The Language of
Destruction in the Old Testament. The most compelling reason for believing in
the annihilation of the lost at the final judgment is the rich vocabulary and
imagery of "destruction" often used in the Old and New Testaments to
describe the fate of the wicked. The writers of the Old Testament seem to have
exhausted the resources of the Hebrew language at their command to affirm the
complete destruction of impenitent sinners.
According to Basil
Atkinson 28 Hebrew nouns and 23 verbs are generally translated "destruction"
or "to destroy" in our English Bible. Approximately half of these
words are used to describe the final destruction of the wicked.79 A detailed
listing of all the occurrences would take us beyond the limited scope of this
chapter, beside proving to be repetitious to most readers. Interested readers
can find an extensive analysis of such texts in the studies by Basil Atkinson
and Edward Fudge. Only a sampling of significant texts are considered here.
Several Psalms describe
the final destruction of the wicked with dramatic imagery (Ps 1:3-6; 2:9-12;
11:1-7; 34:8-22; 58:6-10; 69:22-28; 145:17, 20). In Psalm 37, for example, we
read that the wicked "will soon fade like grass" (v. 2),"they
shall be cut off . . . and will be no more" (vv. 9-10), they will
"perish . . . like smoke they vanish away" (v. 20),"transgressors
shall be altogether destroyed" (v. 38). Psalm 1, loved and memorized by
many, contrasts the way of the righteous with that of the wicked. Of the latter
it says that "the wicked shall not stand in the judgment" (v. 5). They
will be "like chaff which the wind drives away" (v. 4). "The way
of the wicked will perish" (v. 6). Again, in Psalm 145, David affirms:
"The Lord preserves all who love him; but all the wicked he will
destroy" (v. 20). This sampling of references, on the final destruction of
the wicked is in complete harmony with the teaching of the rest of Scripture.
The Destruction of the
Day of the Lord. The prophets frequently announce the ultimate destruction of
the wicked in conjunction with the eschatological Day of the Lord. In his
opening chapter, Isaiah proclaims that "rebels and sinners shall be
destroyed together, and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed" (Is
1:28). The picture here is one of total destruction, a picture that is further
developed by the imagery of people burning like tinder with no one to quench the
fire: "The strong shall become tow, and his work a spark, and both shall
burn together, with none to quench them" (Is 1:31).
Zephaniah stacks up
imagery upon imagery to portray the destructiveness of the day of the
Lord. "The great day of the Lord is near, near and hastening fast; . . . A
day of wrath is that day, a day of distress and anguish, a day of ruin and
devastation, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a
day of trumpet blast and battle cry . . . In the fire of his jealous wrath, all
the earth shall be consumed; for a full, yea, sudden end he will make of all the
inhabitants of the earth" (Zeph 1:14, 15, 18). Here the prophet describes
the destruction of the Day of the Lord in the context of the historical judgment
against Jerusalem. By means of the prophetic perspective, the prophets often see
the final punishment through the transparency of imminent historical events.
Hosea, like Zephaniah,
uses a variety of images to describe the final end of sinners. "They shall
be like the morning mist or like the dew that goes early away, like the chaff
that swirls from the threshing floor or like smoke from a window" (Hos
13:3). The comparison of the fate of the wicked with the morning mist, the early
dew, the chaff, and the smoke hardly suggests that sinners will suffer forever.
On the contrary, such imagery suggests that sinners will finally disappear from
God’s creation in the same way as the mist, dew, chaff, and smoke dissipate
from the face of the earth.
On the last page of the
Old Testament English Bible (not the Hebrew Bible), we find a most colorful
description of the contrast between the final destiny of believers and
unbelievers. For the believers who fear the Lord, "the sun of
righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings" (Mal 4:2). But for
unbelievers the Day of the Lord "comes, burning like an oven, when all the
arrogant and all the evildoers will be stubble; the day that comes shall burn
them up, says the Lord of host, so that it will leave them neither root nor
branch" (Mal 4:1). The day of the final punishment of the lost will also be
a day of vindication of God’s people, for they "shall tread down the
wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of [their] feet, on the day when
I act, says the Lord of hosts" (Mal 4:3).
