If we accept fervent exclusivism, how can we say that universalism is true? So, for those who are attracted to this fervent variety of exclusivism: First note that even fervent exclusivism is compatible with universalism. The first of these says that to be saved one must freely accept Christ. The second says that, eventually at least, all will be saved.
But even if it is possible for both positions to be true, is it all plausible to suppose they will be? We know that some in this life have been only been moving further and further away from accepting Christ. And some people can be very obstinate. And some have become incredibly evil in this life. But, on the other hand, even in this short life, we all know of instances in which people having all three of these problems to a great degree who were brought around and were saved.
So, again, I see no grounds for pessimism that an infinitely resourceful God, who is able to take as much time as He needs, will be able to win over everyone eventually.
If you think that the most dramatic turn-arounds in this life have involved an infringement on the freedom of the people involved, but agree that they were saved nonetheless, then you you are not a fervent exclusivist, and you should have no objections to such non-free savings taking place after death.
I am here addressing only fervent exclusivists. But some seem to have a different worry — not that fervent exclusivism is incompatible with universalism, but that, if fervent exclusivism is true, then nobody, not even God, can know or at least know for certain that all will be saved, since nobody can know what people will freely do.
So, even if universalism will turn to be true, we cannot know that now, and God would not have revealed that to us already. This new worry, then, is based on the assumption that free will is incompatible with foreknowledge: that it is impossible, even for God, to know or at least to know for certain ahead of time what someone will freely do. Note that God can still be omniscient despite not knowing what we will freely do.
Omniscience is a matter of knowing all truths. In fact, my sense is that most theists reject this assumption. How can one be free if divine decrees, issued long before one is born, causally determine what one does? That position — compatibilism about freedom and determinism — has always seemed very implausible to me.
But even among those who join me in rejecting compatibilism about freedom and determinism, many and I think most accept the compatibility of freedom and foreknowledge. If you believe that God knows ahead of time who will freely accept him in this life, then you must not really be an incompatibilist about freedom and foreknowledge, and you should have no objection to supposing that God can know ahead of time who will freely accept Him in the life to come.
Thus, this objection will have carry no weight with you. Nevertheless, I myself am somewhat attracted toward these controversial views. A way to think about these two options is that one perhaps compromises a bit on universalism, the other on fervent exclusivism.
After all, God will be on the case, and will have as much time as He needs. While it is true that some are heading in the completely wrong direction, and give no sign that, left to their own devices, they will do anything but accelerate their progress in that wrong direction, they will not be left to their own devices.
There are actual instances in this life of breathtakingly dramatic turn-arounds, and God does intervene to bring people around in this life without violating their freedom, according to the fervent exclusivist. If one takes this option, I think one can still be counted as a universalist. But this does seem to compromise on universalism a bit, because one is not only admitting that one could of course! Not even God knows absolutely for certain that all will be saved.
And this gives rise to a sticky question about whether God would have revealed that all will be saved if He was not absolutely certain that this would be so. Option 2: God could pick some time in the distant future — a time far enough off that it is overwhelmingly probable that all will have freely accepted salvation by then, given the non-freedom-violating means of persuasion God intends to employ — and resolve to at that time compel acceptance of any hold-outs that are then left.
These would then be saved by their acceptance, though their acceptance might not be as valuable, given that it was not free. Thus, God can be absolutely certain, and can therefore responsibly reveal to us, that all will be saved. There are many variations of this story that you might think up and think about for yourself. For instance: God could pick different times for different individuals, etc. In this case, these stories illustrate ways that zealous incompatibilism and universalism — and even foreknown universalism — can both be true even while the value and importance of human freedom is respected to a great degree.
Now, this position does give up on fervent exclusivism though not on strong exclusivism or exclusivism simpliciter , since it holds that one can be saved even if one does not freely accept Christ. Nevertheless, it does go a fair way toward accommodating the motivation behind fervent exclusivism — the importance of human freedom — in that it has God adopting a plan by which He goes to tremendous lengths to attain free acceptance from every person.
And those who hold this view can still maintain that it is far better and more valuable for a person to freely accept than for this acceptance to be coerced in a freedom-negating way. But it does deny that one must freely accept in order to be saved, and thus it does deny fervent exclusivism. Since the compromise position respects the importance of human freedom, it is likely to be an attractive compromise.
Many who hold that God cannot foreknow what we will freely do seem to suppose that He can know what He Himself will do. This gets too complicated for me to go into in detail here. Thus, even those who hold that God cannot foreknow with complete certainty what we will freely do are very strongly motivated to hold that He can foreknow what He Himself will do. The above options are sketched out as potentially helpful guides for those who are attracted to certain combinations of views involving freedom, foreknowledge, and salvation.
The following materials are recommended by Keith DeRose for further reading on the matter of Universalism and the Bible. Universalism and the Bible. Appendices A. Further Reading Books Blog Posts. Some Universalist Passages Contrary to what many would suppose, universalism, understood as above, receives strong scriptural support in the New Testament.
