The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

II. Able Coverage of Historical, Philosophical, and Biblical Evidence

Pettingell’s The Unspeakable Gift was written after fourteen years of further study, wide reading, and consultation since he had prepared his first treatise, in 1870, while in Belgium. At that time he had not seen any American book on the subject. ³ The Introduction to The Unspeakable Gift was written by the noted Conditionalist Edward White, of St. Paul’s Chapel, London, rehearsing how great a company of able scholars were in “full revolt” against the Innate Immortality perversion, with a new tolerance developing for dissenters. Its acceptance was already widespread in Britain, North America, France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Belgium, and Australia, and somewhat even in India, China, and Japan. CFF2 497.3

Especially was its penetration true at the University of Cambridge, where Professors Stokes and Adams and Canon Jamieson (head of Christ’s College) were “avowed adherents.” ⁴ White here reaffirms his own conviction, now buttressed “by forty years of study,” that Eternal Torment is “absolutely groundless,” and “contrary to every line of the Bible.” ⁵ CFF2 498.1

Interspersed with excerpts from more than seventy-five noted Conditionalists, the book opens with a citation from Dr. R. W. Dale, and closes with a unique “Supplement”an assemblage of contrasting “passages” facing each other on opposite pages presenting the “pro and con” of the question by means of key quotations from scholars. Of this Pettingell says:
“By comparing these opposing views with each other and with the Word of God, he [the reader] will be able easily to decide for himself which of these two conflicting theories has the sanction of Scripture, and which is in conflict with it.” ⁶ CFF2 498.2

It is a unique device. CFF2 498.3

1. CONTRASTING PAGES OF CONFLICTING SCHOOLS’ EXCERPTS

The opposing views (pages 308 and 309) are respectively headed “‘Thou Shalt Surely Die’—JEHOVAH,” and “‘Ye Shall Not Surely Die’—SATAN.” Then follow contrasting definitions of Conditionalism and unconditional Immortal-Soulism, followed by key statements of the opposite viewpoints, but with Bible texts (Old and New Testament) forming the first Conditionalist pages, matched by the statements of Platonic philosophers, poets, and theological speculators holding to the indestructibility of the human soul, pre-existence, transmigration, and ultimate reabsorption, and particularly Platonism. ⁷ Then follow, on paralleling pages, the Apostolic and Ante-Nicene Fathers who held to Conditional Immortality and the destruction of the wicked—Barnabas, Clement, Hermas, Ignatius, “Twelve Apostles”—but with an absence of names, on the opposite page, for none had as yet adopted Platonism. ⁸ CFF2 498.4

2. CONFLICTING VIEWS OF THE OPPOSING SCHOOLS

Then, on the left, appear the statements of Conditionalists Justin Martyr, Theophilus, Irenaeus, Arnobius, and Lactantius (pages 314, 316), opposed on the right by citations from Athenagoras, Tertullian, and Hippolytus. Next come the Reformers Tyndale and Luther, contravened by Leo X, the Koran, Calvin, the “Presbyterian Confession of Faith,” and Jonathan Edwards. ⁹ And now follow modern Conditionalist representatives, with quotes from Rothe, Olshausen, Boardman, Warleigh, Thom, Thompson, Abbot, Perowne, Alford, Tulloch, Dale, Dobney, Davis, Parker, and Weymouth, which are opposed by excerpts from Edwards, Ambrose, Hopkins, Baxter, Rutherford, and Whitaker. ¹⁰ He skims the cream of their testimony. CFF2 499.1

Then appear citations from Conditionalists Ker, Litton, Taunton, Scott, Ellicott, Foster, Watson, Whately, Mortimer, Newton, Petavel, Kramer, Wilson, Phelps, Graham, Hart, Leask, Chase, Lambert, Renouvier, Strang, Schultz, and Butler-faced by opposing declarations from Spurgeon, Whitaker, Brown, Young, South, Taylor, Erskine. ¹¹ And finally follow Conditionalists Hendrickson, Walker, White, Graff, Denniston, Jennings, Ferguson, Macrae, Ashcroft, Phelps, and Constable, faced by Taylor, Erskine, Parker, Mountford, Muller, Moore, Collier, Scott, Lytton, Davidson, Spurgeon, Newman, Pollock, Winslow, Hedge, Martineau, and Garland ¹²—each with a key quote. It is a unique, imposing roster of names and of contrasting statements of the opposing positions held concerning this paramount issue. CFF2 499.2

3. INTRODUCTION OF GREEK PLATONISM AND PERSIAN DUALISM

Part I of the main text of the book deals with immortality in the light of history, reason, and philosophy. In chapter one Pettingell goes back to the source and ground of our hope of immortality, and of the nature and destiny of “man himself,” not simply of the “soul,” stressing not merely future punishment but the priceless gift of Eternal Life through Christ, and loyalty to the plain letter of God’s Word. ¹³ CFF2 500.1