We need not interpret
this prophecy literally, because we are dealing with representative symbols. But
the message conveyed by these symbolic images is clear. While the righteous
rejoice in God’s salvation, the wicked are consumed like" stubble,"
so that no "root or branch" is left. This is clearly a picture of
total consumption by destroying fire, and not one of eternal torment. This is
the Old Testament picture of the fate of the wicked, total and permanent
destruction and not eternal torment.
Jesus and the Language
of Destruction. The New Testament follows closely the Old Testament in
describing the fate of the wicked with words and pictures denoting destruction.
The most common Greek words are the verb apollumi (to destroy) and the noun
apoleia (destruction). In addition, numerous graphic illustrations from both
inanimate and animate life are used to portray the final destruction of the
wicked.
Jesus also used several
figures from inanimate life to portray the utter destruction of the wicked. He
compared it to the following: weeds that are bound in bundles to be burned (Matt
13:30, 40), bad fish that is thrown away (Matt 13:48), harmful plants that are
rooted up (Matt 15:13), fruitless trees that are cut down (Luke 13:7), and
withered branches that are burned (John 15:6).
Jesus also used
illustrations from human life to portray the doom of the wicked. He compared it
to: unfaithful tenants who are destroyed (Luke 20:16), an evil servant who will
be cut in pieces (Matt 24:51), the Galileans who perished (Luke 13:2-3), the
eighteen persons crushed by Siloam’s tower (Luke 13:4-5), the antediluvians
destroyed by the flood (Luke 17:27), the people of Sodom and Gomorrah destroyed
by fire (Luke 17:29), and the rebellious servants who were slain at the return
of their master (Luke 19:14, 27).
All of these figures
denote capital punishment, either individually or collectively. They signify
violent death, preceded by greater or lesser suffering. The illustrations
employed by the Savior very graphically depict the ultimate destruction or
dissolution of the wicked. Jesus asked: "When the lord therefore of the
vineyard cometh, what will he do unto those husbandmen?" (Matt 21:40). And
the people responded: "He will miserably destroy [apollumi] those wicked
men" (Matt 21:41).
Jesus taught the final
destruction of the wicked not only through illustrations, but also through
explicit pronouncements. For example, He said: "Do not fear those who can
kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him [God] who can destroy
both soul and body in hell" (Matt 10:28). John Stott rightly
remarks: "If to kill is to deprive the body of life, hell would seem to be
the deprivation of both physical and spiritual life, that is, an extinction of
being."80 In our study of this text in chapter 3 we noted that Christ did
not consider hell a the place of eternal torment, but of permanent destruction
of the whole being, soul and body.
Often Jesus contrasted
eternal life with death or destruction. "I give them eternal life, and they
shall never perish" (John 10:28). "Enter by the narrow gate; for the
gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter
it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and
those who find it are few" (Matt 7:13-14). Here we have a simple contrast
between life and death. There is no ground in Scripture for twisting the word
"perish" or "destruction" to mean everlasting torment.
Earlier we noted that
seven times Christ used the imagery of gehenna to describe the destruction of
the wicked in hell. In reviewing Christ’s allusions to hell, gehenna, we found
that none of them indicates that hell is a place of unending torment. What is
eternal or unquenchable is not the punishment but the fire which, as the case of
Sodom and Gomorra, causes the complete and permanent destruction of the wicked,
a condition that lasts forever. The fire is unquencheable because it cannot be
quenched until it has consumed all the combustible material.
Paul and the Language of
Destruction. The language of destruction is used frequently also by the New
Testament writers to describe the doom of the wicked. Speaking of the
"enemies of the cross," Paul says that "their end is destruction
[apoleia]" (Phil 3:19). Concluding his letter to the Galatians, Paul warns
that "The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will
reap destruction [phthora]; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from that
Spirit will reap eternal life" (Gal 6:8, NIV). The Day of the Lord will
come unexpectedly, "like a thief in the night, . . . then sudden
destruction [olethros] will come upon them [the wicked]" (1 Thess. 5:2-3). At
Christ’s coming, the wicked "shall suffer the punishment of eternal
destruction [olethron]" (2 Thess. 1:9). We noted earlier that the
destruction of the wicked cannot be eternal in its duration because it is
difficult to imagine an eternal inconclusive process of destruction. Destruction
presupposes annihilation.
