‘Universalism is heresy!’ has been the default position of the church for nearly 1500 years, alongside the idea that ‘infernalism (eternal torment) is orthodoxy.’ For this reason, it’s hard for many Christians to fathom a time in which universalism might have been considered orthodox, and the idea of eternal torment heretical. However, the fact is that universalism was actually the majority view for the first four hundred years of the church’s existence. In fact, until the time of Augustine of Hippo, who was one of the first mainstream infernalists, the salvation of all was proclaimed by major champions of early orthodoxy such as Irenaeus of Lyons, the three Cappadocian Fathers, and St. Jerome. This series of posts will go through the history of early church thought on hell and universal salvation.
As seen in the previous post, the idea of eternal conscious torment was confined to fringe gnostic circles during the second century. The major Greek apologists of the second century — ‘Mathetes’, Irenaeus, Theophilus, and Clement — were universalists who believed that there would be an end to punishment at the consummation (telos). However, at the same time, in the Latin-speaking world a change was occurring. Beginning with Tertullian, the founder of the catechetical school of Carthage, a number of theologians broke away from the orthodox universalism of their time and began to teach infernalism instead. This post will cover the rise of infernalism in the Latin-speaking world, discuss possible reasons for this, and describe Origen of Alexandria’s rebuttal to these Latin infernalists of the late second and early third centuries.
Tertullian and Cyprian of Carthage
Tertullian (c. 155 - 220) was a Latin Christian apologist (and possibly a priest) from Carthage, and a highly prolific writer. Over two dozen of his writings survive to this day, most notably his Apologeticus, which was written near the turn of the second century as an effort to convert the leaders of Carthage to Christianity. There is no doubt that Tertullian was an infernalist. He believed that, contrary to conditionalism, all people including the wicked would be raised to immortality at the Great White Throne judgment, and contrary to universalism, that most would be sent into punishment eternally. His Apologeticus, probably written near the date of his conversion, explicitly sets out this belief:
these have further set before us the proofs He has given of His majesty in His judgments by floods and fires, the rules appointed by Him for securing His favour, as well as the retribution in store for the ignoring, forsaking and keeping them, as being about at the end of all to adjudge His worshippers to everlasting life, and the wicked to the doom of fire at once without ending and without break, raising up again all the dead from the beginning, reforming and renewing them with the object of awarding either recompense. (Apologeticus 18)
Epicurus makes light of all suffering and pain, maintaining that if it is small, it is contemptible; and if it is great, it is not long-continued. No doubt about it, we, who receive our awards under the judgment of an all-seeing God, and who look forward to eternal punishment from Him for sin — we alone make real effort to attain a blameless life, under the influence of our ampler knowledge, the impossibility of concealment, and the greatness of the threatened torment, not merely long-enduring but everlasting, fearing Him, whom he too should fear who the fearing judges — even God, I mean, and not the proconsul. (Apologeticus 45)
When, therefore, the boundary and limit, that millennial interspace, has been passed, when even the outward fashion of the world itself — which has been spread like a veil over the eternal economy, equally a thing of time — passes away, then the whole human race shall be raised again, to have its dues meted out according as it has merited in the period of good or evil, and thereafter to have these paid out through the immeasurable ages of eternity. Therefore after this there is neither death nor repeated resurrections, but we shall be the same that we are now, and still unchanged — the servants of God, ever with God, clothed upon with the proper substance of eternity; but the profane, and all who are not true worshippers of God, in like manner shall be consigned to the punishment of everlasting fire — that fire which, from its very nature indeed, directly ministers to their incorruptibility. (Apologeticus 48)
Likewise, Tertullian also believed that the punishment meted out by God is retributive in nature, rather than correctional (Against Marcion 1.26-27), contrary to the views of his Greek contemporaries and indeed the testimony of scripture (Job 5:17; Prov. 3:12; Heb. 12:5-6; Rev. 3:19). This idea of eternal torment in hell resonates throughout all of Tertullian’s writings, as it does in much of modern orthodox Christian literature. He even spends two chapters of his treatise On the Resurrection of the Flesh discussing how it is possible for the resurrected body to remain immortal and incorruptible while also experiencing continual death and destruction (35-36).
The source of Tertullian’s belief in infernalism can likely be traced back to a translational difficulty. As noted by Ilaria Ramelli and David Konstan in their book Terms for Eternity [1], both aiōnios and aidios, which mean ‘eonian’ (age-long) and absolutely ‘eternal’ respectively, are translated into Latin as aeternum (meaning absolutely ‘eternal’) without distinction. Therefore, Tertullian, whose first language was Latin, would not have understood that the words used to describe postmortem punishment in the New Testament don’t necessarily indicate eternality.
