The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

III. Stokes—Man Not Innately Immortal; Only Through Redemption

Sir GEORGE GABRIEL STOKES, M.P. (1819-1903), illustrious mathematician and physicist, was educated at Bristol College and then at Pembroke, Cambridge. In 1849 he was appointed professor of mathematics at Cambridge University, Sir Isaac Newton’s old chair, ³⁹ which post he held until his death. His scientific contributions dealt with abstruse problems in mathematical physics-hydrodynamics. He developed the modern theory of the motion of viscous fluids, and his discussions on the refrangibility of light made him famous. He also made notable contributions to the science of optics. CFF2 641.1

Professor Stokes was special lecturer at Aberdeen and Edinburgh. In 1851 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Britain (for the Advancement of Science), was its secretary from 1854 to 1885 and president from 1885 to 1889. In 1887 he became a member of Parliament for Cambridge University, and in 1889 was made a baronet. He left five volumes of mathematical and physical papers. CFF2 641.2

1. PUBLIC DENIAL OF INNATE IMMORTALITY

An Anglican in faith, he was especially interested in the relationship of science and religion, or natural theology, particularly in the field of Christian evidences. He was an earnest churchman and competent theologian and gave a noted “Lecture on the Immortality of the Soul,” in 1890, at the Finsbury Institute, later published, at which time he publicly reaffirmed his denial of the inherent immortality of the soul. CFF2 641.3

Reported widely in the press, this public declaration made a profound and lasting impression in high circles. In this stand in a controversial field he was supported by three Anglican bishops. To Professor Stokes, death is a suspension of life and all its activities, a period of rest and “sleep” until the resurrection. He was long a warm friend of Conditionalist Edward White. CFF2 641.4

In 1897 Stokes published his treatise Conditional Immortality, but prior to that he was a contributor to the wellknown Symposium That Unknown Country and to Immortality-a Clerical Symposium. He enjoyed marked success in placing his convictions on Life Only in Christ before scientific doubters and in quashing their principal objections. His courageous public avowal of Conditionalism had a most salutary effect in moderating the previous harsh and indiscriminate criticism of all Conditionalists. Until his death he continued to be an unfailing witness at Cambridge. CFF2 642.1

2. SOURCE OF IMMORTALITY AND THE INTERMEDIATE STATE

Introducing his chapter (XLIV) in That Unknown Country, Scientist Stokes declares his conviction that man is not by nature immortal but that immortality is made possible through redemption. Furthermore, he states his belief that “the intermediate state between Death and Resurrection may be regarded as a state of unconsciousness.” ⁴⁰ CFF2 642.2

3. MAN NOT IMMORTAL MERELY BY CREATION

Approaching the question from the scientific angle, Sir George said, “Consciousness, as we know it, is intimately bound up with the state of our material organism.” But he declares that the idea of “man’s immortality” as in some way “inherent in his nature” is “beyond the ken of science.” For true information man must turn to the “teaching of revelation”—the “Scriptural account of creation.” ⁴¹ Comparing man’s nature with that of the animal creation, Professor Stokes declares that man alone has a spiritual nature, but that this does not “supersede it [the animal nature], but is superadded to it.” ⁴² Then, coming to the question of immortality by creation, and the origin of man, Sir George succinctly states:
“In the Scriptural account of the creation of man, there is nothing to lead us to suppose that he is by creation an immortal being. Quite the contrary. His attainment of immortality is represented as contingent upon the use of something outside of him. Whatever the ‘Tree of Life’ may mean or symbolize, it is clearly indicated that it was upon his use of it that his possession of immortality depended; and that when, by disobedience, he fell from his primeval state of innocence, access to it was denied him. Scripture, therefore, leads us to the same conclusion as that to which we should have been led by all outward appearances-that so far as depends on anything in man’s original nature, at death there is an end of him.” ⁴³ CFF2 642.3

4. UNFITTED FOR IMMORTALITY, CHRIST PROVIDES REMEDY

Thus it is that “unaided by revelation, man can only offer conjectures as to a conceivable solution.” ⁴⁴ Then follows this illuminating paragraph: CFF2 643.1

“But if we frankly accept the Scriptural account of the fall of man, we at once obtain a solution of the teleological enigma. We learn that, unlike the lower animals, man is not in the condition in which he was created. If they have instincts suited to their mode of life, while he has aspirations which have no natural fulfillment so far as can be seen, it is that he alone is in an unnatural state,—in a state, that is, different from that for which he was originally fitted.” ⁴⁵ CFF2 643.2

