The Conditionalist Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

II. Zurich’s Brunner-Sinner Brings “Eternal Destruction” Upon Himself

Eminent Swiss scholar, Dr. EMIL BRUNNER, ²⁸ professor of systematic theology at the University of Zurich, believes ultimate, complete extinction of being to be the fate of the sinner. Though created “for eternity,” the willful sinner’s “eternal destruction,” which deprives him of life, is brought about by his own choice. He has the power to turn away from the “eternal destiny” desired of God for him. But first Brunner deals with Platonic Immortal-Soulism. CFF2 894.2

1. PLATONIC INNATISM IS NOT “BIBLICAL.”

Platonic Immortal-Soulism has, he holds, replaced the Biblical truth as to man’s nature and destiny. But man determines his own “destiny” by his own choices:
“It is true that the doctrine of the immortality of the soul as a substance is of Platonist, and not of Biblical origin. It is a result of the view that the human spirit is essentially ‘divine.’ But if we start from what God has given us in His self-revelation, this idea of an immortal soul is replaced by the truth of man’s destiny for eternal communion with God. The essential destiny of man is not substantial immortality, but eternal life. This eternal destiny is, however, to this extent, part of the essential structure of man, in that what man is, can never be understood apart from his relation to this destiny. Man never ceases to be a being created for eternity, even when he misses his true destiny by turning away from God and from his eternal destiny. Just as man does not cease to be a responsible being when he sins, so too he does not cease to be a being destined for eternity.” ²⁹ CFF2 894.3

2. SINNER DEPRIVES HIMSELF OF ETERNAL LIFE

The sinner, Brunner says, brings “eternal destruction” upon himself: CFF2 894.4

“Just as sin deprives man of true humanity, true responsibility, and the love of God, so also sin deprives him of that eternal life for which he has been destined. As a sinner he lives no longer in the love of God, but he comes under the divine wrath. This divine wrath, however, does not destroy his eternal destiny. In depriving himself of eternal life he brings upon himself eternal destruction.” ³⁰ CFF2 895.1

3. PAGAN ORIGIN OF SOUL-SURVIVAL CONCEPT

In chapter 11, “The Mystery of Death,” in Eternal Hope (1954), after noting the “pathos” of many “funeral orations,” Brunner states, concerning the “phenomenon” of death: CFF2 895.2

“Man does not die like other higher animals, any more than he lives like them. Human existence is an exception in the world of living beings; for man is the only living being who is a person. Hence his death is something other than the death of animals.” ³¹ CFF2 895.3

Touching on “dissolution,” and whether a man is “finished when he dies,” and the “relation of soul and body,” ³² Brunner points out the pagan view of soul survival as coming from animism, as well as from Indian and Egyptian sources: CFF2 895.4

“Widely spread among all peoples and at all times is the idea of a survival of the soul after death, i.e. the view that death means the separation of soul from body. This view appears in many varied forms from primitive animism to the philosophical doctrine of immortality. It assumes the form of the Indian teaching of Karma about the reincarnation of the soul in another life in a state corresponding to its ethical worth. Again it appears in the idea, first found in ancient Egypt, of an otherworldly judgment, in which some souls will be assigned to a joyful and radiant world, others to a dark, joyless, and tormented existence in the beyond.” ³³ CFF2 895.5

4. PLATONIC INNATISM ASSIMILATED BY CATHOLICISM

The penetration of Platonism into dominant Catholic dogma, and through Calvin incorporated into post-Reformation theology, is next noted-along with recent restudy: CFF2 895.6

“For the history of Western thought, the Platonic teaching of the immortality of the soul became of special significance. It penetrated so deeply into the thought of Western man because, although with certain modifications, it was assimilated by Christian theology and church teaching, was even declared by the Lateran Council of 1512 [1513] to be a dogma, to contradict which was a heresy, and likewise from Calvin onwards it was assumed in post-Reformation Protestantism to be a part of Christian doctrine. Only recently, as a result of a deepened understanding of the New Testament, have strong doubts arisen as to its compatibility with the Christian conception of the relation between God and man, and its essentially pre-Christian origin has been ever more emphasized.” ³⁴ CFF2 895.7

