Hi Sobornost, I think most people in this forum are aware of the so-called doctrine of reserve - some things (e.g. universalism) should not be taught to all. Nobody here disputes that Origen was a universalist, but I would say precisely the fact that he and others reserved the universalist teachings only for the “perfect” contributed to universalism’s eventual decline. Due to this doctrine of reserve, catechumens at the “universalist schools” (that is, the schools with universalist teachers) did not necessarily become convinced of universalism. While we can speculate that some early churchmen believed in universalism but didn’t voice it because of the reserve doctrine, this speculation is just a guess, not evidence and won’t convince a skeptic. But you’re right that there are writers who sometimes seem to support eternal torment and at other times speak like universalists. They may have practised the doctrine of reserve, or they may have been genuinely unsure about the issue, or changed their mind at some point, or some parts of their writings were misattributed to them, or were outright falsified, or maybe we are not reading their words carefully enough. Who knows?
I have the same view as you expressed in your post, Questorius. We are children of God at our core and we will return to that eventually. And I came to that view before reading any material. I listened to God and myself, as you stated. And I just happened to later find out I was correct. 
And I, too, see the kingdom as being present inside of us right now, here on Earth, not some future destination. Paul said he was a citizen of Heaven, seated in Heaven right now.
Jesus never said we have to choose accept His salvation before we die. And, in fact, in 1 Peter 3:19-20, we’re told that Jesus preached to the spirits in prison from the time of Noah. In Peter’s time, the people from Noah’s day were considered the worst sinners by far, having done horrific things that the Bible says it won’t talk about. Why would Jesus bother preaching to them if not to save them? He must have saved the all.
And it’s important to note that when the Bible is translated properly, Hell is seen clearly as the unseen realm that exists here on Earth–the Earth’s spirit realm where Satan fell when he was cast out of Heaven. Near death experiences show that as well. So if a person doesn’t want to accept God, He doesn’t throw them into Hell, He simply let’s them stay on Earth after death, but in its spirit realm instead, a different “kingdom” than His kingdom. So His actions aren’t wrathful, they’re respectful. He won’t force them to come to Heaven. But He also knows that if they spend long enough on the unseen spirit realm here on Earth that Satan rules, they’ll ask Him to save them, and they’ll go right to Heaven when that happens. There’s nothing unloving about our reality. It’s our perceived reality, fed to us in church for years that programs us that way.
While I hold the same views as most people in this forum, I don’t call myself Christian anymore. That was the derogatory term the Roman’s called Jesus’ followers back then. I don’t think religion truly exists. It’s an idea, a convention, only in our minds. It’s like a wall between us and Jesus/God. I now see reality as God and humans with no religion in the middle blocking anything. Not a fan of organized religion anymore. Jesus taught us how to live and especially how to live in relationship with Him, which is God/Jesus. That want a religion, that was life. If I think to do so, I’ll show some really cool verses about God’s nature, and Him asking us to be in relationship with Him so He can make us perfect (human perfection not God perfection–the two are different in the Bible).
Thanks. I’m aware of that about Origen’s writings, but I haven’t yet seen the timeline on it. Did he write it early on? Did he change his stance later in life? I don’t know. If Origen stated that late in life then I would say he probably utilized it before that point. However, translation and context and colloquialisms are then what we’d need to look at in regard to whether he actually meant to teach a fiery hell or if that was just a misunderstanding of the language being used.
1 Peter 3:19-20 is in my view one of the most gracious parts of the Bible. Even the people of whom it was said “that every inclination of the thoughts of their heart was only evil all the time” (Genesis 6:5) were given a second chance by Jesus in the afterlife.
As for everyone being a child of God, a beautiful passage is to be found in Acts 17 where Paul reminds his pagan listeners that God is not far from them and that all people are his offspring. Maybe Paul believed in creation ex Theo rather than ex nihilo – that we’re not created out of nothing, but out of God. And if someone can’t believe that he or she is God’s child, then Jesus’s genealogy in Luke 3 shows that he or she is at least God’s greatgreat…grandchild. Adam is there described as the son of God, just as Isaac is described as the son of Abraham. So according to Luke, if God weren’t our father, he would at least be our Grandpa.
Actually, the word aion was used to express a very long period of time sometimes. If I remember correctly, Beecher says the Hebrews didn’t have a concept of eternality, but instead a concept of really long periods of time. So they would use the word owlam to express a very long time since it was an expression of the distant future. If it wasn’t Beecher, I may have been Benner. I forget. And owlam is translated to aion in Greek. There were words in Greek that meant eternal and none of them were aion. Why not use the words from Koine Greek that definitely mean eternal as opposed to a word that demoted more a long period of time? Aion is used to describe God sometimes. But is it being used in the durational sense of God being endless or is the word being used in a locational-adjective way, calling God the God of the eternal realm or the God of time or the God of the ages?
