The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-10-10
CONTINUED from Page I.
FATE OF THE WICKED.
Eternal Torment.

GACIIdi
'The Bible does not teach the doc
trine Of eternal torment This doc
trine was invented by the devil him
self when he said to Eve that if she
disobeyed God she should not surely
die, although God had plainly told her
that she should surely die
This is a striking example of the
ease with which man allows mere
words, mere sounds to deceive him,
or rather muddles and confuses him
self, when he does not try to get the
sense of the words he reads. For in
the words quoted, it is quite plain that
there is reference in the first place tC
the death of the body, which entered
into the world, according to ST. Paul
by means of sin. (Romans V, 12). Ii
one insists on seeing spiritual death
also in these words, he must under
stand it in the only sense in which the
spiritual soul of men can be said tC
die. He must understand the loss OF
the supernatural life of the SOUL grace
in this life and glory in the next
But, says the critic, the soul that
sinneth, it shall die, according to the
prophet Ezechiel (XVII, 4-29. He
seems to think that the Bible was
written in English and that EZechiel
was contemporary of King James OF
of Coverdale. Any decent biblical
handbook would have told him what
he could have found in the Hebrew
Lexicon, that the word rendered soul
in this passage regularly means also
the living person" the whole man
body and soul together
Attempt at Higher Criticism.
A similar ludicrous mistake is made
by our critic when he comes to try his
higher criticism upon the words OF
our Lord: And these (the wicked)
shall go into everlasting punishment. >
1T does not say everlasting furnishing
but everlasting punishment" says Car
lyle B. Haynes. 1t is pity he did not
look up his Greek Testament before
he committed himself to this comical
attempt at original subtlety. For st
Matthew seems to have taken par,
ticular pains to shut out just this yer!
misinterpretation of his words; he
uses, not the word "Kolasma" which
might possibly mean punishment as 9
thing over and done with, but
"kolasis" which means precisely pun.
ishing" as a continued process. st
Matthew did not write in English fol
the friends of Cranmer and of Queen
Elizabeth. Carlyle B. has landed right
in the middle of the hole he dug for
himself and tried to jump.
He quotes texts to show that the
wicked will be punished on earth !;
from which he imagines it follows that
they will not be punished anywhere
else. This is a new kind of logic. He
also says that fire that shall never
be quenched is not a fire that shall
never go out, but a fire that can not
be put out. Jerusalem, says he, was
burned with a fire that could not be
quenched, sit shall not be quenched, >
says the prophet Jeremias (XVII, 27) T;
but it is not burning yet, says Mr..
Haynes. That is just how a scoffins
infidel would put it, if he wanted tc
throw ridicule on the prophet. Our
very wise critic must meet the infide'
here. And the only way to meet him
is to point out that something is i'm
| piled in the condensed form of the
text. The fire was not to be extin.
guished until it had done the work il
was sent to do. So in the case of the
| fire of hell it will not be eXtinguisheC
while it's dreadful work of punishment
of the wicked remains unfinished, an0
that means for all eternity.
Let the reader turn to the seventh
verse of Jude and there notice that
Sodom and Gomorrah suffered the ven
geance of eternal fire. Hence eterna.
| fire does not last forever" This
piece of logic, too, is due to supersti
tious reverence for the English trans
lation of the Bible. In the King James
Bible the words are: (the cities) ARE
set forth for an example, suffering the
vengeance of eternal fire." The Eng.
| lish and American revision committees
give as an alternative in the margin
ARE set forth as an example of eter
nal fire, suffering punishment" Still
another version suggested by Prot
estant scholars is: suffering punish
ment or vengeance, which is a tokeI
of eternal fire" The fire that de
stroyed Sodom and Gomorrah was q
token, type, a forewarning of the
fire of hell which will punish the
wicked; not, however, in regard to
duration, since that fire was over in
short time, while the fire of he'll
is eternal. The terror, the pain; the
sudden ending of sinful self-indul
gence, and the wrath of God that sent
it all, made the fate of the wicked
cities warning to all men of what
awaits the impenitent sinner in the
next life.
Our critic makes great capital out
of the Scriptural use of such words
as DEATH" ''perdition,' destruction,
to show that the souls of the wicked
will cease to exist That will be Their
wish; and Christ said it were better
/ T,,Ia n.