There is also reason to believe that Tertullian’s infernalism may have had a more personal motivation, a desire to see his enemies tortured eternally, albeit probably unconsciously. The final ‘spectacle’ in his work On the Spectacles is the Lake of Fire, into which Tertullian imagines looking on with glee as he watches his political and religious opponents burn in torment:
How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? What my derision? Which sight gives me joy? Which rouses me to exultation? — as I see so many illustrious monarchs, whose reception into the heavens was publicly announced, groaning now in the lowest darkness with great Jove himself, and those, too, who bore witness of their exultation; governors of provinces… in fires more fierce than those with which in the days of their pride they raged against the followers of Christ. What world’s wise men besides, the very philosophers… now covered with shame before the poor deluded ones, as one fire consumes them! Poets also, trembling not before the judgment-seat of Rhadamanthus or Minos, but of the unexpected Christ! I shall have a better opportunity then of hearing the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; of viewing the play-actors, much more “dissolute” in the dissolving flame; of looking upon the charioteer, all glowing in his chariot of fire; of beholding the wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows; unless even then I shall not care to attend to such ministers of sin, in my eager wish rather to fix a gaze insatiable on those whose fury vented itself against the Lord. (On the Spectacles 30)
Tertullian not only wishes this fate upon the monarchs and governors that persecuted Christians, but also the philosophers and poets whom he had debated with in the past. According to him, gladiatorial shows, dramas, and other spectacles from his time all catered to the flesh and were not befitting a follower of Christ to watch; the only spectacle worth watching is the eternal suffering of one’s enemies! Obviously, this is a fairly un-Christian view, and certainly goes against the teachings of Christ who exhorts us to love our enemies (Matt. 5:43-48) and of the God who “doth will all men to be saved” (1 Tim. 2:4).
Thus, the source of Tertullian’s unorthodox infernalism was likely an unfortunate mistranslation from the Greek New Testament into Latin, as well as an apparently deep-seated desire to watch his enemies burn eternally in hell. Unfortunately, he passed this belief on to his pupil Cyprian (c. 210 - 258), who became the bishop of Carthage after him, and one of these two seems to have spread it to the Roman clergy as well. In a letter from the Roman clergy to Cyprian, we see that they believed that
[God] has prepared heaven, but He has also prepared hell. He has prepared places of refreshment, but He has also prepared eternal punishment. He has prepared the light that none can approach unto, but He has also prepared the vast and eternal gloom of perpetual night. (Epistles of Cyprian 30.7)
Similarly, Cyprian believed that once one died, there was no way to repent or be saved from punishment.
What will then be the glory of faith? What the punishment of faithlessness? When the day of judgment shall come, what joy of believers, what sorrow of unbelievers; that they should have been unwilling to believe here, and now that they should be unable to return that they might believe! An ever-burning Gehenna will burn up the condemned, and a punishment devouring with living flames; nor will there be any source whence at any time they may have either respite or end to their torments. Souls with their bodies will be reserved in infinite tortures for suffering… The pain of punishment will then be without the fruit of penitence; weeping will be useless, and prayer ineffectual. Too late they will believe in eternal punishment who would not believe in eternal life. (Address to Demetrianus 24)
After Tertullian and Cyprian of Carthage’s popularization of infernalism, it spread to become the majority view of the Western, Latin-speaking church. Later Western church fathers, such as Hilary of Poitiers, Arnobius of Sicca, and Augustine of Hippo were all infernalists or conditionalists (excluding Jerome of Stridon, who was an influential Latin universalist in his earlier life). However, at the same time, the Eastern, Greek-speaking church was becoming even more outspoken for universalism.
Origen of Alexandria and the doctrine of apokatastasis
Origen (184 - 253) was a theologian and teacher at the catechetical school in Alexandria. The student of Clement of Alexandria, a well-known universalist, he was a prominent defender of the doctrine of universal salvation. In this respect, he followed his predecessors Clement of Rome, Irenaeus of Lyons, and Theophilus of Antioch. However, unlike them, Origen was the first to officially formulate the doctrine of universal apokatastasis and to completely relate it to the destruction of evil, death, and sin at the consummation (telos).
Origen’s main work which deals with universalism is called De Principiis, or ‘First Principles’, which he wrote in order to “fix a definite limit and to lay down an unmistakable rule regarding [theological debates]” (Preface, 2). Clearly, he had no issue with the biblical description of punishment as eonian, since in the Preface he describes the sentence of unbelievers as “eonian fire and punishments” (erroneously translated by Rufinus as igni aeterno ac suppliciis). This is further evidence that the Latin rendering of aiōnios as aeternum is mistaken, which may have led Tertullian astray.
Throughout De Principiis, Origen develops the idea of the apokatastasis as an event which will occur at the consummation of the ages, in which all creatures will be reconciled back to God and all death and sin will be done away with. This is largely based upon his interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15:20-28, which describes the destruction of death and God’s becoming “all things in all”.