4. HISTORICAL TRACEMENT OF “DEATHLESS NATURE” CONCEPT

The prevalence of the theory of the “indestructible soul independent of the body,” ¹⁴ he shows to be but perpetuated Platonism. And the concept of the continuance of eternal sin and the perpetual sinning of the wicked, forever paralleling the purity and blessedness of the immortally righteous, is but the extension of “Persian dualism,” ¹⁵ which crept into the creed through the “philosophic schoolmen of the dark ages,” perpetuated “through the medium of an apostate Church.” ¹⁶ CFF2 500.2

5. ORIGIN AND TRANSMISSION OF “DEATHLESS NATURE” THEORY

Chapter two treats on the origin and history of the dogma of the “deathless nature” of man, “first whispered” in Eden, ¹⁷ with traces among the ancients. Then comes the philosophy of the Jews, ¹⁸ Life Only in Christ, which He and the apostles taught, perpetuated by the earliest Fathers, up to Justin. ¹⁹ Next, the entrance of Platonic philosophy through Athenagoras, Origen, and others. This resulted in a split of the Christian Church into three schools of thought as to the nature and destiny of man. ²⁰ CFF2 500.3

6. THREE CONFLICTING SCHOOLS TABULATED

Two of these schools taught immortality of the soul as the “natural endowment of all men from Adam.” ²¹ This was made possible by the spiritualizing and allegorizing of Scripture, discarding the literal sense and adopting a metaphysical sense of life, death, and destruction, resulting in the triumph of the positions of Platonic philosophy. ²² CFF2 501.1

Pettingell closes this chapter with a valuable Table on “The Three Theories of Immortality”—Conditionalist, Immortal-Soulist, and Universal Restorationist, with the names and dates of the early advocates of all three groups. ²³ The Table brings out the fact that Christ and the apostles are the progenitors of Conditionalism, and shows the fatal gap of 190 years before the initial introduction of Innate Immortality as the foundation of the Endless Torment and Universal Restoration theories. CFF2 501.2

7. ARRESTED REFORMATION AND ANALOGICAL FALLACIES

Chapter three on the “Disastrous Influence of This False Dogma,” shows how the root of this theological error was not extracted at the time of the Reformation. ²⁴ The grosser perversions of scholasticism, priestcraft, and ecclesiasticism were repudiated. But the majority still retained the philosophic dogma of the immortality of the soul and an eternally burning Hell, though Purgatory was rejected. The doctrine of Life Only in Christ was preserved by a line of witnesses throughout the subsequent centuries, but only recently has it come sharply to the forefront. ²⁵ The chapter closes with a valuable two-page supporting quote from Constable. ²⁶ Chapter four shows the fallacies of analogies from nature and the peril of relying on human reason instead of divine revelation. Pettingell shows that the “whole argument for the immortality of man founded on the nature of his soul, rests upon a pure assumption.” ²⁸ The analogies of the seed and the chrysalis are fallacious because there is no actual loss of life in any of them. CFF2 501.3

8. SECOND LIFE DOES NOT EXCLUDE SECOND DEATH

Chapter five, on “The Natural and Rational Argument,” shows that the doctrine of universal immortality has “not been the general belief of the heathen world.” ²⁹ He stresses further the point that “the idea of a second life does not exclude that of a second death, and final extinction of being.” ³⁰ He reminds us that the Nirvana of the multiplied millions of Hindus is “utter extinction of conscious, personal being.” ³¹ CFF2 502.1

9. NEW MEANINGS PLACED ON OLD TERMS

Part II deals with “Human Immortality in the Light of Revelation.” Chapter six is curiously titled “Logodaedaly,” which means playing with words, or verbal legerdemain. Here he deals with the Platonic “new meanings” placed on Bible terms concerning the nature of man. These affect destruction, death, and life, giving them a sense never found in the classical Greek-as “death” meaning “eternal life in misery.” ³² (Pettingell, it should be added, frequently uses lengthy notes from Constable, Whately, Tillotson, Tinling, Minton, Dale, Locke, White, Baker, Huntington, Boardman, and Hobbs to buttress his positions.) CFF2 502.2

10. MAN NOT INDEPENDENTLY EXISTENT

Chapter seven (“The Creation of Man”) shows that man was not given the “attribute of independent existence.” ³³ He was “amenable to the law of his Creator,” and was “dependent on His [the Creator’s] will for the continuance of his life.” ³⁴ By the “impartation of this breath of life, Adam becomes a living soul,” with man as a unit. ³⁵ In death “this process is reversed.” ³⁷ Man was a candidate for immortality. Immortality was therefore conditional, and “holiness is essential to the immortality of all of God’s creatures,” if they are to abide. CFF2 502.3