Professor Stokes then discusses not only the Fall, which rendered man unfit for immortality, but the means of recovery through Christ:
“By the fall, our first parents lost their primal condition of innocence, a loss which, so far as natural means are concerned, was irretrievable. Not only so, but their progeny, having, by natural descent, inherited a nature which was fallen from the primal condition, were rendered unfit for immortality, and the whole race passed under the law of death. But restitution to a condition of sinlessness by natural means being impossible, God in his mercy provided supernatural means, by which restoration to a state of innocence became possible, and the recovery of the forfeited immortality permissible, for those for whom the provided means shall take effect. CFF2 643.3

“By the incarnation, the human nature was taken into the divine; and, though sinless himself, the Son of God suffered death, the appointed penalty of transgression, in order that through his blood we might have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. But the human and the divine natures being united in him, it was not possible that he should be held down by death, and he rose from the dead, the firstfruits of them that slept: rose, however, not to the natural human life in which he was crucified, but to a mysterious, supernatural, higher life, of which the redeemed are in due time to be partakers.” ⁴⁶ CFF2 643.4

5. ENDOWMENT WITH IMMORTALITY ONLY THROUGH REDEMPTION

Thus it is through this “scheme of redemption” that we have CFF2 644.1

“a solution of the moral enigma which has already been referred to. While it is only the redeemed to whom immortality is promised, all, we are told, are to be raised from the dead, and all are to be judged.” ⁴⁷ CFF2 644.2

Thus what is “involved in the death of Christ will form the touchstone by which some will be so drawn that their characters will be finally established for righteousness, and they will be endowed with immortality.” On the contrary, others, through rejection, will become so “utterly hardened” as to be “fit only for destruction” and will be “condemned to the second death, from which there is no resurrection.” Therefore in this life the gospel is “a savor of life unto life or of death unto death.” ⁴⁸ CFF2 644.3

6. ANY “NATURAL IMMORTALITY” FORFEITED THROUGH TRANSGRESSION

Stokes states that “the advocates of the natural immortality of the soul seem to be nearly unanimous in the belief that, at death, man passes into some different state of conscious existence, which undergoes a further change at the resurrection.” ⁴⁹ But Sir George comments: CFF2 644.4

“No argument for the natural immortality of the soul, that the writer has seen, appears to him to be of any value; and, as to a prevalent belief among uninstructed nations, if it be true that man was created in a condition in which, if be had continued, be would have been fit for immortality, and was endowed with aspirations after immortality, it was natural that, after the forfeiture of immortality through transgression, man should seek to satisfy his craving for immortality by imagining that he had something immortal in his nature. It is, then, to revelation that we must look, if we are to find out something about man’s condition in the intermediate state.” ⁵⁰ CFF2 644.5

7. NO CONSCIOUSNESS OF TIME IN INTERMEDIATE STATE

Contending that it is “through the gospel that life and immortality were brought to light,” Stokes states: CFF2 644.6

“It has been well said that Scripture bases our hopes of a future life, not upon the immortality of the soul, but upon the resurrection of the body. There are comparatively few passages in which the intermediate state even appears to be referred to at all. Of these, two or three are so dark that their real interpretation is quite uncertain. There are two or three in which, at first sight, the intermediate state seems to be referred to as one of consciousness, but which, on further examination, are seen to be, as the writer thinks, perfectly and naturally explicable on the opposite supposition. CFF2 645.1

“It is not in accordance with the plan of this collection [Symposium] that the writers should enter into argument, but it is wished that they should state their own opinions; and, in accordance with this desire, the writer of the present article ventures to say that his own mind leans strongly to the view that the intermediate state is one in which, as in a faint, thought is in abeyance; one which, accordingly, involves a virtual annihilation of intervening time for each individual in particular.” ⁵¹ CFF2 645.2

8. POPULAR THEOLOGY SETS ASIDE BIBLICAL DECLARATIONS

Then Professor Stokes closes his chapter with this trite observation:
“In the popular theology and popular hymns the intermediate state receives an expansion utterly unlike what we find in Scripture; an expansion which goes far towards banishing from view the resurrection state and the day of judgment, though, as to the latter, so prominent a place did it occupy in the minds of apostles and those to whom they wrote, that they frequently speak of it simply as ‘the day,’ or ‘that day.’” ⁵² CFF2 645.3

Such was Professor Stokes’s public witness. CFF2 645.4

9. ASSURANCE OF IMMORTALITY ONLY IN CHRIST

In another symposium Sir George Stokes buttresses the foregoing by the supporting statement:
“Man’s whole being was forfeited by the Fall, and the future life is not his birthright, but depends on a supernatural dispensation of grace. To look to man’s bodily frame for indications of immortality, to look even to his lofty mental powers-lofty, indeed, but sadly misused-is to seek the living among the dead. Man must look not into himself, but out of himself for assurance of immortality. CFF2 645.5

“Christ is risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” ⁵³ CFF2 645.6