So Paul could easily be contrasting a little time from a long time. Nothing in the verse you shared requires that Paul be comparing a short time to endless time. Does that make sense? It’s late and I’m tired so I may not be explaining thing well.
Theodore died in 428 A.D. so I thought of him as already belonging to the 5th century. He was a contemporary of Augustine who died in 430. Theodore actually pushed back against Augustinian ideas. But you’re right that he could be included. After all, he became bishop in 392. But if we include Theodore among the universalists active before the 5th century, then we should also include Augustine in the list of tormentists because he also became bishop before the end of the 4th century.
As for Nestorius, I guess there’s just this passage from the liturgy attributed to him: “All the dead have slept in the hope of Thee, that by thy glorious resurrection Thou wouldest raise them up in glory.” (taken from Hanson’s book, chapter XVI.) I’d say it suggests Nestorius was a universalist, but it doesn’t “prove” it.
Regarding 2 Cor 4:17-18, I pretty much agree with Brian, but let me add a couple of things.
Let’s start with verse 17: “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,” The affliction here is not just limited to time, it is limited to just a moment. The word παραυτίκα (parautika) used here means “but for a moment” so this doesn’t really support the notion that Paul is contrasting all time in general with timelessness.
Now verse 18: “as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” The word translated as “transient” is πρόσκαιρα (proskaira). Other places where this word is used in the Bible are Matthew 13:21 and Mark 4:17 where Jesus speaks of those who are like a seed thrown on stony ground – they remain in the faith for only a short while and immediately fall away when persecution arises, obviously the comparison implied is not of temporality and eternity, but of believing for only a short time and believing your whole life. The last place in the New Testament where this word is used is Hebrews 11:25 where it refers to the fleeting pleasures of sin, which as we know are usually indeed very fleeting, but at most last as long as this life.
Perhaps the idea was that while things of this life are limited to this short life, the unseen things can extend to an age or ages (or possibly to an endless series of ages, but not necessarily). But even if Paul used aionios here to refer to absolute eternity, it’s totally obvious from Romans 16:25 (as I explained in a previous post) that aionios can’t always mean eternal. Also look at Revelaton 14:6-7: "Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead, with an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people. And he said with a loud voice, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come, and worship him who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water.” The word “eternal” here can’t really mean eternal. Is the angel going to continue proclaiming the gospel that the hour of God’s judgement has come literally forever? Even after the judgement is done and God is adored by his people in the New Jerusalem, will this gospel still be relevant? Even if we said that this gospel is not literally eternal, but only speaks of eternity, it still wouldn’t make sense. Why should people give glory to God throughout eternity because he created the sea, even though there will be no more sea in the new earth? (Revelation 21:1) Either the author didn’t mean “eternal gospel” when he wrote “aionios gospel”, or he was a pretty confused individual who didn’t know what he was writing. As a non-Christian, I think it’s likely the author was making up stuff as he went along, but if you accept Revelation as inspired I don’t see how you could maintain that “eternal” in Rev 14:6 is the correct translation.
The last thing I wish to say here about the universalism in the early church is this: I’m genuinely sorry if I caused somebody distress by pointing out the ancient Christians who believed in eternal torment. I haven’t believed in hell for a long time now and I forgot that many people on this site believe it is very real and that the opinions of church fathers reflect to an extent the inspired teachings of the Bible about hell. Learning about the beliefs of ancient Christians about hell is something I do out of curiosity, not out of concern for myself or those I love. I didn’t want to destroy anyone’s hopes that there is no endless hell. I actually believe there are very good reasons to believe with certainty that there is no infinite torment. I just think that the questionable claim that most Christians in the first 500 years were universalists is not among those reasons.
Firstly, if you believe the Bible, I see no ground for doubt that there is a chance to be saved after death. 1 Peter 3:19-20 and 4:6 declare post-mortem salvation with such clarity that all attempts of commentators to explain it away fail miserably.
