And the Atheist Shall Lie Down with the Annihilationist: Part 2
By Clay Jones
Although annihilationists argue that rebellious people should be sufficiently motivated to repent to keep themselves from suffering the cessation of their existence, in part 1 we saw that the cessation of existence, of itself, isn’t enough to deter most naturalists because the cessation of their existence (that is, their annihilation) is precisely their worldview. But terminal annihilationists argue that there is another deterrence: the rebel will suffer while they are being consumed on the way to the cessation of their existence. As annihilationist Edward Fudge wrote in The Fire That Consumes, “This is no gentle and passive death, but a fearful extinction wrought by potentially excruciating destruction in the fiery pit of the age to come.”[1] Note that Fudge here seems to interpret the fires of hell literally.
But how much would an unspecified, limited amount of suffering deter the rebellious? I argue in this article that unspecified, limited suffering insufficiently deters rebellion. After all, over the centuries many people have willingly burned themselves to death, and that must be an excruciating way to die.
The above famous 1963 photo is of a monk who immolated himself in Vietnam to protest the Vietnamese persecution of Buddhists. One witness wrote, “Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring…. As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.”[2]
Over the centuries, hundreds of people have likewise immolated themselves for political reasons. None of these people endured a “gentle and passive death,” as Fudge put it, but will the consuming fire of the Lord’s be worse than what that monk endured? It could be much worse, but then again, who is to say whether it might not be as bad as what the monk endured? I don’t know, but neither do any annihilationists.
Another example of people willingly enduring flames is the former Indian custom of a wife immolating herself on the funeral pyre of her dead husband. Missionaries in the early 1800s said it would be impossible to know the exact number who did this, but their best estimates mean that hundreds of thousands—perhaps millions—of women willingly climbed atop their husbands’ funeral pyres to burn to death.[3]
These examples show that many people already burn themselves to death for a cause in which they believe. Therefore, the threat of a limited consumption by fire insufficiently deters creaturely rebellion. Annihilationists may counter that God’s consuming fire could be hotter and/or last longer than the burning that happens to those who self-immolate. True, but not only can annihilationists not be confident that this is the case, but their inability to state this confidently diminishes its value as a deterrent.
As stated before, people are willing to burn themselves to death for a cause in which they believe. One atheist cause is the desire to thwart God. Philosopher John Stuart Mill said, “Whatever power such a being may have over me, there is one thing which he shall not do: he shall not compel me to worship him. I will call no being good, who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow creatures; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go.”[4] William Earnest Henley wrote in his poem “Invictus”:
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate
I am the captain of my soul.
Similarly, Archbishop Desmond Tutu said, “I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say sorry, I mean I would much rather go to the other place.”[5] There are many other similar comments of defiance toward God in the face of eternal suffering.[6] If they mock the prospect of eternal suffering, then why should we think that a limited suffering followed by annihilation would deter them? As Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl put it, “He who has a why can bear any how.” And if the rebel’s “why” is to mock God, then they will be able to bear the “how” of limited suffering.
In short, compared to eternal suffering, suffering for a limited amount of time won’t be more than a limited deterrent for those hellbent on rebellion.
There’s something else that’s odd about terminal suffering being a deterrent—annihilationists seldom appeal to it in their evangelism. For example, annihilationist Ralph G. Bowles in his almost 7,400 word chapter, “The Offer of Life: Conditional Immortality in the Practice of Evangelism,” writes only this:
The conditionalist [annihilationist] will remind the hearers that there will be a final and awesome encounter with God, a judgment on how we have lived our lives. There will be no reason to think that this encounter with God by unrepentant rebels will be easy or pleasant. Let us also recall that Conditionalism does not lessen the seriousness of the penalty of rebellion, since the real loss or punishment that the unrepentant face is their clear awareness on that Day that they have chosen the infinite loss of God and the blessedness that accompanies the Lord.[7]
So the rebel’s encounter with God won’t be “easy or pleasant”? That sounds like how I felt when I was called into the principal’s office for the third time in grade school. Also notice that Bowles thinks the real motive to repent is missing out on “the blessedness that accompanies the Lord.” But rebels don’t see being with the Lord as “blessed.”
William Fudge sidesteps the issue as to whether eternal suffering might better motivate repentance than temporary suffering: “‘How will this view affect evangelism?’ people may ask. ‘Which view of hell most motivates sinners to repent?’ These questions come to mind, but are secondary and must wait their turn. First we must ask what the Bible teaches. Only when that is settled are we ready to consider the practical implications of such teaching.”[8] I agree that the eternal suffering/annihilation debate is dependent on the correct exegesis of Scripture but examining how the former might better accomplish God’s purposes should not just be waved away.
