resurrected and condemned when Christ returns. They will then be cast into hell where they will suffer never-ending punishment.” (Pg. 20)
But John Stackhouse [“terminal punishment” or Conditional Immortality/Annihilation view] suggests that “Burk’s … argument is essentially deductive: Since God is infinitely great, any sin against such a God deserves infinite punishment… Burk starts by taking swipes at his theological counterparts for being ‘emotional’---as if emotions are not conveyers of information that theologians… ought to pay attention to. Why DOES this formulation of doctrine repel me? Why DOES this view of God horrify me? … perhaps… those are SANCTIFIED feelings… that are warning me that I am on the wrong theological path… The immediate problem … is that Burk shows precisely nowhere in the Bible a single passage in which this argument [sin deserves infinite punishment] is actually made. Nowhere in Scripture does any biblical author say, ‘Because God is infinitely great, sin against God is infinitely bad, and therefore entails infinite punishment.” (Pg. 44-45)
Jerry Walls [“Purgatorial” view] says, “I am wondering whether Burk… believes God is glorified by choosing some for salvation and passing over the rest who remain dead in their sins and are consigned to reprobation. Does he believe God is glorified in giving irresistible grace to some, while damning others who are not given such grace, and who consequently cannot do other than sin and disobey God? Is this what he means when he says ‘the existence of hell serves to demonstrate eternally the glory of God’s justice in his judgment on sin’?” (Pg. 57)
Stackhouse explains, “Any doctrine being offered … must give fully adequate attention to both God’s fierce holiness and God’s fervent affection, God’s justice and God’s generosity… I shall defend… the view that hell is the situation in which those who do not avail themselves of the atonement made by Jesus in his suffering and death must make their own atonement by suffering and then death, separated from the sustaining life of God and thus disappearing from this cosmos. And I will contend that this view best takes into account these two poles of God’s goodness.” (Pg. 61-62)
He argues, “Psalm after psalm and proverb after proverb reiterate the sane biblical teaching… The wicked eventually and inevitably some to the same end: They will vanish from the face of the earth... Sodom and Gomorrah are clearly the paradigm cases of destruction… Consider… 2 Peter 2:6… Peter says that the ‘extinction’ of Sodom and Gomorrah is ‘an example of what is coming to the ungodly.’ This verse---and many others like it---is clear proof for the terminal punishment view of hell. Other interpreters must read this verse against its clear and natural meaning.” (Pg. 70-71)
But he also contends, “One might fairly ask whether Revelation 14:11’s depiction of the damned enjoying ‘no rest day or night’ implies that they never arrive at the relief of death and that they are forever conscious. But ‘rest’ in the Old Testament… carries positive connotations of Sabbath… Thus the condemned are doomed never to enjoy rest, they will never escape their doom---for they suffer and die outside God’s rest… There is no reason to conclude from [Isa 66:24] that the corpses last forever! How could they, if they are being consumed?... The similar language [in Rev 20:14-15] would lead the conscientious reader to a similar conclusion: Death and Hades are destroyed… and ‘anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life’ is similarly destroyed, dead, gone… it is impossible to imagine ‘Death and Hades’ suffering. The ‘second death’ means, ultimately, to disappear.” (Pg. 72-73)
Robin Parry [Universalist view] states, “Critical to most versions of universalism is the claim that it is possible to be saved AFTER one has died… What does the Bible say? Well, it does not DIRECTLY address the issue. There are no biblical texts that say death is a point of no return, but neither are there texts that unambiguously say that one can repent after death… all that [Heb 9:27] claims is that all humans die once and then face judgment, and ALL sides of this debate will agree with THAT claim. To go further than this and insist that this judgment leads to irreversible punishment is to go beyond anything said in the text. So the Bible does not DIRECTLY settle this question.” (Pg. 116)
He adds, “if we believe that Scripture teaches BOTH that all people will be saved AND that some people will go to hell---and it does seem to teach both---then it is arguable that we can legitimately infer that those in hell will be saved out of hell. If postmortem salvation can be legitimately inferred from teachings that have good claims to being biblical, then the doctrine itself can claim to be biblical, at least in a secondary sense.” (Pg. 117)
He points out, “we must be very careful how we interpret the imagery. That the fire will not be quenched and the worms will not die need mean no more than that the fire and the worms will be UNCEASINGLY AND UNSTOPPABLY ACTIVE until they have finished their work. One does not need to postulate eternal torment in hell by everlasting fire and worms to make sense of this image.” (Pg. 119)
Editor Sprinkle states in his Conclusion. “Evangelicals must think deeply and critically---indeed, BIBLICALLY---about Parry’s argument. And if I can be completely honest, I hope that Parry is right.” (Pg. 198)
This is an excellent collection of views [and fitting “partner” to the earlier
Four Views on Hell
], that will be “must reading” for anyone studying the doctrines of Hell, Conditional Immortality/Annihilation, Purgatory, or Universalism.
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