I found this scripture interesting when reading through 1 peter.
1 peter3:19
It was in the sprit also that he went to preach to the spirits in prison.
Now I read briefly a refrance to this, and it stated that Jesus did go to visit the spirits in prison, those who were still bound in spirit.
I have some thoughts and understanding on this, but it also opens alot of considerations as to what and where some go after death, and wether they are to be always bound.
Please share your thoughts on this, as it trully has me wondering.
Thankyou and God bless
pickles
I PETER 3:18-20, 4:6 AND PATRISTICS
18For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, 19in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison, 20who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water. (1 Peter 3:18-20 NRSV)
For this is the reason the gospel was proclaimed even to the dead, so that, though they had been judged in the flesh as everyone is judged, they might live in the spirit as God does. (1 Peter 4:6 NRSV)
Many Early Church fathers taught that Christ descended to hell with the gospel according to 1 Peter 3:18-20, 4:6. Second and Third Century Church fathers teaching the descent to hell with the gospel included Polycarp of Smyrna, Ignatius of Antioch, Hermas, Justin, Melito of Sardis, Hyppolytus of Rome, Irenaeus of Lyons, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen. Fourth Century Eastern Church Fathers teaching the descent to hell with the gospel included Athanasius, Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzen, John Chrysostom, Jacob Aphrahat, and Ephrem the Syrian. Later Eastern Church Fathers teaching the descent to hell included Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus the confessor, and John Damascene. These patristic authors agreed that Christ delivered the gospel to hell between his death and resurrection. The only dispute among them was if Christ preached the gospel to all the dead or only a particular category of the dead such as those imprisoned from the days of Noah or the Old Testament believers.4
Augustine wrote extensively on the topic. For example, in Letter 164, he opposed a common Christian doctrine of his time by saying that it is absurd to think that anybody who rejected Christ in life would get a chance at salvation in hell. And he proposed that 1 Peter 3:18-20 teaches that the preexistent Christ preached through Noah.
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4Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, "Christ the Conqueror of Hell: The Descent of Christ into Hades in Eastern and Western Theological Traditions", (A lecture delivered at St Mary’s Cathedral, Minneapolis, USA, 2002),
Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev: Christ the Conqueror of Hell » Theology and Spirituality » Articles in English » OrthodoxEurope.org.
III: EXEGESIS AND I PETER 3:18-20, 4:6
Utley's exegetical Bible study of 1 Peter represents common modern evangelical views of 1 Peter 3:18-20, 4:6.5 Utley notes that three items should be linked together: 1) Jesus was "in the spirit" per verse 18; 2) Jesus preached to the spirits in prison per verse 19; 3) these spirits did not obey in the days of Noah per verse 20.
Utley also notes six theories about the preaching to the imprisoned spirits according to 1 Peter 3:18-20:
1) the preexistent Christ preached through Noah
2) Christ ascended through the heavens and announced his victory over the angelic realms, which relates to Rabbinic tradition from the apocryphal II Enoch that says fallen angels are imprisoned in the second of seven heavens
The next five theories are in the context of Christ preaching between his death and resurrection.
3) Christ preached "condemnation" to the imprisoned humans of Noah's day
4) Christ preached good things to Noah and his family in Paradise in the view of the imprisoned humans of Noah's day in Tartarus
5) Christ preached "condemnation" to the fallen angels of Genesis 6:1-4
6) Christ preached "condemnation" to the "half-angel, half-human" creatures of Genesis 6:4
7) Christ preached "salvation" to the imprisoned humans of Noah's day
The context of 1 Peter 3:18 indicates that the preaching takes place after the physical death of Christ. So we can eliminate the interpretation of the first theory.
Utley contends that "was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit" implies that the preaching took place after the resurrection, and he chooses the second theory. Utley says that both phrases "was put to death in the flesh" and "made alive in the spirit" are a parallelism while both phrases are aorist passive participles, and the tense implies that this is a historical event performed by an outside agency. And in this case, "made alive in the spirit" implies the resurrection.
We agree that this is an example of parallelism that is common in the Bible, and we agree that the phrases are aorist passive participles. But "made alive in the spirit" does not have to imply the resurrection. For example, the death by crucifixion forced the spirit of Christ to temporarily leave his physical body, so Christ was made alive in the spirit.
And in regards to the theory of fallen angels imprisoned in the second of seven heavens, we see no essential difference between angels in "chains of deepest darkness"6 in the second heaven or some region in hell. Likewise, we see little difference between the second and fifth theories apart from whether Christ preached between his death and resurrection or after his ascension.
Concerning the third theory, we see no reason for Christ to preach unconditional condemnation to the unsaved humans that lived in Noah's days. This is inconsistent with Hebrew prophecies of judgment. For example, the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel teach that prophecies of judgment to both nations and individual people are always conditional, which we will see in Section V. And the fourth theory is similar to the third theory in that the unsaved hear preaching with evidently no conditions for repentance.