Secondly, there are many passages that just make no sense on the supposition that endless torment is true. To name just one – Matthew 5: “But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. … You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” To be sons of God in a spiritual, moral sense, you must be as loving as God. Now, some theologians say that God loves the sinners in the sense that he gives them grace in this world, but this love will supposedly not stop him from tormenting them for all eternity in the next. They claim that although God torments them in eternity, we can say that he loves them because he gives them good things in this life. To me this is immensely ludicrous! Imagine that you invite someone to a restaurant. You are being nice to them there, you pay the bill, but after you leave the restaurant with them, you torture and rape that person to death. And that’s what you planned to do from the start (God has foreknowledge, so if somebody is going to hell, he knew he’d send them there before they were alive). Do you get to call yourself a son of God, someone perfect like God, if you do that? Well, if eternal torment was true, then I wouldn’t see why not, because the God of eternal torment would do the same and worse. If the Bible was inspired and God was going to torment anyone forever, the passage I quoted could not be in the Bible.
The Bible aside, it is wholly contrary to logic that all-loving God who sees the future would create creatures that he knew would be forever in hell before he created them. Of all the arguments for endless torment (and I’ve possibly heard all of them) none can refute this. What’s more, God has nothing to gain from us, certainly not from tormenting us. He has no lack of anything, he has nothing to prove to himself, he doesn’t seek validation from his creatures. To feel lack of something, to want to prove something to others to make oneself feel better are the traits of imperfect, unhappy, pitiful people. A true God would have more than enough of everything he could ever want. If we were created by a God, then my reason convinces me that we must have been created out of his superabundance. His greatness and goodness naturally overflowed into creation.
Found it – here is the passage I was thinking of:
‘’It is not right to explain to everybody all that might be said on this subject. Nor is this the appropriate moment. It is risky to commit to writing the explanation of these matters, because the multitude do not require any more instruction than that the punishment is to be inflicted upon sinners. It is not of advantage to go on to truths which life behind it because there are people who are scarcely restrained by fear of everlasting punishment from the vast flood of evil and the sins that are committed in consequence of it.’’ (Against Clesus. Book 6, section 26)
Origen is responding to a prolonged written attack on Christianity by the Pagan philosopher Celsus. This particular passage is in response to Celsus’ muddling up the beliefs of orthodox Christians with the Ophite Gnostics. The translation I have is by Henry Chadwick and is quite old – it was made in 1953. I note that he uses the term ‘everlasting punishment’ in the final sentence I’ve quoted. My hunch is that Origen certainly uses the word ‘aeonian’ (meaning ‘age long’) here rather than aidios (which properly means ‘eternal’). But I can’t read Greek so that’s merely a well-informed guess.
The other passage from Origen I’ve seen quoted is the hermeneutical key of he offers in hiw Commentary on Romans V.1.7 in which he states Paul covers over his universalism to be a ‘wise steward of the word’
I’ve seen passages where Origen explicitly teaches universal salvation in his Peri Achon (his philosophical theology book), in his Biblical Commentaries, and in his Homilies. I would have thought that the teaching would be less likely to be found in the Homilies - but I guess that all depends on who the audience for the Homily was.
The date given for Origen’s Commentary on Romans is 246 - and for Against Celsus is 248. Origen died in 253 - so both tetxs were written towards the end of his life. But I can’t draw any inferenes from this regarding whether Origen only taught with reserve later in life. These happen to be the only two instances I know in which Origen speaks of the doctrine of ‘reserve’ - but I know so little and you’d need to find out more.
I’ve done a search on this one and if you ar really interested in ths matter it seems that the essay to read is ‘Guarding the Mysteries of Salvation: The Pastoral Pedagogy of Origen’s Universalism’ by Mark M. Scott. (Ramelli referenes this in her latest book).
That’s lovely - thank you
That’s enormouly interesting idea - that thee dotrine of reserve may have contributed to the decline of universalism. I think you obviously are some kind of Patristics scholar - at least b training. And I am just not a patristics scholar - no way 
Now I’ve read more of the thread I see you that you certainly know the bits and bobs of stuff I know. So you know about the three quotations - from Augustine, Basil, and Jereome in the fifth century which assert that very many Christians believed in universal salvation in their day. Hmmmm - these bits of evidence suggests to me that the doctrine of reserve may have eased to be effetive as Chirsianity became widespread and was passed on through families. They suggest that the multitudes from whom thee doctrine was one kept under wraps have now atually come to believe in it. Just hypothesis - but your comments are appreciated and much valued
I encourage you to do your research on Nestorius. Beecher tells all about Nestorians being Universalists.
Theodore of Mopsuestia is one of the founders of Nestorianism and he was a strong proponent of Universal restoration.