Another thought: for all we know, Satan and his angels may have already been in existence for 800 billion, trillion, centillion years. Telling beings that have been in existence for 800 billion, trillion, centillion years that an indeterminate heat and length of fire will consume them into non-existence might not mean much. If the Lord wants to stop rebellion for now and forever, then eternal suffering better deters rebellion than a limited suffering and the cessation of existence.
Whatever Jesus meant when he spoke of “everlasting fire” (Matthew 18:8; 25:41) and the place where the “worm does not die and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:48), what most terrifies the wicked is not that this means annihilation but that it means eternal torment.
The Fear of Eternal Suffering Leads Many to Repent
The fear of eternal suffering has led many to turn to Jesus for salvation. For example, the deceased atheist Christopher Hitchens’s brother Peter Hitchens was also an atheist, like his brother. But one day he was at a museum looking at a painting that depicted hell (that painting is displayed at the top of part 1 of this series). Peter Hitchens writes:
Still scoffing, I peered at the naked figures fleeing toward the pit of hell, out of my usual faintly morbid interest in the alleged terrors of damnation. But this time I gaped, my mouth actually hanging open. These people did not appear remote or from the ancient past; they were my own generation. Because they were naked, they were not imprisoned in their own age by time-bound fashions…They were me and the people I knew. One of them—and I have always wondered how the painter thought of it—is actually vomiting with shock and fear at the sound of the Last Trump…I had a sudden, strong sense of religion being a thing of the present day…A large catalogue of misdeeds, ranging from the embarrassing to the appalling, replayed themselves rapidly in my head. I had absolutely no doubt that I was among the damned.[9]
That painting was instrumental in Peter Hitchens becoming a Christian and subsequently publishing a book that countered the work of his brother Christopher. He did that because he was afraid of eternal suffering.
I’ll only give one more example of someone who turned to Jesus to avoid eternal suffering: me. As an almost-13-year-old, I heard Billy Graham preach a sermon entitled “Heaven and Hell.” When he finished, I was convinced that I was headed for eternal suffering so I “went forward” and committed my life to Christ. Thank you, Jesus!
Jesus preached eternal suffering. Let’s not run from that!
Notes
[1] Edward William Fudge, The Fire That Consumes: A Biblical and Historical Study of the Doctrine of Final Punishment, 3rd ed. (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2011), 122.
[2] David Halberstam in Ian K. Smith, “South Vietnam, 11 June 1963, Malcolm Browne: The self-immolation of Thich Quang Duc in Saigon,” The New Statesman, https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2010/03/thich-quang-vietnam-browne, accessed September 6, 2021.
[3] “Burning of Widows in India,” The Missionary Herald. Boston: American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. 25, 4 (Boston: Crocker and Brewster, 1829), 130-131, and see “Lord William Bentinck on the Suppression of Sati, 8 November 1829,” in Speeches and Documents on Indian Policy, 1750-1921, ed. Arthur B. Keith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1922), vol. 1, 208-226, available at Modern History Sourcebook (Fordham University, 1997), https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/mod/1829bentinck.asp, accessed September 15, 2021. It’s important to note that sometimes women were forced to be burned alive.
[4] John Stuart Mill, An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy: The Principal Philosophical Questions Discussed in His Writings, 2d ed. (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1865), 103.
[5] Abigail Frymann, “‘I'd rather go to hell than worship a homophobic God’: Desmond Tutu speaks out as he compares gay rights to the struggle against apartheid in South Africa,” Daily Mail, July 27, 2013, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2380058/Id-hell-worship-homophobic-God-Desmond-Tutu-speaks-compares-gay-rights-struggle-apartheid-South-Africa.html#ixzz3HOFsU29A, accessed October 27, 2014.
[6] I quote many of them in my book Why Does God Allow Evil?: Compelling Answers for Life’s Toughest Questions (Harvest House, 2017). I consider these defiant comments to be not more than unrealistic bravado, but the point remains that many rebels still proclaim them.
[7] Ralph G. Bowles, “The Offer of Life: Conditional Immortality in the Practice of Evangelism,” A Consuming Passion: Essays on Hell and Immortality in Honor of Edward Fudge (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2015), 313-314.
[8] Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, 6-7.
[9] Peter Hitchens, The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010), 102-103.
— Clay Jones is a visiting scholar at Talbot School of Theology and the chairman of the board of Ratio Christi. He has authored Why Does God Allow Evil? Compelling Answers for Life’s Toughest Questions and Immortal: How the Fear of Death Drives Us and What We Can Do About It. His website is clayjones.net.
Image: Thích Quảng Đức self-immolation
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