The end of the world, then, and the final consummation, will take place when every one shall be subjected to punishment for his sins; a time which God alone knows, when He will bestow on each one what he deserves. We think, indeed, that the goodness of God, through His Christ, may recall all His creatures to one end, even His enemies being conquered and subdued… “For all things must be put under Him.” What, then, is this “putting under” by which all things must be made subject to Christ? I am of opinion that it is this very subjection by which we also wish to be subject to Him, by which the apostles also were subject, and all the saints who have been followers of Christ. For the name “subjection,” by which we are subject to Christ, indicates that the salvation which proceeds from Him belongs to His subjects, agreeably to the declaration of David, “Shall not my soul be subject unto God? From Him comes my salvation.” (De Principiis 1.6.1)
Let us see now what is the freedom of the creature, or the termination of its bondage. When Christ shall have delivered up the kingdom to God even the Father, then also those living things, when they shall have first been made the kingdom of Christ, shall be delivered, along with the whole of that kingdom, to the rule of the Father, that when God shall be all in all, they also, since they are a part of all things, may have God in themselves, as He is in all things. (De Principiis 1.7.5)
I am of opinion that the expression, by which God is said to be “all in all”, means that He is all in each individual person. Now He will be all in each individual in this way: when all which any rational understanding, cleansed from the dregs of every sort of vice, and with every cloud of wickedness completely swept away, can either feel, or understand, or think, will be wholly God… So then, when the end has been restored to the beginning, and the termination of things compared with their commencement, that condition of things will be re-established in which rational nature was placed, when it had no need to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; so that when all feeling of wickedness has been removed, and the individual has been purified and cleansed, He who alone is the one good God becomes to him all, and that not in the case of a few individuals, or of a considerable number, but He Himself is “all in all.” And when death shall no longer anywhere exist, nor the sting of death, nor any evil at all, then verily God will be “all in all.” (De Principiis 3.6.3)
Into this condition, then, we are to suppose that all this bodily substance of ours will be brought, when all things shall be re-established in a state of unity, and when God shall be all in all. And this result must be understood as being brought about, not suddenly, but slowly and gradually, seeing that the process of amendment and correction will take place imperceptibly in the individual instances during the lapse of countless and unmeasured ages, some outstripping others, and tending by a swifter course towards perfection, while others again follow close at hand, and some again a long way behind; and thus, through the numerous and uncounted orders of progressive beings who are being reconciled to God from a state of enmity, the last enemy is finally reached, who is called death, so that he also may be destroyed, and no longer be an enemy. (De Principiis 3.6.6)
Likewise, Origen thought that all punishment was for the ultimate purpose of restoration back to God, and that once one’s soul felt the torture of being separated from God, they would return to Him of their own free will:
Now I am of opinion that another species of punishment may be understood to exist; because, as we feel that when the limbs of the body are loosened and torn away from their mutual supports, there is produced pain of a most excruciating kind, so, when the soul shall be found to be beyond the order, and connection, and harmony in which it was created by God for the purposes of good and useful action and observation, and not to harmonize with itself in the connection of its rational movements, it must be deemed to bear the chastisement and torture of its own dissension, and to feel the punishments of its own disordered condition. And when this dissolution and rending asunder of soul shall have been tested by the application of fire, a solidification undoubtedly into a firmer structure will take place, and a restoration be effected. (De Principiis 2.10.5)
Origen believed that evil could not be inherent to the creation, or else God could be considered evil for creating it (Homily 1 on Psalms 37.4). Therefore, in his estimation, it is only possible to choose sin out of a place of ignorance rather than from an evil nature; every person believes that their actions are good and beneficial, if only for themselves, even when they are detrimental and sinful. Because of this, he says, once we see God clearly and without all of the worldly things which blind us, every person will choose Him necessarily of their own free will (De Principiis 3.5.8).
Rather than developing this idea of his own ‘heretical’ thinking, as is often claimed by modern Christian infernalists who wish to minimize the amount of universalism in the early Church, it is clear that Origen was only delivering the doctrine that had been passed on to him by previous Christian writers. The idea that God has justified all people appeared already in Clement of Rome’s writings, whereas the emphasis on “destruction of death” is evident in the epistles of Ignatius of Antioch. The apologist Theophilus of Antioch combines the idea of universal salvation along with apokatastasis as restoration to the beginning, which is prominent in Origen’s writings. Irenaeus of Lyons, the champion of orthodoxy of the late second century, believed in the universal apokatastasis and related it to the eventual consummation; and finally, Origen’s teacher Clement of Alexandria developed the apokatastasis as the natural result of God’s goodness and free will. There can be no doubt that, although Origen was the first to combine all of these ideas into one doctrine, universal apokatastasis was believed by many members of the early Church prior to him.
Conclusion
At the turn of the second century, the Latin Church father Tertullian introduced the idea of infernalism into the proto-orthodox community. Despite the fact that his belief was likely caused by a mistranslation (as well as, apparently, a desire to watch his enemies burn for all eternity), belief in eternal torment quickly spread to his pupil Cyprian of Carthage and the rest of the Latin-speaking church. At the same time, Origen of Alexandria cogently defended the belief in universal salvation passed down to him by his orthodox predecessors. He demonstrated both from scripture and with logical arguments that all people would be saved at the consummation. The next post will examine the Greek Church fathers of the fourth century, and show that although infernalism continued to be taught in the Western church, the Eastern church remained solidly universalist in its theology.
Part 5: https://universalistheretic.blogspot.com/2022/02/indeed-very-many-part-5-fourth-century.html
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