An Examination of the Scripture Testimony
APPENDIX
It is claimed by many, (when they find the Scriptures do not bear them out in the belief that the wicked must exist in torment through age without end,) that the good of all ages have believed it. We have found no such sentiment taught by David, Job, Daniel, or any Scripture writer. If we come to the testimony of those who have been the servants of God in the past, as well as the present dispensation, we shall find many of them holding sentiments similar to those advanced in the preceding pages of this work. We will give a few extracts in proof of what we have just stated. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, it seems did not exist, even among the heathen in the vicinity of the promised land until they received it from Babylon. “Pythagoras lived in Egypt from thence he went to Babylon. Jamblichus tells us his stay there was 12 years. The most important doctrine which he brought home from thence, was, that of the immortality of the soul.” — Prideaux’s Connections, Vol. 1, Page 205. MPC 188.1
Dr. Campbell says: “Before the Captivity, and the Macedonian and Roman conquests, the Jews observed the most profound silence upon the state of the dead, as to their happiness or misery. They spoke of it simply as a state of silence, darkness, and inactivity. But after the Hebrews mingled with the Greeks and Romans they insensibly slid into their use of term and adopted some of their ideas on such subjects as those on which their oracles were silent.” Here is testimony concerning the past dispensation. MPC 188.2
We find our Saviour at the commencement of the gospel age, saying to his disciples, [Matthew 16:6, 7, 12,] “Beware of the leaven to the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have taken no bread. Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.” Says Josephus, “The Pharisees believe that souls have immortal vigor in them, and that under the earth there will be rewards and punishments.” The Sadducees denied the resurrection: and the Pharisees, though they believed this, held an error in supposing that men were rewarded at death. Christ testified to them, “Ye make the word of God of none effect by your traditions.” He taught, “Thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just.” MPC 188.3
Says Justin Martyr, who was born A.D. 89, and was martyred, A.D. 163. Should you happen upon some who are called christians indeed, but even dare to assail the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob with blasphemy, and say there is no resurrection of the dead, but instantly when they die, are received up into heaven; do not count these among christians.”—Brooks on Prophecy, p. 52. MPC 189.1
Below we give a list of texts in which some of the important words relied upon as strong proof of the immortality of the soul are used (such as soul, spirit, etc.,) and their corresponding Hebrew rendering in the margin. MPC 189.2
Texts in which the pronouns Me, Myself, He, His, Him, Himself. Yourselves, They, Themselves, are used, in the margin the word soul is used in their stead. MPC 189.3
TEXTS MARGIN.
Common Version Hebrew.
| Numbers 23:10. Let me die the death of the righteous. | Let my soul die. |
| Judges 16:30. Let me die with the Philistines. | Let my soul die. |
| Psalm 131:2. I have behaved and quieted myself. | Quieted my soul. |
| Psalm 49:19. He shall go to the generation of his fathers. | The soul shall go. |
| Psalm 105:18. He was laid in iron. | His soul came into iron. |
| Proverbs 16:26. He that laboreth. | The soul of him that laboreth. |
| Proverbs 14:10. His own bitterness. | The bitterness of his soul. |
| Micah 7:3. He uttereth his soul. | The mischief of his mischievous desire. |
| Proverbs 6:16. Seven things are an abomination unto him. | Of his soul. |
| ~Job 18:4. He teareth himself in his anger. | His soul. |
| ~Job 32:2. Justified himself. | His soul. |
| ~Jeremiah 51:14. The Lord of hosts hath sworn by himself. | By his soul. |
| ~Amos 2:14. Neither shall the mighty deliver himself. | His soul. |
| ~Leviticus 11:43. Not make yourselves abominable. | Your souls. |
| ~Joshua 23:11. Take good heed therefore unto yourselves. | Your souls. Their soul dieth. |
| ~Job 36:14. They die. | Their soul. |
| ~Isaiah 46:2. Themselves are gone. | |
| ~Isaiah 47:14. Not deliver themselves. | For their souls. |
| ~Esther 9:31. Decreed for themselves. | For their souls. |
~Texts in which the word person is used, and the rendering in the margin is soul:
| ~Genesis 36:6. All the persons of his house. | All the souls. |
| ~Exodus 16:16. According to the number of your persons. | Souls. |
| ~Jeremiah 52:28. Eight hundred, thirty and two persons. | Souls. |
~Instances where himself and life occur in the text and are rendered life, person and living soul in the margin:
| ~1 Kings 19:4. Requested for himselfthat he might die. | For his Life. |
| ~Isaiah 43:4. Give people for thy life. | Person. |
| ~Genesis 1:30. Everything that creepeth upon the earth, wherein | A living soul. |
| ~ there is life. |
We have already stated that the primary signification of the word soul was the whole man. These many instances we have referred to above prove what we have claimed. Life is sometimes meant by the soul.
