The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 1

I. Athenagoras—Pathfinder on Revolutionary Road

Though facts are meager concerning the life of ATHENAGORAS (c. A.D. 127-190), he was born in Athens and was well trained in pagan Greek learning, especially in the philosophy of Plato. Accepting the Christian faith, he became a catechist in Alexandria. He wrote a conciliatory Apology (c. A.D. 177) to the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, and his son Commodus. While Athenagoras refuted the false charges against Christians, his main burden seemed to be to show that Christianity and Platonism are really in fundamental accord, and that the great essentials of Platonic philosophy are actually embraced in Christianity. His was a philosophical defense of his new faith, and his writings were of an altogether new order, increasingly saturated with the teaching and phraseology of Plato, unquestionably the source of his views. CFF1 930.1

He sought to unite these two streams that they might flow on together. And while his arguments did not carry much weight in his own day, and his name was not well known to his own generation, his contentions gradually gained credence, as others began to press this revolutionary and really alien doctrine of Innate Immortality that involved the eternal existence of the reprobate. Although the foundations are barely discernible in the Apology presented to the emperor, Immortal-Soulism came out into the open in unabashed phrasing and argument in Athenagoras’ later treatise on The Resurrection. It was obviously a development that he himself did not at first envision. He was unquestionably the spearhead in the intrusion of universal Innate Immortality into the Christian Church. CFF1 930.2

1. BASES CONTENTION ON PHILOSOPHY, NOT SCRIPTURE

It is significant that Athenagoras based his contention as to the immortality of the soul, not on Scripture, but on philosophical argument. Precision in theological language had not yet found an established format. Athenagoras was clearly groping. But his main premise was that God’s purpose in creating man was that he should live—that the divine purpose of man’s existence is existence itself. And God’s purpose, he contended, cannot be defeated. It must be accomplished. It is therefore impossible for man to cease to exist. Such is his argument. CFF1 931.1

Athenagoras does not make perpetual existence a consequence of righteousness or the triumph of morality. Rather, all men must live on forever—good and evil, happy and miserable. His was a compulsory immortality, so that in wickedness there is interminable suffering never to any advantage. On the contrary, the gospel that had previously been preached conditions unending existence on holiness. But this is obtained only by the exercise of human freedom and the development of character. Immortality depends upon the triumph of righteousness. Men of purpose lay hold upon it; it is not forced upon them. It is a gift of God. CFF1 931.2

Athenagoras implies that, as the wicked must live forever, they therefore live a life of eternal misery. But he does not state so dogmatically. That was left for others. Nevertheless, such reasoning is the source and origin of the dogma of eternal misery, as based on such premises. We reiterate the argument in all its baldness: The wicked must be miserable forever, because they must live forever; and they must live forever because God made them for the primary purpose of living! That is the logical fruitage of the acceptance of the Platonic pagan philosophy of Immortal-Soulism. CFF1 931.3

Now note the boldness of Athenagoras’ commitment in contrast with the Conditionalist position of the Apostolic Fathers, and then that of Justin Martyr and Irenaeus at the outset of the ante-Nicene period. It is as the contrast of darkness and light. Let us trace it in detail. CFF1 931.4

2. REPEATEDLY USES PLATO’S “IMMORTAL SOUL” PHRASING

In his earlier Plea, or Apology, Athenagoras did not personally use either the thought or the phrase “immortal soul.” But a decade later it is repeatedly invoked in his Treatise ... on the Resurrection. A profound change of view had obviously taken place in the interim. And here it is employed, not once, but nine times in one short treatise. Moreover, Athenagoras drafts in addition upon a whole battery of supporting expressions—variations of the one basic concept—in order to sustain this Platonic concept that he had now espoused. First observe this initial “immortal soul” phrasing, in about nine variant forms, that constituted both the thought and the terminology of Plato, whence it was clearly derived: CFF1 932.1

“Continuance of being in immortality” (chap. 13, in ANF, vol. 2, p. 156).
“He [God] made man of an immortal soul and a body” (ibid.).
“Composed of an immortal soul and a body” (chap. 15, p. 157).
“Wholly incorruptible and immortal” (chap. 16, p. 157).
“From the first created immortal” (ibid.).
“Continuance with immortality” (ibid.).
“The soul to remain by itself immortal” (chap. 20, p. 160).
“An immortal nature” (chap. 23, p. 161).
“Possessed of an immortal soul and rational judgment” (chap. 24, p. 162).

3. BATTERY OF SUPPORTING EQUIVALENTS EMPLOYED

And here are about seventeen supporting equivalents, running through this revolutionary Resurrection treatise, used to buttress this central concept: “Not liable to corruption” (chap. 10, p. 154); “continuance of being” (chap. 12, p. 155); “perpetual duration” (ibid.); “perpetual existence” (ibid.); “preserved for ever” (ibid.); “remains in existence” (ibid.); “continuance of being” (chap. 13, p. 156); “continuance for ever” (ibid.); “must continue for ever” (chap. 15, p. 157); “interminable duration of the soul” (ibid.); “perpetual continuance” (ibid.); “continuance of being” (chap. 16, p. 157); “continuance according to its peculiar nature” (ibid.); “continuance invariable and unchangeable” (ibid.); “continue to exist without end” (ibid.); “unchangeable continuance” (ibid.); and “incapable of dissolution” (chap. 20, p. 160)—and all found within the compass of only six pages! CFF1 932.2

Surely a more complete committal to this thesis could scarcely be imagined than these seventeen supplemental expressions afford, added to the nine—or twenty-six in all. Language could hardly be more absolute, conclusive, or incriminatory. Athenagoras assuredly and openly now taught the innate, inalienable, indefeasible immortality of the soul. And he was, so far as can be determined, the first Christian ecclesiastic so to do. And this was about the year A.D. 187. CFF1 933.1