The reason Nestorianism was anathematized is because Nestorius’s opponents claimed he believed Jesus was two beings–one part human and one part God. But the belief was as if it were two different people, making Jesus just a God-inspired man. However, this was either due to a misunderstanding of Nestorius’s beliefs or it was a planned attack to discredit and get rid of Nestorius for good. Why? Because Nestorius adamantly defended Christ being a single person just like most Christians today and back then believed. He and his sect never should’ve been anathematized. They should’ve been counted Christians even to the present. And that means Universalism was taught by the largest denomination of Christianity for over 1,400 years. That means most Christians believed in Universal Restoration for over 1,400 years. It was the Pagan-like Catholic Church who pushed it out, eventually, and they were dwarfed by the Nestorian Christians. Go read up on Nestorians if you doubt they were Universalists.
I whole-heartedly agree. I love making that argument when people say, “God created man because He can’t love without having someone to love (faulty logic), and He deemed loving us as more important than several people suffering in Hell forever. That’s how much He loves us.” WOW! I mean…how twisted does one have to be to not think that statement through? How pathetically needy do they think God is? Their God is outright evil if they really think He’s like that. Thankfully, He can’t be like that. Philosophical arguments are by far the strongest refutation for eternal torment. I truly love philosophical debate on this subject. No one–regardless of how intelligent and well educated, can refute it–period. It is irrefutable.
There are plenty of verses that say God does all He pleases, and that He can do all things, and that His will is that none perish and all repent. Those three verses alone destroy eternal torment because they testify that He can create a system where everyone gets saved and that that is His will. That may look like proof-texting but in context, all of those verses really do mean what they say on the surface.
When people say God’s justice requires He send people to eternal torment, that makes zero sense. Since when does a lifetime of sin, even if those sins effected millions of people throughout history, constitute eternal torment? That’s just evil. And for what purpose? So God can enjoy the being tormented? Or so He can strike fear into people’s hearts while their alive so they’ll join Him (which clearly doesn’t work since the Bible seems to say most people will end up in Hell forever according or mainstream doctrine)? Fear is not the tool God uses to recruit. Love is. Fear us often a mistranslation in the Bible, especially when speaking of what we’re supposed to do to God. Fearing Him is not what the verses are supposed to say when translated and we can prove that conclusively now.
People argue that God’s justice is more important than His love, so He has to send people to suffer in Hell forever. Well if justice were more important than love, God wouldn’t have come in the form of Jesus. Jesus gives everyone a way out of justice by saving them I’d they accept His sacrifice to cover their sins. That single act disproves the argument.
The brainwashing in our world today is exceptionally strong. But I have a feeling that’s all going to change soon.
God is absolutely amazing. He built our reality so that all people would be saved eventually, because that’s what the Bible says when translated and understood properly. It’s clear as day with the right passages.
And the fact that love holds a high respect for free-will choice means God would never create us here on Earth, possibly about to live a life of horrors, without asking us first. Therefore, I don’t believe He could’ve created us here first. He would’ve had to have created us in the perfection of Heaven first, and then eventually asked us if we wanted to live a life as a human on Earth in order to grow and learn and help others grow and learn. In Heaven, things are perfect. Can’t learn too much without struggle. So it appears that we choose to come here to learn through direct experiences with sin, shame, harming others, being hurt by others, etc. God told Jeremiah that He knew him before He placed him in his mother’s womb. Many argue God’s foreknowledge to explajn that verse, but I think that’s a poor argument. The word “knew” in Hebrew is often used to mean an intimate knowing or a oneness with each other. God was most likely saying in that verse they He and Jeremiah were family in Heaven before, at one with one another, and Jeremiah chose the life he would go into (and therefore was appointed as a prophet to the nations). We see evidence of this in Near-Death Experiences (NDEs). People die, end up going through the Life Review with God/Jesus, they enter Heaven and then say, “I remembered living there before. I remembered choosing to come to Earth to learn.” NDE experiences also sometimes relive the moments in Heaven right before they chose to live a life here. They picked which life they’d lead. It was all planned. They weren’t forced into anything. They were lovingly given choices. If God had created us here against our will and then we lived a life of horrors at the hands of child abusers, that’s just cruel. What living God would do that?
And if the hundreds of thousands of NDEs are indeed correct about pre-existence, then why on Earth would anyone choose to come here if they could end up in an eternal Hell? If that were the case, God created us in Heaven as complete morons. LOL
No, God is incredibly loving. He didn’t force us to come here. He graciously gave us the opportunity so that we could grow our hearts through experiences of difficulties here. This life is a huge blessing, and the worse it us here, the more our heart grows by the time we get back to Heaven, which will deepen our relationships with our siblings there through our shared or similar experiences. It’s quite an amazing existence when you see it that way. And there’s incredible faith in God to have it all worked out with that viewpoint, as well. I love it.
I once read a great website that had several pre-existence verses but I lost it! If anyone knows of a really good website for verses of pre-existence, let me know. I’m still kicking myself for not saving that website more carefully.