Christ preaching unconditional judgment to the fallen angels in the fifth theory has the same problem as the third and fourth theories because prophecies of unconditional judgment are inconsistent with the teachings in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. The sixth theory has all of the problems of the fifth theory, plus the sixth theory contains the apocryphal I Enoch teaching of half-angel, half-human creatures, which needs correction. For example, if incarnate angelophanies had sex with women, then it would be incorrect to say that the offspring are half-angel, half-human. The argument for this correction will examine scriptural teachings of human-like angelophanies, teachings about the incarnation of God the Son from the Fourth Ecumenical Council in 451, and mammalian hybrids.
The account in Genesis 18:1-19:25 teaches important details about human-like angelophanies. The account begins with three human-like angelophanies visiting Abraham. The angelophanies conversed, ate, and drank with Abraham. And later, the men from Sodom wanted to sexually rape two of the angelophanies. These details suggest that the angelophanies had a digestive tract and sex appeal. We assume that these angelophanies manifested in a human body. And we propose that each of the angelophanies were a hypostatic union of an angel and a newly created human adult body without mother or father or genealogy, which we call a "fiat angelic incarnation". We also consider that some angelophanies were a hypostatic union beginning with an angel fusing to a human zygote or new embryo, which we call a "progressive angelic incarnation". We favor the former scenario because good angelophanies tend to suddenly appear in scriptural accounts and the former scenario avoids Adam’s curse on holy incarnate angels.
We propose that the wicked sons on God that produced children with human women according to Genesis 6:1-4 were angelic incarnations. And other interpretations have contextual problems according to Utley.7
Now we will look at the biology of the purported descendants of angelic incarnations and human women, which from the scriptural context includes the "Nephilim" per Genesis 6:4 and the "Anakites" who descended from the Nephilim per Numbers 13:33. The example of the Anakites indicate that at least some of the Nephilim had no trouble producing fertile children. And the biological definition of "hybrid" in regards to mammals implies that hybrids such as mules rarely if ever produce offspring. And the "biological species concept" implies that interbreeding between different mammalian species rarely if ever produces fertile offspring. This implies that the Anakites did not descend from a hybrid. And this implies that the angelic incarnations had
Homo sapiens chromosomes. Many of the angelic incarnations and their children may have been physically taller or stronger than the average human, but their biological bodies were completely human as the body of the Lord Jesus was completely human.
Rejecting the apocryphal theory of hybrids also fits the rest of the New Testament. For example, 2 Peter 2:4 and Jude 6 use apocryphal descriptions for the punishment of fallen angels, but do not suggest that the angels are hybrids.
The seventh theory that Christ preached salvation to the imprisoned humans of Noah's day has trouble because the phrase "spirits in prison" in 1 Peter 3:19 alludes to the fallen angels from Genesis 6:1-4. And Utley associates the seventh theory with Clement of Alexandria. But Clement of Alexandria noted in Stromata, Book 6 that Christ also preached to those who were chained after perishing in the flood, which implies the fallen incarnate angels of Genesis 6:1-4. And Clement of Alexander supported universalism that included the restoration of fallen angels. Likewise, the seven theory options are insufficient.
We propose that 1 Peter 3:18-20 teaches that Christ preached the gospel to the imprisoned incarnate angels from Noah's days. This has advantages: 1) the interpretation represents sound exegesis; 2) it works with the teachings in Jeremiah and Ezekiel in regards to the conditions of prophetic judgments; 3) it rejects the erroneous apocryphal teaching about half-angel, half-human creatures.
Clement of Alexandria and other Early Church fathers such as Gregory of Nyssa also believed that Christ preached salvation to all dead humans. And we assume that this is an implication of combining 1 Peter 3:18-20 and 4:6. And this suggests that the preaching to the wicked angelic humans from Genesis 6:1-4 represents the universality of the preaching during the descent to hell. For example, these wicked angelic humans lived before the origin of Hebrew messianic prophecies, the Mosaic Covenant, the Abrahamic Covenant, and the Noahic Covenant. Likewise, we propose that 1 Peter 3:18-20 and 4:6 imply that Christ preached salvation to all dead humans, including fallen incarnate angels.
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5Bob Utley, The Gospel According to Peter: Mark and I & II Peter, (Lubbock, Texas: Bible Lessons International, 2001).
6See "chains of deepest darkness" in 2 Peter 2:4 and "eternal chains in deepest darkness" in Jude 1:6. NRSV
7Bob Utley, How It All Began - Genesis 1-11, (Lubbock, Texas: Bible Lessons International, 2001).
TheoPerspectives: Orthodoxy and Gregory of Nyssa's Universalism
