Two Views On Christ’s Descent

by Travis Lowe on March 10, 2020

This past week, we celebrated my wife’s 25th birthday by taking a trip up to Gainesville and spending the night at Devil’s Den park. If you’re unfamiliar with the location, it’s a prehistoric limestone cave and underwater spring. It looks equal parts like something out of a horror movie and the little mermaid, a sprawling cavern with crystal clear blue water nearly 60 feet deep. As we made our way underground, flippers and snorkels in hand, I thought about the irony: I’d just spent all week getting ready to preach on Jesus’s descent, “Into hell” as some translations of the Apostles Creed state. This is one of the most controversial lines in the creed, and it has been the subject of intense debate and rival interpretations.

There’s also a bit of irony in the fact that while we’re teaching a series on the, “Majors” of the faith,  this particular portion of the creed is open to different understandings. As I explained on Sunday, there are Godly people on all sides of this discussion, and while I’m convinced that Jesus descended to the place of the righteous dead, it’s worthwhile to create a little bit of space for the other viewpoints that faithful Christians have adopted so, with that said, here are two alternative views on how we should handle, “He descended into hell.”

1.) Remove It From The Creed- This view has been especially popular among evangelicals in the last 30-40 years. It is perhaps best expressed by Wayne Grudem in his article, “He Did Not Descend Into Hell: A Plea for Following Scripture Instead of The Apostles Creed.” In his opening paragraph, Grudem Explains:

It seems best to consider the troublesome phrase, “he descended into hell” a late intruder into the Apostles Creed that never really belonged there in the first place, and that, on historical and scriptural grounds deserves to be removed.

This perspective argues that the history of the phrase difficult to trace, and places special emphasis on alternative ways of reading Ephesians 4 and 1 Peter 3. Additionally, it argues that Jesus’s final words, “Father, Into your hands I commit my spirit” imply that he expected to enter into the presence of his Heavenly Father immediately upon death. Those who take this perspective rightly desire to hold scripture as the final authority, and test even the most ancient traditions by it.

2.) Jesus Descended Into Hell On The Cross: This view, as far as I’m able to tell, originated in the writings of French reformer John Calvin during the Protestant reformation. Many of the denominations that have followed his line of thinking have included a similar explanation of the creed in their statements of faith. For example, Heidelberg Catechism, affirmed by many Presbyterians, states,

“Christ, my Lord, by his inexpressible anguish, pains, and terrors which he suffered in his soul on the cross and before has redeemed me from the anguish and torment of hell.”

Calvin understood well that in hell, the full weight of God’s wrath against sin is experienced. While we often speak of hell as the absence of God, a better way to describe it is that it is the absence of God in blessing and his exclusive presence in judgment. Because Christ bore God’s wrath in our place on the cross, this perspective argues that he experienced the full horror of hell before he died.

As I said on Sunday, I’m not convinced of either of these views. I disagree with them on biblical, theological, and historical grounds. But I recognize that there are Godly people in each of these camps, and we can all benefit from understanding the other side a little bit better. For all of our disagreements, believers, regardless of their perspective, unite around this commitment: Death is not natural to humanity, it is an enemy. To deliver us from this enemy, Jesus experienced everything that comes with death, so that we might be raised to walk in newness of life.

If you’d like to dig into this topic a bit more and explore the various perspectives, including my own, I’d recommend that you take a look at the following resources.

-He Did Not Descend Into Hell: A Plea for Following Scripture Instead of the Apostles Creed-Dr. Wayne Grudem

-He Descended To The Dead: An Evangelical Theology of Holy Saturday-Dr. Matthew Emerson

-Affirming The Apostles Creed-J.I. Packer

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