Gregory of Nyssa, the Nicene Creed and temporary hell?

[james.goetz]

HI Tom,

May I ask for your thoughts about Gregory of Nyssa being a champion of both the Nicene Creed and the Ancient Church doctrine of a temporary hell?

[tomtalbott]

May I ask for your thoughts about Gregory of Nyssa being a champion of both the Nicene Creed and the Ancient Church doctrine of a temporary hell?

Hi Jim,

As you might expect, St. Gregory of Nyssa is one of my heroes among the early church fathers, and I thought your discussion of him on your blog was excellent. Here is an interesting quote from his “Address on Religious Education”:

When a baser metal is mixed with gold, refiners restore the more precious metal to its natural brightness by consuming the alien and worthless substance with fire…. In the same way, when death, corruption, darkness, and other offshoots of vice have attached themselves to the author of evil, contact with the divine power acts like fire and effects the disappearance of what is contrary to nature. In this way the nature is purified and benefited, even though the process of separation is a painful one. Hence not even the adversary himself can question that what occurred was just and salutary–if, that is, he comes to recognize its benefit.

Thanks,

-Tom

[JasonPratt]

Note that “salutary” has linguistic connections to “salting”, btw.

I have occasionally wondered, although I have not yet been able to substantiate it, if in Mark 9:49-50 Jesus was providing (by analogy) an answer to a contemporary aphorism (“if salt becomes unsalty with what will you season it?”, similar to “if water sticks in your throat, with what will you wash it down?”); by connecting it with how “false salt”, or salt mixed with sand or similar cheap substances (dangerous to consume!) may be refined in order to free the salt from the impurities and recover the original quality of the salt.

[JasonPratt]

I also wanted to compliment you on your testimony regarding how you were once heavily involved in Satanism and witchcraft, Jim.