| ~Job 12:10. The soul of every living thing. | Life. |
| ~Genesis 1:20. Moving creature that hath | Soul. |
~Let those who suppose the soul is immaterial read the following texts:
| ~Ecclesiastes 6:7. And yet the appetite is not filled. | Soul. |
| ~Lamentations 1:11. Give pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul. | Make the soul come again. |
We will now quote an instance where the expression dead body occurs. Translators tell us the original Hebrew for dead body is meth nephesh.
| ~Numbers 19:11. He that toucheth the dead body of any man. | Dead soul of man. |
See the following texts, in which the expression dead body occurs. Remember as you read them that those dead bodies spoken of are dead souls. Numbers 9:10; Leviticus 21:11; Numbers 6:6; 19:16; 2 Chronicles 20:24, 25; Psalm 79:2; Psalm 110:6; Haggai 2:13.
| Wind. | Spirit. |
| ~Amos 4:13. Createth the wind. | Spirit. |
| ~Zechariah 6:5. These are the four spirits of the heaven. | Winds. |
| Ghost. | Breath. |
| ~Job 11:20. Hope shall be as the giving up of the Ghost. | A Puff of Breath. |
For the consideration of those who may think there is at the present time a hell of torment, in which the wicked go at death, we give the following concerning hell. Vain have been the attempts to locate hell by those who believe that it now exists. The texts in the New Testament in which the word hell occurs, applied to the punishment of the wicked, not one of them refer to any place that is now in existence, but to one that will exist after the judgement. “Gehenna,” the Greek word translated “Hell,” and used in the New Testament in relation to the punishment of the wicked, occurs 12 times in the New Testament—7 times in Matthew 3 times in Mark, once in Luke, and once in James. Three of these appear to be used figuratively, viz; Matthew 5:22; 23:15; and James 3:6. The places where this word occurs are Matthew 5:22, 29, 30; 10:28; 18:9; 23:15, 33. Mark 9:43, 45, 47. Luke 12:5. James 3:6. MPC 191.1
The word is used only in addressing the Jews, and was understood by them. What was their idea of Gehenna? Says The Polymicrian Greek Lexicon to the New Testament, “Gehenna, properly the valley of Hinnom, south of Jerusalem; once celebrated for the horrid worship of Moloch, and afterwards polluted with every species of filth, as well as the carcasses of animals and dead bodies of malefactors; to consume which, in order to avert the pestilence which such a mass of corruption would occasion, constant fires were kept burning.” In this valley people anciently punished transgressors. See Leviticus 20:9, 14; Jeremiah 7:30; 19:1-13; 32:35; 48:8; Isaiah 30:30-33. And people are again to be punished there. See Joel 3:2. Zechariah 14:1-3. Revelation 16:16-21; 20:9. MPC 192.1
The words which are rendered hell, and are used in regard to the state of the dead, simply signify the grave.—“Hades” is a Greek word which occurs eleven times in the New Testament, and is ten time translated “hell” and once “grave,” viz.: 1 Corinthians 15:55. It is found in the following texts, viz.: Matthew 11:23; 16:18. Luke 10:15; 16:23. Acts 2:31, 27. Revelation 1:18; 20:14. The Hebrew word “Sheol” is the word that is rendered “hell” 31 times in the Old Testament, and can never be understood to signify a place of punishment. MPC 192.2
“The Gates of hell” some have supposed to refer to a place of torment. Dr. Campbell says: “The gates of hades [the grave] is a very natural paraphrase for death.” He adds: “We have sufficient evidence, sacred and profane, that this is its meaning.” MPC 192.3