Basic HTML Version
660
Second Helvetic Confession continues after the quotation cited above: “In like manner, we
believe that the unbelievers are cast headlong into hell, from whence there is no return opened
to the wicked by any offices of those who live.”[Chap. XXVI.] The Bible sheds very little direct
light on this subject. The only passage that can really come into consideration here is the
parable of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16, where hades denotes hell, the place of eternal
torment. The rich man found himself in the place of torment; his condition was fixed forever;
and he was conscious of his miserable plight, sought mitigation of the pain he was suffering,
and desired to have his brethren warned, in order that they might avoid a similar doom. In
addition to this direct proof there is also an inferential proof. If the righteous enter upon their
eternal state at once, the presumption is that this is true of the wicked as well. We leave out of
consideration here a couple of passages, which are of uncertain interpretation, namely, I Pet.
3:19; II Pet. 2:9.
B. THE DOCTRINE OF THE INTERMEDIATE STATE IN HISTORY.
In the earliest years of the Christian Church there was little thought of an intermediate state.
The idea that Jesus would soon return as Judge made the interval seem to be of little
consequence. The problem of the intermediate state arose when it became apparent that Jesus
would not at once return. The real problem that vexed the early Fathers, was how to reconcile
individual judgment and retribution at death with the general judgment and retribution after
the resurrection. To ascribe too much importance to the former would seem to rob the other of
its significance, and vice versa. There was no unanimity among the early Church Fathers, but
the majority of them sought to solve the difficulty by assuming a distinct intermediate state
between death and the resurrection. Says Addison: “For many centuries the general conclusion
was widely accepted that in a subterranean Hades the righteous enjoy a measure of reward not
equal to their future heaven and the wicked suffer a degree of punishment not equal to their
future hell. The intermediate state was thus a slightly reduced version of ultimate
retribution.”[Life Beyond Death, p. 202.] This view was held, though with some variations, by
such men as Justin Martyr, Irenæus, Tertullian, Novatian, Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose,
and Augustine. In the Alexandrian School the idea of the intermediate state passed into that of
a gradual purification of the soul, and this in course of time paved the way for the Roman
Catholic doctrine of purgatory. There were some, however, who favored the idea that at death
the souls of the righteous immediately entered heaven, namely, Gregory of Nazianze, Eusebius,
and Gregory the Great. In the Middle Ages the doctrine of an intermediate state was retained,
and in connection with it the Roman Catholic Church developed the doctrine of purgatory. The
prevailing opinion was that hell received at once the souls of the wicked, but that only those of
the righteous who were free from every stain of sin, were admitted at once into the
blessedness of heaven, to enjoy the visio Dei. The martyrs were usually reckoned among the