11. DEATH IS UTTER EXTINGUISHING OF LIFE

Chapter nine stresses the “Silence of the Scriptures” regarding “natural immortality,” ³⁹ with Boardman, Olshausen, Tillotson, and a Presbyterian Quarterly extract (1860, page 600) concurring. ⁴⁰ True immortality is the glorious consummation of Christianity. ⁴² Chapter ten (“The Death Incurred”) deals with Adam’s “alternative possibilities,” namely, Life or Death. These result in either a “Second Life” or a “Second Death.” Pettingell shows that death means “utter ruin and extermination and extinction.” It is the “loss or ending or extinguishment of whatever life is in question.” This he proves from a vast array of Old Testament texts. And the same is followed with the New Testament witness. But the great deceiver makes a “flat contradiction” of God’s Word, and teaches “the immortality of the sinner.” CFF2 503.1

12. ETERNAL LIFE IS PECULIAR GLORY OF CHRIST

Chapter eleven (“The Life Given”) is “Life Eternal Through Christ.” The New Testament is a “new revelation,” fuller and clearer than the Old—involving the New Birth and the Resurrection and the final “Destruction of all evil through the almighty power” of Christ. ⁴⁷ It presents a “new and higher life”—the zoe life, spiritual, undying, supernatural life, running all through the Gospel of John. ⁴⁸ “Christ is the only Source” of this “Eternal Life.” ⁴⁹ This is His “peculiar glory.” And Paul, Peter, James, Jude, and John all affirm the same. ⁵⁰ CFF2 503.2

13. TWO CLASSES AND TWO DESTINIES

Chapter twelve (“Life versus Death”) contrasts the two opposites, “death and destruction” and “Life Everlasting.” ⁵¹ And a series of two classes are “brought into juxtaposition”—“sinners and saints,” “the wicked and the righteous,” “believers and unbelievers,” “reprobates and heirs,” “enemies of God and friends of God,” “the foolish and the wise,” “the tares and the wheat,” “the dross arid the gold,” “the children of the world and the children of the kingdom.” ⁵² The righteous will be resurrected to a life that shall never end, ⁵⁴ but the resurrection of the wicked is to a second death and final extinction. CFF2 504.1

This is amplified and enforced in the New Testament always the two classes and the two destinies, with carnality, sin, and death, in contrast with spirituality, holiness, and Life Everlasting. So it is “everlasting destruction,” or Everlasting Life, ⁵⁵ not simply eternal happiness and eternal misery, with both classes living eternally. Because Christ arose, we will all rise, irrespective of the outcome, to our respective destiny, which is Eternal Life or Eternal death. ⁵⁶ CFF2 504.2

14. FIRST LIFE TRANSITORY; SECOND LIFE ETERNAL

Chapters thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen deal with leading problem texts and arguments (Daniel 12:1, 2; Matthew 25:46; Mark 3:28, 29; Mark 9:43-50; Luke 16:19-31; Revelation 14:11; Revelation 19:3; Revelation 20:9, 10, 20). These are answered in superior Conditionalist fashion. The “punishment” is “deprivation.” ⁵⁷ The handling of the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus is particularly effective. ⁵⁸ Chapter sixteen (“The Exodus of Sin and Death”) brings on a series of couplets-“the two Adams, two progenitors, two births, two classes of men, two kingdoms, two divine Advents, two lives, two deaths.” ⁵⁹ CFF2 504.3

The second birth is supernatural. It results in a spiritual, deathless life, ingenerated by the Spirit-unto Life Everlasting. ⁶⁰ But if man is already an immortal being “there is no place for a second death.” ⁶¹ The first life is physical, earthly, and transitory; the second is spiritual, heavenly, and eternal. ⁶³ Pettingell then says tritely: “Of course if there be no actual death in the first instance, there can be no actual resurrection from the dead.” CFF2 505.1

15. OVERTHROW AND ABOLISHMENT OF ALL EVIL

Then comes the “Exodus of Sin and Death”—a “heaven without a hell somewhere to balance it,” the “King of glory with His holy angels” without “the Devil and his angels also.” ⁶⁴ No sin will be existent anywhere, no sorrow, darkness, death, devil, or Hell. The concept of two eternal principles in conflict, both without beginning and both without end, and eternally in conflict, Pettingell insists, is simply Persian dualism. ⁶⁵ But evil had a beginning, and it will have an end. It is but an “episode” in God’s eternal plan. It began “in time,” and will end “in time.” ⁶⁷ In eternity, “beyond the second death there is to be neither sin nor suffering.” The prophecy of the “crushing” of the head of the serpent will be accomplished. Satan and death will be destroyed forever. That is the “overthrow and abolishment of all evil.” CFF2 505.2

Then follows the “Supplement,” already described. CFF2 505.3