Thanks so much for that quote and the book reference! Much appreciated.
I’m fully agree that it’s almost certain that Origen used aionian to describe punishment in that verse, just like Jesus did. And again, Origen knew his native Koine Greek language exceptionally well. He’d know that punishment meant pruning, a correctional punishment. Therefore, aoinion (meaning “of the world to come”) describing correctional punishment would make perfect sense.
And remember that Beecher points out that in a Cyric version of the Apostle’s Creed, it ends with “life of the world to come” instead of “eternal life” because their language didn’t contain a word that meant eternity. I think it was Cyric, but I keep forgetting what language it was for certain. I need to find that in the book again.
Once a scholar understands what Beecher presents about aionian and owlam, I don’t see how they can believe in eternal torment unless it’s due to financial and career concerns. Careers often end when a Christian scholar or preacher express Universalism. They have to find a ministry that will allow them to preach there, or build their own, or find an institution that will allow them to continue their research. I’ve heard some of the stories. It’s such a shame that Christianity no longer has the relaxed nature of being exploritive and inquisitive with beliefs like it did in the first few centuries.
Thank you, I’m really flattered you think I’m some sort of scholar, but except for having attended a couple of lectures on patristics and learned the most basic Greek my “training” only consists of occasionally reading ancient Christian texts and saving interesting quotes in text documents.
Regarding the quotes about the great number of universalists, I’d say that they are weighty evidence of universalism being widespread in the fourth and at the beginning of the fifth century. Unfortunately, they do not prove that universalism was very common in the 2nd century. Anti-universalists can claim that universalism would never have become so popular if it wasn’t for Origen. But yeah, it can be quite persuasively argued that it was a very common, if not the majority view in the 4th century.
As for the notion that the doctrine of reserve was no longer used so much in the 4th century, there might be something to that. But even with Gregory of Nyssa, though he sometimes seems more open about the restoration than Origen, there are homilies where he conspicuously avoids mentioning the universal restoration and even speaks in a way that may have suggested to his flock that such a restoration is not to be expected. Consider his Homily on the Nativity: “In this way evil will completely disappear, when all are recalled to life through the resurrection: the righteous will immediately be transported to celestial bliss, while those held in the grip of sins will be consigned to the fire of Gehenna.” After this he leaves the topic of eschatology and speaks of something else. Those of his hearers who were unfamiliar with his major written works could have thought that he believes the fire of hell is the ultimate destination of sinners. On top of that, later anti-universalist theologians could use this homily of Gregory’s to cast doubt on his clear universalist statements in his major works.
By the way, the idea that the doctrine of reserve contributed to the eclipse of universalism is by no means my original idea. I remember reading it in some universalist book, and after reading some universalist church father writings, like Against Celsus that you quoted, I became convinced it definitely had a hand to play in the fate of universalism in the middle ages. Proponents of eternal torment generally defended their view much more openly and vigorously than universalists.
Truly vehement defence of universalism seems to be found in Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia who are to be credited for making the doctrine very popular with the so-called Nestorians. The other parts of Christendom connected them with the Nestorian heresy, however, so the precursors of later Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox would not take Theodore’s and Diodore’s universalistic arguments seriously even if they read their works.
There was also Isaac of Niniveh, but his most outspoken defences of universalism are to be found in the so-called Second Part which wasn’t even translated to Greek, but remained only in Syriac and until recently was relatively unknown. So although Isaac defended universalism vigorously and is at the same time venerated by the Catholics and the Orthodox, his universalism didn’t really influence those churches much. Well, some of his statements related to hell have in fact been pondered a lot by the Orthodox, e.g. the notion that the scourge of hell is the scourge of divine love, but the Orthodox somewhat misinterpreted his ideas and watered down his universalism to a feeble hope. Sadly, not even the modern descendants of the so-called Nestorian church hold to universalism, it seems to me. See this discussion.
I hope I haven’t been boring you by just repeating what you already know, Sobornost
The language you’re talking of was Syriac (or its ancient variety), the language of Syrians who lived in Syria. It was one of the major literary languages of early Christians besides Greek and Latin.
Thanks. Very interesting - will get back to you No you aren’t repeating stuff I already know at all. I’m familiar with some of the data - but you are opening up new ideas regarding how to make sense of the data
Good - will respond when I have some time Will need to have a look at Beecher first
Thank you. I suspected that was it, but for some reason, I keep thinking it was spelled with a C when I read it in Beecher’s book, which throws me off.
Oh, good! Glad to hear it. I love these subjects. Lots of fun!