John Stott perceptively
remarks: "It would seem strange, therefore, if people who are said to
suffer destruction are in fact not destroyed; and, . . . it is ‘difficult to
imagine a perpetually inconclusive process of perishing.’ It cannot, I think,
be replied that it is impossible to destroy human beings because they are
immortal, for the immortality and therefore indestructibility of the soul is a
Greek and not a Biblical concept. According to Scripture only God possesses
immortality in himself (1 Tim 1:17; 6:16); he reveals and gives it to us through
the gospel (2 Tim 1:10)."81
In Romans 2:6-12, Paul
provides one of the clearest descriptions of the final destiny of believers and
unbelievers. He begins by stating the principle that God "will render to
every man according to his works" (Rom 2:6). Then he explains that "to
those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he
will give eternal life; but for those who are factious and do not obey the
truth, but obey wickedness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be
tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and
also the Greek" (Rom 2:7-9).
Note that
"immortality" is God’s gift to the faithful, awarded at the
resurrection, and not an inherent human quality. The wicked do not receive
immortality, but "wrath and fury," two words associated with the final
judgment (1 Thess. 1:10; Rev 14:10; 16:19; 19:15). Paul largely repeats the words
and phrases found in Zephaniah’s classic description of the great day of the
Lord, as "a day of wrath . . . distress and anguish" (Zeph. 1:15). God
will "consume" the whole world with "the fire of his jealous
wrath" and He "will make a sudden end of all who live in the
earth" (Zeph. 1:18).
This is most likely the
picture Paul had in mind when he spoke of the manifestation of God’s
"wrath and fury" upon the wicked. This is indicated by the following
verse where he says: "All who have sinned without the law will also perish
[apolountai] without the law" (Rom 2:12). Paul draws a contrast between
those who "perish" and those who receive "immortality." In
this whole passage, there is no allusion to eternal torment. Immortality is
God’s gift to the saved, while corruption, destruction, death, and perishing
is the wages of sin and sinners.
In view of the final
destiny awaiting believers and unbelievers, Paul often speaks of the former as
"those who are being saved [hoi sozomenoi] and of the latter as "those
who are perishing [hoi apollumenoi]" (1 Cor. 1:18; 2 Cor. 2:15; 4:3; 2
Thess.
2:10). This common characterization is indicative of Paul’s understanding of
the destiny of unbelievers as ultimate destruction and not eternal torment.
Peter and the Language
of Destruction. Peter, like Paul, uses the language of destruction to portray
the fate of the unsaved. He speaks of false teachers who secretly bring in
heresies and who bring upon themselves "swift destruction" (2 Pet
2:1). Peter compares their destruction to that of the ancient world by the Flood
and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah which were burned to ashes (2 Pet 2:5-6).
God "condemned them to extinction and made them an example to them who were
to be ungodly" (2 Pet 2:6). Here Peter states unequivocally that the
extinction by fire of Sodom and Gomorrah serves as an example of the fate of the
lost.
Peter again uses the
example of the destruction of the world by the Flood, in dealing with scoffers
who mocked at Christ’s promised coming (2 Pet 3:3-7). He reminds his readers
that as the world "was deluged with water and perished" at God’s
command by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist have been
stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of
ungodly men" (2 Pet 3:7).
The picture here is that
the fire that will melt the elements will also accomplish the destruction of the
ungodly. This reminds us of the tares of Christ’s parable that will be burnt
up in the field where they grew. Peter alludes again to the fate of the lost
when he says that God is "forbearing toward you, not wishing that any
should perish, but that all should reach repentance" (2 Pet 3:9). Peter’s
alternatives between repentance or perishing remind us of Christ’s warning:
"unless you repent you will all likewise perish" (Luke 13:3). The
latter will occur at the coming of the Lord when "the elements will be
dissolved with fire, and the earth and the works that are upon it will be burned
up" (2 Pet 3:10). Such a graphic description of the destruction of the
earth and evildoers by fire hardly allows for the unending torment of hell.
Other Allusions to the
Final Destruction of the Wicked. Several other allusions in the New Testament
imply the final destruction of the lost. We briefly refer to some of them here.
The author of Hebrews warns repeatedly against apostasy or unbelief. Anyone who
deliberately keeps on sinning "after receiving the knowledge of the
truth," faces "a fearful prospect of judgment, and a fury of fire
which will consume the adversaries" (Heb 10:27). The author explicitly
states that those who persist in sinning against God ultimately experience the
judgment of a raging fire that will "consume" them. Note that the
function of the fire is to consume sinners, not to torment them for all
eternity. This truth is reiterated consistently throughout the Bible.