Brunner observes, logically:
“If the soul is immortal in the sense and for the reason which Plato and his successors teach, then the problem of death is solved because death has no power over the deeper side of man as a person.” ³⁵ CFF2 896.1

Then this would be true: “Death can affect the immortal soul as little as the waves of the tossing sea the lighthouse.” ³⁶ CFF2 896.2

5. SINISTER IMPLICATIONS OF ‘PLATONIC DUALISM.”

The essence of Platonism and its Dualism is this:
“The body is mortal, the soul immortal. The mortal husk conceals this eternal essence which in death is freed from its outer shell.” ³⁷ CFF2 896.3

“That this dualistic conception of man does not correspond to the Christian outlook can be shown from various angles. The contrast stands out most clearly in the two following points. The effect of this Platonic dualism is not merely to make death innocuous but also to rob evil of its sting.” ³⁸ CFF2 896.4

6. FANTASIES OF PLATONISM V. REVELATION OF GOD

Grave encroachment of Platonism upon the divine prerogatives of God is also involved. It claims man is “divine“: CFF2 896.5

“The second aspect of the contrast to the Christian view is as follows. Man in his spiritual and higher being is divine, not creaturely. God is not His creator, God is the all of which the human spirit is but a part. Man is a participator in the divine in the most direct and literal sense. Hence, since this mode of robbing evil of its sting runs necessarily parallel with the rendering innocuous of death through the teaching about immortality, this solution of the problem of death stands in irreconcilable opposition to Christian thought. One believes either in the immortality of the soul-and it is only necessary to believe so long as one has not mastered the proof-immortality being essentially demonstrable-or one believes in the God of revelation.” ³⁹ CFF2 896.6

7. DEATH SPRINGS FROM HUMAN “REBELLION.”

The Bible knows nothing of the “bi-section,” or dualism, of man, says Brunner. Death must be taken “seriously,” for the “wages of sin” is death, and sin is the revolt of the creature against the Creator:
“The guilt of sin separates him from God and robs man of the life which lay ready for him in God. For God Himself is life; whosoever is separated from Him is cut off from the sources of life.” ⁴⁰ CFF2 897.1

Brunner then declares concerning death:
“Death is therefore for the Christian understanding an ordinance of God, but it is not an original element of the divine order in creation; on the contrary, it has arisen from disorder. It is the reaction of the divine anger to human rebellion.” ⁴¹ CFF2 897.2

8. GREEK PHILOSOPHY IRRECONCILABLE WITH DIVINE REVELATION

Recapitulating, and reiterating the irreconcilable conflict between Platonism and Inspiration, Brunner records:
“Let us cast a glance once again at the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. It cannot be explained by weakness of faith on the part of the church that it took over a point of view which stemmed from such a different source-that of Greek philosophy, and was so utterly foreign to its own essential teaching. Somewhere in the Christian faith there must have been some opening through which this foreign doctrine could penetrate. Assuredly, from the Biblical standpoint, it is God alone who possesses immortality. The opinion that we men are immortal because our soul is of an indestructible, because divine, essence is, once for all, irreconcilable with the Biblical view of God and man.” ⁴² CFF2 897.3

Our sole hope and life are therefore in Christ. CFF2 897.4

9. CREATED AND DESTINED FOR ETERNAL LIFE

Declaring that man was “created and destined for eternal life,” though God’s plan was “marred” by sin, Brunner says:
“There is here no possibility of a Platonic-Socratic anamnesis as a result of which we might find our way back to this eternal destiny. There is in us no eternal unimpaired, indestructible essence to which in face of evil and death we might have recourse. All that is the Platonic idealistic Vedantic outlook, not the Christian one.” ⁴³ CFF2 897.5

We are to have “a genuinely Biblical Christo-centric faith in immortality. Not in the way we are made but in God’s creative summons have we our eternal life.” ⁴⁴ CFF2 898.1

This, then, is Brunner’s depiction of Platonism:
“The philosophical belief in immortality is like an echo, both reproducing and falsifying the primal Word of this divine Creator. It is false because it does not take into account the real loss of this original destiny through sin.” ⁴⁵ CFF2 898.2