As we have seen there is a seemingly endless debate over the question of God's sovereignty vs. God's desire to save all men.
The key to closing this debate is in seeing that the doctrine of eternal hell is the weak link. In fact it is a translators opinion, not infallible translation of the underlying languages.
Before getting into that in detail it is useful to digress and consider how we should interpret the Bible and resolve questions of this type.
One, virtually universal rule of Biblical interpretation is that the plainest texts interpret the more obscure. We don't, for example, build core christian doctrine out of the symbols in the book of Revelation, and then use those findings to rewrite the plain words of the Apostle Paul. The plain interprets the obscure and ambiguous, not the other way around. To let the obscure interpret the plain, is make the Bible say anything we want. Cults often do that but it is a disastrous approach to Bible study.
As a matter of practice, most Bible believing Christians take the teaching epistles of the Apostles (Romans to Jude) as the primary authority for this age. This is especially true of the writings of the Apostle Paul (Romans to Philemon). His was the most comprehensive collection of writings in the New Testament and he says of himself that he is a plain speaker:
Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. (2 Corinthians 4:1-3 NIV)
We have very plain texts in scripture that say that God's desire is to save all men. Here is Jesus:
But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself." (John 12:32 NIV)
The texts that confirm this teaching are too numerous to list. All doesn't have to mean all without exception. It can mean pervasively or typically. The Calvinists often advance this argument. But it really does no good. Christianity has never been the majority religion in the world and all can't mean minority. Some say that it means all kinds of men, all without distinction. And it can mean that but that doesn't help either. Consider:
This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance 10 (and for this we labor and strive), that we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, and especially of those who believe. Command and teach these things. (1 Timothy 4:9-11 NIV)
Are we to read this as God is the savior of all kinds of men especially the kind that believes? If so then how is God the savior of the kinds that don't believe? No. All means all without exception. In the above text we are being told that God is the sovereign savior of all men without exception but that there is a special salvation for those who are part of the Body of Believers in Jesus, the Bride of the Lord himself.
But if all means all without exception and God sovereignly saves men then all men will be saved. All men will be brought to repentance. THe problem with the great Calvinist Arminian debate is that both sides take the doctrine of Eternal Hell as infallible, and then, by different lines of reasoning end up having to reject something that is plainly taught in scripture. The right answer is to take the two great truths of God sovereignty and His desire to save all men and combine those two truths as the universalists do. To refuse to do that forces one to either refute the rock solid Biblical doctrine of God's sovereign choice, or somehow prove that all means minority.
The more compelling case is that Hell is not eternal. That case in a nutshell is that the words translated as Eternal in the Bible could just as easily be translated as age lasting (as they sometimes are) and that permanence doesn't necessarily prove eternity.
We have already seen how ambiguous the Hebrew word owlam is. The old covenant wasn't an everlasting covenant. It was an age lasting covenant. The same ambiguity exists with the Greek word "aion" and it's adjective "ainios." Those are the two words in the New Testament from which the English translations of eternal are derived.
Comparison of two translations will illustrate the ambiguity with these words. Here is how the Greek word aionios is rendered in 2 different translations of Mat 25:46.
First the King James Version:
And these shall go away into [everlasting] punishment: but the righteous into life [eternal].
Now here is the Young's literal translation:
And these shall go away to punishment [age-during], but the righteous to life [age-during].
The Young's translation is a consistent translation. It renders each Greek word consistently into English. In some cases such a rendering may be absurd, in other cases just plain wrong. But what such a translation does do is reveal where the translators have imposed their opinion on the rendering of the word into English.
The fact is that the ambiguity in the Greek language with respect to the word Aionios, is such that EITHER of the above translations might be true. One has to make a THEOLOGICAL judgment as to which translation is true.
As has been pointed out previously, if one chooses the translation of "eternal" then one has to do away with either God's sovereignty or the definition of All as meaning all without exception. God's desire to save all men and his sovereignty are plainly taught in scripture. Applying the principle of the clear interpreting the obscure, we have to conclude that the Young's translation is right. If one can accept that, then the great Calvinist Arminian debate is over. God is sovereign and He will save all men.
The same issue arises in all texts that reference the eternal nature of things. One should do a word search on the Greek words aion and aionios (Strongs numbers 165 and 166) and see how they are used in the popular English translations. One will find that aion is sometimes translated as age, sometimes as forever. Aionios is always translated as eternal.
But note that aionios is an adjective of aion. An adjective cannot take on more force than the noun it is derived from. Hourly is related to hours. Daily is related to days. Neither hourly or daily is related to years. Likewise aionios is related to aion. It can men "age lasting" or eternal, but the word itself doesn't prove anything one way or the other.
One has to look to a theological reason, independent of these words, to sort out the true meaning. One argument advanced for rendering the words as eternal is that to do otherwise negates the promise of eternal life. In fact that isn't true. The affirmation of a shorter period of time doesn't negate a longer period of time. To see Mat 25:46 pointing to an age of life doesn't in any way negate the promise of eternal life.
The compelling testimony of scripture is that God and His mercy are without end. There is nothing in the ambiguity of the words "aion" and "aionios" that refutes that. In fact it is belief in God's infinite mercy that is the core doctrine behind the universalist position.
Next we need to consider the second line of reasoning behind the doctrine of Eternal Hell, which is inference from metaphors and apocalyptic language. That is the subject of the next section of this essay.
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