Throughout his epistle,
James admonishes those who do not practice the faith that they profess. He warns
believers not to allow sinful desires to take root in the heart, because
"sin when it is full-grown brings forth death" (James 1:15). Like
Paul, James explains that the ultimate wages of sin is death, cessation of life,
and not eternal torment. James speaks also of God "who is able to save and
to destroy" (James 4:12). The contrast is between salvation and
destruction. James closes his letter encouraging believers to watch for the
welfare of one another, because "whoever brings back a sinner from the
error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of
sins" (James 5:20). Again, salvation is from death and not from eternal
torment. James consistently refers to the outcome of sin as "death" or
"destruction." Incidentally, James speaks of saving the "soul
from death," implying that the soul can die because it is part of the whole
person.
Jude is strikingly
similar to 2 Peter in his description of the fate of unbelievers. Like Peter,
Jude points to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah "as an example of
those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire" (Jude 7, NIV). We noted
earlier that the fire that destroyed the two cities is eternal, not because of
its duration, but because of its permanent results. Jude closes, by urging his
readers to build themselves up in the faith, caring for one another.
"Convince some, who doubt; save some, by snatching them out of the
fire" (Jude 23). The fire to which Jude refers is obviously the same kind
of fire that consumed Sodom and Gomorrah. It is the fire that causes the
permanent destruction of the wicked, as envisioned by Jesus, Paul, Peter, James,
Hebrews, and the entire Old Testament.
The language of
destruction is present, especially in the book of Revelation, because it
represents God’s way of overcoming the opposition of evil to Himself and His
people. We noted earlier how John describes, with vivid imagery, the consignment
of the devil, the beast, the false prophet, death, Hades, and all the wicked
into the lake of fire, which he defines as "the second death." We
found that the phrase "second death" was commonly used to describe the
final, irreversible death.
A text not mentioned
earlier is Revelation 11:18, where at the sounding of the seventh trumpet John
hears the 24 elders saying: "The time has come for judging the dead . . .
and for destroying those who destroy the earth." Here, again, the outcome
of the final judgment is not condemnation to eternal torment in hell, but
destruction and annihilation. God is severe but just. He does not delight in the
death of the wicked, let alone in torturing them for all eternity. Ultimately,
He will punish all evildoer, but the punishment will result in eternal
extinction, not eternal torment.
This is the fundamental
difference between the Biblical view of final punishment as utter extinction and
the traditional view of hell as unending torment and torture, a view shared by
many cruel pagan systems. The language of destruction and the imagery of fire
that we have found throughout the Bible clearly suggests that the final
punishment of the wicked is permanent extinction and not unending torment in
hell. In the light of this compelling Biblical witness, I join Clark Pinnock in
stating: "I sincerely hope that traditionalists will stop saying that there
is no Biblical basis for this view [annihilation] when there is such a strong
basis for it."82
The Language of
Destruction Is Metaphorical. Traditionalists object to our interpretation of the
language of destruction which we have just surveyed, because they maintain that
words like "perish," destroy," "consume,"
"death," "burned up," "lake of fire,"
"ascending smoke," and "second death" are often used with a
metaphorical meaning. This is true, but their figurative meanings derive from
their literal, primary meanings. It is an accepted principle of Biblical
interpretation that words occurring in non-allegorical prose are to be
interpreted according to their primary meaning, unless there is some reason to
attribute to them a different meaning.
Scripture never
indicates that these words should not be interpreted according to their ordinary
meaning when applied to the fate of the wicked. Our study of the usage of these
words in Scripture and extra-Biblical literature has shown that they describe a
literal, permanent destruction of the wicked. For example, John’s vision of
the "smoke ascending forever" (Rev 14:11) occurs in the Old Testament
to portray the silent testimony of complete destruction (Is 34:10) and not of
eternal torment. Similarly, the "lake of fire" is clearly defined as
the "second death," a phrase used by the Jews to denote final,
irreversible death. Incidentally, if the "lake of fire" annihilates
Death and Hades, we have reason to believe that it hardly can preserve the lost
in conscious torment for all eternity. We sincerely hope that traditionalists
will find the courage to take a long, hard look at the Biblical data which
envision hell as the permanent destruction of the lost.