Universalism and Strong Exclusivism But perhaps we should distinguish between two types of exclusivism. Consider, then: This raises the question: Who will so confess and so believe? Universalism, Judgment and Punishment Many of the passages that are typically utilized in attacks on universalism teach that, after death, God will judge people and punish many of them. I scanned this drawing, by E. Kemble, from the edition New York: Charles L.
Webster and Company of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, p. To see the other drawings by Kemble from the first edition, see Virginia H. Appendices All of the above remains basically unchanged in content since I wrote it for an adult Bible study in early The Danger of False Belief on this Matter Many have e-mailed to warn me of the dangers of believing and promoting universalism.
Further Reading The following materials are recommended by Keith DeRose for further reading on the matter of Universalism and the Bible. An excellent defense of universalism by the philosopher, Thomas Talbott.
Universal Salvation? Though I found this book quite valuable, I do disagree strongly with parts of it. Most of my strong disagreement is with the material in Chapter 5. They seem to think that the denial of exclusivism follows directly from universalism [see pp. Perhaps their claim would be that while universalism is compatible both with exclusivism and with non-exclusivism, it fits in better with non-exclusivism.
I wanted to pour this new wine into old wineskins. I quickly learned why Jesus recommended against this: the old wineskins always burst. If so, my experience has been completely different. From a pastoral standpoint, the passages surveyed suggest that one might evaluate eschatological teachings in terms of their practical effects.
And it is exceedingly difficult to see how the biblical call to self-denial and godly living can flourish on the basis of universalist theology. Who would need to work at being alert or prepared if a universalist outcome were already known in advance?
Some Christian universalists, including Origen, acknowledged this problem and suggested that universalism should be kept secret from the masses and disseminated among only a select few. And while some argue that universalism does not logically exclude the need for evangelism, I would ask: Where are the universalist evangelists, going to the ends of the earth, painstakingly learning and transcribing hitherto unknown languages and suffering opposition, up to and including the prospect of martyrdom, so that they can deliver their message of final salvation for all?
Among the non-universalists, there are tens of thousands of such laborers. Our beliefs about eschatology carry profound importance as an incentive to or disincentive from the difficult tasks to be undertaken in our difficult times. To unlock this article for your friends, use any of the social share buttons on our site, or simply copy the link below.
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Free Newsletters Get the best from CT editors, delivered straight to your inbox! Baker Academic pp. Posted: March 11 , More From: Paul Copan. Current Issue. Read This Issue. Instead, another person has replaced him. Therefore, the person who was promised eternal life will not be the one who receives it. Yet, suppose McLaren replies that the sameness of my story will enable me to be the same person. Still, that appeal will not work either, for a narrative is just a set of linguistic parts sentences, paragraphs, chapters that are used to tell the story of my life.
If it does not have an essence and nothing does on a physicalist view , then my story cannot preserve my identity and my hope of eternal life. As my essence, my soul is my set of my essential capacities and properties. I cannot lose or gain any of them and still be the same person.
However, as capacities such as for deep, interpersonal relationships, being virtuous, rational, etc.
So, the soul is not static; we can grow and change, yet that ability presupposes a fundamental, essential sameness about us, both of which are grounded in the soul. Moreover, this view of sin as something compatible with the physical fails to do justice to our deep fallenness. No matter how much we work ethically on our relationships, there is a much deeper dimension to our sinfulness than this view allows e.
I think this view of sin fails to grapple with the incredible depths of depravity we can see in both fellow humans and ourselves. For instance, there are many historical examples that beg the question: how can ordinary human beings perpetrate atrocities? Where did this wolf-tribe [i. Does it really stem from our own roots? Our own blood? It is our own. Yet, in a physical world, it seems there is no room for evil. Evil is a way things morally ought not to be. Likewise, goodness is the way things ought to be.
Both evil and goodness are prescriptive. However, physical stuff is fundamentally descriptive. By reducing evil or goodness to just something physical, we lose morality on this view. Worse, all people sin. Yet, on a panentheistic view, in which all people already are in God, sin is in God.
That means that God is not truly holy or good. He not only has allowed evil into his presence; he has evil in his being. Evidently, then, God can tolerate sin and not punish it. This means punishment of sin is optional for God. If so, God does not punish sin due to his nature as being holy and just. Rather, he would punishment only if he wills that. Unlike traditional orthodoxy, what God wills would not be based on his perfect moral character.
What about the idea that we all work from our limited standpoints and have our different interpretations of God, and that our fundamental need is moral transformation? First, this depiction of our need misses what is actually the case, as I just tried to describe. Second, though, the claim that we never have access to reality as it is apart from our interpretations is demonstrably false. For one, if it were true, there would not be a way to get started with interpretations.
For if all our access to reality requires interpretation, then there is nothing that simply is given to us — everything is interpretation.
However, if so, what then are we interpreting? Another interpretation? In addition, what is it of? It seems if we cannot ever access something that simply is given in reality, then we are on a never-ending regress of interpretations, a process that we cannot even start.
For another, consider Saul of Tarsus and his encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus.
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